USA Leadership Corps

Peter's Story

Before graduating from the University of Chicago's Graduate School of Business, Peter He was a Senior Analyst for NASDAQ Stock Market. In that role he was responsible for developing, planning, and implementing new software products for the use of its institutional clients.

Recently, Peter took a position as a Financial Consultant for a real estate company that afforded him great time flexibility during the workday. Therefore, he was very interested in using that flexibility to volunteer in his community. “I have always found volunteering personally rewarding,” he shares.

Peter Learns About The Corps

One day while visiting Monster.com (to stay abreast of the job market), Peter viewed a posting for an unique volunteer opportunity. The posting was titled, "Boost Your Career/MBA: Consult Non-Profits and Small Biz.".

Peter read the posting, visited the Corps website and thought, "This seems like an excellent way to improve my leadership skills while also serving my community... I also think it would be a great way to gain exposure to different management environments.”

He then applied to the program and received nearly 100 pages of online training materials. As he reviewed the Corps' consulting approach he thought, "This approach is very comparable to the strategies I learned during business school."


	Peter He
	. .

MaidPro of Silver Springs, MD ....

Finally he had a phone interview with a Corps Project Coach. “In addition to testing my knowledge of the Corps approach, the interview prepared me for my first client interaction - during which I needed to earn my client’s trust very quickly.“

Peter's Client

Two weeks after his interview, the Corps matched Peter with a small business within 15 minutes of his home. His client was MaidPro of Silver Springs. MaidPro is a national residential and office cleaning franchise, and the owner of this local, Maryland-area business had very specific revenue targets he wanted to achieve over the coming years. He was looking for assistance in improving his marketing strategy in order to achieve those targets.

After his first meeting with the client, Peter thought, "My client has put his heart into building his company. I am very excited to help him and his team on this important challenge."

"The Corps was a great way to improve my leadership while also serving my community."

Peter's Success

Over the next three months, Peter met with the owner, his office manager, and his sales manager to analyze their business goals and challenges. He followed the Corps’ consulting approach diligently each step of the way. “The Corps approach guided us through ambiguous areas of their business. We were able to identify (and prioritize) a great number of revenue-enhancing ideas very efficiently.”

By the conclusion of the project, Peter and his client identified the business’ biggest area for improvement: having better trained representatives who were more effective at converting new sales. The client and Peter agreed that many opportunities had been missed because some staff members were not 100% effective when dealing with prospective customers.

Peter and the client then developed a comprehensive plan for training the reps.

"I found the entire experience valuable, especially as a young professional preparing for more managerial duties."

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Summary:

Peter was very satisfied with what he accomplished during the project. “I found the entire experience valuable, especially as a young professional preparing for more managerial duties... Further, because I also am considering opening my own business within the next few years, this experience gave me greater insight into the challenges of entrepreneurship.”

Peter’s client was also very pleased with the results. And to show his appreciation, during their last project meeting he gave Peter a bottle of wine!