PM-Mastery

Interview with Kayla McGuire - Project Management Consultant

• Walt Sparling • Season 1 • Episode 37

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In This Episode:

Ever felt overwhelmed by big projects, wishing you could break them down into smaller, manageable tasks? Join us as we chat with Kayla McGuire, an independent project management consultant whose passion lies in doing just that! 

With her background in startups and small businesses, Kayla will share her journey of realizing her love for project management and how she transformed it into a successful consulting business.

In this fascinating conversation, we'll discuss the importance of flexibility with project management tools and solutions, and how Kayla approaches each project with a fresh perspective as a PM consultant. 

Get ready to explore her popular YouTube channel, which she started without any promotion, and learn how her consulting business has grown since its inception. By the end of this episode, you'll be inspired by Kayla's drive to empower others and turn their ideas into reality. Don't miss out on these invaluable insights from an expert in the field!

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Intro:

Welcome to the PM Mastery podcast. This podcast is all about helping you master your project management skills by sharing tips, tricks, tools and training to get you to the next level, while sharing the stories of other project managers on their journey in project management. Now here's your host, Walt Sparling.

Walt Sparling:

Welcome everyone to the current episode of PM Mastery. Today I have with me Kayla McGuire. Kayla is an independent project management consultant. Is that right, kayla?

Kayla McGuire:

Yeah, that's a great way to say it.

Walt Sparling:

Okay, so a different spin on the typical interviews we have, and I'm interested in hearing about Kayla's story. So we're going to start out with the typical. who are you? Tell us a little bit about yourself.

Kayla McGuire:

I'm Kayla. It's great to be here, by the way. Well, thank you for having me. I've been listening to your podcasts and enjoy what I have learned about other project managers, so I'm really excited to be here and share as well.

Kayla McGuire:

My name is Kayla and my background is in startup and small business, going back as far as college days when I helped my uncle open his restaurant. So I've kind of always had this interest in startup and small business and spent some time working in startups and small business, actually had my own business there for a while and then landed in tech startup, which is where I discovered project management. Might be one of your questions in the future here, but through that I discovered my love for project management, figured out that, wow, this thing is, this project management thing is actually sort of how I naturally think. So I'm going to jump off into project management, and that's what I've done for the last, i guess, seven years or so, and two years ago I decided to go and start my own consulting business project management consulting business and that's what I've been doing full time for the last two years.

Walt Sparling:

So that is bold. I like that bold and daring. So you did have a little bit of time in the PM world and then you're like, hey, I can do this, and you combine a little bit of your starter, your PM experience, and now you're doing this and you're two years in.

Kayla McGuire:

You said Right, I'm two years in full time. I did a year prior to that, so my business is technically celebrating its third birthday this month. But yeah, that's it.

Walt Sparling:

So the next thing is the question is typically what you do, so you've kind of led into that, but could you give us a little bit of like what's a day in the life with Kayla?

Kayla McGuire:

Yeah, i have three different things that I do through my business. The first is project management typical project management, and what that looks like is I will partner with a team who has a project usually looks something like a website build or a new app that they want to develop And I'll help project management manage that through the lifecycle. So that's the first thing that I do. The second thing is the consulting aspect of the business, which is what I love the most, and that's where I partner with small teams, small businesses, startups usually that are, between you know, 12 and 20 employees kind of too small to have a project manager, but they have a lot going on.

Intro:

They have a lot to manage.

Kayla McGuire:

They just can't bring someone on in a full time capacity. So I'll come in, serve as like a fractional project manager, but also as like an operational expert to wrangle things, maybe even build a PMO, figure out how we can get things done more effectively. So that's the consulting part of the business. And then the third thing that I do that I recently started doing this is the most recent thing I've started doing and that's the coaching. Through the coaching, i do one-on-one coaching, but I also offer boot camps, and we can talk more about that in a little bit as well.

Walt Sparling:

Yeah, i'm definitely interested in learning a little bit about that. Why, why do you do this?

Kayla McGuire:

Why do I do this? Well, as I said, my fascination with the business world in general goes back, you know, to college days. So I always knew I wanted to work with small teams and startups and business and things like that. I love figuring out puzzles. I love figuring out how to get things done. That's really where I've found my passion is and what I'm good at. What other people say I'm good at, so I know I'm probably good at it And I just get excited when somebody says, hey, we have an idea but we don't actually know how to get it done. Can you help us figure that out? That's the most exciting thing to me is putting that all together, figuring out how to get things done and then empowering people to actually do it. That's one of the hardest parts, too is the execution of the idea. You know, working with people and showing them that it's not as hard as we make it if we break it down into small pieces and just focus on one thing at a time.

Walt Sparling:

And I think that's the PM, that's the PM part of you. That's like hey guys. So that's great. And my next question is it varies by person And it's how do you continue to learn in order to continue to grow? But I'm kind of thinking through your experience and you have three different things that you do. They're all completely different in most ways. You could get someone on Monday as a client that is completely 180 to someone you get on Thursday and you got to figure out what it is they need and it might be an industry, because you've said a couple of different things that you've done that there's not specifically industry related similarities.

Walt Sparling:

I know, when I think about that is like I consider myself a PM, pmi book. I'm a PM. I can manage anything, any industry, any whatever, because I know the core stuff. But I've been doing design and construction for years. Going into a tech world would be like I could probably figure it out, but that's going to be super scary. How do you take all the variety of things you're going to get into and how do you continue to learn and grow in what you do?

Kayla McGuire:

Oh well, I'm a super curious person by nature, So that's something that I naturally do. I have a natural curiosity. Also, I don't watch TV. It's going to sound like I'm a little bit of a workaholic. I mean, that might be true, but I genuinely love this and I'm genuinely curious. But I'm also not afraid to say if someone came to me with a project and it wasn't a good fit for me, maybe I didn't have an interest in the thing, Maybe I really there's a huge learning curve that I don't think would be beneficial to the relationship. I don't have a problem saying that and saying this project isn't a good fit for me. Here's who is a good fit. So I try to focus on those things where projects that I know I'm going to be excited about, projects that I'm curious about and I want to dig into more. If I don't have that curiosity, then that's a really big red flag for me to even take the project on.

Walt Sparling:

Okay, so you investigate and you learn and you just do you have any favorite like channels or media, that you use platforms to learn stuff?

Kayla McGuire:

I read a lot of PMI articles. If we're talking about project management, i love to stay on top of trends and things like that. I'm obviously on LinkedIn. I probably spend way too much time on LinkedIn, but I learn a ton of information on there. Aside from that, i have some favorite podcasts and things that they're more related to like self development than they would be to that sort of thing. I'm very into personal development and growing and becoming a better version of myself. But yeah, in general, i just I'm curious. I will contact someone if I have a question, i'll call, i'll look something up, like I'm saying, if I work with a team and I don't know something, i don't have a problem saying I don't know what that means. Can you tell me what that means? Can you explain that to me? I feel it's much better to be straightforward with people and upfront about what you do and don't know. All right.

Walt Sparling:

With the variety of stuff you do, and I know that you had indicated that you were a single mom, so challenges You've got your own business, you've got a variety of different services you offer and you're a mom. So tell us a little bit about challenges.

Kayla McGuire:

Oh my gosh. Well, i think you just hit the nail in the head. There It is. It is very difficult to balance all of that sometimes, often times and I struggle with the same Feelings I think any mother or parent would about how much time do I want to spend on work versus? is this taking away from time I should spend with my child? So I try to make sure that I have dedicated times and spaces for things that I'm doing. She knows, when I have these in my ears, that it's quiet and we don't disturb mom. She's an active kid. I'm I'm so lucky to have her. She's very smart, she's active, she's social, we do a lot of activities and she's involved in a lot of things. So, yeah, i think having that, that space, both in terms of physical space and time, the biggest help that I've found in my own time management is time blocking.

Kayla McGuire:

This is really the secret right, it's what everybody tells you, but there's so much truth to it and you have to be disciplined with it.

Kayla McGuire:

So what I do every day before I start my work day is and I try to do this night before, but it doesn't always happen like that Usually happens in the morning I wake up early, i'll look at my calendar, i figure out how I what I want to get done that day, what's the most important, block that off, designate all my time and stay focused and, like I say, sometimes I get distracted And I spend a little too much time on LinkedIn or whatever it is.

Kayla McGuire:

We all have our vices. I figure LinkedIn is not a bad place. So I, yeah, block it off and get stuff done and at the end of the day, if I was able to get, you know, 90% of The things done that I wanted to get done, i feel pretty good because I know I'm making progress and I know I'm headed in the right direction. I also think it's really important to say you know to stuff. You have to say no to things that aren't a good fit, to things that Just don't take you where you want to go and many of us as PMs are helpers, and it's hard to say no Especially it depends on your situation.

Walt Sparling:

But, like leading a team, i know it's like my team needs me and it's like my boss needs stuff and it's like You know I'm trying to help the team. Well, you need to get this done for me. You need to learn to say no.

Kayla McGuire:

All right, you do Well, and we take it on ourselves too. I know I do this where I'll have the team, team members come to me and say I have all of this stuff going on And I just can't do this, and I so Want to say, well, i can do that for you, even though I also have a full plate. So you're right, it's about Figuring out how to make that work.

Walt Sparling:

You've got to pick, and choose, yeah so one of the problems that I think a lot of people that I've talked to over the The years is like okay, they have challenges, so how do they deal with challenges? time blocking. I love time blocking. I'm a big fan of it. I push that with teammates, with other people, and it's like I've written courses on it and it's like it's so cool. But you typically Get through that hurdle with some kind of tool, whether it be Outlook or Gmail or maybe it's another scheduling app or a tool that keeps track of your time. If you use certain methodology and I'm trying to think of one where you'd like the 30 minutes.

Walt Sparling:

Logan has some good stuff, like the Pomodoro Yes and I just bought a little device based on a recent podcast and it's got a 15, 20, 30 minute and a 60 minute and depending on where you put the book, the Cube, it starts a timer and I have time blocks. So I just have to start the timer because sometimes, like you said, you get into something and you get in the zone and that 30 minute timer, 15 minutes later, you're still. You're still focused. If you don't get that little beep, beep, beep, pull you out of that. No, you got something else to do. You keep going. So tools. So what are some of your favorite tools that keep you productive and keep you going?

Kayla McGuire:

I am so simple. I love simple things. I love keeping everything simple, because every time I've tried to adopt a bunch of tools and make things complicated, it just becomes complicated. So I love simple things. I live and die by my calendar, my Gmail calendar. I just live and die by it. Anything that's on there I know is truth, except for, apparently, our meeting today.

Walt Sparling:

We figured it out.

Kayla McGuire:

We figured it out. So, yeah, my calendar is key. Obviously, i use Gmail. All of the Google products I love especially being a business owner and trying to be smart about what I spend money on. I love the Google products. I also use Calendly. I think that has been really helpful for me with scheduling meetings and being able to refer people to my calendar to just say, hey, grab a time slot here So helpful.

Kayla McGuire:

A tool I like for project management with the teams that I work with and keep in mind that these teams are often small teams A tool I really like that's where there's actually a great free version of it is called Shortcutio. I think it used to be called Clubhouse. We used to do a tech startup I worked at several years ago. I really liked it for the simplicity of it. It's easy to use, quite customizable, easy to set up integrations and things like that. So I always like to suggest that, especially for teams that are more focused on software building technology, that's sort of a thing. It's a great tool. So use that one for PM stuff.

Kayla McGuire:

Sometimes I use Monday. In a project that I'm working on right now, which is essentially I'm building a program for a client, i'm using Monday. It seems to be a pretty good solution for what we're doing now. But I'm pretty flexible. I'm not married to any one tool or solution. I'll use whatever makes the most sense for the use case And that's what I try to promote with my clients as well is use what makes sense for you and what works for you and makes your life easier. So you don't need a ton of tools. If you don't need a ton of tools, use what's going to work for you.

Walt Sparling:

And as a consultant, that's a big thing because you might have I used to be an IT consultant and I had tools that I used all the time and I'd go into small companies and say, oh, you should use this for backup or you should use this for virus monitoring, and they're like, well, we don't have that And I'm like, okay, we'll work with what you got And then over time we'll see. But you got to be flexible. The thing is it's another learning. You can look at it two ways. It's another learning thing you have to do, or it's another learning opportunity, so you're more flexible. But I think in your position or role, flexible is huge because you got to deal with what they have. So you're learning a lot just because of the variety of clients you have.

Kayla McGuire:

You hit the nail on the head And I think that's really one of the reasons why I love this is because I do have that curiosity, that love of learning And I know that the projects that I step into there's going to be a learning curve for me most of the time, but I welcome that. That's exciting to me. That doesn't scare me unless it's something I really don't want to work on. In most cases, that's exciting to me.

Walt Sparling:

Not all challenges are bad.

Kayla McGuire:

No, no, and I found the teams that I work on really appreciate that about me as well, because I come in with fresh eyes, fresh perspective of hey, some of the stuff I'm learning for the first time, why are we doing this this way, or why do we use this And we're able to have these conversations and address challenges and things that are happening in the workflow and figure out if this is actually the best way to do things.

Walt Sparling:

In the back of my mind. I'm thinking about that kind of building that relationship with a client and you get someone to show you something and teach you something And it's like you are creating a bonding moment right there where they're like oh, they're willing to listen And I get to show them stuff and they're like I really like this person.

Kayla McGuire:

Yeah, well, yeah, i think that's a big part of it, And I'm all about asking questions. I'm all about understanding from their perspective. What do they need? What are the pain points, like what? that's how I approach all of my clients is really trying to understand them and what they're trying to achieve and how we can make things better, easier, smarter for them, instead of focusing on. You know, this is what you need to do, and I know that because I'm the expert and I did this on my last project. Maybe that's true, but you need to listen first.

Walt Sparling:

So we're kind of through our norm. We only have one question left. That is kind of our can, and I want to hold that to the end because there's a few things that I want to talk about with you. One you're doing consulting. You talked about your. I don't think you mentioned your YouTube. If you did, i missed it, but I know you have a YouTube. I know you also do a boot camp for other people that are independent PM consultants And I had mentioned to you before we started the call that you were actually on my radar back in January. I had seen you on LinkedIn and I think I looked you up and I was watching some of your posts and then I found out you had a YouTube channel. So I went, i sent myself the link to go and I was going through my email, kind of putting all my notes together, that was searched on your name And I'm like wow, i've been like and I said earlier stalking.

Walt Sparling:

But been following you since like January, so tell us a little bit about your YouTube channel and about this boot camp.

Kayla McGuire:

Yeah, so my YouTube channel. I always like talking about the YouTube channel because it seems like something I would absolutely never do three or four years ago. I would have never done this. The reason why I started my YouTube channel is because I was working for a tech startup in 2020 and we were trying to get some more funding And, unfortunately, in February of 2020, we weren't able to get the funding And so we just had to close the doors. It was game over done. We can't move forward.

Kayla McGuire:

And I was devastated because I loved working at the company and I loved the team and I was really getting into the project management stuff that we were doing at that time and really kind of learning a lot, learning a lot. And so I was devastated. And it's February 2020 and then the pandemic hits and I'm unemployed and have the little one at home and I'm thinking what am I going to do? What am I going to do next year? And so I started looking for jobs and I knew I wanted to work in startup and I was like I want to be. I want to be a project manager again for a startup. That's the job that I want. So I started looking for jobs and then I just started getting curious about what kind of articles there are about being a project manager and startup, and I started looking up to see if I could find some support or resources for people that are trying to get jobs in startup, project management or trying to level up or trying to become better, and I couldn't really find anything. It was like this is a weird little niche. I wonder if there are other people that do this.

Kayla McGuire:

And one of my friends actually before that, i started a blog because I thought, well, this is interesting, i was going to write about it. So I started a blog written word and I said I'm going to write this blog and maybe this will help some other people too. So I started this blog. And then I had a friend who said you should take a video of yourself talking about this, and I was mortified. I thought why would I do that? Why would I ever do that And why would anyone ever want to watch that? But she planted the seed and I thought about it And one day I just pulled out the camera and at this time I'm embarrassed to say I didn't even know how to edit the video Like this is just a. I hit record and it was one tape and I just talked to the camera And that was my first video and I posted it and it did not go viral. I think I got like 10 views.

Walt Sparling:

Mom, dad, uncle, Exactly right.

Kayla McGuire:

Like well, that's the funny thing too. I didn't tell anyone. I didn't tell anyone I knew, and I've never promoted it that way. Until I joined LinkedIn back in October, i didn't promote my YouTube channel, i just put the videos out there, which is not what you're supposed to do, but that's what I did, and so I just kept making videos and at this point, i have over 150 videos that I've made And, like I said, the trajectory of the channel is organic because I haven't promoted this thing. I think I'm just now coming up on a thousand subscribers, which is exciting, but I know that the people that are subscribing actually want to watch, and I get a lot of feedback from people that comment or send me private messages or, you know, ask me questions.

Walt Sparling:

And it's interesting because and I told you that I started to look at you in January but you did a post recently where you talked about your YouTube and how you started and how different your new videos are compared to your old, and I'm like, oh, i'm going to go check this out. So I followed the link and it wasn't until later that I'm like, oh, that's the same one.

Kayla McGuire:

Oh, that's funny.

Walt Sparling:

So we grow. I mean not my first podcast. We're like not something I'm proud of, but you don't know until you try. And I think I started in 20 as a whim. Someone said you should start a podcast And I'm like, on what I don't know And why? Well, you have a voice, okay, but I gotta have something to talk about. So I came up with project management while I was out on a retreat one month with my wife And it's like, hey, guess what I'm gonna do. And here we are.

Kayla McGuire:

It's great. Yeah, I love it. It's funny how that happens, how we have those ideas where someone suggests it and then we think about it and decide to do it And yeah, in my case, it's been really great. Like I said, I don't have a huge viewership, but I have gotten clients from it And I think that's the biggest tell for me that I'm doing the right thing. I'm talking about the right thing. In fact, I got a client who I still work with to this day off of one of my very first videos. He contacted me and said I really like what you're saying. I haven't seen anyone else talk about this the way that you talk about this And I would love to partner. And so we've been working together for almost three years now And it's been amazing, And I've gotten coaching clients and other clients from the channel as well, So it's been a great thing.

Walt Sparling:

But we're gonna make you famous after this, after this interview.

Kayla McGuire:

If I could get, i think I need six more subscribers. So if I could get, i think that's what I need to get to a thousand. Oh, seven, okay, i need seven more, all right, you'll have those. Oh, four more. Look, I got three more while we were talking.

Walt Sparling:

Yeah, and we're not even live. It's just out there. Yeah, yeah, all right. So that is cool, and I've watched some of your videos. I think it's great. I love the story. So the other thing that you do is the bootcamp. So give us a little update or info on the bootcamp.

Kayla McGuire:

So the bootcamp is a reef and idea. I've been doing the coaching since last October And the bootcamp is something that I thought of after doing quite a few coaching sessions and people giving me feedback about how helpful I was when talking about freelancing and some of the specific questions that were helpful. I started kind of matching that up with questions that I just get in my inbox and LinkedIn or on YouTube And there are a lot of the same questions around how do I get started in freelancing? Where do I find my freelancing clients? What are the best platforms? What sort of rates could I expect in project management, freelancing? I thought you know what? these are all really good questions and they're not that easy to find. I'm going to kind of bottle this up And first thing I did was create a little booklet.

Kayla McGuire:

It's about 50 pages and I offer that in the bootcamp as well. And then I just said you know, i'm going to try this thing out. We're going to do three sessions, one hour each and go through my step-by-step in the booklet And by the end of it. The idea is that you have these front end questions answered that a lot of people will hymn and haught over during their first days or weeks or months or even years as a freelancer. I want you guys to have all of that out of the way so that you can actually go out there, market yourself and start getting clients. So many people get hung up on all of these things like how I write my resume, or what rate should I charge, or how many profiles do I need to put out there on freelancing platforms. Get all those questions answered in that figured out, so you can go out there and actually start to find clients and make money. That's what it's all about.

Walt Sparling:

Well, i'm looking forward to taking that, because I'm definitely interested in that.

Kayla McGuire:

Oh good, Yeah, you are Welcome to join.

Walt Sparling:

Awesome. Well, I toyed with it when I first saw it. I'm like I know I have an interview coming up with her, So I'm going to talk with her first And then we'll go. So we're still not down to the final question, but I am kind of excited because, as we talk, we have interacted quite a bit over the last few months. Just prior to this, I think I stalked you a little bit, Said hey, I'd love to get you on the podcast.

Walt Sparling:

You're like I don't know And then eventually you're like all right, yeah, i'll do it, but we've interacted in a lot of posts together with a lot of other great PM leaders, and one of the things that's coming and this is very new to me, just like what you're doing is this idea that I just came up with recently called the PM Knights and Ladies of the Roundtable, and it's going to be PM leaders, both male and female, from so we can't call it Knights of the Roundtable that are in the industry, that have been providing all this great information for various audiences, and I want to do like a quarterly LinkedIn live, which I've never done one before. I've seen them, but never done one.

Kayla McGuire:

I've never done one either.

Walt Sparling:

And get on with maybe four or five. We have a whole group of people I think I have eight people now that are signed up for this and great names And we're going to do topics. I mean, my first one I think I want to do is on communications, But we'll talk about risk budgets, phasing different things and let people ask questions and get all these variety of experiences to answer questions, And you have recently joined the table, So I'm looking forward to having you a part of those conversations.

Kayla McGuire:

I am so excited. I think that's a fantastic idea And, yeah, it'll be fun.

Walt Sparling:

Yeah, i am definitely looking forward to that, and in the show notes that I have, i'm going to put links to your boot camp, links to your YouTube, link to your LinkedIn profile, and I might put in some Well, i don't have any link for the Knights and Ladies at the table, but maybe put a little call out there. So the last one of my favorites is the Did You Know, which is the opportunity for a guest to come in and share something, anything that people may not be aware of, and it could be an aha moment. So do you have a Did You Know for us?

Kayla McGuire:

I do have a did you know? we talked about this a little bit already. My did you know comes from something I learned after being interviewed for a dice article about Five steps to become a freelance project manager. And what I learned through that article working through the staff is there's over 128,000 Open freelance project manager jobs in the United States 128,000 this is the reason why they decided to run that article And I just thought you know what?

Kayla McGuire:

That's a lot. That's a lot of job openings. Obviously, they're different, right, they're gonna be for different types of PM work and different rates and things like that. They're all across the board, but it's a lot. And What I like to share about that is that there's opportunity out there, because so often I get Messages in my inbox that are, like you know, is are there jobs out there for me? I want to start freelancing on the side. What do you think? could I really make money at this? and the answer is yes. Yes, if you apply yourself and you strategically job search just like you would for a regular job, and Find the right opportunities for you, there's certainly Jobs out there. So I like to throw that out there just as data to support that, this freelance project management thing is Is actually a thing? because that's a question I get a lot. Is this an actual thing? it is.

Walt Sparling:

Now is this okay? So I do see that you provided the link to that article, so I'll throw that in the show notes as well, and that's great. That's great input. Any last thoughts or things you want to throw out?

Kayla McGuire:

Gosh, I feel like I breezed through everything, but I tend to do that. I tend to be really quick about my answers, so if there's anything I could be more thorough about, let me know.

Walt Sparling:

I like the breezy It gives. It gives us an opportunity to Kind of get the highlights, and I would rather People either go and check out your LinkedIn, go and check out your YouTube channel, which you've got tons of videos out there, and then generate some questions. And one of the things I like to do is Usually when people just get new jobs, so you don't actually have a new job, but you're kind of going into a new new venture here with kind of the bootcamp thing and Maybe we'll have you back in a year. So if anyone is interested in learning more, they can either message you or message me and say, hey, I'd like to have her talk more about X plus. Now you're gonna be talking on the round table, so There's gonna be lots of opportunity to ask you more detail.

Kayla McGuire:

There you go. Yeah, and I'm. I'm always open to questions, always open to sharing. I I'm so glad that you asked me to be on here, by the way. This has been great.

Walt Sparling:

Well, i am so happy that you said yes, and for everyone else, i appreciate you Hanging out and we'll see you on the next episode of PM mastery.

Intro:

Thanks for listening to the PM mastery podcast at www. pm-masterycom. Be sure to subscribe in your podcast play. Until next time. Keep working on your craft.