Lessons

Lesson Info

Skype with CTMH COO Brian Holman

We have brian just its life sounds like saturday night, no, actually, I'm live from utah in my home office. Brian, why don't you tell our viewers and our studio audience here what your role is and how long you've been with close to my heart? Well, basically, my job is to do everything that monica doesn't want tio my job is to do all this stuff that as long as it works, you don't care. But if it doesn't work, we're in big trouble. No, but seriously, by my job is to basically make sure that we get products out there on time that we order everything that we pay commissions to consultant is that all the shopping sites work and it's a fun, fun job I've been with close to my heart for eight years has been a wonderful journey. Well, thank you, brian, it really is fun to work with him, as you can see he is like, but notified guy close to my heart, he actually started as the vp of tea. And, you know, this is a hard business for men to understand really are even to appreciate, and what I can say...

about brian holman is that he holds the record of having someone on our team who really has a passion for what we do and totally gets it you know and so of course he had to be promoted for that and so he became our chief operating officer how long ago was that brian over five years ago so he started yeah about eight years ago and so within three years he was on on our executive team and so brian you do such a good job of getting color like he even knows all the names of the paper colors and he's like dresses and the colors when you go out to events right brian in rome brian I want you to tell them about your black family photos that you did oh yeah that was great so I had an idea of what I wanted everyone to look like so I made everybody including my wife bring all the clothes that they wanted to wear to coordinate our colors and set him on the bed so that I could approve them way because I have to match your scrapbook you paper I love that story I did allow them a second shot where they could just dress and whatever they wanted that was my compromise all right brian so tell our viewers at home are consultants or even those customers who are curious why close to my heart well for me it's been an amazing journey I was a business executive in the high tech industry before he came too close to my heart and you might think that's a strange path but one of the greatest part about being for close to my heart is our founder and ceo jeanette lynton she's one of the best bosses I've ever worked for she has a long term strategic vision that she doesn't very fun from she believes passionately and memory keeping and having people preserve those family memories for generations she's also very frugal and wise advantages the business responsibly and it's been such a blessing for me to be able to take her lead and be able to continue to follow those principles that she continues to guide assume so that's been a great part of the journey at the home office it's really a family as well we really get along great together we most the time and having a great time doing the things that make people excited and that's I guess what's cool for me you know, in the past I worked as an executive for companies that made business software nobody gets too excited about that when you go to our annual conventions and you have a thousand people screaming about the things that you're releasing and the community is so vibrant and loves everything it's just really rewarding for us to be able to do that and then for me personally I've made great friends from all over the world and they become dear friends and so it's just a beat the family like atmosphere it close to my heart you work hard, we enjoy the community. Thank you, brian. Well, we we really have something special, don't we? And I think that goes to show why we have such amazing longevity both with our consultants and our employees. Thank you. Thank you, brian. So, brian, I need to know if you've been watching all of the classes while they've been going live. It's awesome and actually I wanted to say something I would be sweating in my boots to do two days of live to be like this, and I want to just think monica jill for the great job they've done, haven't they done a great job? Are salt presenters? They did such a great job, there's so much enthusiasm that topknot and also to all of our guests off those in the studio and those who have been watching these last two days. What a fun way for people to connect and see the magic of close to my heart community. Well, thank you so much, brian. Thank you for being on skype with us and this is a very impromptu ask of him and we appreciate him taking some time out of a saturday to join us. Although I know you've been watching, you've been riveted and watching it live all right, brian, thank you so much and and I'm taking I'm taking monday off, okay? All right bye brian thank you as I mentioned brian home in this part of our executive team as along with jeanette lynton who continues to lead this company she is a visionary and here I told karen not to cry and I'm going to start crying because I love this woman like she's my own family and I would do anything for her and I'm so grateful for this opportunity the way that it's change my life and how I've seen it changed the lives of thousands of people and thousands of families jeanette is an artist first and foremost and everything that comes out of close to my heart is literally stamped hands to helped by genet because she cares and because she is an artist and she has such a love for consultants for our community and our customers and we're so grateful for jeanette for giving us this opportunity all of us to be able to share our memories and to celebrate those relationships she had planned a trip with her husband sometime ago before we made this commitment with creative live and I'm so grateful that she has allowed jill and I to represent our home office and of course our three amazing consultant presenters who I'd like to ask to come up right now come on in karen michelle and christina so this is that ladies were at the very end of our presentation here and so our classes and we hope that of course our students both at home and in studio have learned a lot, but before we close I just want to ask a couple of questions of you as consultants to share with our community out there what it means to be a close to my heart consulted for you does I guess sure, because I'm first in line I I've never been happy here what's up with like radio you mess up the whole then what it means to be a close to my heart consultant to me is so much more than selling product I feel like I'm representing everything that we've just shared with you the last two days and I feel a great responsibility to do that because if I were just out sharing some little handcrafted thing I've made I feel like I was representing me but it's so much more than that close to my heart it is a family and jeanette lynton is someone who has created a place that is like no other it's so much more than a job. So I guess to me being a close to my heart consultant it means being part of a family and you know how you hear your parents when you walk out the door and they say don't forget who you are I feel like that's so it works with close to my heart too because I can't forget who I am and what I'm representing thank you so much I'm now going to mix up the questions just world peace you just for that you're next to christina we were talking about home gatherings which you did brilliantly really really amazing we discussed a little bit about you know how you start off doing home gatherings but once you get that going and you have your first couple talk a little bit about how the booking system works and what that means as far as moving poured with home gathering absolutely so once you get that first booking and that's really just one I want to talk to you about getting that first booking is key once you get that people love the product and they're going to want their friends to do it they want their friends to do it they want their family to do it they're going to tell everyone and anyone they can about it that's how that it starts this wheel kind of turning that first booking and eventually what happens is it just starts going and it takes on a whole life of its own and if you're you know really diligent and keep working that and for incentives do incentives for things like bookings for your hostesses and your guests it really just helps keep that ball rolling and eventually like me I'm kind of chasing that ball now so what will happen is you'll just start booking more and more parties and you're booking to end three and four months out into different supplement catalogs into different annual inspiration catalogues because literally there so many people that want to book that you can't fit them all in and once people see this product and have a party and coming to have fun because at the end of the day that's really what it's all about, they're gonna want to experience this themselves so it really just kind of snowballed. So thank you. Thanks, christina. Alright, michelle now it's your turn to be on the spot here, but talk to us about what it means to teach other consultants as a team leader and as a teacher, that hat we've asked her, obviously you saw what amazing art she does and I don't I can't even count how many conventions you've taught at our prison to that. What does that mean for you? Wow that I was not expecting that. That is a question and it definitely is a passion for me. I am so grateful for close to my heart and that they believe in all of us and invest so much and equipping and empowering us to be successful at whatever that means for us and designing our own personal close to my heart businesses for me, teo, I have the opportunity to give back to that to be a part of that equipping and empowering that a gift wow well, for someone who wasn't expecting that I wasn't a credible and thank you I'd like to ask you all to come up because I feel like she really does represent our home office staff and have her talk a little bit about what it means to be part of the home office team and also test thank her for this incredible time you've been an amazing teacher and presenter jill so tell us a little bit about your experience that close to my heart personally, yeah, I kind of shared a little bit yesterday just about that this had always been my hobby and then I had a career and they were kind of you know, I went to work and then I came home and in my hobby which was scrapbooking and so one of job it close to my heart opened up for me it was the perfect marriage of everything I'm passionate about a job that I love with the hobby that I love and then I get to do that for work so it is amazing opportunity but I know I speak for everyone who works at the our profits that whatever our role is within the company, we do what we do because we love what we see that comes out of that it's not about a piece of paper even to the person who designs the paper they know what's going to happen when it gets into the hands of the consultants, and they care about that, and everybody cares about what it becomes for our consultants who sell those products because of bin of the day we wouldn't have a job if they weren't successful, and so we appreciate so much the role that they play that makes our company a complete picture, and I just feel fortunate that I've been able tio teach and present, and sometimes it is a little intimidating because I think I'm teaching the experts these are radio who know what they're doing more than I do, but it's a blessing and operate a great opportunity to be able to share what I love as a job it's just there's nothing better than that, and I know everyone at the office just really, really cares about the whole thing, so it sounds like a dream, it sounds kind of made up, but it you really can't be that made up because we've been doing this for so many years exactly, and so thank you to each and every one of you for this incredible learning experience and to be able to provide this and represent. Thousands of consultants across all of north america and australasia and jill representing our hard working staff back at the home office so thank you so much I'm gonna get ready here to wrap up and so we are really, really excited about this opportunity that we have here at creative live and I'm goingto go overto kenna and see what the audience out there is saying, well, there's so much love for you as well I just wanted to make sure everyone at home heard because you and I were talking this morning about jeanette story yes, and I know we haven't talked about that on air and I just I would love for everyone out there like me who doesn't know her story wonderful thank you kind of forget any that opportunity I would love to share it that story jeanette was a single mother with two small children and she I had to start over you know, she found herself in a situation where she didn't have a husband and she had two little children to take care of and she was designing stamps and had to basically start from nothing. She had her two kids and a rubber balkanize er and so she was in her townhome burning rubber literally burning rubber and her basement and designing and drying those adorable stamps and she would take them to trade shows and craft shows and she would sell her stance while her two little children played under the table and they talk about now and now they're grown and working at the corporate office that's been really fun to see the linton family girl and I just can't believe that I've been a part of that watching them really grow as a beautiful, talented family and so jeanette's husband now and david linton works in our warehouse and he's over all of our shipping and warehouse operations and it really is a wonderful family environment like I said earlier jeanette really built this from nothing and had a need and as a mother wanted a way to provide for her children and she did it through rubber stamps and soon after she was doing these craft shows people would come up to her and say, how can I do this these air adorable I want to sell these and so she remembered that her mom sold avon and she was an avon lady and I will let's do home parties. And so she started home parties and started doing party planning and and sure enough, it started to take off take off so big that we actually would have hiring freezes where we wouldn't take consultants on because we couldn't handle all of the work can you believe that we're turning people away because we were trying tio just keep up with all of the orders jeanette personally drew every design in our catalogs and then launched background and texture paper with their scrapbooking line she revolutionized the scrap looking industry singlehandedly one of the most innovative creative women I have ever met in my life and through that still remained really humble and very just really secure and that she knew she wanted to own this business and she is still the single owner of close to my heart and we are a debt free company and we have a beautiful building. I showed a picture just a minute ago this is a picture of our building with our home office staff in the shape of a heart, and as brian holman was saying, we really do we are a family we are and we care and we care about our kids sultan's we care about the end customer and products matter to us, but what matters more is the community of consultants and so we hope that you've learned something really amazing here are even just the inspiration for helping you to celebrate those relationships so very grateful for jeanette lynton who followed a dream and made it into reality for so many people thousands of people all over the world so thank you for joining us thank you for being here were so so very happy and hope that you've learned something new and make sure that you check out close to my heart dot com thank you