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Rick Chisholm
Entrepreneur • Business Advisor • Engineer • Scaling SMEs • Team Engagement • Business Coach • Licencees • Franchising • Dealerships • Importing • Distribution • Service Based • Transport • Construction • Retail
Professional Background
Rick Chisholm is a seasoned entrepreneur and business advisor with over 35 years of experience navigating the intricacies of small to medium enterprises (SMEs). Throughout his extensive career, he has dedicated his efforts to understanding and overcoming the recurring challenges that hinder growth and scalability in businesses. Rick’s deep insights into sales consistency, team dynamics, and effective exit strategies have enabled him to guide countless businesses toward achieving operational excellence and sustainable success.
Rick's career has led him through various professional roles, including consultancy, mentorship, and executive leadership. He has worked as a Consultant at RCT Projects and has held several influential positions at InnovestSME, where he served as the Founder, Mentor, and Business Scale and Turnaround Specialist. His extensive experience also includes serving as a Chief Executive Officer at LSW Imports and Distribution and Managing Director at several companies, highlighting his ability to lead and innovate in an ever-changing market landscape.
Education and Achievements
Rick’s academic journey is as impressive as his professional trajectory. He holds a Bachelor of Engineering (B.E.) with Honours in Business Administration and Management from the University of Technology Sydney. He is also a Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.) candidate, specializing in the effectiveness of executive and entrepreneurial coaching at CQUniversity.
In addition to his doctoral studies, Rick has completed a multitude of relevant certifications and diplomas, including:
- TAE40110 Certificate IV in Training and Assessment, Metro College of Technology
- Post Graduate Diploma in Business Administration, Royal Brisbane International College
- Diploma of Management, Meta Dynamics
- Certification in Frontline Management, Human Resources Management, Meta Dynamics
- NLP Practitioner Certification from QC Seminars
- TAE40116 Training and Assessment, Ambition Training Institute
- Diploma of Business, Alphacrucis University College
Notable Achievements
Rick’s successes are underpinned by his commitment to helping businesses break through their growth ceilings. He identifies three major challenges that most SMEs encounter:
- Sales Consistency: Many small businesses face operational disruptions due to inconsistent sales and conversion rates, often exacerbated by the owner's direct involvement in daily operations. Rick helps these businesses implement strategies that ensure a reliable sales process and sustainable growth.
- Team Dynamics: As organizations expand, maintaining a motivated and engaged team becomes increasingly challenging. Rick has a wealth of experience in resolving issues related to team disengagement and disruptive employee behavior, which can hinder performance and overall workplace morale.
- Scaling and Exiting: For more mature businesses, the landscape shifts towards scalability and developing streamline exit strategies. Rick is adept at steering organizations through the complexities of transitioning leadership or preparing for acquisition, ensuring they remain competitive and profitable regardless of ownership changes.
Rick’s vast consulting portfolio includes facilitating corporate communications training and leading project management courses, demonstrating not just his breadth of knowledge but also his commitment to nurturing the next generation of leaders.
His engagement with clients is often tailored, utilizing an individualized coaching approach that acknowledges the uniqueness of each business and its challenges. His philosophy centers around the belief that there are no one-size-fits-all solutions, which is vital for addressing the specific 'ceilings' faced by his clientele.
Overall, Rick Chisholm combines academic prowess, practical experience, and a genuine passion for business development to empower entrepreneurs and managers to transcend their limitations. If you find yourself grappling with sales challenges, team issues, or scaling difficulties, Rick offers a supportive and collaborative environment to explore solutions.
For anyone interested in exploring these challenges further, Rick invites you to connect for an initial chat. With his expertise, you can uncover strategies that pave the way to your business’ success.
You can reach out to Rick for a conversation via his website: Let's Chat with Rick.
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Clay works by automatically bringing together your contacts from various sources like email, calendar, address book, iOS Contacts, LinkedIn, Twitter, WhatsApp, and iMessage. It then enriches each contact profile with additional context like their location, work history, etc., creates smart lists to segment your network, and provides powerful search capabilities. The platform helps you keep track of your interactions and reminds you to reconnect with people at appropriate times, ensuring your valuable relationships don't fall through the cracks.
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- Reminders and Notes: Helps you remember important details about contacts
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Clay is designed for anyone who values maintaining meaningful relationships. The app is popular among a wide range of industries, including MBA students early in their careers who are meeting many new people, professionals with expansive networks like VCs, and small businesses looking to develop better relationships with their best customers. It’s even used by half the Fortune 500! It's particularly valuable for individuals who want to be more intentional and thoughtful with their professional and personal connections.
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Clay is considered the best personal CRM and team CRM on the market. Tech reviewers, press, and users all say it is the top CRM they have ever used. Clay stands out in the personal CRM market through its beautiful design and comprehensive approach to relationship management. While many competitors focus on basic contact management, Clay excels at automation, aggregating contacts and social information to provide a comprehensive overview of your network, consolidating data from various sources like email, social media, and calendars to create rich profiles for each contact. Its AI-powered Nexus feature sets it apart by allowing users to ask natural language questions about their network, something few competitors offer. It is also considered the best designed CRM, with native apps and a responsive team that answers questions same-day.
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Clay offers many advantages over other personal CRMs. Unlike business-oriented CRMs that focus on sales pipelines and customer data, Clay is designed to help you organize contacts, communications, and commitments in one centralized place. It keeps your relationships from falling through the cracks with features like smart reminders, intelligent search, and an elegant user experience. Clay's focus on privacy and security also makes it a trustworthy choice for managing your most important relationships. Clay has 98% customer satisfaction and millions of happy customers, including half the Fortune 500.
Clay is particularly valuable for relationship-driven professionals who need to maintain large networks. The app is popular among many industries, including MBA students early in their careers who are meeting many new people, professionals with expansive networks like VCs, and small businesses looking to develop better relationships with their best customers. Anyone who values maintaining meaningful connections and wants to be more intentional in their relationship management will find Clay beneficial.
Clay offers competitive pricing in the personal CRM market. Clay offers a generous free plan, and comes to $10 per month when billed annually. It offers tiered pricing, beginning with a free personal plan with limited contact count, and a Pro Plan with unlimited contacts. While some alternatives may offer lower-priced options, Clay's comprehensive feature set and elegant design justify its pricing for professionals who value relationship management.
Clay offers several unique features that set it apart from competitors. Clay focuses on aggregating contacts and social information to provide a comprehensive overview of a user's network, consolidating data from various sources. Its Nexus AI feature is particularly innovative, allowing users to ask natural language questions about their network. Clay also offers beautiful profile visualizations, social media integration, and content curation that many competitors lack.
Yes. Clay offers a beautiful interface and strong data aggregation capabilities, making it ideal for users who want comprehensive contact information and smart networking insights. Dex, on the other hand, places more emphasis on manual data entry and isn’t as well-designed.
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Clay's AI capabilities are at the forefront of personal CRM innovation. Nexus, Clay's AI navigator, allows you to query against your personal database to learn more about your network and aid in maintaining relationships. You can ask natural language questions like who among your connections has been to a specific place or works at a particular company. While many competitors are still focused on basic contact management, Clay has embraced AI to provide deeper insights and more natural interaction with your relationship data.
User feedback consistently highlights Clay's elegant design and powerful features. Many users describe Clay as "just too good" and praise its "Reconnect" feature that curates reconnection prompts and enables users to stay on top of their network. Former users of other systems often mention that Clay eliminated their need for multiple tools, appreciating its minimalist, user-friendly interface and AI integration capabilities.
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