0:08

Welcome to the childcare business podcast

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brought to you by pro care solutions.

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This podcast is all about giving childcare,

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preschool, daycare after

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school and other education professionals,

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a fun and upbeat way to learn about strategies

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and inspiration you can use to thrive.

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You'll hear from a variety of childcare thought

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leaders, including educators, owners,

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and industry experts on ways to innovate,

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to meet the needs of the children you serve from

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practical tips for managing operations,

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to uplifting stories, transformation,

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and triumph. This podcast will

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be chalk full in insights. You can use

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to fully realize the potential of your

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childcare business. Let's jump in.

0:53

This is the childcare business podcast, and

0:55

this is a first of its kind , um,

0:59

guest that we've ever interviewed in person. And

1:01

I'm sitting here with , uh, Gary Ram

1:04

Romano and Gary , uh , is the president and

1:06

CEO of Savita strategies, LLC,

1:08

where he works with nonprofit leaders and entrepreneurs.

1:12

Uh, he's also an author. So looking forward to talking

1:14

a little bit about that, and he's published two books

1:16

, uh, one is called small, but

1:18

mighty, which is designed to help entrepreneurs

1:21

launch and grow now on profit consultancies.

1:24

And the other is lean recruitment, which

1:26

describes how to cost effectively recruit talent.

1:29

Um, you know, today Gary's gonna talk a little bit

1:31

about , uh , his expertise on

1:34

employee, on the employee retention tax credit.

1:36

And we're actually here in Austin, Texas

1:39

for the opportunities exchange shared

1:41

service conference , uh, got

1:43

connected with Gary through , uh , the

1:45

conference hosts. He's gonna be talking

1:47

in one of the sessions and , uh , just

1:49

based on that content thought he would be a

1:52

great guest for our podcast. So

1:54

, um, Gary, welcome to the

1:56

show. I'm glad to be here. Excited

1:58

to be are glad to be the first in person you're

2:01

doing . Like it's like maybe we're

2:03

getting past the last couple of years and

2:06

things are getting back to normal. I, I think this

2:08

particular conference, like many of 'em has had

2:10

to go to virtual conferences

2:12

the last year or two. So everybody's

2:14

excited to be back in person. It's kind of like

2:17

a family reunion walking through the

2:19

vendor hall, like everybody's seeing each other in

2:22

person for the first time. So I'm excited to

2:24

have you here in person as well. Um,

2:27

had a chance to chat with you a little bit before we

2:29

started recording Gary, but I would love to, you

2:31

know, maybe talk a little bit about your background.

2:33

I wanna get into some of the topics

2:35

that you guys are gonna be talking about here at the conference

2:38

and the things that you're passionate about with your

2:40

organization, but can you talk a

2:42

little bit about Savita and

2:45

what you guys do and how you got started? Absolutely. So

2:47

I founded the firm 13 years ago

2:50

now and , um, you

2:52

know, I saw a niche for public

2:54

serving organizations, right? So those

2:57

that are mission driven , whether they're profit

2:59

or nonprofit who needed high

3:01

quality help in terms of strategic planning, HR

3:04

work , um, capacity building

3:06

those areas. And , um,

3:09

we've actually split into

3:11

three different areas over the years. Um,

3:14

early on, we started doing a lot

3:16

of evaluation work, cost, effective evaluation,

3:18

because as we know, that can be a huge rate.

3:21

Limiting factor for organizations is how to

3:23

afford independent evaluation. That's

3:25

that's effective and, and helpful for

3:28

leadership. And so we

3:30

found it , I guess it was about six years ago now

3:32

, uh , luminary evaluation group, which

3:34

, uh, Allison lorocka now heads up

3:37

as president CEO. And so that

3:39

became an independent firm. And then more recently

3:42

we started up Cita strategies early start,

3:44

which is our arm. That's

3:46

just focused on business

3:49

issues when it comes to childcare . And it's born

3:51

out of work that we started back

3:53

in March of 2020 helping

3:56

childcare providers, access stimulus, and

3:58

then that grew into you helping them

4:00

do , um, rapid cycle go

4:03

goal based coaching , uh , an

4:05

approach we developed , um, to help them

4:07

remain stable or as stable as

4:10

possible through the pandemic and,

4:12

and start to be ready to emerge. So were

4:14

you guys already doing work in the childcare

4:16

industry Premar 2020 ? Was that like

4:19

a , a now natural progression for

4:21

you to lean into our space a bit

4:23

because you already had clients in

4:25

the space or did you just identify that opportunity

4:28

early once COVID hit and started

4:30

seeing some of the headlines and things happening

4:32

in the industry more the former than the latter?

4:34

So I go back to doing work

4:36

at the systems level in childcare back

4:39

to 2005 . You when , and I worked for

4:41

a different consultancy and , um,

4:43

my first experiences were in a large national

4:45

project that the WK Kellogg foundation

4:48

had , um, which was , uh

4:50

, a massive effort to really create zero to

4:52

eight systems. And so I

4:54

was engaged in TAing , um, certain

4:57

locations and helping them scale , um,

5:00

and then continued in the area. Um,

5:03

and I'd say over the years, about 60%

5:05

of our work was in childcare

5:07

specifically , um,

5:09

with the other areas, being other public serving areas,

5:12

such as, you know, college access and those sorts

5:14

of things. But, you know, in terms

5:16

of the more recent work , um, it

5:18

all started when one of our connections , uh

5:21

, who at a , a large family

5:23

foundation, New Jersey had reconnected

5:25

us. We had worked with them in the past and, and

5:27

their executive director wanted

5:30

to hear a little bit more about the P P

5:33

cuz . I was a person who was getting out there and saying, look, this

5:35

is imperfect, but this is what we got. Got it. And

5:37

this is, this is March, 2020. This is March,

5:40

2020 . Yeah. And this is Barbara Raman,

5:42

who is their then ed . And who's just

5:44

a giant New Jersey as it is in childcare

5:46

. And at the end of the conversation,

5:49

it was my 30 minute spiel. Barbara said, well, you

5:52

know, we're most concerned about , uh

5:54

, family care providers and centers in marginalized

5:56

communities in New Jersey. They're not gonna be able

5:58

to do this. They don't have the time. They

6:00

don't have the effort. This is confusing. Could

6:03

you do TA we've done TA programs

6:05

in the past. I was like, sure. So that was TA

6:07

just for the audio technical assistance. Yeah . Sorry

6:09

. Technical assistance. No . Perfect. So tech you've

6:11

done technical assistances. And

6:14

so she asked, can you help and

6:17

assistance meant , can you help them fill out the loan applications?

6:19

That's right . Can you help them access the funding? Okay, exactly.

6:22

And so that was a

6:25

Thursday, they had an emergency board meeting

6:27

the following Saturday 9:00

6:29

AM. The following Monday, we were meeting with the local

6:32

childcare reer resource and referral agency

6:34

, uh , which is the Essex county one, which

6:37

is just a , a great organization

6:39

, um, and started plotting

6:42

how we can start working together to

6:44

spread the good word. And then Barbara recruited

6:47

, uh , I believe it was four other private funders.

6:50

And so we ended up doing this work in three counties in

6:52

, um, in New

6:55

Jersey. And again, it started out with a P P P we

6:58

moved into the employee retention tax credit

7:01

families first leave. And then also we

7:03

created that rapid cycle coaching

7:06

approach , um , towards the end of

7:08

2020, when there was no money and the providers

7:10

were still suffering. And we started saying, well, look, can

7:13

we aggregate what other providers

7:15

were doing successfully in the pandemic

7:17

and create a hierarchy, right. So

7:19

we can go through it and say, are you doing

7:21

this? Are you doing this? Are you doing this? These are things that

7:24

we're seeing, we're building resiliency. And we know they

7:26

could work cuz other providers like you are

7:28

doing it. And um, that

7:31

system then got the attention of the state

7:33

of Texas. So we're now doing

7:35

statewide efforts , uh , in Texas, in

7:37

Virginia, in as well . So similar work

7:40

that you guys were doing in New Jersey when

7:42

you first started , uh , work up there, but

7:44

yeah, certainly in Texas on a much bigger scale.

7:47

Yeah. Everything's bigger in Texas. Exactly

7:49

. So even, even the initiatives

7:51

in childcare are bigger in Texas. That's

7:54

right. Do you just really quick , uh , you

7:56

know, there's a few topics I wanna talk about. I wanna give

7:58

you, you know, you know, platform to share

8:01

some of the things you'll be talking about even at this conference,

8:03

but when you talk about PPP and then you

8:05

talk about the employee retention tax credit and

8:07

some of the government funding that's been available, you

8:10

know , I think sometimes when people, you know, hear the

8:12

term funding, it all gets lumped

8:14

together. There's COVID funding. And

8:16

then now there's the build back better plan. And

8:18

we've done such with some of the leading

8:20

groups kind of advocating for our industry,

8:23

you know, in DC in terms of funding,

8:26

but are , are they different? Was the P

8:28

P P and the employee retention tax credit

8:30

totally different. So providers had the

8:33

ability to apply for both of those pots

8:35

of funding or did they go hand in

8:37

hand ? And it's a great question. And

8:40

you know, probably more of a lengthy answer than

8:42

you , you might want, but I think it explains how we got

8:44

here, please. So originally both were

8:46

stood up in March, 2020 and

8:49

the E RTC, the employee retention tax

8:52

credit was actually an alternative to the PPP.

8:54

And so for a variety of

8:56

reasons and I could go into it, but I won't

8:59

bore the audience. Um, at the time

9:01

it wasn't as good a deal. And so

9:03

because of the short nature, remember this was back

9:05

in the heady days when we thought it was gonna be a V recovery,

9:08

right . And we'd be over this in six weeks. And my

9:10

wife who's a scientist was laughing at me. Um,

9:13

you know, but we did believe that

9:15

at the time. And so the PPP was a better deal, which

9:17

was, as we know, a forgivable loan mm-hmm

9:20

<affirmative> , um , and the employee

9:22

retention tax credit was less

9:24

popular because it wasn't as good a deal. The

9:26

only times we referred people to, it was

9:29

certain nonprofits we worked with were nervous

9:31

about taking any loan, espe , even a

9:33

forgivable one, if they didn't know how it was gonna

9:35

be forgiven, right . Cause in those early days just perception

9:37

that it was a loan. And when you tag the

9:40

loan term to it, I , I heard that said is

9:42

free money. And so that's what you're saying. Exactly

9:44

. So, so we would refer them to the employee retention tax

9:46

credit. The , the big change for

9:49

the E RTC was December

9:52

27th, 2020 , which tells you how I spent my 20,

9:54

20 Christmas vacation <affirmative> . And

9:56

what happened was that, you know, the, the president signed

9:59

a new tranche of , uh

10:01

, stimulus funding, but also adjusted

10:04

the EER TC in many important ways. And

10:07

the two most important things he did was one,

10:10

he said, well, you can have a P P and a EER

10:12

TC. So originally it was one or the other, okay

10:14

. The rules are, you can't

10:16

do both at once. Right. Which makes sense. Right. We're

10:19

paying Ryan out of the PPP. We can't then say

10:21

federal government, can you pay 'em again? Right,

10:23

right. But other than those times, you

10:25

can now use the employee retention tax credit.

10:28

The other thing that changed was they

10:30

allowed you to go back retroactively. And this

10:32

is huge. So we

10:34

talked to providers and they'll

10:36

initially say, so you're talking about a program that

10:39

ran from April, 2020 and ended

10:41

September 20, 21. Why are we

10:43

talking about this? Mm-hmm <affirmative>, we're talking about

10:45

this because you can retroactively apply for the funds.

10:48

So you have up to three years

10:51

currently under federal law to apply for

10:53

the funds. So this is a , uh

10:55

, an incredible source of funding that

10:58

you can get. And this is not, this

11:00

is a refundable tax credit, which is a

11:02

nice way of saying they give

11:05

you money back the federal government. And what you get

11:07

back at the end of this is, is one of

11:09

those rainbow colored IRS checks, just

11:11

like any other refund check and quite

11:14

literally that's it, there's no forgiveness. There's

11:16

no depend 60%

11:18

of it on this 60% of it on that, or

11:20

40% on that. None of

11:23

those things, this is cash. Wow.

11:25

Which is a huge, hugely powerful

11:27

opportunity for providers. And that's

11:29

specifically where you're saying you can go back retroactively,

11:32

even though it ended in September of 2021,

11:35

that is the employee retention tax credit. That's

11:37

correct. And so can you talk about like

11:39

eligibility requirements, cuz this is a big, you

11:41

know, I think one of the things that we've really been hearing

11:43

so much in our industry is the

11:45

role that government funding, you

11:48

know, not only historically has played in our industry,

11:50

but what role it's play now and then potentially

11:52

what role that's gonna play moving forward as

11:54

centers, you know, had

11:56

the light has shined on our industry. We talked

11:59

about this a lot, the need

12:01

for centers to be sustainable

12:03

in their communities is so essential to our economy.

12:06

And so part of that is, you

12:08

know, obviously looking at business metrics. So we're

12:10

, I wanna talk a little bit about that. How a business

12:12

needs to look at their, their revenue and

12:14

make sure they're covering their cost of doing business pay themselves.

12:17

I know you're a big advocate of making sure providers

12:20

are setting aside salary for

12:22

themselves, making sure they're reducing

12:24

expenses, all the, you know, the, the,

12:27

the foundation things that a strong business should

12:29

be doing, but also there's

12:31

money available from the government. So in

12:34

terms of like eligibility for the

12:36

employee retention tax credit, the E RTC,

12:38

I think is how you refer to it. What are the

12:40

eligibility requirements? And I know this is a big

12:42

part of what your organization does. Can you talk

12:44

about eligibility requirements

12:47

and then how you help providers

12:50

actually access those funds? Absolutely.

12:52

So the L eligibility is

12:55

twofold. So first this is just

12:57

for w two employees. So

13:00

unfortunately if you have a 10

13:02

99 contractor, if you're a sole proprietor,

13:04

this doesn't work, right. So

13:06

we often will then talk about families first leave

13:08

as another opportunity. But if

13:11

you have w two employees, they cannot be related

13:13

to the, the owner or the owner, right

13:16

beyond that it's

13:18

open season. Right. And what

13:21

happens is there is a set of triggers.

13:23

The federal government has created. And,

13:26

and I'll go through those in a second. But those triggers

13:29

basically say, gosh, Ryan, during,

13:31

during the pandemic, your

13:34

business suffer, and this is for any small business.

13:36

So under 500 employees. So,

13:39

you know, it's not just a childcare one , but

13:42

they say, look, you know, you suffered under the pandemic.

13:44

You kept people employed. You had W2

13:47

payroll still mm-hmm <affirmative> . And

13:49

because of that, we want to give you some money as

13:51

an encouragement that you continue to keep people

13:53

employed. Cause it's cheaper to

13:56

give you this , these funds then just to have people

13:58

unemployed and

14:00

you know, the, the triggers. And this is where,

14:03

you know, when you ask the question, how do we help them ? We

14:05

help providers go through the three big steps

14:07

and the first one is going

14:10

through those triggers. And you

14:13

know, what I often say is this

14:15

is like E P but easier people

14:17

get very scared when they hear tax

14:20

credit. Do I call my CPA? Do

14:23

I do this? It's actually a payroll based system.

14:26

So the first step is you self-certify. So

14:28

this is often bewildering, cuz we'll get providers

14:30

who will say where's the application. There's no application.

14:34

You need to look at one of those triggers and

14:36

say a, you know, document in some

14:38

way that you met the criteria, trigger.

14:40

Number one is you were closed , uh

14:42

, for a period of time due government order. So

14:45

that's an important one that has to be a must, not

14:47

a should. So it couldn't be like

14:49

we had one health department that said you really should close

14:51

for a while . Unfortunately it

14:53

doesn't count. It has to be, you need to close from a period

14:55

of time. And we saw that in some of the

14:58

states, for example. So New Jersey had an

15:00

order for nine months where

15:02

I'm sorry, that was , uh , social distancing. They had an order

15:05

for three, four weeks where they had to

15:07

close. Everyone had to close, well, bam

15:09

eligibility right there. As soon as you

15:11

can show that government required

15:13

closing. So for those like essential

15:16

centers that stayed open to provide care

15:18

to essential workers, they would be as an example, excluded

15:20

from this. If they were, even

15:23

though everybody else shut down, they

15:25

stayed open to provide care. In some

15:27

ways, I don't know if it's the right way to describe

15:29

it, but that that's gonna work , work against them

15:32

as this goes . Maybe , maybe . So lemme talk about the other

15:34

triggers and , and all you need is one trigger and they

15:36

could vary . So you could say I had a trigger this trigger in

15:38

June and this trigger in July, the

15:41

second trigger is revenue. So

15:44

you had to show that. So 2019

15:46

is our base year before the world ended, right?

15:49

And you have to go quarter by quarter and you

15:51

compare or 20, 19 to 20,

15:55

20, 20, 19 to 2021 in

15:58

2020 , you're looking for a 50%

16:00

or greater reduction in

16:03

revenue to trigger it. And then it keeps

16:05

going with 20%. So if

16:07

you could imagine in quarter 2

16:10

20 20 , let's say you had, you know, had half

16:12

the money you've even made in 2019,

16:15

you've hit the trigger. But

16:17

then the next quarter, let's say some relief funding started

16:20

kicking in and now you're 25%

16:23

down from where you were in 2019. Well

16:25

you still get to keep it . Okay. And

16:27

it keeps going. And the last quarter, even

16:30

the last quarter is you

16:32

get it for free . So even after you

16:35

recover, you still get one, one quarter

16:37

that you get to use in 2021.

16:40

It's just a flat 20% reduction from

16:43

2019. So

16:45

that becomes a way that if you did stay open

16:48

for those emergency workers, if you still

16:50

show that revenue drop that

16:53

it's another way to get triggered in it.

16:55

However, what we found was

16:58

that was a real problem with some

17:00

of our, you know, head starts . Some

17:02

of the other agencies that did get funding

17:05

start coming in from the government. And

17:08

they're like, well, heck we're we're now getting penalized. So

17:11

another trigger came out in

17:14

2020 that the government allowed partial

17:16

cessation of business. So

17:18

this is sounds bad. Yes . Not I'm you're

17:20

gonna have to define this one. Yeah . Yeah. So what

17:23

it means is that your business model took a hit

17:25

to an extent where you didn't have to close, but

17:28

you did have to fundamentally change your business model

17:30

and increase costs. And again,

17:33

this is from a government, an order. So a must

17:35

government order, not a should. So

17:38

the example the IRS gives is they're

17:40

looking for a 10% reduction in

17:42

the capacity to produce goods or services.

17:45

So the example they give is a restaurant restaurant

17:48

has 10 tables , um,

17:50

because social distancing regulations that

17:52

come in from their local government or state

17:54

government, it can be either they have to

17:56

roll four of those tables in the back. That's

17:58

a 40% reduction. Now, if you

18:01

noticed they didn't ask how many

18:03

people showed up for lunch, how many people showed up for dinner?

18:05

Because what they were trying to get away from was, well,

18:07

what if they just don't like your re right, right.

18:09

So they said , well, what's an empirical way to judge

18:12

capacity. Right. And , and impact.

18:15

So for our childcare providers, we

18:18

do the same thing. And what we

18:20

say is, so for example, in New Jersey, there

18:22

was a nine month regulation around social distancing

18:25

that affected, close to a 25%

18:27

reduction in capacity. Mm-hmm <affirmative> that

18:29

means literally if you're in the state of New Jersey, you're

18:32

eligible. Yeah. I was gonna say, that seems like

18:34

a trigger that most centers would be

18:36

able to, you know, be

18:39

eligible for at least based on my understanding and

18:41

listening to people all over the country. That's right . And

18:43

this is where it becomes like really exciting because

18:45

you start to talk to providers and they go, well, I can't

18:47

do revenue. Cause I got federal funding. I

18:50

didn't get this. I , you know, I got this. Well,

18:52

did you ever reduce capacity? Oh yeah, I did.

18:54

Right. And so when you talk about being

18:56

open for essential workers, like

18:59

for example, in the state of Texas, the providers

19:01

who had to keep open for essential workers had

19:03

to also do social distancing mm-hmm <affirmative> that

19:05

dropped their capacity. So suddenly

19:08

bam, they have eligibility. And that was the huge

19:10

change because you know, again like

19:12

entire states could now be eligible

19:15

for that period of time. They have these government orders

19:17

saying you must the, the

19:20

last , um, trigger, which

19:22

is also a really important one came out

19:25

in August, 2020. So

19:27

right near the end of the program maybe is July. And

19:31

what it was was that they

19:33

said, look, there are all these businesses that

19:35

started operations. And that's a key word

19:38

after February

19:41

15th, 2020. So, so brand

19:43

new centers, is that what you mean? Started brand new

19:45

centers. Okay . And so it could be, for example, so

19:48

we had a number of providers who said, I started

19:50

to ramp up the world ended. I

19:52

didn't open until 2021 you're

19:55

eligible. Cause you started operations afterwards.

19:57

Now this isn't, I opened a new

19:59

center under my same company. You

20:02

know, it has to be a distinct entity. Got

20:04

it. That you're starting. But what it means is,

20:06

you know, we've seen a lot of startups in

20:09

the pandemic. So if you do,

20:11

if you are eligible, then what they do

20:13

is they give you quarter 3,

20:15

20, 21 and quarter 4

20:18

20 21. I know I said the program ended, this is the one

20:20

statu in the statutes . This is the one exception,

20:23

statutory exception is this, this

20:26

recovery startup as they call it. So

20:28

this is another one where, you

20:30

know, and the only other criteria is you had to make under

20:32

a million dollars in revenue in a given year. Okay.

20:34

For those that startup segment. Yeah.

20:37

So I mean, it's, you know, no offense

20:39

hard to find a childcare provider who has made

20:41

over a million dollars in the pandemic, especially that's

20:44

what's starting up. Yeah , that's right . That's right. So,

20:47

you know, when we find that providers started

20:49

up after February 15th, 20, 20,

20:52

you know, there's a high likelihood, they already have

20:54

two quarters forget about any other trigger,

20:56

but those two quarters instantly are

20:59

granted to them , make them eligible. And

21:02

, and then do you guys, so like with that

21:04

program and the available funding, is

21:07

it, is it a situation like you

21:09

keep referencing quarterly? So are these, is

21:11

this tax credit? Like the check

21:13

they receive quarterly for the quarters that

21:16

they were affected or are they looking back

21:18

now if , if you're eligible retroactively

21:21

and it , and it's a lump sum for the entire period

21:23

of time that you qualify for, how does that work? So it

21:25

mechanically is quarter by quarter . Even if let's

21:27

say you , you qualified for every quarter. Right?

21:30

So I was talking to a provider last week who

21:32

qualified for all the quarters she can qualify

21:34

for, but you have to apply

21:36

each one quarterly. Okay . So what's,

21:38

what's happening behind the scenes. The mechanism

21:41

that they're using is your

21:43

payroll taxes. So specifically

21:45

the credit flows through your

21:48

social security tax that you pay as an employer.

21:51

Why did they do it this way? I have no idea. I've talked to

21:53

a couple of staffers of , uh , members

21:55

of Congress have never gotten an answer. They're

21:58

not sure whatever this is what we have.

22:00

Right. So what happens

22:02

is, and so by the way, that's an important point because

22:04

if you're a nonprofit provider, they often say,

22:06

I don't pay taxes. You pay

22:08

payroll taxes. If you have a W2 employee,

22:10

you're paying payroll , you pay payroll taxes. You're social

22:13

. Exactly . Yeah . So what happens is

22:15

every quarter, if you have W2 employees,

22:17

you know, you have to form do a form 9

22:20

41. That's your quarter, quarterly

22:22

payroll tax report to the federal government. The

22:25

mechanism you use to get the credit is

22:28

the form 9, 9 41 . You do, what's

22:30

called a 9 41 X, which is an

22:32

amendment to your 9 41 . Basically

22:34

what you say is, you know, quarter

22:37

4, 20, 20, I didn't know I was

22:40

eligible. I now do. Um,

22:42

I want to change the entry of my 9

22:44

41 that says qualified wages

22:47

for this tax credit. And then how much money I

22:49

should be getting it totals down.

22:52

The government reviews it. These have to be hand reviewed,

22:55

like any other amendment. And

22:57

so it does take some time. This is not quick money, but

23:01

once they review it, they'll send you a quarter by quarter

23:03

of those checks. Got it. And so when

23:05

you say it takes time, like just what you

23:07

guys are seeing right now, what's a tip from

23:10

the time it's all been filled out.

23:12

I just filled out my 9 41 and submitted

23:15

it turnaround time

23:17

for that to work. What , what do you guys do ? It could be

23:19

anywhere from six to nine months now it's getting

23:21

better. Um, the current

23:23

administration brought in a lot

23:25

of temporary workers that you may have heard of

23:28

in January. I think it was 8,000 for of

23:30

the IRS. And one of the reasons was to

23:32

keep these things flowing that the E RTC

23:34

in particular, because it's become so popular. Cause

23:37

this is the only way you can get money. Right. And

23:39

so they've now we've seen a distinct

23:41

uptick in the reviews and

23:44

approvals and the checks going out. In fact, I had one

23:46

provider who had pinged me two weeks

23:48

ago and like the very, and I said, be

23:50

patient it'll come. She's like, did I do , do , do

23:52

something wrong? Nope . Taking their

23:54

time. Very next day. She got her checks.

23:57

Okay. And so that's encouraging, you guys

23:59

are seeing that that timeline is getting shorter.

24:01

It's depressing. Yeah. But the , but

24:03

the, you E R TC is still

24:05

, um , bucketed back to it

24:08

ended at the end in September,

24:10

2021. So as you guys look forward, have

24:13

you heard anything about there being a timeline where

24:16

they're gonna stop allowing providers to go

24:18

access this and what level of urgency,

24:20

if you're talking to providers, would you say,

24:23

Hey, now is the time don't delay?

24:25

Is that, is that part of your message? Yeah . I

24:27

mean, I always say, you know, do it

24:30

while you can't. So right now it's

24:32

under the same statute of limitations that you have for

24:35

any 9 41 change or any tax change

24:37

tax form change, which is three years. Okay . I

24:40

honestly, when they ended it, so they originally,

24:42

it was supposed to go to the end of 2021,

24:45

ended it early. And I'm , I'm not saying

24:47

this with any political judgment. I'm just saying point

24:49

of fact , um, Congress ended

24:52

it early to reallocate money for the infrastructure

24:54

bill. And at

24:57

that time I was very much afraid

24:59

that they would then change the statute of limitations

25:01

that there wouldn't be this kind of long tail to

25:03

accessing the money. They never did. <affirmative>

25:06

now at some point, will Congress go

25:08

back and say, whoa, whoa, whoa. We're

25:11

seeing this money still go out. Let's let's end

25:13

it. That may happen. There's

25:15

no word I have of that happening. I want people to

25:17

freak out and say is scary saying it's ending tomorrow

25:19

. No, I'm not. But what I am

25:21

saying is if it were me, I

25:24

would do it sooner than later. Right. Is

25:26

once you're in, you're in line. Yep . Versus

25:30

not being in line. And then if, gosh , forbid, you

25:32

know, at some point when , when people are looking for

25:34

money , um, for other , um

25:36

, efforts that they end up,

25:39

you know, curtailing this. So I would say sooner than

25:41

later, but you don't have to panic and say, I'm gonna

25:43

drop everything and do it today. Fair. But

25:45

yeah, like you said, it's available now. It

25:47

is a year from now two years from now. We

25:49

might not be able to guarantee that's the case. So it's

25:52

worth the time and energy are , do you guys run

25:54

into Gary , like in the work that you're doing any

25:57

sense of, like what percentage of providers

26:00

are taking advantage of this? Like, is it a

26:02

, I know you're here in Austin and

26:04

you're gonna share this message and you're

26:06

, you know, we're working to get the word out because we're

26:08

all kind of , um, have , uh,

26:11

interests in helping providers be

26:14

more and more sustainable as a business. Is

26:17

this a small fraction of providers that know about

26:19

this and are tapping into it? Or is

26:21

it a large portion or what's your, what's your

26:23

sense of that? It's, it's a small portion.

26:25

And, and to be clear, it's not just providers,

26:28

small businesses. Right. You know, I did

26:30

a , a couple of articles that I

26:32

was a source for, for Forbes on , um,

26:36

on stimulus funding. And I kept

26:38

trying to get them do something about the RTC.

26:41

And I think because it sounds complex, they

26:43

BA they baed. So the word word hasn't really gotten

26:45

out there on it. You are seeing

26:48

increasingly, and , and this is a little saddening,

26:50

especially in the states where we're working to do

26:52

this for free for providers. You're

26:54

seeing a number of outfits who are now charging

26:57

20% of the credit, which could be S

26:59

sizeable , um, to process it

27:01

for you. And so we're starting to see a little

27:03

bit more interest because there is this profit motive,

27:06

getting people out, sharing the information

27:08

like, you know, I know there's one provider

27:10

we know or consulting organization

27:12

we know of in particular, that's reaching out to providers

27:14

now and saying, you could be eligible for 20%

27:16

of the credit. We could do it for you. Um,

27:19

you know, so that's both troubling

27:22

and heartening. I do wanna see access

27:24

and certainly it's a free market, but if

27:27

you can get help for free it's

27:29

of course preferential. Um, but

27:31

we're seeing still so many providers have

27:33

never heard of it. So many small businesses have never

27:35

heard of it. You know, part of the challenge

27:37

was you didn't see it in the media, like you did the PPP,

27:40

right? Um, you hear employee

27:42

retention tax, read it , your eyes glaze

27:44

over. Right. And people go,

27:46

oh my gosh, that sounds scary. Talk

27:49

to my CPA. That's not for me. Right. And

27:51

then you talk to your CPA. If you have one and

27:53

your CPA says not my job. So this is

27:55

all handled, as we said, through the 9

27:57

41. So unless your CPA does your nine 40 ones,

28:00

he or she is gonna send you to your payroll company. So,

28:03

and that's, what do, Hmm . Right. We say,

28:05

go call up, you know, paychecks

28:07

or whatever the Gusto they'll process it

28:10

for you. Um, and,

28:12

but the pay , but the, you know, Gustos

28:14

and the other payroll companies of the world,

28:17

they're not making huge amounts of money off these changes

28:20

if they charge you a nominal fee at

28:22

all. Right. And so for them, it's

28:24

not a big money maker . They're not pushing it. Most

28:26

of the time, Gusto is an exception or

28:28

they are pushing it. But for the

28:30

most part, they're not. So what you end

28:32

up with is kind of silence around it. When

28:35

you hear things that sounds really confusing as

28:37

you heard it, isn't that confusing, you

28:40

know? Um, it does , you

28:42

, you know, it's of course always better if you can

28:44

help have, and not having help,

28:46

but at the same time, you know, this is not brain

28:48

surgery. Yeah. It just needs a guide.

28:50

It sounds like somebody that can like unlock

28:53

that initial door and explain, Hey, it's available,

28:56

it's here. There's a couple of simple triggers

28:58

that would make you eligible. So is

29:00

that part of what I mean, not part

29:02

of, but is that the role that your group plays

29:05

with individual providers then is,

29:07

Hey, we will actually be your guide through

29:09

this process, not only bringing awareness,

29:12

but then you help them identify the triggers,

29:14

help them identify what's the documentation

29:16

that you need to submit and

29:19

walk them through that. And then maybe a

29:21

follow up to that just really quick area is like, what

29:23

should a provider is ? So if I'm a , if I'm a child

29:26

care owner and, and I work with you,

29:29

what should I expect in terms of like,

29:31

what, how does Savita what's the

29:34

benefit to you? Is it just the relationship and future

29:36

business opportunities? Is it funding

29:39

for you? Is there a percentage that I expect

29:41

to pay of what comes in? How , how does that work? Yeah

29:43

. Just so a provider could be clear on

29:45

like, what should I expect if I talk to an organization?

29:48

Oh yeah. I mean, that's absolutely fair. So

29:50

there's two levels of support that we're providing. One

29:53

is absolutely free. So one of

29:55

the things that we've gotten a lot of compliments on,

29:58

and, you know, I turn a over it , as I say

30:00

it, cause I don't, you know, I don't wanna be Boal , but

30:02

we've been, we've received a lot of compliments

30:04

on creating guides and workbooks that

30:06

are very accessible for providers. And

30:09

one of the things we're trying to do is not put anything

30:11

behind paywall . So

30:13

if you go to CS, so Charlie Sierra

30:16

CS early start.com right now,

30:18

which is the Cita strategies early start

30:20

set . You can find the guide for

30:22

how to do this absolutely free 24

30:25

7, download it, find all our materials

30:27

on there free. Um,

30:30

so that's one thing. And we've had providers who

30:32

have said, I got the guide and I

30:34

was able to do it like this. Wasn't really all that hard. Right

30:37

? I did it now . It's not for

30:39

everybody. And you know, in

30:41

states that we're working. So right now in

30:43

Texas, Indiana, Virginia,

30:46

we were working on it in New

30:49

Jersey. So if you're a New Jersey listener, I would probably help

30:51

you anyway. Um, we

30:53

are providing free services. Now we're

30:55

doing that because we're getting

30:58

federal stimulus to do that. Got

31:00

it. So we are not doing this retail, like we're

31:02

not gonna charge you 20% and you

31:04

know, do that. But in those states, we

31:06

are getting compensated by the

31:09

state, you know, or against federal government

31:11

coming through the state , um, to do this

31:13

work. So for the providers, it's absolutely for

31:16

charge . Excellent. So they're getting

31:18

government support to participate.

31:21

And the government saying, not only are we gonna support

31:23

you with this , these funds, but we're gonna support

31:25

organizations that are helping you access 'em that's

31:28

right. Which is amazing. And this is really sizable

31:30

when we talk about the 20% that some firms

31:32

are charging you, it can add

31:34

up. So, so the credit, the

31:37

way it works is a little bit different in 2020

31:39

than 2021 in 2020,

31:43

you get half of the

31:45

first 10,000 each

31:48

employee made during the,

31:50

for all the eligible periods. So in other words,

31:52

you can get up to 5,000 an employee. Okay?

31:55

Right. So if you do the math, that adds up pretty quickly

31:58

in 2021, it got crazier and

32:01

the federal government to encourage people to use it. It

32:03

, so now you can get up to 7,007,000.

32:07

So 70% of the first 10,000 made

32:10

per quarter. Wow

32:12

. So if you think about it, right, let's say you

32:14

have , you're an owner, you have a center director

32:17

and they're making 40,000 because

32:19

the math is easy for me a year. Well,

32:21

if you were eligible all three quarters to 2021,

32:23

that's seven plus seven plus seven that's

32:26

$21,000. Coming back to you

32:28

is cash for that one employee.

32:31

Well , just that one employee. So as you can imagine, like,

32:33

you know, in the state of Texas and

32:35

you know, alone, we've done 30 million as

32:38

of January one. Right?

32:40

Wow. Um, in New Jersey, I

32:42

think we did, I wanna say like 18

32:45

or 19 million in a very relatively short

32:47

period. So there's a

32:49

lot of money here. Mm-hmm <affirmative> and you

32:51

know, and part of what we are seeing is a

32:53

situation. Cause this goes back to what you were saying about sustainability,

32:56

right? Cause we do have some providers you were , and gosh,

32:59

you know, I'm already getting a bunch of money from the state

33:01

through ARPA funds. Should I do

33:04

this? And what we are seeing

33:06

is with the increasing

33:08

costs associated with labor, which

33:10

is your primary cost , right. You know, that better than

33:12

I do of , you know, what's

33:15

happening is a lot of the ARPA

33:17

funds that are coming down are almost neutral. Right?

33:20

We're putting that money out as we should.

33:22

Right. In bonuses, in temporary pay

33:25

increases, which is wonderful. It's wonderful

33:27

for you as the owner. It's

33:29

wonderful for the people who work for you. If you're

33:31

a sole proprietor, it's wonderful for you too, cuz

33:33

you can pay yourself. Right. But

33:36

what we're not seeing is

33:38

providers going back to where,

33:40

where they were. So what I mean

33:43

by that is, you know, there's not a provider I

33:45

know in the country, that's not true. There's one I

33:47

can think of who is a delightful person.

33:49

And I don't know how she did it, but she

33:52

got through some really rough times and still preserved

33:54

her reserve. And so what we saw was

33:56

two things. One reserves

33:58

went away. If you had reserves, regardless,

34:01

whether you had reserves or not consumer

34:03

credit card debt went up because you started to

34:05

float things on your credit card, which is what

34:07

you need to do as a business owner, get

34:10

it , you know, maybe your idol , you took out

34:12

an idol and you have that debt too. Right.

34:15

So with the ARPA funds, you're staying

34:17

open, but you're still not getting head

34:19

to where you were of that stability. So

34:22

we're finding that these funds are

34:24

then able to bring stability. So I had a provider

34:27

just two weeks ago where I was talking about the same concept.

34:29

You know , she said exactly that she said, Gary , I

34:31

still have debt. She said, I can't

34:33

wait to get this money because then I could pay off my

34:36

debt. And I'll finally be back where I was in

34:38

2019. Yeah. And which is kind of

34:40

what the , it , the idea is, Hey, let

34:42

us help you absorb everything that's

34:44

happened in the last couple years and how it's impacted your business

34:46

and get back to the reserves

34:49

you had or the debt free , you

34:51

know, balance sheet that you had created

34:53

with all that hard work and to kind of get back

34:55

where you were. And that is how they can use the funds.

34:57

Aren't earmark for, you have

34:59

to spend it on this or you have to

35:01

use it on this. Like if you're eligible, those

35:04

funds are then you know, yours

35:06

to use, however you need to and want to that's

35:09

right. I mean, like when we talk to nonprofits,

35:11

I often say these are unrestricted funds. Cause

35:13

nonprofits know how hard they are to get. When

35:16

I talk to for profits, I always kid around about

35:18

like, you know, if you wanna put into your business,

35:20

you can pay down your debt if wanna have The

35:23

Bahamas vacation of your dreams. You could do

35:25

that too. Not that I'm encouraging that, but

35:27

my point is to show the flexibility. Yeah

35:29

. It is a cash refund. Once it's

35:31

in your account, nobody can tell you what to do with it. Yep

35:33

. So you have tremendous flexibility.

35:35

So we, we know cuz we help with

35:38

accessing ARPA funds in the states, we're working

35:40

in that there are limitations

35:42

to the ARPA funds and what they could be used for construction

35:45

being a prime example. You can't do it well,

35:48

these funds can. Right. So

35:50

if you wanna build that extension yeah. You can't use

35:52

ARPA funds, but you can use these funds and

35:54

then maybe use your ARPA funds to and

35:57

build it up. Yeah, that's excellent. And

35:59

then you guys have also found like through

36:02

the work that you've done and I know I wanna be respectful

36:05

of your time cause I know you're , uh , a , a main

36:07

speaker here and you've got your sessions , um,

36:10

through all the work that you guys are doing on,

36:13

you know, these tax credits on the PPP

36:16

early on, you've also identified

36:18

coaching opportunities as a whole, right. For

36:21

the industry, meaning you also provide

36:23

services above and beyond the things we're

36:25

talking about. So I , I would love to give you like maybe

36:28

a quick platform to talk about like

36:30

the coaching role that you guys play. I know

36:32

you referenced this early in our conversation. I've

36:34

read a lot about the evaluation process

36:36

you guys have created that I think has been

36:39

really impactful for your customers

36:41

as well. Can , can you talk a little bit about that

36:43

side? Absolutely . And how you support absolutely

36:45

. As well . You know , as I mentioned, you know, back

36:48

in the last quarter of 2020, everyone

36:50

was suffering and there was no money we

36:52

put together, what's evolved into what we call

36:54

the thrive pathway, which is a very

36:56

simple coaching system. And

36:59

basically there's a list of best

37:01

practices. And for each one we

37:03

recommend going down the line for

37:05

providers, cuz these are ones that we found from providers.

37:08

Those centers and family care have

37:10

been important for their stability and growth and

37:13

with each one of them . And again,

37:16

you'll find this free, including the thrive pathways

37:18

entirely on our website. So

37:20

it's just out there and the materials

37:23

are as well for each one of those things. There's an easy

37:25

to use workbook or guide . So for example, first

37:27

thing we start with is budget. So many providers

37:30

are flying blind. This

37:32

is heavy turbulence, right? You want the

37:34

radar, you want everything you could do to

37:36

help fly that plane. So start

37:38

with a budget. So we have a so simple workbook

37:40

on like, how do you develop? And I mean, by

37:43

workbook, it's like three pages. How

37:45

do you develop that first budget? And we say, okay

37:47

, how's your cashflow ? Do you know

37:49

what your cash flow is? Because that's the next

37:51

most important thing. Yeah . And so we

37:53

go down that list, including marketing other

37:56

things, accessing these federal funds and

37:59

say, have you done it? And if you have, it's

38:01

very simple, next goal, do that thing. So it's

38:03

not overwhelming. And

38:05

what we found is number one, this has , has salient

38:07

in terms of bringing stability to providers.

38:10

Um, you know, I had one provider who I had heard

38:12

of , um , just , uh

38:14

, Friday , uh , it wasn't on the video. Um,

38:17

but they were doing a video with some, some family

38:19

care providers and , and this actually

38:21

doubled her revenue. Wow . You

38:23

know, and, and one of the things also in there is,

38:26

you know, a review of your taxes and you

38:28

know, that's a whole nother subject. Uh , the

38:30

evaluation arm, as I mentioned, luminary evaluation

38:32

group, Allison did an incredible

38:35

assessment of 60 provider

38:37

tax returns that we're able to get through this work

38:39

and get their permission to use for research. And

38:42

so there's even an easy, and again, this is free

38:44

on the website and easy to use guide on how

38:48

do you go through your schedule C and

38:50

determine where you at risk, where should you

38:52

maybe be doing greater deductions and

38:55

taking you through that? So all

38:57

that is up there. And you

38:59

know, that system has not only been helpful in

39:01

stabilizing businesses, but we also have found

39:04

some QS systems using it as almost

39:06

pre-coaching. So a lot

39:08

of them , they wanna take a provider

39:10

from point a to point B, but they can't do it until

39:12

the provider is at point a. Right. So

39:14

it's now out , we're kind of helping them use

39:16

the system to get to point a, to get

39:18

to that baseline that you can then

39:21

build off from there. And I think, you know, one of

39:23

the things I love just reading some of the content and

39:25

kind of doing a little research on Savita and

39:27

on, you know, this Lumin it's

39:30

luminary, luminary, luminary , um, is

39:33

I think you guys have learned and you speak

39:35

to it right way that it's like, look, this isn't

39:37

intimidating. It doesn't have to be this lengthy

39:39

process. That seems so inaccesible

39:42

to, you know, what , whatever we define small

39:44

or medium size business owners, it's

39:47

we can make it painless. We

39:49

can make it easy. We can make it efficient and

39:52

the outcome will be impactful. Like it

39:54

will impact your business. I don't know if I'm like,

39:57

like adding the wrong description, but

39:59

I , is that how you guys view it? Like you wanna

40:01

make it like , absolutely. Yeah.

40:04

I mean, and that's, and that's our primary goal is,

40:07

you know, I think part of the challenge you

40:09

have in any small business and I've spent most of

40:11

my adult life running micro businesses.

40:13

So businesses with under 10 employees

40:16

in , you know, most micro businesses have

40:18

few really good resources because you have this

40:21

bunch of business resources that are really meant

40:23

for large corporations, a , a bunch

40:25

that are really meant for larger , um

40:28

, small businesses. Cuz remember the federal

40:31

term , small business goes up to 500 employees,

40:33

right? Yeah . In the childcare world, we'd be

40:35

like, wow, you know , that's

40:37

a four . Exactly, exactly.

40:39

Right. But you know, we're talking mostly

40:41

what's termed as microbusinesses and

40:43

the resources for microbusinesses in general are

40:46

not great. They're not, they're not meant

40:48

for, right. Like, you know, what

40:50

we see for other small businesses is hand

40:53

this to your CFO. You'll get it done. Right.

40:55

You are the CFO, you're the CEO. You're

40:58

you're the center director. You're the you're teacher. Cause

41:01

when people are out with COVID right, you're doing it all. And

41:03

so what we're trying to do is design materials.

41:06

And I should say everything we do is in English and

41:08

Spanish and design materials

41:10

where you can self execute . If you don't have a coach,

41:12

right. You can go on our website, let's

41:15

say you wanna figure out your cash flow , go on our website,

41:17

take the work book. The idea is that it takes

41:19

you step by step . Nothing's hidden. There's

41:22

no like, and call us for step

41:24

five to finalize it. Right. And get your checkbook

41:27

handy, you know? But instead, what we're trying

41:29

to do is get this out there so that the providers

41:31

can either be helped or helped themselves through

41:33

this because this shouldn't

41:35

be something where we're, we're hiding this

41:38

information. It's absolutely imperative

41:40

for the sustainability of the sector. Yeah.

41:42

Just like providers. I think it's getting to

41:44

a point just like providers are gonna tap into their local

41:47

licensing and resource and referral to like,

41:49

just get information about how do I start

41:51

a center. This type of conversation

41:54

needs to be an essential part of that initial, you

41:56

know, discussion as well as you're building out

41:58

your business plan. And as you're, you know, kind of

42:01

determining what are the important things that

42:03

I need to do to make sure that what I'm about

42:05

to embark on is gonna be successful.

42:07

So it , Gary, just as we kind of wind

42:09

up and, and um, you

42:11

know, I know I have Bre are earlier, but I appreciate

42:14

you sneaking some time. And you know, we, we

42:16

met local time. 8:00 AM Austin. I know you

42:19

flew in last night, you've got all

42:21

sorts of , um, engagement. So

42:23

I appreciate you carving out some time for us. If

42:25

our listeners wanted to find out more. I , I

42:27

know you've referenced the website a few times, but I just

42:29

wanna give you an opportunity cuz our audience

42:32

are , you know, the end of vis. I think that you,

42:35

you guys work with you , it's directors,

42:37

it's owners, it's people that are trying

42:39

to open centers in our space, trying

42:41

to sustain their existing centers through

42:44

some of these difficult times. How can our

42:46

audience find you if they wanna get more information? So

42:48

I mean the website's a great source CS

42:50

early start.com . Um,

42:53

the other thing I would say, and , and I may regret

42:55

this later, email me Gary ATIV

42:59

Strat C IV St R a t.com

43:01

. I'm always happy to answer an email.

43:04

I'm a big boy, if it's a bad time.

43:06

Cause sometimes people be like, I didn't wanna bother you if

43:08

it's a bad time, a big enough boy,

43:11

we'll set it aside to like to do it, but I promise

43:13

I will respond. Um , nice . Yeah

43:15

. And we'll put that information in the show notes as

43:18

well. And I would encourage, you know, because

43:20

if , if nothing more than getting information

43:22

that you know, you as a local provider in

43:24

your community in your state can

43:27

then go share with other providers. If

43:29

for any reason, this doesn't apply to your situation.

43:32

Being able to tell some of your peers about

43:34

it , um, there's

43:36

money there there's, you know, grants,

43:39

there's tax credits and there's experts

43:41

that can help you with that. So , um, we'll

43:44

put all that information in the show notes as well,

43:46

Gary, and uh , appreciate your

43:48

time. It was a pleasure having you on the show. Appreciate time . I'm

43:50

glad to be here and glad to be the first in person

43:53

episode. You'll always go down as the

43:55

first I okay . Last bonus question actually.

43:58

Yeah . Um , that I was gonna say, let me finish my thought.

44:00

You're the , you will always go down as

44:03

the first in person podcast

44:05

interview for our show. So that'll,

44:07

that'll stick with you if nothing else. Um,

44:10

you're an author as well. So bonus

44:13

question, I'm always curious, writing

44:17

a book seems like one of the most complicated, difficult

44:19

things for me, like the way I learn is

44:22

not through writing it's

44:24

in my head. And so to put thoughts from

44:26

my head on paper is a challenge for

44:28

me. How did that process start?

44:30

Was it like, Hey, I wanna write a book and I

44:32

have the talent, or did somebody say to you, Hey Gary, you

44:35

should write a book about this. What , what was

44:37

the, a little bit of both those things? So what had

44:39

happened was there's actually three books. I, I

44:41

feel bad cause I sent you an old bio finding your north star,

44:44

which is our strategic planning process came

44:46

out just a few months ago. That's also all

44:48

three of them are on Amazon. Um

44:50

, what happened with the

44:52

first book was, you know, I would do

44:54

this work, helping other consultants build

44:57

their business, just pro bono. It was like, it

44:59

was fun to me. I love entrepreneurship. And

45:02

one day, one of the people I was helping said, you have

45:04

a whole system. And I was like, well, let's have a deal. I'm

45:06

doing this for free this coaching. And I'm

45:08

gonna ask you to write down an outline of what you're the

45:11

learning. And , um,

45:13

it coincided with the birth of child number

45:15

two. And um, I

45:18

always, for both kids, I took the

45:20

late night, early morning, depending on how you define

45:22

it feeding. So my wife could actually get some rest

45:26

and coinciding with that was a podcast

45:28

I had seen with a person who was very

45:30

prolific of really bad

45:33

books, but it

45:35

was very interesting to hear him because one of the things he said

45:37

was look for thousands of years, books

45:40

weren't written, they were told, right?

45:42

And , and I'm a huge fan of classical history, right?

45:44

But if you look at the IEA, the odysey, these were oral

45:47

books, these were books that were shared orally

45:50

and weren't written down for hundreds years . Right.

45:53

And that was a huge C change to me. Cause I

45:55

kept thinking, if I'm gonna write a book, I have to sit down and

45:57

write it. And it was always a personal challenge to

46:00

me. I was never a good student. I was always told I wouldn't

46:02

be successful. I had a learn new disability. So

46:04

it was one of those things where I felt like I'd want to do it. So

46:07

there was this confluence of here's

46:09

something I could share that would be valuable hearing

46:12

the, this idea of being

46:14

able to say it orally and,

46:16

and also wanting this challenge for myself. And so I

46:19

started using, I tried a bunch of different dictation

46:22

, um, systems that's

46:24

when I found was the iPhone, just the regular dictation.

46:27

And so in those morning feedings, I

46:29

would, I would have the outline

46:32

in my son's room and I would just start

46:34

dictating Molly eight and then went to sleep. And

46:37

from that, I cleaned up the dictation. Right.

46:40

And that became the book. And that was actually all how

46:42

all three had been written was through

46:45

dictation, dictation, meaning this

46:47

is for my lack of knowledge, speaking it into

46:49

your phone and it writes your words for

46:52

you. Okay . And then cleaning it up later. Right.

46:54

And what I found was for me and this, by the

46:56

way, is how we write all our materials. And one of the great

46:58

compliments we've gotten on our materials is

47:01

they're so conversational. People have said, it's like

47:03

chatting with one of your folks and that's

47:05

because we literally write them that way. Right.

47:07

We write them as if we're talking to you, instead

47:10

of saying, I'm gonna sit behind the computer and

47:12

say, how do you do the employee, a retention

47:14

tax credit, but instead we dictate it and

47:16

then we go from there. So it has a much more kind

47:18

of relaxed, conversational tone. I

47:21

like that. That's good. That's a good little in good

47:23

insight for those aspiring authors

47:26

or individuals, maybe like myself, that struggle

47:28

to put thoughts on, on paper dictation.

47:31

I like that. That's a little life hack right there. Absolutely.

47:34

Um, so hopefully everybody kept listening

47:36

to the end of the show because that's a nice little freebie

47:38

at the end. And , uh, you know , again , uh

47:40

, Gary Roman with Savita strategies

47:42

, um, and luminary valuation group

47:44

really appreciate your time. Thanks for being on the show. My

47:47

pleasure. Thank you for having me. For course .

47:49

Thank you for listening to this episode

47:51

of the childcare business podcast, to

47:54

get more insights on ways to succeed in

47:56

your childcare business, make sure to hit

47:58

subscribe in your podcast app. So you never

48:00

miss an episode. And if you want even

48:03

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48:05

strategies, head over to our resource

48:09

[email protected] until next time.