We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Amanda Camp. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Amanda below.

Alright, Amanda thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. Along with taking care of clients, taking care of our team is one of the most important things we can do as leaders. Looking back on your journey, did you have a boss that was really great? Maybe you can tell us about that boss and what made them a wonderful person to work for?

I have been fortunate enough to have several leaders in my life that have been positive role models and helped me on my journey. I would not be here today without each of them. However, if I had to choose the one that made the biggest difference in my life, it would be my very first supervisor, Bill Leming.

Bill taught all of his staff, many of which started at 16 and 17 years old, how to be responsible employees. I was already instilled with a proper sense of work ethic thanks to my parents, but Bill showed me how to hone that into something which would help me throughout my life. He taught by example and earned our respect daily, showing us that a boss and a leader were very different things.

He also taught me how to protect a team, as well as how to provide excellent customer service while also making sure you weren’t walked on. I will never forget a day, fairly early on in my career there, that a man came by the restaurant and began to order, flaunting every chance he could how influential he was in our community. When I accidentally made a mistake, he began to rant and chastise me to the point of verbal abuse. He demanded I go get the manager so he could tell him how atrocious I was. I went, tears in my eyes, to let Bill know. He didn’t let me get two sentences out before he jumped up so fast, he knocked his chair over in the process, and ran to the front where the man was standing. He took the man aside so that I could barely hear what was said, but I did catch the man say something incredibly rude about me and then Bill firmly tell him that the man was not to speak about his employees that way, regardless of the mistake that was made, and that if he was going to act in such a manner, his business was not welcome there, no matter who he was in the community. The man did apologize and, when I tried to apologize to Bill for making a mistake, he told me that a simple mistake happens and it doesn’t warrant that type of behavior.

Years later, I asked Bill if he remembered that story. He didn’t really. But that’s because, for Bill, it was the right thing to do and was certainly not the first time he had stood up for someone (my words, not his.) He made sure that my takeaway that day was not if I make a mistake, I am no longer worth anything as a person. He made sure that what I learned was that everyone deserves boundaries, respect, and grace. And that a true leader is one that protects their team and builds their confidence.

Because of him, I was able to be a great employee and, I hope, a leader instead of a boss when the situation called for it. He gave me so many gems of life lessons that I have used on a daily basis, especially as I craft my own company. He’ll never take credit for it, but thank you, Bill.

Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.

My name is Amanda Camp and I am the Founder/Chaos Coordinator at Ale Advised.

I come from an educational background in social work and relationships theory, which, simply put, is the study of how people interact. I have always been fascinated with this and have found that, not only is it one of the most important things in our personal lives, but it is essential to successful businesses.

When I began creating my own company, I knew I wanted to take a relationship-focused approach, putting it at the center of everything I do. This does mean that some of my techniques are a little different than most, but this is part of what makes my offerings unique.

Ale Advised is a consulting firm, specializing in external and internal communications. “External” offerings would be marketing, PR, writing, etc. “Internal” would be brand identity, chaos coordination, etc. Chaos coordination is always a highlight because I love organizing and helping people make sense of the storm around them.

One other unique offering is Relationship Theory in the Workplace training. While all of my work is relationship-focused, this type of training allows me to take it even further and include the entire company. This is not an HR training, nor is this solely looking at the business data. The goal of this training is to understand and organize both management and staff in a way that everyone can work better together.

I am a Certified Cicerone and primarily focus on the craft beer/food & beverage sector, but I have clients from many different industries.

We’d love to hear the story of how you turned a side-hustle into a something much bigger.

Anyone that has been in customer-facing jobs, especially in the non-profit world, can tell you burnout is rampant. I adored my decade in that sector, but several years ago, I started allowing myself to admit I needed a hobby so I could prevent the burnout that was creeping in. I began to assist my husband at beer festivals and I became hooked. I spent the next few years doing that until one day, I got the opportunity to actually plan a beer event. I was ecstatic and it went well enough they asked me to keep helping out. I never dreamed I would be able to do something like that full-time and kept telling myself not to get too excited. But as the burnout of my day-to-day job became more apparent, I knew that I needed a major change. I had also been helping out someone in my network with communications and administrative duties and so, when a friend of hers reached out to see if I could also help them, I thought maybe this was my chance. My husband and I talked it over and he encouraged me to bet on myself and take the leap. Those phrases might sound cliche, but it was what I needed to hear at the time. I gave myself some time to go completely freelance and a little over a year later, it became clear that I couldn’t go back. I enjoyed getting to help on so many different projects and the amount of light-bulb moments, so to speak, for both myself and my clients made me feel like I was doing work worth doing. A few months ago, I decided to make it official and I began Ale Advised.

Any stories or insights that might help us understand how you’ve built such a strong reputation?

I think the main thing that has helped me build my reputation within my market is my own code of ethics and my willingness to be a little different. My clients trust me because they know I can’t go against my gut, or make decisions simply because it is the easiest or most lucrative for myself. Being as relationship-focused as I am, they know that I am willing to take the time to understand their business as well as themselves as individuals, looking to them as the expert on their business and treating them as a partner in this endeavor. Some of my exercises and asks of clients may at times seem silly or unrelated but they give me the chance to prove the results. Because of all of this, I have been able to build excellent rapport with my clients and they have been more than willing to share their experiences with others and provide recommendations.

Contact Info:

• Website: aleadvised.com
• Instagram: aleadvised
• Facebook: Ale Advised
• Linkedin: Ale Advised