We recently connected with Jen Bilger and have shared our conversation below.

Jen, appreciate you joining us today. Looking back, do you think you started your business at the right time? Do you wish you had started sooner or later

Timing is always important when starting a business. In my experience, I launched my business in 2019 and with the events and business landscape over the past few years, many people ask me if I wished I had launched my business earlier or if I would have stayed in corporate longer had I known. The answer is always a resounding NO!

I spent 20 years cultivating a wonderful and lucrative career in the corporate world. This came with experiences and lessons that developed me into the person that would eventually take the risk and start a business of my own. I was ready to take on everything starting a business entailed because of my corporate journey.

For me, even knowing the hardships I would have to face due to the pandemic, I would not change it for anything. My small business because something stronger because of those hardships. I learned to pivot and adapt my business because that was the only way forward. My business became what is today because I launched it at the perfect time for me to start it.

Jen, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?

Learning to interact with others on their level is an important skill all business professionals, owners, leaders, entrepreneurs, and team members should learn to master if they want to connect and build valuable relationships that lead to success. Effective and thriving business leaders understand it is just as important to know and appreciate their own strengths and limitations to attain their goals and reach levels others only dream of achieving. As an Author, Speaker, Certified Behavioral Consultant and Coach, I use my unique focus on the behavioral side of business to enable professionals, leaders and business owners to define and utilize their strengths to build solid business and team foundations.

I apply the skills perfected during my 20-year tenure in corporate HR to quickly assess the needs of the client while empowering them to choose the best path to lead them to success. With a collaborative approach, I am known to help professionals define and learn the best methods to build solid teams, resolve issues, meet goals, grow revenue, connect with others and build the solid relationships needed to find the most lucrative and successful way to accomplish great things.

Why do business professionals and leaders choose to work with me? I inspire them to fulfill their aspirations using her extraordinary ability to recognize and understand everyone’s hidden strengths as well as what they need to grow and develop so they can attain their purpose and goals, create business and sales strategies that lead to success and overcome obstacles that block forward progress.

Can you tell us about what’s worked well for you in terms of growing your clientele?

As a business owner that truly believes that what you put out in the world is returned in kind, the best thing I can do is to treat my clients with empathy, actively listen to their needs and treat them how I would want to be treated if I were the client myself in their situation.

That being said, I have built my business around collaborating with clients to create a service solely for them, based on their needs and taking into consideration their unique situations and circumstances.

Have you ever had to pivot?

When I left corporate behind and launched my business, I worked at building a business in HR consulting. I had a great career in corporate HR and was considered an expert in that field. I still enjoyed HR and thought this was the best type of business to create. What I hadn’t realized was that when I left corporate behind, HR was meant to be left behind as well.

I had other strengths and more importantly, my passion was not with HR anymore. I had to learn some hard lessons at the very beginning of launching my business. I wasn’t selling my business, I was selling what I did in corporate, and frankly, I wasn’t selling much of anything in the beginning. My business almost ended before it even started due to the type of business I chose to launch.

My business coach (yes business coaches have business coaches of their own) asked me about the one client that I had signed in the first 6 months. They asked me what that client hired me to do and guess what, it wasn’t HR. It was Behavioral Sales Coaching. I was excited to talk about my first client and the workshop I created for them and the program developed. It was then that I realized with the prompting of my coach that I needed to pivot my business and not try to sell myself as an HR consultant any longer. I decided to change my business model and once I pivoted, my business grew.

In Q4 of my first year, I signed my first long-term contracted client as well as multiple other clients under my new Behavioral Coaching business model. The new model allowed me to use my strengths developed during my time in corporate to provide leadership, business and strategic coaching support to my clients so they could find success in building strong teams and business foundations. The best part – I could still provide HR consulting services to my clients and use that expertise to differentiate myself from other coaches.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.coachjenbilger.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/coachjenbilger1
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/CoachJenBilger/
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jennifer-bilger-cbc-sphr-shrm-scp-88b22a16/
• Other: https://linktr.ee/jenbilger95

Image Credits
Professional Photographs taken by Tommy Cowan of T5 Photography