Amanda Haugh has been on a leadership journey. A journey which has led to where she is today, a self-described “router” connecting employees, managers and leaders, breaking down silos and creating high performing teams.
Now Vice President of Operations at Speakcore, which provides an easy-to-use and streamlined speaker bureau management platform to the life sciences and pharmaceutical industry, Amanda traces the start of that journey to her early career as a hostess in the restaurant business.
Having the Opportunity to Impact Others’ Lives.
“I was a hostess at a restaurant called Isaac’s Restaurant and Deli when I was16. And I kept that job all through college. Because the restaurant was so close to college, I would go home every weekend and work. Through that process, I went from being a hostess to being accepted into their leadership training program and ended up becoming a District Manager overseeing 5 restaurants in central Pennsylvania, which was just so much fun!”
Isaac’s ran their leadership program because they were trying to retain their employees as well as develop and grow General Managers to oversee their 22 restaurants. It was a very comprehensive program.
Amanda smiles as she thinks back.
“I learned SO much through that program and that experience that I carry with me today. That was the foundation of my interest in human resources and operations,” she states.
She continues, “…Through that experience, I got people interested in the opportunity for management. Some of the managers who were there for night management, I helped grow into General Managers. They took over and their names ended up on the doors…I’ll never forget Carl and Andy…and I was so proud and pleased that they buckled down and really took the time to learn the business.”
Amanda was also in charge of the financials as well. She managed Profit & Loss results, vendors, customer satisfaction, and food costs and was rewarded based on managing the P&L effectively.
“We won every other year,” she shares, proud of her success, “And I was a part of it and got compensated with bonuses and trips as a result.”
“I never started with a seat at the table. I started by seating tables and my career grew from there.”
Leaning into Deep Connections and Figuring It Out!
At that point Amanda had her second child, a son, who was a preemie, and decided that she needed to take a job where she wasn’t working as much. One of her servers thought Amanda would be good in staffing and introduced her to the branch manager at a recruiting company in Center City Philadelphia where she got a job as a recruiter.
“That was tough.” Amanda pauses. “I took a huge pay cut. It was in an industry I knew nothing about. The first day I walked in during the financial crisis back in 2007. My new boss said ‘Figure it out’. I walked in, sat down, she showed me the software and said, figure it out! There was the training.”
So Amanda did!
“My proudest moment was not only did I figure it out, but I got promoted over top of [my manager]…We did such a good job that we became the sole provider for a contract where I was overseeing over 100 contractors in a warehouse in Swedesboro, New Jersey.”
I asked her about her biggest lesson from that experience.
“I had to learn how to create deep connections with people, to be a recruiter whom people trusted. To do what I said I was going to do. I had to give feedback, honest feedback…to people who were coming to us for placement – even if it was hard. It wasn’t the feedback that they necessarily wanted but I knew for them to be successful, to grow and land a job they needed that feedback.”
Leaders are made in the trenches.
Amanda sits back, reflecting on her journey.
“You know,” she shares, “I never started with a seat at the table. I started by seating tables and my career grew from there.”
In the Swedesboro job, she was truly in the trenches. Carrying a suitcase in every day with paper I9’s, learning picking, packing, warehousing, shipping/ receiving, plus the tech to run the operation. Her job required her to work with Spanish speaking employees, learn creative ways to connect with people, be innovative regarding how they were reaching out to candidates and getting their current employees to bring referrals to the table.
“Learning how to flex my style, walking the floor, asking about the contractors and their work and families. Demonstrating every day my commitment to them made all of the difference.”
“The biggest mistake that managers make is that it’s not about perks and ping pong tables. It’s about trust, connection, communication.”
Keep the Longer Term in Mind.
At that point Amanda had her third child and was looking to move into more professional positions. She got her feet wet in the hourly contingent workforce arena but wanted to advance in her career. The day she started at a new role, the person who had introduced her to the company left. She was back in the trenches. She laughs.
“I was back to building relationships, making connections and ended up creating a training program to bring up the recent college grads that we were hiring.” She pauses, thinking back.
“I loved that I was able to build out the program and make an impact in such a short time. I moved into a Corporate Training role, dealing with all of the different divisions leading the training function, building and designing the training by working with the branch managers to ensure the business needs were met. We were growing VERY quickly and needed the process standardized. I’m proud that so many of those people are now in key leadership positions, just like at Isaac’s. I gave them the foundation, learned how to grow people internally, and engage them. It was extremely satisfying.”
Take the Time to Understand and Keep on Learning.
I asked her what her biggest leadership lesson was during that transition.
“Take the time to ask employees what drives them,” she says. “That’s what will help to retain them. And you’ve got to approach retention with the long-term in mind. The biggest mistake that managers make is that it’s not about perks and ping pong tables. It’s about trust, connection, communication. That’s what helps create cultural change.”
Along the way, Amanda got her degree in human resources because she wanted to break out of recruiting and continue to grow as a leader and as a manager.
“The O’Connor Group gave me the foundation and I realized that process consistency was critical to growing smartly, even during “hypergrowth” when we hired 42 people in 2022. I couldn’t have moved into an Operations role without the right processes to build out capacity and put the systems in place to support the growth.”
“Things “die” in solos. I work to bring things and people together.”
Be a “Router” and Play to Your Strengths.
“I’ve learned along the way that I’m a “router”. I really excel at connecting employees, managers and leaders to break down the silos and create a team. I’ve learned through the coaching I’ve received that people are my passion, which is why my initial work at Speakcore as I moved into the VP of Operations role, was to have engagement meetings to get to know people, begin to create relationships and identify the biggest issues we needed to solve.”
Amanda saw a paper onboarding process and knew that the company needed to automate. She spearheaded the project to put in place Paylocity so that people could access their own information.
“Things “die” in solos,” she tells me. “I’m trying to bring things and people together. We put in place an intranet through Sharepoint because we needed a hub for people to go for information. To ensure that people had information about where the company was and is going we held our first Town Hall. Finally, we put in place a user-friendly handbook that clarified paid time off, allowed them to see their personal information and change it if they wanted.”
She pauses and smiles.
“I’ve learned that you can’t build a strong company without understanding our employees and what their goals are, what they’re building for themselves. Scaling a business means that we scale our people first. That includes sharing information about how we operate as a business. So I will continue to be a router, bring people together and play to my strengths.”
Tags: Leadership Development for Small Business, Leadership Development in New Jersey, Leadership Development in Philadelphia, Overcoming small business challenges