Dream Dare Do

Ciara Lewis

An organization can only be as successful as its top Leader. After almost ten years of experience in medical billing and coding, I made the independent decision to create KLConsulting LLC. At the moment, I perform the roles of Owner and Operator. Though I was eager to launch my own company, I also had to consider the difficulties that would entail it. We can never really be ready for some of the difficulties that can arise when running a business, in my opinion. I used my personal savings and established my business from the ground up. The first problem was that I never got any finance or support for my business. After that, there were more challenges. 

The second difficulty I faced was hiring people and attempting to build trust so that others could take on some of my tasks and represent my Company. I was prepared to try assigning work because I was starting to feel a little overburdened by carrying out all the tasks in the company. The only issue was that I didn't yet have anyone to assign tasks to. My initial attempt to use Indeed to find a new billing manager or biller was a complete failure. After interviewing more than twenty candidates, I was able to reduce the candidates to five, from which I was able to select two. To aid with organization and streamlining, my initial plan was to hire a manager. The lady interviewed on her 1st and 2nd interview very well and her references checked out. When I hired her, everything went great for the first two weeks of our working together.  Then, the unthinkable happened: she made a mistake on a crucial job that I had given to her. The crucial lesson I learned was that I had to take charge of the project, attempt to make things right with the customer, come to a solution with them, and decide how to handle the employee. I had to terminate her, and it opened my eyes to the fact that I needed to start building the appropriate team before I could start delegating, and that I needed to be ready to step in when needed. I had to be more cautious about the types of projects and clientele I took on after that to make sure I could manage everything by myself if necessary until I had the right team in place. I was ultimately able to start assigning some of the tasks to someone I could trust along the way, once I had identified someone I could trust. 

This was only one of the numerous difficulties I encountered within my business. I said this to emphasize that being an entrepreneur requires a number of qualities, like being strong, willing to take risks, diligent, detail oriented and several other characteristics. To be honest, it's not something that comes naturally; you must work on it constantly. I think being an entrepreneur teaches you how to better yourself and broaden your horizons in addition to helping your business flourish. I think that as your business expands, you also do, sometimes for the better and sometimes not. Hopefully, you will have taken the route that leads to growth in the end. Being an entrepreneur requires you to continuously discover new approaches, tactics, and strategies to test and experience. It also implies that a part of you must develop as you venture along these new avenues. Being an entrepreneur is fun, challenging and an adventure. Some days are more challenging than others and some days you are reminded exactly why you chose to do it.  Website: klconsultllc.com 

Instagram: @klconsultingllc 

Facebook: @ KL Consulting, LLC 

LinkedIn: Ciara Lewis