Today we’d like to introduce you to Trisha Daho.
So, before we jump into specific questions about the business, why don’t you give us some details about you and your story.
I went straight to a Big 4 accounting firm out of law school. I knew from the moment I arrived there, that I wanted to be a partner. The regular track for making partner was between 14 and 16 years. I made it in 9 years after building a multi-million dollar practice in Detroit of all places! Soon thereafter, I was transferred to the Carolinas to build another practice there. I was also recruited to be a champion for all of the gender equity and diversity initiatives for that region of the country. I learned a ton about how to motivate a high performing team from a variety of backgrounds and current circumstances. Most of my team there was on flexible work arrangements and we still managed to grow a thriving consulting business. Three years later, the firm asked me to move to a bigger market and told me that I could choose between Chicago and New York. I chose Chicago, having lived most of my life in the Midwest.
Chicago proved to be my biggest business challenge. The internal culture was vastly different than I had been used to. I had made so much progress and success largely in part, because I had been allowed to be entrepreneurial in all of my prior positions but in Chicago, we were told to only pursue already well established business relationships. I felt like despite my usual 80 hour workweeks, my wings had been clipped and it wasn’t the enormous fun it had been in the past to create brand new and fruitful business relationships. I was getting burnt out.
Around the same time, I met my now husband, a french schoolteacher, while on vacation in Paris. He didn’t quite understand the culture I was working in – midnight conference calls, proposals due while vacationing, and instant access to me at all times! He began to ask me questions about why I was so passionate about my work. I surprised myself with the answers. I loved being surrounded by extremely intelligent people, I loved the thrill of the pursuit and I loved solving very complex problems for my clients. But, I hadn’t had much of a personal life in nearly 20 years, nor was I able to make the leadership decisions I thought I would be making. My life wasn’t really my own.
After much reflection, I decided to make the leap and start my own company. I would focus on helping other professional service providers create enormous value for their clients and in turn, create huge revenue growth for themselves and their teams. In addition, I would create the same kind of hard core strategies for groups of women and diverse people so that they could thrive in the same environments from which I had come. And that is what I do now!
Has it been a smooth road?
Nothing great is every a smooth road!
I would say my corporate life prepared me for nearly everything I am doing now with a couple of important exceptions. First, I miss my giant, high performing team and the endless resources I had in corporate America! Pacing yourself to get it all done is an art form in the middle market. I’m still learning that I can have and do every single thing RIGHT NOW. Second, the realization that your vision will change and that it’s okay is revelatory. You do not have to have it all figured out as you leave the gates. It is far more important to leave the gates and always be refining, make it what you live for.
So, as you know, we’re impressed with Empowered – tell our readers more, for example what you’re most proud of as a company and what sets you apart from others.
My company, Empowered, has two primary service offerings. The first, and core offering, is helping leaders of professional service firms like law firms and accounting firms, create strategies to refine all of the parts of their firms that are not already ideal and also, create winning strategies to further their brand in the marketplace, attract exactly the right clients, and increase revenues and profits. The kind of focus, planning, and action that takes places delivers a typical 2 and a half times increase in their current growth percentages. The second service offering is very similar in content but is offered to large firms like the one I grew up in, specifically for women and diverse people who are up and coming leaders. We put together a peer advisory experience for groups of about 15 leaders and spend a year with them to create powerful strategies around their own individual books of business, help them connect meaningful with the real leaders of the organization to create advocacy for their own career paths and trajectories, and establish high performing teams that allow for much greater revenue growth. It is essentially taking everything I did for 18 years and bringing to the very people in my shoes.
I’m most proud that I have created a firm based in action. I partner with leaders, I do not subordinate their own abilities and acumen. They know themselves and their firms better than I ever will, and we use that power to create amazing results for them. My power is that I have been exactly where they are. I have started from virtual scratch and had to make hay in a short period of time with nearly no support. And, because I’ve been there, I own this company. If it had been easy, if I had had leaders and bosses who really advocated for me and supported my value in the firm I was in, I wouldn’t be as equipped now.
Let’s touch on your thoughts about our city – what do you like the most and least?
I love how motivated most people are, there are so many extraordinary movers and shakers in this city that are looking to create enormous value in a million new ways. That is exciting! I love the diversity of the people here, the fact that so many come from all over the country and the world to make their marks in Chicago is humbling to me. And I like Midwestern values: work hard, be kind, do well.
I do not like the traffic. I will never get used to the traffic!
Contact Info:
- Website: www.empoweredlc.com
- Phone: 224-938-3348
- Email: trisha@empoweredlc.com
Getting in touch: VoyageChicago is built on recommendations from the community; it’s how we uncover hidden gems, so if you know someone who deserves recognition please let us know here.
