Renia (pronounced REE-nah) Carsillo is the founder of Realign Consulting. She believes her superpowers are pattern recognition and activating change. Since 2008, she’s used them to help business founders and executive teams grow both their profit and people-focused impact with joy and ease at the center of the strategy. Renia has worked side by side with impact-driven companies, multinational franchises, and B2B brands in some of the most traditional industries, from industrial manufacturing to government contracting. She and her team have helped over 100 small and mid-sized companies build values-driven, people-first operating models, guided by two proprietary frameworks: Do Better Business™ and Values-Driven Marketing. Her work sits at the intersection of people, systems, and habits. For a business to grow sustainably, these three must constantly realign, because alignment is an ongoing practice.
Values-Driven Business Lessons from a Cleveland Restaurant - [Small Stage, Big Impact Podcast]
E65: Cordelia Proves a 3x James Beard-Nominated Restaurant Can Also Be a Container for Community.When Craig and I visited Cordelia in Cleveland, the last thing I wanted was to take the server up on their offer to talk to the owner. Restaurant owners have long been some of my least favorite people to talk to. But Andrew Watts was a delight, and our whole evening turned into one of the best lessons on the values, beliefs, and community I've had in years. In this episode, I walk through what Cordelia's “3-Core” looks like in practice, from Midwest Nice to how they answer their 1-star reviews. The best restaurants are rooted in place.Last Thursday evening, Craig and I sat at the counter at Cordelia in Cleveland, Ohio, working our way through the "Belly Up," Cordelia's version of a tasting menu. A little over halfway through, our server mentioned that one of the owners was in that evening and would come over to say hello. I balked. Conversations with restaurant owners are some of my least favorite. About 12 years ago, I swore to Craig I would never work with another restaurant for the rest of my life. But over he came, and, like every other person I met at Cordelia, Andrew Watts was a delight. So yeah, now who's the asshole? (Definitely me.) In today's episode, I walk through what Cordelia taught me about the 3-Core of a values-driven business: core values, core beliefs, and core communities. |
Renia Carsillo
Renia (pronounced REE-nah) Carsillo is the founder of Realign Consulting. She believes her superpowers are pattern recognition and activating change. Since 2008, she’s used them to help business founders and executive teams grow both their profit and people-focused impact with joy and ease at the center of the strategy. Renia has worked side by side with impact-driven companies, multinational franchises, and B2B brands in some of the most traditional industries, from industrial manufacturing to government contracting. She and her team have helped over 100 small and mid-sized companies build values-driven, people-first operating models, guided by two proprietary frameworks: Do Better Business™ and Values-Driven Marketing. Her work sits at the intersection of people, systems, and habits. For a business to grow sustainably, these three must constantly realign, because alignment is an ongoing practice.
Happy Tuesday, Reader! Q4 has a way of sneaking up on us, and this year it’s bringing more than the usual year-end rush. Between economic instability hitting our businesses and a tense election season affecting our communities (and maybe even the safety of people we love), many of us are arriving at fall's traditional "completion season" already exhausted. The cooler air carries that familiar energy to finish what we've started. But if you're feeling like you don't have it in you to push...
E64: Mobile Websites Mostly Suck, and That’s a Brand Trust Problem. Here Are 3 Ways to Fix It. Nearly two-thirds of searches happen on mobile, and a bad experience there costs trust and conversions. In this episode, I talk about why mobile websites mostly suck, why we small businesses are part of the reason Google keeps users on its own platform, and why a lazy mobile design is the brand equivalent of poor customer service. The good news is that it doesn't take much to get it right. It just...
E63: Half of America’s New Business Founders Are Women. The Data Can’t Even See Them. The media spent the summer calling the surge in solo businesses a “fake business boom.” I dug into the data and found something else: just under half of new businesses are started by women, in a dataset that doesn't even track gender. Most small business research is built to leave women-owned companies out entirely, and I talk about why that matters. I also share my own path, from solo owner to a 10-person...