Melissa Overton on Innovative Medical Training and Leadership Development in Johnston County

jonathan-breeden_1_08-14-2024_111017.mp3: well wilson’s got you up yeah wake county’s about like san francisco oh yeah but but wilson johnson harner they’re like like common sense purveyors right right right so anyway does my clothes look right do my clothes butch came here wearing shorts and he’s like well we had an event at work and i’m like i don’t like i know you’re coming from the waistband i know i was like i’m like wait a minute zoom in but i don’t know if they did i know so we we shot a couple with butch and that would be awesome though for those of us that know him that would that would be no no he’s he’s he he’s he’s interesting to say the least so oh okay so anyway so so the way the format of this podcast works is i do an intro like melissa overton it’s it’s it’s me medical training dot me not biz it’s me dot me see i had my head in the middle medical training dot me medical training dot me alright i gotta go it was the only training website left when i opened my business and my brother is a millennial and he was like the name of your business should be your web address that’s interesting yeah because you’ve always said that i mean that’s every time i’ve heard you speak so yeah so anyways well and i’m launching a whole new brand but we don’t have time to get into all that probably yeah so so yeah well if you want to talk about it i don’t want to talk about anything you want but so then i ask people to like and subscribe and follow the podcast and then i welcome you on and then i say the first question is always you know tells who you are what you do you know biographical where you grew up you know blah blah blah you know sort of your history where you went to school you’re a nurse you’re in a hospital you know kind of you know how we got here mhmm and then then we usually start talking about whatever business or whatever trainings y’all provide how you can help the community this that and the other and then because you’re so active in the community well i know you do you’re doing launch showco which i’m willing to help with i told dana was here we recorded her the other day i told dana i would help like i mean because i’ve done i’ve worked with them on the mentoring side or the sponsoring side i mean i would be a mentor i’ve done i’ve been a mentor for okay which has been hit or miss like one year it was really good even though the business didn’t make it and the next two years i met with a lady one time and said like i don’t know what you do i couldn’t figure out what you do okay you’re gonna have to make what you do clearer and she sold the green leafy stuff that goes on fancy restaurants microbrains okay like when you go to a fancy restaurant they have a which apparently have a lot of health stuff to them right these microgreens like the parsley and right right right that it’s these microgreens but that’s her whole business it’s selling parts that she’s trying to grow in a shipping container in a backyard in a town of garner with all kinds of zoning problems and and i was like and after i told her i was like it’s not clear you gotta work on she i never heard from him again so i was like alright here’s the good news is this will be things that are shipping well it’s a greenhouse effect so right so yeah right they can’t they can’t get that hot well i know it shouldn’t say that dark but yeah it’s weird but yeah our group we’ve got our fourth cohort coming through so the good news about that is is that now in order to qualify the interview you have to be in business for at least a year making money and then they have to do a shark tank style presentation to get into to the program oh okay well garner’s so if they’re like completely sketchy we refer them back to the small business center so that they can work on that and be ready for the next couple years so this year we’ve had a lot of success well because because my third person was doing juicing out of their house and i never heard from her i was like this is well that’s a health code violation yeah i mean they were just yeah that’s public health so it just yeah i was just like our first year we had some of that cigars is like i don’t know well they’re figuring it out what happened is our first year we let anybody in our second year we got a little more discerning our third year we were like wait a minute so third cohort has been the most successful and this coming year we expect one to say that i mean i’m willing to come speak about whatever i i i can talk about mindset and the mindset podcast i listen to mhmm i can talk about trying to make yourself a brand okay i know a little bit about that i mean i i pay people a whole lot of money to make me a brand but i am kind of a brand now so i know a little bit about what they did we’ve got i could bring rayna with me yeah you know we’ve got the launch beyond series it’s something we piloted last year and we’re gonna bring back and what that is is that is a continuing ed series that is targeted towards our graduates but open to anyone in the community to come out and it’s a two and a half three hour session on a monday night once a month it’s like the fourth monday of every month yeah and so we’ll be looking for topics for that yeah so i definitely am gonna put you there dude i could talk about all kinds of stuff i don’t know you’re like me just talk about anything yeah i could talk to them i use the department personality profile which is fascinating everybody in the office take this personality profile i still haven’t given that to you no not me i i was a i’m a contractor i know you’re a contractor i know so anyway it’s fascinating the harbor i do the colors which is just the berry it’s like disc yeah it’s like the four basic and i like this one is more specific and when you’re working together in a tight group like this those details are more needed when i teach the colors which is disc and it’s the elements it’s called all these different ones the reason that i do that is i teach them how to size people up like i know more about your personality now than most people just by talking to you for a few minutes yeah so know what motivates people so well because then when you’re having the conversation yeah exactly so we’ll so so we’ll talk about medical billing no not medical billing medical training dot me medical training dot me oh my gosh i’m gonna get this wrong anyway and then when you talk about launch show code you can talk about celebrate her if you want to elevate her some of the elevate her i’m bad i’m involved in a lot of stuff so we probably need like five podcasts to talk about different things like we’d be like if you need different content later we’ll be like we’ll be like yeah we yeah like we did two with butch by the time we got done talking to dana it was like thirty five minutes and we didn’t get to everything i think we gotta make two or three out of dana dana doesn’t even you let her go oh yo she was told us all kinds of stuff so yeah anyway i’m on the board with her so that’s where we get all these ideas and run with them so yeah so anyway and then the last question that we ask is what do you love most about the county that’s easy most people say the people it is you know and and so i have a unique perspective right and then then we’re like how do we get in touch with you if if i was gonna touch with you and then i sort of wrap it up ask him to like and subscribe and that’s that and and i actually said i knew you were coming so i said when we talked about you when dana wittman was here i said make sure you listen back in a couple weeks because once opening we’ll be on this podcast so i’m already doing the preview same thing with glitch like when i knew i was doing two episodes i said at the beginning of the first episode we’re gonna talk about a b c d and then they come back in a few weeks and hear him talk about f g h i mhmm and then i did that at the same at the end so if you really like what he had to say you can come back and and the next one is the sheriff’s department and public schools and the bonds and and land use and the first one was who is he and how he got here in clemson and nc state and mhmm clayton town council and raising kids and coaching ball and you know that kind of stuff so so sort of biographical and and you know but i did get him on the second one i’m like i nailed it he didn’t know what to say he was speechless but he got through it because i was like so the the the student growth in johnson county is flat but you’ve now given them twenty five more million dollars in recurring expenses for the same number of students explain that well well well well well we got this question and and we have federal money that ran out and we had to do this and that i’m like he was he was he’s like you’re gonna give me a story i i i knew i’d get you i was like i was like twenty five million dollars with the same numbers too oh yeah i got him i got him but we need it because we’re so far behind the table all the stuff yeah we’re so far i got kids at public school right now we are so far behind the eight ball i’m like oh my god that’s funny alright we’re ready yeah okay alright for different mother okay alright alright well we’ll see how this goes alright we’ll see we’ll give we’ll give it to them we’ll see is what they ask you to do i know am i sitting at the right angle for all these i’m like holy moly so yeah right right alright medical training dot me okay three two one hello and welcome to another episode of the best of johnson county podcast i’m your host jonathan breeden and today we have melissa overton from medical training dot me that is the website and that is the name of the business and she’s gonna talk to us a little bit about some of the customized training that her business provides she provides continuing education for nurses and paramedics and they also do on-site aed training and cpr training so we’ll talk a little bit about that we’re also gonna talk about all some of her community involvement with the clayton chamber of commerce and different things that she has done over the years with that including being one of the main people behind the launch joco program but before we do that i would like to ask you to like follow subscribe this podcast wherever you’re seeing it whether it be on youtube apple spotify linkedin tiktok twitter instagram or anywhere else that the best of johnson county podcast comes out so that you’ll be aware of future episodes of the best of johnson county podcast the best of johnson county podcast comes out every monday so we’ve had a lot of great guests we’re up well over forty episodes by now and so go back and listen to some of the previous guests that we’ve had including dana wootton president of the clayton chamber of commerce butch waters johnson county commissioner chairman patrick harris johnson county commissioner chris johnson johnson county economic development director and craig olive johnson county register of deeds i think you will find all of these episodes fascinating and educational as i did and we’ve enjoyed bringing to bringing them to you here from my office at the breed law office welcome melissa hey thank you for having me alright so anyway what we’ll always start with what’s your name what do you do where are you from so i am melissa overton and i actually am from johnston county not everybody knows that but i actually grew up in selma as a young girl and mom remarried when we were in high school so then i became a wake county girl which is how a lot of people remember and i grew up and did things and i went to east carolina university for nursing school and when i graduated from nursing school i said i was gonna be a big city nurse and i made it to wilson north carolina oh man wilson i love it wide awake wide awake wilson as a community nurse i was an er nurse working night shift learned a tremendous amount there was at the hospital for fourteen years went from er to er leadership to education leadership and then transitioned into the intensive care unit so kind of a a roundabout experience with health care and got injured early on in my career and i always tell people tell god what you’re gonna do and so he’ll laugh at you right so i said oh i’m gonna start a medical training company one day right and i’m gonna do this when i’m in my fifties and i was thirty seven i was thirty seven so as any er nurse would do i kinda blew up my whole world and decided just to start all over from scratch and move back to johnston county so i came back to my roots when my kids were four and six instead of graduated from high school like i said they would be when i did do this oh that’s that’s that’s that’s wild so so where did you go to high school so i went to triple s for two years ninety to ninety two and then i went to athens drive for the for the remaining two years so when we do like it we’re coming up on our thirtieth anniversary i wanna go to both right i wanna go to both because i i’ve got my triple s connections and i tell people something about johnson county is triple s is better than triple a right you can sit on the side of the road for an hour an hour and a half waiting for aaa to help you out but if you call a triple s hookup they’re gonna be there in a minute so literally had somebody come and change a tire for me on the side of the road one time and i was like that’s the triple s hookup that’s that’s it that’s it that’s it so well that’s cool so so what made you think you wanted to get into medical training so i was an er nurse right when i was in college i did ems and i worked at ecu in the er as a nursing assistant secretary and so i saw firsthand what we do to save lives and i wasn’t always thrilled with the experience of how we were trained it just seemed to be especially cpr training those people that have to take it every two years and it’s their job requirement they get really burned out and frustrated because they’re like i’m taking the same class over and over and over again so when i was working in the er i would show up in my manager’s office and i go you know what i’ve got this really good idea right and just about every week i came to her office and said you know what i got this really good idea so one day after about five years she called me in and she said do you know how you show up in my office every week and i said yes ma’am she said well we’ve decided to create a nurse educator position and you’re the mouthiest most opinionated nurse with a bachelor’s degree and i was like wow i worked night shift because i was mischievous mischievous i’m the good nowdy right i’m the good nowdy most days we all have our moments but it was an opportunity to go in and and to create education and innovate education instructor for cpr and advanced life support classes and it literally as wide open as i am it almost sent me turn tail running and i was married at the time and my husband was in the medical field and he said why why are you afraid of this you go after everything with no fear why is it this and i said well you know in health care we have to take tests and i’m always afraid of someone looking at my test score i don’t always take the written test the best you know and what if what if they say i’m not qualified and he says if you hate it he he said you can always go back to staffing and i was like great because i was a good er nurse and he was like an humble you know and so so we laughed about that but it gave me an opportunity to go in and go okay how do we teach these classes to meet the requirements for the certification but how do we make them different so that people really relax they lean back they have a good time in class and they walk out i tell them i don’t care what your test score is my challenge to you is are you a better provider and more willing to get involved as a result of coming to this training because that to me is the definition of true success test scores test score i’ve seen people make a hundred and they’re not gonna save a life i’ve seen people fail the test and they’re the first person i want working on me right so that’s what got me into the whole training side of things starting out with medical okay so so your whole focus is biz is is the practical the practical side of medical making sure that people can actually do it whether they can pass a written test or not because a written test isn’t gonna save somebody’s life it’s not and and what happens is number one when you walk into a classroom in any environment and you’re worried about passing a test you’re listening for the keywords from the instructor you’re not learning you’re not absorbing it’s a different level okay i’ve gotta pass this class i gotta pass this class versus when you tell people okay i need everybody to take a breath if you completely bomb the test if you’re not a complete jerk i do i leave that i’m like if you’re a jerk you get no assistance but if you’re not a jerk and you really truly come in here and you show me that the challenge is taking the test itself we’re gonna have ways to remediate you and work with you so that we want you to relax and absorb as much of the content as possible because my family lives in this community so i very much need you to to be empowered to respond i don’t need you to lock up and freeze up because you couldn’t remember the answer on the test i need you to go melissa said i feel like i’m gonna throw up i’m gonna pass out i don’t wanna get involved in this but she said do it anyway and so when they leave the classroom we tell them you know in those moments when it’s life and death what saves a life and life and death isn’t always the most experienced person it’s the person willing to get started and so we spend a good amount of time at the beginning of class kinda framing that out what does that look like and why is this so important because our responders are amazing right i would not trade them for anything in the world but they are kind of at the mercy to what the person does to begin with before they get there and that’s huge learning that in ems was so huge average ems response time nationwide is ten minutes johnston county eight and a half right right so that is very impressive that they already like blow the bar out of the water you know a minute and a half of time is is is fifteen percent chance approval beyond everyone else they say that that for every minute that lifesaving efforts are delayed the chance of survival drops by ten percent so when we think about how long it takes for ems to get their average from when they’re sitting in their station and your person falls out and you call for help eight and a half minutes eighty five percent chance of death what makes the difference is when you get on the phone with nine one one or just because you know what to do and you didn’t think to call nine one one yet i always say call nine one one first start cpr even if it’s the worst cpr in the world we’re seeing lives saved because even if you’re doing bad cpr you leave me with something to work with when i become the first responder on the scene to handle this to handle that crisis so whether we’re talking about out of hospital we do pediatric first aid and cpr with day care providers whether we’re doing first aid and cpr for manufacturing companies offices organizations just about it everybody needs first aid and cpr but it’s always on the bucket list isn’t it it’s always like you know what i really need to take that class i’ll get to it later right it’s kinda like going to see the ava gardner museum ava gardner museum is a treasure but how many locals go i’m gonna go see that eventually but because it’s in your backyard you forget to take advantage right right well and you know i’ve been to the ava gardner museum it’s amazing but i went when i was doing leadership johnston yes probably in twenty eleven i think i was in that class yeah kelly wallace was leading it and and and we went all over the county and and and really learned a lot and went a lot of places and that is even though i work i go to the courthouse all the time in downtown smithfield i had not been to the ava gardner museum mhmm and it really was it really was fascinating look back at history and stuff like that but one of arguably the biggest movie stars of all time was born and raised right here in johnston county right and i know she ended up you know living her life the end of her life she was in london mhmm but but it is still a fascinating thought you know but when she was buried she came back home that’s right and the reason she went the to europe if you talk to the family and you talk to the people i used to be on the board of directors for the museum for several years and one of the things i learned is the reason she went to europe was because she was so hounded by the press she could not get peace so that’s the reason that she left right she lived in spain she lived in england a lot of it was because she needed the peace not because she didn’t love the country right and so i felt yeah and i found that appreciated because if you think about it in her time the paparazzi wasn’t like it is now but i imagine she was probably one of the first especially she and frank sinatra right that whole hounded thing so yeah and leadership johnston fun fact i am the education person for leadership johnston right now so i’m doing all the leadership training now so it looks a little different than it did in twenty eleven oh that’s awesome that’s awesome a lot of leadership training i’m trying to remember rose andrews well rose andrews and keith dimsdale mhmm mhmm who who had is amazing had the chick fil a in smithville he’s recently retired i guess in the last twelve months yeah so he doesn’t have that chick fil a anymore but he did a lot of it as well and and and great got a loan from him he he was he was and and everything about you know chick fil a and the leadership training he went through to become a chick fil a operator mhmm absolutely fascinating i would recommend highly recommend leadership johnston to anybody that is interested in learning more about johnston county and how johnston county works i mean you study government you study tourism which is the island of the naval art museum you study agritourism you study health care health care the industry education non profits all all the things all the things it it is it is well worth your time do you have any employees that might be interested in leaders of johnston usually the applications are in the summer yeah so they’re actually starting up now so they’re starting up now starting up now august of twenty twenty four mhmm and the program starts in october they changed it it now starts in january so we do an orientation in october or or we will say between october and november and then the actual classes start in january now and so now half of the time is spent on leadership development and coaching which is the part i do and then the other half is the exploration of the county and its resources through panel discussions through tours we really try to make sure we look it’s always fun pretty early on we get chris johnson to come in with economic development to kick it off and kinda paint the picture of the county usually the first one we start with is education so we have everyone from johnston public county public schools to johnston community college to neuse charter schools partnership for children all coming in and talking to these leaders about what is it that they’re doing to impact education in our community and how do we get involved how do we learn more well that’s that’s cool it used to be one day a month it is it’s one day a month it is that’s what you got yeah i got that part it’s one day a month and then we did a weekend retreat yes somewhere where we did a ropes course powell woods yeah we did a ropes course and the one we went to there was a swing thing that you swing on and you ended up in a lake somewhere and that’s not that i haven’t done that part i’ve completed i’m asking yeah you’re welcome talking to kelly wallace i need to know about this right so much fun it was so much fun and i i learned i learned a ton i i really just learned a ton i thought i knew a lot but when i got done with that class i knew even more and and and i keep like you know the stuff i learned keeps coming back to me now even though i think it’s been thirteen years since i took that class and the friends i made i still have i was gonna say the networking is is is hard to compare right because you’re you’re building these relationships and i tell people as the students in the class because of the way we’ve set it up now they’ve got access to the c suite of all these organizations that maybe they couldn’t always get access to they’re able to ask questions how are they invested in the community but also the network with themselves and the others how they can go in then when someone says i need a resource oh i know a guy i know a guy a gal that you know and i just i’m biased a hundred percent i’ll tell you right now i’m biased a hundred percent but it is absolutely amazing and it is for anyone from the c suite level that wants to get more involved in the community and learn more all the way down to your emerging leaders that you’re identifying and saying hey how do we help them develop those skills it it was it really was excellent and you know as we have more leaders growing up within my office i probably will be sending somebody to it here in the next couple of years yeah because it really is it really is a great program and i i learned a ton well let’s go and talk more about you so so the y’all do cpr aed training on-site for business corporations you also you also do continuing ed for nurses and paramedics so so i have a facility in downtown smithfield so i’m right across from the courthouse at the neuse river neuse commons building and so we offer classes there everything from first aid and cpr all the way up to advanced life support we do some medical continuing education when we are contracted by other companies fun fact we train about thirty five hundred people a year in first aid and cpr so we we stay pretty busy for a little company in smithfield right we stay pretty busy there is a team of us that work together now a lot more of the customized education is going more towards leadership development now just from the involvement at the chambers you know i’m a member of clayton chamber i’m on the board there i am a member of triangle east chamber was a past board member there member of garner chamber just starting to get involved with them pandemic kinda threw that off off the game but getting involved in these chambers and benson is on my on my radar and clinton sampson i joined them well loretta bird would love to have you vincent i love loretta she’s one of the she would love to have you in the vincent chamber of commerce she is she and dana wooten are the two classiest people i know in johnston county i mean they they they’re they’re mentors i look up to them a lot but but with this all this leadership development content kinda came about i went back and got my john maxwell certification in twenty eighteen and it was really to improve me but what i found out is that we know if you look at the economic development study that chris johnson put out that they had is that it’s like sixty five percent of employers recognize that their staff needs communication conflict resolution skills right people skills they call them soft skills durable skills a million things but it’s all about doing this and so i like to start out with talking about personality differences and generational differences what makes us where we really get along really well or we completely can’t stand each other and would rather not be in the room and how do we take that information and pull it through so that’s where the coneds come in so it’s health care to banking to manufacturing to pharma it’s a little bit of everywhere right now i mean that’s good that’s good i mean it’s it’s sounds like it’s not one size fits all because i know you do customized training as well mhmm depending on what a business may need right and you have over twenty teachers that work with you we’ve got about twenty contracted instructors some work every now and then some work weekly with us on the leadership training side it’s just me right now i’m kinda guarded about my content it’s taken me fifteen twenty years to to really curate this stuff and so i’m looking at the future at expanding that i’ve been talking to a couple of people because it can be confusing to be a medical training company that’s doing leadership i will tell you you’ve got the inside information and anybody on this podcast is gonna find out i literally just launched last week melissa overton dot com so that is branding out the speaking coaching leadership people development skills that i haven’t even announced to social media so you’ll be you heard it here first right first that’s well that’s good and i and i know you’re you’re a great speaker i’ve heard you speak and and and i mean you can talk about a lot of different topics and you bring a lot of energy and a lot of personal experiences and you’re still from selma yes you know i’m a joco girl right right i know melissa you’re you’re you’re always gonna be from selma yes and i’m not gonna you get you’re gonna be from selma well technically it was corbett hatcher because true people from selma are like you were in the country you don’t even get that recognition so i grew up on thirty nine highway i tell people you know and and you know here’s the good thing is is no matter where i go in life and what i’m doing i can tell you one thing i’m always gonna be me and it’s always gonna be the girl that sometimes is classy with a k and sometimes with an i e right and and that’s part of what i love about it is i can behave when i need to but for god’s sakes life is short let’s have a good time let’s lean in and just love on each other as a group of people in a community that that can get it done well one of the other community things that you’ve done that you’re sort of helping head up is launch joco yeah and so tell the audience a little bit about what that is and and how it works i i know about it i think it’s a tremendous program for young entrepreneurs i wish there would have been one of those when i was trying to get this business off the ground in two thousand but there wasn’t but i think it would have been helpful that’s exactly why it started so when i joined the board of directors at clayton chamber of commerce the second year in they asked me to be the workforce development chair which is my jam right developing people workforce and i went and sat down with dana wooten and melissa oliver was the board chair at that time and i said look if i’m a be on this committee i want us to have like some meaningful work that comes out of this so like you know like the yes we’re doing it it’s the meet and dana said have you ever heard of the launch my city program and i said no and she said well out of detroit they developed this program because they recognize that most entrepreneurs go out of business within five years you their their failure rate is very high and she said and by then i’m already in but i’m listening to her she said you know they fail within five years and so this program was developed to give them the education the networking the mentoring that they needed and the access to funding or where it is in this to help them become more successful and i said i’m all in and i said well look but i’m an entrepreneur and number one i’m doing this because i could’ve used this when i started my business in twenty twelve twenty thirteen my god what kind of potholes could i have avoided if i just had some of this now i was lucky the first thing i was told to do was join my chamber of commerce and in the first chamber of commerce meeting that i went to i met don dugan from edward jones oh yes and don’s a great guy right and i started chit chatting with him i was talking to everybody but we were talking about a four zero one k issue right it was a perfect timing for it and i said look if you can help me with this it was a four zero one k that i had at the hospital that i need to move over so if you can help me i’ll give you all the money i have which is like a whole five dollars you know but we’ll take it and you know don being such a great guy is used to dealing with millionaires and he’s like you know what this girl looks like a hot mess i’m gonna try to help her he has been my one of my biggest mentors since then and has become a very dear friend and i give him a lot of credit it’s the mentorship and it’s him calling me out sometimes on things that i really don’t wanna be called out on and my friends love me too much to say and he’s my friend but we’re different right and so he’ll be like what what are you doing you know why why are you doing this so that’s how launchdoke was started so we started talking about it as a clayton initiative and very quickly recognized that where it would really be most successful and best embrace is if we made it a county wide initiative so i started going out and literally having conversations with people i met with johnson community college i’m like hey by the way we’ve got this great idea and they’re like what and we’re like trust us so had a few meetings to make that happen went to the clayton rotary because this was actually a rotary based program and wake county had done it right so katie gales and matthew kane from the raleigh rotary had done it and katie was with wake community college at the time so we knew and we had talked to them and they were like yes you need to do this so then we found out delta sigma theta who if you haven’t had it on your podcast incredible group of people in this community so the johnson county alumni chapter delta sigma theta had actually started a small version of this a year or two before so very quickly i kinda took a break i’m really big about collaboration and i was like the last thing we need to do is come in and run over somebody’s effort so we said look either we’ll stay out of your lane or we can join forces together so they met and said you know what i think they’re on to something let’s let’s do this together they’ve been one of our biggest contributors since then miss evelyn sanders and talia virgin both were huge and they’re in this cleveland area right you’re talking about your neighbors right sanders is great interview her oh my gosh people right and talia virgen same way she’s the chief social worker for the fayetteville va so you talk about your resource she lives right here in your backyard and so started working with them then after we got them on board we said well let’s go talk to central rotary let’s talk to vincent chamber of commerce let’s talk to triangle east chamber of commerce town of clayton said hey we wanna help on this from an economic development side promotion and so all these entities came together and we just started dreaming and brainstorming and so today what the program is is it is a a three pronged approach if you have a business idea you’ve got the side hustle you wanna get going but you’re not quite there yet then we call you the launchnow group launchnow people are referred to the small business center of johnson community college suzanne ross another massive resource in the community to interview suzanne works with them to help them make sure have they got their structure the company structure set up you know are you an llc are you an s corp all the things right make sure that they’ve got a good idea they get that free business coaching that our tax dollars pay for if they are beyond that if they’ve been in business for at least a year and they’ve generated at least five thousand dollars of revenue we didn’t ask when how five thousand and you live in johnston county you’re not a nonprofit you’re not a multilevel marketing and you are not a franchise because those rules are so different then we want you to apply for launchdoco and the launchnext program is fourteen weeks a night classes so free to them sweat equity is everything right but free to them a thirty thousand dollar program where we give them we feed them supper every night that they come into class because it’s every tuesday pretty much for fourteen weeks straight starting at the end of january we give them business education classes what is your business structure by the time they finish the class then they have a pitch deck if they need a loan and they have a business plan a small business plan where’s your mission what is your vision who is your ideal customer how much what’s your overhead you know that was the don thing we laugh about he’s like so what’s your overhead every day and i’m like what do you mean he’s like how much money do you need to make every day to keep in business and i’m like that’s that’s the thing and he was like how have you done this and i was like god looks after children and idiots i’m a be honest like that’s that’s the whole thing right i am well predict they’re like so you are and i got ready to answer that one time and the lady said she’s a child of god and i said yeah that too right so he had to explain that to me and that’s those are the potholes right so looking at that helping them design it all the way down to how do they advocate for their business so when they finish those fourteen weeks this is where we’re gonna be calling you soon we have mentors so a mentor graciously volunteers their time two to four hours a month for six months to help them what what is and i tell them you’re you’re not a genie and you’re not a fairy godmother but you were here to be another voice of reason to help them and we try to match their weaknesses to your strengths so that they can really jump in while they’re learning the value of networking part of the mentoring process is these mentors are part of these organizations that are sponsors then we say you need to go to at least one business meeting with them see what rotary is about see what the chamber is about see what delta sigma theta is doing in the community see what the community college has going on at the foundation level right all these things get them involved in this so that when they graduate did dana talk about how much money we’re giving away in grants this year i don’t think she did i don’t think she did oh my god so we just had a meeting yesterday so the first year there was no money because everybody’s like we’re not even sure you’re gonna like pull this off okay fine just if i say trust me the one thing i can tell you john trust me like i will not do anything unless i put my whole heart in it so when we got into this it could not fail because my ego was wrapped up but i was like god looks at your children and idiots we’re covered we already made that clear so first year no grant money second year ks bank stepped up and gave us five one thousand dollar grants individual grants and clayton women in networking said hey we want a part of that they gave one fifteen hundred dollar grant this year the third cohort graduating this year we have eleven thousand five hundred dollars worth of grants to give to these students oh that’s awesome that’s awesome seventeen participants representing fifteen businesses that have access to this money and not everybody gets a trophy they’re gonna have to show they work for it they’re gonna apply for this and when they do that application process the clayton chamber foundation which is where that money is housed they are the ones that make the selection process so they don’t have the relationships i have which is great because i would wanna give everybody a trophy let’s be honest yeah so how would people wanna go out and apply for launchcode i know there’s some info sessions yeah you you know i mean this by by the we’re recording this in august of twenty four this may not run till october of twenty four but so by the end you’ve missed the boat but don’t worry there’s another opportunity so so approximately what is the timeline yeah for launch joanne so applications are open now and we usually close those at the end of september so that we can make that selection process and move forward so yes if this is viewing in october don’t get frustrated though we have other opportunities coming up that you can start to get engaged number one you can always go to the johnson community college small business center suzanne ross go ahead and get started with her your tax dollars pay for it yes this launch program itself that we’re hosting right now it’s costing us right at thirty thousand dollars a year so we raise money and sponsorships and in kind donations and well not well in kind donation johnson community college for the space for the classroom has been huge so it would be even more than that if we didn’t have that but when we look at this and how we’re pulling this program off you can still get engaged because we have a third prong called launch beyond launch beyond is a continuing education series we recognize when we were sending them out into the world go forth and prosper there was still a lot missing we never got a chance the curriculum is not set up to talk about networking and professionalism and communication conflict resolution so we created the launch beyond series that goes january through june one day a month where anyone anyone in this community or outside the community can attend these classes there’s a small fee involved if you have not gone through the launch program but the way that we’re paying it forward to our launch graduates was we said you know what you get to come to con ed for free so we’re pretty proud of that as well we have had some amazing speakers if you haven’t had matt gorman from gorman insurance group on here he did networking he’s phenomenal i learned as much as i know i learned and i was oh i mean i yeah and and and i think i’m a pretty good networker right i think you’re a pretty good networker you and i run into each other all the time right but you can always you can always learn more yeah and and and people like to people like to meet new people they like to do business with people they know yes and and i think i still think there’s a role for that chamber of commerce is sort of evolving now we talked to them a little bit about that yeah like chamber of commerce is weren’t doing these launch things before but they are now right but i do think that it’s i do think it’s supported for for new businesses to go out network i i i still go out network i you and i were we see each other we see each other all the time we were at the johnson awards the banquet together the other night in benson down at brockway cleveland right coffee in cleveland i mean there’s tons of stuff to get involved in the community if if you wanna be involved in the community through between the triangle east chamber of commerce the smithfield the clay chamber of commerce garner chamber of commerce i’m a member of all of those i’ve been a mentor through the launchgarnor program for three years i’ve really enjoyed that so if you are a business owner listening to this you know reach out to launchjoco i’m gonna try to be a mentor for them as well mhmm i found it to be extremely rewarding and it sort of reminded me why i got into business for myself and you know the thing that if you take nothing else from any of this is my business is no different from your business melissa we we we have the same issues even though i’m a lawyer and you’re in medical coaching we have the same issues from from marketing to networking to cash flow to overhead right to training right to hiring to retaining right like it’s all the same mhmm regardless and so you know any business experience can help any other business experience because the businesses businesses are the same yeah most marriages are largely the same as well the vast majority of them of course right i mean i’m just saying happily right but but marriages are similar yeah but businesses are even more similar yes and i think people don’t realize that the other thing you need to do to be successful in business and you’ve done that and i’ve done that is you have to make a decision mhmm and you have to make a decision to move forward and you have to make those decisions every day and you can’t get in this paralysis by analysis thing mhmm where you you come up with a hundred million things that are gonna go wrong and your anxiety starts spinning and boy i got plenty of anxiety and don’t actually make a decision to move forward because the thing is by making a decision not to move forward that’s a decision as well and the odds that what you are worried about ninety five percent of it will never come true because you would make a different decision if something started going wrong and so that’s what people need to do i’m hoping that is what is being encouraged in launch joco yes it is what i work with my mentor mentees and launched garner is you gotta just keep making decisions try to make good decisions but make decisions yeah and try to move forward and try to be better tomorrow than you were today right and that when i first started in leadership there was a quote by somebody that was a former intel ceo that’s how old the quote is and it’s faded but it’s on my desk and it says something about everything in life has a ready moment if you miss that moment you start to decline and so that’s exactly what you just said you know is that you’ve got you just got to do it anyway and my other quote i always use at launch joco graduation is steve harvey and steve harvey says the dream is free but the hustle is sold separately and i’m like yes that’s true because some people show up and they go oh i have this great idea support me you should it goes back to your membership of your organizations like rotary and clayton chamber and everything or all the chambers right not just clayton but all the chambers and these different kinds of organizations is it’s about the relationship building and i love that you said that because a lot of people that i do business with now are people that i built relationships matt is now my insurance person because i watched him for about three years i had somebody i had somebody that my parents have used for fifty years so i’m taken care of i can pick up the phone and as much as i hate being john and kathy’s daughter sometimes instead of melissa i know if i need something quick it’s their networking right so i’m watching matt and i’m like you know what this guy really is who he says he is and i wanna do business with him i would have never met him outside of these circles and when you need a you know everybody’s in business what happens when your roof is leaking right when all of a sudden this hurricane comes through and we’ve got water damage in our building from the roof re roof leaking you know well what if i need a plumber what if i need an electrician all of these relationships are built because you get out in the community and you put yourself out there and it can be terrifying at first but what do you have to do do it well you just have to do it so how can people reach out to you i know we have the new website melissa overton dot com right i guess there’s the the the the the medical training dot me right that website’s still out there social media just come find me melissa overton i’m here i’m i’m i’m all over the place because i love this community i just i would not trade it for the world i am so glad that i came back to my roots if you had asked me whether or not this is what i would have done i would have said no way i’m gonna be a big city girl i’m not going back to that small town number one johnson county is not small town anymore right there there are pockets but you know at the end of the day i just wanna keep giving back and i wanna see our whole community continue to to elevate which is why i get involved with all these efforts yeah and so the last question i have is mhmm what do you love most about johnston county it’s definitely the people i’m sure everybody says that it’s definitely the people because we are evolving we’re growing we’re diversifying which we need and i love but you also still have that small town feel you still run into people my mother had childcare centers for thirty seven years in smithfield and people will come up to her and go are you my aunt cathy and she’ll look at their eyes and she’ll remember and go oh yeah little johnny that’s you and like i’m like how did you recognize she’s like there’s just something about your eyes that never change and like she remembers them and the fact that because they were all called aunt this and aunt that then are you my aunt cathy and we just you just know immediately that’s that’s us i would not i would not trade for world that’s the best part of johnston county i i agree one hundred percent and that’s what almost everybody that says is that it’s the people yeah so we’d like to thank melissa overton for being our guest today on the best of johnston county podcast as we mentioned earlier if you’ve not liked followed or subscribed to this podcast wherever you’re seeing it please do us a favor of doing that so that you’ll be aware of future episodes of the best of johnson county if you’d also be willing to leave us a five star review down at the bottom where you’re seeing this podcast it will help for our visibility and feel free to share this podcast on your instagram or any of your social media if you know any of melissa’s friends share it with them so that they’re aware of it i’m sure she’ll be sharing it on her social media as well so that more people become aware of the best of johnson county podcast until next time i’m your host jonathan breeden keep it classy yeah so okay