“A good leader is someone who is helping others become the best of themselves.”

In this episode, Craig Anderson sits down with Brook Gratia, President of Edgewater CPA Group, to explore the realities of leadership, scaling a business, and the challenges of integrating new teams. Brook shares her journey from launching her firm to leading a team of 20, reflecting on key leadership lessons—like hiring the right people, adapting to team dynamics, and navigating the emotional complexities of leadership. She opens up about the difficulties of merging company cultures, setting clear expectations, and balancing the demands of running a business while supporting employees.

After You Listen:

• Connect with Brook Gratia on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/brook-avey-gratia-54275b6/
• Check out Edgewater CPA Group: https://www.edgewatercpa.com/
• Connect with Craig on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/craigpanderson/
• Subscribe to Craig’s "The Evolving Leader" newsletter: https://clearpathcoaches.com/stay-in-touch

Key Takeaways: 

• Hire the right people from the start to save time, stress, and money
• Separate your identity from employee decisions while still showing care
• Build structured processes to keep teams aligned and accountable

Things to listen for:

(00:00) Intro

(02:10) Best leadership book

(05:03) Leadership inspirations

(08:45) Defining leadership

(11:42) Early leadership roles

(15:54) Challenges in growing a business

(27:13) Get out of the weeds and lead

Episode Transcript

This has been generated by AI and optimized by a human. 

Craig Anderson [00:00:00]:

About a week into the insourcing event, I sat in my office and realized this was going to be very different. Welcome to Executive Evolution. I have over 25 years of leadership.

Craig Anderson [00:00:14]:

Experience in corporate America. I learned a lot of lessons the.

Craig Anderson [00:00:17]:

Hard way, and I created this podcast.

Craig Anderson [00:00:19]:

So that you won't have to.

Craig Anderson [00:00:22]:

A long time ago in my career, we were. I really didn't change jobs for 20 years, but kept getting outsourced and insourced and various and sundry things that happened to the business.

Craig Anderson [00:00:33]:

And at one point, we went from.

Craig Anderson [00:00:35]:

Being part of a company that had really high margins and treated salespeople like gods, and we were largely a sales organization. And we got moved into a very large national bank that had a very tight focus on margin and returns and performance. And it was a very different culture that we moved into, unfortunately. And it's another long story. Things took forever to happen, and then all happened very fast. And while a lot of work went into getting us insourced, that transition to a very different kind of firm didn't happen. And it was really a stressful situation. A lot of my time was spent managing expectations, calming people down, watching people leave, because it was just not what they thought it was going to be.

Craig Anderson [00:01:21]:

And today, in my interview with Brook Gratia of Edgewater Accounting, she talks about what it's been like throughout her leadership journey, but particularly about buying firms and integrating them into her firm and the lessons she's learned from that. So let's jump in and listen to Brook's story of her Executive Evolution.

Craig Anderson [00:01:41]:

Brook, welcome to Executive Evolution. I'm so excited to have you here today.

Brook Gratia [00:01:44]:

Thank you for having me. I'm excited to chat with you.

Craig Anderson [00:01:47]:

Absolutely. I think you may be my first accountant, and you're doing this at the beginning of tax season, so thank you so much for jumping in.

Brook Gratia [00:01:55]:

Yeah, no problem. I'm excited.

Craig Anderson [00:01:57]:

All right, well, we always like to kick off Brook, with the lightning round. Are you ready to go?

Brook Gratia [00:02:03]:

I'm sure. Yep.

Craig Anderson [00:02:04]:

All right.

Brook Gratia [00:02:05]:

See what crazy answers I come up with.

Craig Anderson [00:02:07]:

I can't wait. So question number one.

Brook Gratia [00:02:09]:

Okay.

Craig Anderson [00:02:10]:

What is the best leadership book you have ever read?

Brook Gratia [00:02:13]:

I'm not sure if it's a leadership book, but it probably is. Is Keith Cunningham's the Road Less Stupid, where basically he talks about running a business and that what you need to do is basically shut up and start thinking. So you ask yourself question, and he goes to this whole thing of, like, sit down and think and, like, answer. Like, you create bullets down there. And you answer your question, you just keep going you give yourself 15 minutes and you just keep answering and then you reflect. And I think maybe this is just me as a business owner. Sure. It funneled into leadership side.

Brook Gratia [00:02:50]:

As we get moving so, so fast all the time, and we don't slow down and we're just like, okay, next problem, next issue. And to figure out what is really driving us, what's really causing different things to do. And that sometimes you just need to stop and think and reflect and then take action. And it kind of the road less stupid so you don't get caught in that side of things. I have really, really loved it. I've also been pinging and Ryan Holiday. He's talked about stillness is key. Again, it comes back to, okay, just make yourself still breathe, reflect, and come back to what your problems are or your successes are or whatever piece it.

Brook Gratia [00:03:33]:

It's all slowing down and being probably intentional. So those have been my newest. They're probably my current loves. I really looked back through my library, I'd probably be like, oh, these are good too. But yeah, they're my. Probably my current driving.

Craig Anderson [00:03:48]:

It's a really good thing because a lot of the business owners I talk to and work with, that's the one thing they never make time for. They never make time for contemplation, thinking about the business, thinking six months down the road because they're so busy putting out this fire and dealing with this issue. And it's like at a certain point, the business just starts to overwhelm you. And if you. Especially if you haven't built good structures around it so people can do some of that stuff for you. So when do you find is, like, the best time for you to do that? Sit down and contemplate?

Brook Gratia [00:04:17]:

In the morning. For me, maybe it's because I have kids, and if I can get out the door before they, like, annoy me and wake up, and if I can get in the office before my staff comes in, I can kind of sit down and reflect and be in that moment. Or I take an afternoon and I go get a coffee at a coffee shop and I just have a moment to myself. But I have to intentionally turn off things, which is why sometimes, best in the morning, because I haven't turned anything on to have them distract me. I am like, I can just do those spaces.

Craig Anderson [00:04:52]:

Yeah. Once the input starts to flow, it's really hard to stop it in a given day. So good deal. All right, question number two. Who is your leadership crush?

Brook Gratia [00:05:03]:

I get back to political spaces of things which aren't really leadership side of things. But I've always been impressed with Barack Obama and the calmness that I always perceived and the wisdom with which he would answer. And you had to pull that many people together under what felt like a unifying space. But I don't know if I would necessarily call a political leader my crush. What's interesting is I probably could look back on my own personal life and say I've had actually in my father and some of those like childhood leaders saw really good demonstration of what it means to reflect and to connect with people and to watch them operate in grace. You mad people are coming at you a lot. I would not say there's a crush on my dad by any means, but if I'm talking about I'm inspired by and watch through that aspect of things. I think I've learned a lot from my own father and watching how he has navigated some stuff.

Brook Gratia [00:06:12]:

And I think I learned a lot from. I sit with a lot of other business leaders too and I listen to their stories of what goes well and what doesn't go well. And I pick and choose from dick various different pieces of what people say to go, okay, these are good components. Or I hear stories that, that come in so my other half will talk about her bosses and mentors and various different things. Oh, they're all really brilliant. So I just, I see. I don't know if I have any one person. All kudos you like, I remember sitting down with you when we were going through coaching sessions and just being like, hey, okay, that's a good perspective, like helping me reflect on it.

Brook Gratia [00:06:52]:

I don't know if I have any one leadership person. I think it's just a compilation of all the impacts in life that have come together. And I know that's totally not what you want to hear, but no one person blows me away because I think I can see their tear ups and their successes in the middle of it. They often are very generous and very caring. The leaders that they. They're humble too. That I tend to resonate with. Not that I am generous or humble or attained to a whole lot of all that stuff, but they're the ones I'm like, wow, you're really cool, you're inspiring.

Craig Anderson [00:07:27]:

But what I hear is right, it may not be one person, but there's a lot of people and you're observing and you're pulling the tickets that really resonate with you to say, I want some of that, I want some of that. I want some of that. Yeah, I like that.

Brook Gratia [00:07:37]:

It's all the Little pieces that come together. And I do really bad at remembering people's names and stuff. I'm just like, oh, there's story. Like, okay, yeah. Who is that person? And so, yeah, I think we were literally talking about George Clooney the other day, and I couldn't remember his name that was with you. And I'm like, okay, name. But I get the feelings and the memories of what people teach me through that.

Craig Anderson [00:07:58]:

Just make up some mythical person for all the stuff you can't pull back, like Kramer. It'll all be your own Bob Sacchimano. You just go, oh, yeah, this guy I know. Just create this mythical leader that is the source of all your wisdom and inspiration. Yeah, I've got to meet this person.

Brook Gratia [00:08:12]:

That is true. I'm totally going to start doing that makeup.

Craig Anderson [00:08:16]:

Just pick a great name, something distinctive so everybody remembers.

Brook Gratia [00:08:19]:

Is that a great leadership tactic to make up a person in your life?

Craig Anderson [00:08:23]:

Probably not, but it's better than going, God, I can't think of that person's name. And then you forget the point you were trying to make anyway, which would be how I'd handle it. I'd be so obsessed trying to remember the name I'd say. And now I can't remember what the heck it was that they did that was so great. So just watch that space. All right, so given this kind of smorgasbord of leadership influence you have and some of the things you just said there about leaders that you admire or leadership characteristics you admire, how would you define leadership in 10 words or less?

Brook Gratia [00:08:51]:

I think a good leader is someone who is helping others become the best of themselves. Probably left it right there and might have been at 10 words. I think that my job, in the roles I have, whether it's leading my family and my children, whether it's leading my work and my coworkers, is to see the people in front of me and help them become the best that they can be. And sometimes that's not within the organization that I'm working at. We all are impacted by multiple different things. Whether it's outside influences, trauma that we've grown up with, all of the different components that make us who we are, that some environments are not the best. I may not help someone the best, but my job is to try to come in and go, how do I give you the tools? How do I help you process through whatever emotional pieces you have? How do I inspire? How do I pull through and help you become the best you need to be in this situation? And it does include Giving direction and helping kind of framework where that is going. And sometimes in leaving an open hand to listen to the person and go, all right, so it's not an easy play.

Brook Gratia [00:10:09]:

And sometimes you want to be like, I need this done and you need to do it and boom, boom, boom, boom. And really you lose sight of the person in the midst of that. And so I can lead through, I can do project management and manage the project getting done and manage that the tax returns get done and manage that the accounting gets done and all of that sort of stuff. But I feel like good leaders, these are people and they are taking the time to help them become invested themselves. And that's really hard piece when sometimes you are struggling with your own self somewhere in the midst of it. But yeah, you got to find that balance. Or when you feel like you're the person leading and there's nobody above you, so it's all resting on your shoulders. How to not feel that because it's also not all resting on their shoulders.

Brook Gratia [00:10:57]:

We kind of lead together and help each other out and processes do.

Craig Anderson [00:11:01]:

No, I think it's great. It's, you know, so much of what we do and I don't think we always think about it this way is just helping our people develop because ultimately it helps our business too, right. If we can help them see what they can do or see their own potential or how to get through it. I always remember the story of one of my early bosses bringing me into her office when I was clearly on the edge and ready to just go crazy and kill people or something. One day in the office, she just sat me down, she said, craig, what are you doing this weekend?

Craig Anderson [00:11:24]:

And I told her whatever it was.

Craig Anderson [00:11:25]:

We were doing that weekend. And she goes, that's why you go through what you go through here and why this is worth it. And I was like, that's such a great perspective because I never had that perspective before. Right. And I've not forgotten that in like 30 odd years. What joy Benefield told me, like, that's a long time ago. So anyway, I think that is a great definition. So going from there, you've had your accounting practice for a long time, but what was the first leadership role you ever have?

Brook Gratia [00:11:51]:

First one would probably be if we take it all the way back to something. In my teens, I remember I went to church and we had a youth group, was probably a big church. And I had in my brain that I wanted to do a all nighter, maybe even middle school, I don't know, whatever piece of it is. And I don't know if people deem this leadership. I orchestrated that. Hey, let's do this. I got all of the adults engaged. I.

Brook Gratia [00:12:20]:

I remember ordering pizza and running down the hallway with it. And when we opened it up, it was like, gross, because you can't run with pizza because that's something we know right now. But we did this all nighter and, like, had a blast and had fun and there are hundreds of odd kids. And I came up with the idea and orchestrated it and brought it all together. I feel like that's the first distinct memory of that. And then there's just life pieces from that point and I don't ever really remember. I'm sure there were moments where I got in, like, hey, let's apply for a position like student leader or something along those lines and fight for stuff. That fighting for a position was never something I remember or think I did much of.

Brook Gratia [00:13:05]:

If I did, it was always intimidating to have other people's opinions of me. So I didn't really want that. So I'll just not go somewhere where you could tell me what you think of me. But I would just step into. If something didn't happen, get done, I would just do it. And so when I finally graduated from college and got a job at a bigger accounting firm, I was like a receptionist, like an administrative assistant person. And I just kept saying yes to as many opportunities as would come and filling in where everybody else didn't and slowly moved it where. Next thing I know, I'm ultimately in charge of preparing the Army's financial statement.

Brook Gratia [00:13:44]:

No one would ever say that, but like, in the defense finance world, which is what we were consulting with, I'm in charge of all of that and a bunch of people. I'm doing all of this because I am. I am willing to say yes and stepping into things. And I don't even. It was not a conscious thought of, let me be a good leader. Let me do like. I just feel like I worked hard and cared about people. I treated people with respect, I hope.

Brook Gratia [00:14:11]:

I mean, I'm sure I dropped on my face on some places, but I feel like it wasn't this hey, pat me on the back sort of thing. It was just a stepping into opportunities. And then somewhere along the line, I decided, hey, let me start my own business, which is a whole different ball game of leadership, because not only are you trying to talk people into being willing to bet on you, not just an organization, but bet on you and help them flourish and then market for them and do all of those things. And so it's not just even leadership. It's business side of things. So you're trying to pull in all of those pieces. I don't know. You just keep stepping into each one of those pieces.

Brook Gratia [00:14:50]:

You probably say it started when I was a little kid bossing around my brothers. I'm the oldest. I have three brothers. So I'm sure that I got some of it from just that natural kind of space and life that I. That.

Craig Anderson [00:15:04]:

It's interesting to me, though, because when you talk about it, right, it was a lot of. I can't remember some movie my kids watched when they were little, and it was a robots or something, he was like, see a need, fill a need. That was like his entire philosophy of life. And what I hear when you're talking about this is, I wasn't trying to be in charge. I wasn't the one who going, put me in charge, put me in charge. But where you saw the gaps, you said, I want to fill that gap and try and make something happen. But that shifts then when you launch a practice, because now you're the president, CEO, founder, whatever you want to call it, you're the boss. So now you actually have this crown placed upon your head.

Craig Anderson [00:15:39]:

And worse, you placed it upon your own head. So what was that transition like when you suddenly looked around and go, all right, well, now I gotta tell these three people what to do. And by the way, if I don't do my job well, I'll lose these three people. So how did that transition go as you started to build your business?

Brook Gratia [00:15:57]:

I think it's a slow transition. I remember when I started my business, it was just me, and I'm working for my house. And there came a moment where I'm like, okay, I should have an office. And like, the big goalpost step of, like, okay, I got to rent an office space. And then I got there, and I'm like, okay, if I want some more work, I don't want to do all of these little bookkeeping things. I need to hire someone. And so I hired someone. It was a lot of learning because I didn't hire the right people to start with.

Brook Gratia [00:16:24]:

I'm also a person who, when I talk to you, I think the absolute best of you. So when you're interviewing with someone, I'm like, oh, yeah, like, we're bonding, like, we're connecting. I'm thinking really good things about you. And then I get in and work with you, and it didn't work out the way it needed to. It's simple conversations, but yet some hard conversations. I've had to have conversations with staff about hygiene. And you can't come in wearing that coarse smelling like this. Like, how do we help you with some of those things? And those aren't not conversations I anticipated have been.

Brook Gratia [00:17:00]:

And so. And it takes again, a lot of sitting back and reflecting and going, what part of this is me? What part of this is someone else? And giving a lot of chances. And I'm probably an HR nightmare for anybody who's a true HR person because I don't know how to like filter through things. I process a lot of stuff out loud, but in the end of the day, it don't know if I sat back. Like, right Now I have 20 people who work for me. I would have never thought that when I started my organization, like, I don't even know where the heck I was taking it. I was just starting something. And then the next thing I know, I have all of these people.

Brook Gratia [00:17:36]:

And it's hard sometimes because when someone quit, it feels personal. Hey, you quit because I'm not someone you enjoy working with. I'm not enough. But that's often not the way it is. Yeah, it's different than that. So trying to separate yourself from your identity, from how people respond to you as a leader and being able to engage well in a caring manner and be human. And you're supposed to lead by example. And sometimes the example in a moment is, my brain is fried, I have nothing left.

Brook Gratia [00:18:12]:

Like, what do I bring to this table? But you have to like, breathe and go, okay, if I come to the table, drained, they're all freaking out. Where the heck is the business going? Like, my job, like, are we all tanking? So, you know, you have to find that internal motivation, even when you're sometimes empty and then other times you're feeling great and motivated. It doesn't really matter what the people are doing. Like, you're like, okay, this is like driving. And it's amazing though, how much I have to pay attention to my own. Thank you. It's never been a big moment of like, oh, okay, Now I have 20 people. I'm trying to figure this out.

Brook Gratia [00:18:46]:

I'm worried, like, it was a slow process step. And I, I bet that, I don't know, maybe it's not that way for a lot of people, but I feel like we all of a sudden one day look behind us and we're like, wow, this is where I'm at and this is how I got here. And like, and almost forget what it was like 20 years ago. But it's not easy caring for other people while also making sure you're. You're also caring for yourself and knowing that caring for yourself cares for the other people. And when you're in a service industry space and I'm not just doing a product thing, not only do I have clients there, staff that you're leading or you're trying to lead clients through concepts and different things. And there's a lot of people there with a lot of different opinions, which is why I could never be in a politician because there's a really lot of people with lots of different opinions. And to not take things to separate your identity from it while also caring for people while also still maintaining that it is part of your identity.

Brook Gratia [00:19:41]:

It is part of who you are is that you are in a position that you get to care about people and help them become better for whatever that turns out to be. But you're also not responsible for who they become. They are responsible for their part too. It's a very interesting balance. I don't claim at all to be the best at it by any meals and stuff. I'm really bad at saying I'm sorry. Mother half will tell you that all day long. So when I do make mistakes, it's a breath of like, okay, you need to apologize for not addressing that the best side of things.

Craig Anderson [00:20:19]:

But there's so many things in there, right? Because you talked about like early on growing the business and just hiring your first couple of people. You're like, oh, I like this person. This will work. Sounds like you realize over time. Actually I need to put some frameworks around this that say, oh, I probably should be asking some different questions just aside from personality resonance. And then you had to put some frames around just as the business grew, how you interacted with the team. And I think another one that is so interesting to me is you really have to start thinking in a service related business, which so many small businesses are, right. I have to teach my people how to treat my clients.

Craig Anderson [00:20:53]:

Because when it was just you, you did it intuitively. Now you have to educate people and so you start building systems and ways to do it in your head for you. Because I think it's interesting as you've gone on the journey, right? So you went from you to now you have 20 people. If you think about it this way, where did the pieces get harder? Was it when you went from 5 to 10, was it went from 10 to 20? Did you have to be a somewhat different leader or different business as you stacked on employees over time.

Brook Gratia [00:21:23]:

For me, what was the hardest part, leadership wise, that I've had to step in is I've acquired a couple of accounting firms. So there are other firms that have been existent and acquired them to pull in and they already had some. First time I did it, they already had employees. The second time I. They were like owned by owners and pulling them in. That integration of an old process and an old wave of management into my style, that was probably my hardest movement through because not like I sat down and interviewed each one of these people and said, hey, would you like to be part of who I am, Their boss or them? They sold and came over and now I'm kind of, we're all stuck. Not stuck, but stuck like in this space. And we don't always align on things.

Brook Gratia [00:22:17]:

And how do you process that through and how do you not make people feel smaller as you're engaging with things that you might be like, I don't understand how you don't know how to do this side of things. And so navigating through that difference and different lifespans of things and in some cases people were retiring and going, okay, you're turning off but I still need your help. Like how do I navigate that life stage for you? And kind of bringing that in. That was probably my most difficult piece was having people on the team that I didn't select that were I was trying to mash into a personality of how we operate which is very electronic, which is very flexible and remote side of things, which is very documentation. All of those things sometimes are ends on normal way of operating. So trying to get them to change and not be mad. And I've had situations where I've had employees yelling and screaming at each other and. And having to go, okay, I have to like address this.

Brook Gratia [00:23:36]:

And it feels like you get stuck in the middle of a fight with your kids. But like adults and like how do I like navigate through that? And these are real emotions they're going through, real things that are present, they're real hurt on both sides. I don't want to deal with it. Can we just run the bed's nest? But I can. If I don't create a space where people feel safe, then things start to fall apart. And if we don't feel like a team that is playing together. So I spent a lot of time working on how, what are the little things, things that help the team come together. And so then my next thing that it's just a me personality that I struggle with Is what are the little tricks that help the team work together? That somewhat to me feel cheesy at times.

Brook Gratia [00:24:28]:

And my business development guy would be like, stop. You can't say these are cheesy. But they feel like that to me. So we do these things called edgy coins, where each employee can, like, recommend an edgy coin for something awesome that another teammate did. And when I first put that in place because someone suggested it, I'm like, like, okay, these feel instantly like, come on. But after a bit, it's been amazing watching, trying to cultivate these things that allow people space to say thank you. And in a public kind of forum within our team, which then encourages the team to, like, want to step into some stuff. But me trying to figure out the psyche of team development and how teams work and what things work in that space, I have to ask a lot of questions of a lot of people because I don't know how to think like a team, think person.

Brook Gratia [00:25:25]:

Like, I just blaze ahead and do whatever I'm going to do, but I have to slow down and go, all right, where's my team at? How do I encourage them and get them all working together when they operate very different? Some of them are very, like, process, like, boom, boom, boom, boom. And others of them are a little bit more visionary and, like, strategic and like, those sort of conversations. And some of them are introverts and some of them are extroverts. And like, how do you, like, balance all of those pieces? I don't like to work in the office. I like to work health. Like, it's just not easy. Maybe that's my big thing with leadership. It's just not easy.

Brook Gratia [00:25:58]:

Well, we can do hard things. But I think that has been my hardest aspect of biggest change is what stopped being me interviewing and meeting with one person. To me, all of a sudden grandfathered in with people and trying to get them to play as a team. And none of them are mean. But sometimes I don't want to play like the rest of us play. And how do you help and respect and value people when you are on two different pages for how things. Sometimes, yeah.

Craig Anderson [00:26:29]:

And it sounds like as your business evolved, you kind of lock down practices. This is the way we do business, and this is how we do it. And then as you brought all these companies in, then it's like, okay, I appreciate that's how you did it, but this is how we do it. And then you have to get them acculturated and get them to buy in and grow them into your Business. And it's so funny because when we're not in leadership, we're like, well, God, if I was doing this, we'd have it together. And da, da, da, da. Then you're actually sitting in the chair and you're like, oh, wow, there's actually 8 million things. I didn't realize that I have to worry about sitting here.

Craig Anderson [00:27:01]:

So.

Craig Anderson [00:27:02]:

So given that if we could put.

Craig Anderson [00:27:04]:

You in a time machine, you can pick whatever time machine you like to play in. You can do a DeLorean, you can do the old H.G. wells time machine, however you like to travel through time. Go back to Brook. What did you say 20 years ago when you launched this practice? What's the one piece of advice you would give yourself that would have made it easier, kept you more calm, made you more successful?

Brook Gratia [00:27:25]:

I don't know if I could have afforded it, but my biggest thing I probably would have told myself is to get out of the weeds of the work and stay in the management of things. I tend to something doesn't work, I get in and I fix it. Personally, like, if we're overwhelmed at things, I'm managing client expectations. So then I would be spending more time focusing on developing people and evaluating them. And I tend to chew a lot of, all right, I figured it out. I just was handed stuff and said, figure it out. So, like, that's how my dad taught me. Like, that's what I do to other people.

Brook Gratia [00:28:02]:

Here's the stuff. Figure it out. At some level, it's nice, but once you get to a certain size, you can't just be like, here, figure it out. So creating really tight processes and things, then making sure that I've mentored people through those and empowered them through it and really sat down with them to make them feel like rock stars in it, that I valued more time spending on my people than on doing the work. And then also making sure I was crazy tight on hiring the right people. I've hired multiple wrong people and then spent massive amount of time, like, cleaning up. And it's cost me tons of stuff. So basically back to myself 20 years ago, be annoyingly tenacious about a tight team that is really competent.

Brook Gratia [00:28:52]:

Like, over evaluate that slow hire fast, higher sort of space of it. Make sure you have the right people, and then spend time with those people, really getting them up to speed, speed, so that you can trust that when you hand something off to them, it's just. It's good. It's golden. Like, I would have been able to grow way faster and way tighter If I hadn't tried to juggle getting the work done and mentoring the people at the same time. Understand my own bandwidth is a really hard, hard thing.

Craig Anderson [00:29:23]:

But I like it is just going back. If you could start working on the business sooner, getting the right people, getting the right processes in place so you can integrate people a lot more quickly. Love it. So Brook, if people want to conn with you, learn more about you, learn more about your firm, where can they go?

Brook Gratia [00:29:40]:

So we are Edgewater CPA and you can find us online. Google edgewatercpa.com primary offices are located in Carmel, Indiana, but our phone number is 317-386-7021. I got that in there. But you can feel free to go online. We have a Contact us. We would love to hear more about you and your stories and what dreams and visions you are going with things and how we can help support that from a financial accounting kind of space. And yeah, that's how you can find us.

Craig Anderson [00:30:11]:

Great. And how about your podcast? Where can they find that?

Brook Gratia [00:30:14]:

Oh, yeah. So we do have another. We have a podcast that we do. It's called the Owner's Odyssey. And we sit down with owners and we just listen to their journey. Because I think when you run your own business and you're trying to start something, it can feel very lonely and like, oh my gosh, like, what are we doing? And I want people to go, okay, so this is not. I'm not crazy. Whether it is I did it with my family and now we're trying to figure out how to deal with this, or I just morphed into this, or I am jumping into it, like what has been other people's stories.

Brook Gratia [00:30:48]:

And hopefully it's a little inspiring. Sometimes it gets a little long because people Journeys is not a quick statement. It's a long haul. I love hearing people's journeys and where they're going and their vision, and it's just, it's fun to bring that out of them. We talk about it called the owner of Odyssey. You can find it on all of the podcast things. I don't even know what people say. Apple, all that jazz.

Brook Gratia [00:31:12]:

And I'd love for you to listen.

Craig Anderson [00:31:13]:

Beautiful. And that's a lot of the reasons I do this. And so thanks so much for sharing the story of your Executive Evolution today, Brook. Appreciate it.

Brook Gratia [00:31:20]:

No problem.

Craig Anderson [00:31:23]:

I really appreciated all that Brook Gratia had to say. Clearly, she's put a lot of thought into what it takes to manage a successful small business through change, through growth, through how she leads people, leading by example. And what I was really impressed by was how much self awareness she's developed over the course of her leadership career. So, as always, I like to break down my key takeaways in the areas of competence, confidence, and calm. So in the area of competence, what I think is so important and something I really work with in my practice to help small business owners grow and build and stabilize their business and reduce the chaos is to build structures that are repeatable in their business. We really want to have structures that help us bring on new employees, that help set expectations that are repeatable so that we can manage expectations correctly. That's such a crucial part of running your business. As it grows, even from three people to five, you start to really have the need for these things.

Craig Anderson [00:32:20]:

In the area of confidence, Brook talks about a lot of the challenges she had early on with her hiring practices. She was hiring the wrong people because she just resonated with them on a personal level. And she has learned over time that she really needs to focus on the.

Craig Anderson [00:32:37]:

Kinds of people she needs to get.

Craig Anderson [00:32:38]:

In the door to do the roles that she needs performed on. And so that brings you a layer of confidence. I think the self awareness that she displayed drives confidence. Because now we see, okay, I didn't do that, right? Here's how I need to do it differently. That's going to allow me to be more successful. And when you have the confidence in knowing you can learn from your mistakes, mistakes don't seem so scary anymore, Although I still recommend trying to avoid them. And then finally, in the area of calm, Brook talked about how leadership is really hard. It's one big takeaway she's had from running her own business for 20 years.

Craig Anderson [00:33:09]:

And the thing that we start to learn is that we're not the only ones doing it. It's one of the reasons why I like to teach a lot of the small business frameworks that I teach in group programs, because I think it's really important for small business owners to realize it is hard, but I'm not alone. Other people are going through the same types of challenges I am every day. And when you realize it's not just you, that does help you to build some calm. As always, remember, you can go from being an accidental leader to the greatest.

Craig Anderson [00:33:35]:

Leader of all time.

Craig Anderson [00:33:36]:

All it takes is developing your confidence, confidence, and calm. See you next time on Executive Evolution.