Entrepreneurial Leap: Building a Consulting Business from Scratch

Cassie Bernhardt and Courtney Scott, founders of Impresa Advisors, take us behind the scenes of their remarkable journey from secure C-suite positions to launching their own consulting firm.

Their story begins with serendipity – a chance meeting that revealed striking parallels in their career paths and created an undeniable connection that would become the foundation of their partnership.

What makes their entrepreneurial leap particularly fascinating is how they frame vulnerability not as weakness, but as the essence of courage.

"While the risk is the same, there's comfort in knowing somebody's in it with you," shares Cassie, highlighting how their partnership transformed the daunting prospect of leaving corporate security into an exciting new chapter.

As former endurance athletes, both women bring a unique resilience to business challenges, approaching obstacles with the mindset that pushing through difficulty is simply part of the journey.

Impresa Advisors operates as a fractional C-suite for startups and growing companies, allowing visionary founders to focus on innovation while the partners handle operational fundamentals

Their approach is deeply relational; they begin client engagements by sharing stories and creating authentic connections that humanize the business relationship.

This storytelling approach carries through to how they grow their own business, with most new clients coming through referrals or connections made during everyday interactions.

For aspiring entrepreneurs, Cassie and Courtney offer invaluable wisdom: trust your intuition about when the time is right, expect and welcome difficult days as learning opportunities, and remember that entrepreneurship is an iterative process where you don't need all the answers on day one.

"You've survived 100% of your bad days," Courtney reminds us, "and you will survive this one too."

Ready to transform your relationship with business courage? This conversation will show you how vulnerability becomes your greatest entrepreneurial strength.

About the Guest

​Impresa Advisors is a consulting agency founded in 2023, specializing in providing comprehensive advisory and fractional C-suite services to early-stage businesses and venture capital portfolio companies. Their seasoned team, with extensive experience as COOs, CMOs, CROs, and CHROs, focuses on optimizing operations, enhancing market positioning, and fostering sustainable growth. The leadership includes Principal Managing Partners Cassie Bernhardt and Courtney Scott, MSHRM, along with SVP of Brand Marketing & Communications Jennifer Kasper.

‍‍Transcript

Carol Park: 0:03

Well, hi everybody, and welcome back to the Courage Unmasked podcast, where we continue to talk about courage and the vulnerability of courage, and that courage is vulnerability and not weakness. And I'm very excited this morning to introduce to y'all and then get to hear their stories Cassie Bernhardt and Courtney Scott, who are entrepreneurs who ventured into starting their own consulting agency, c-suite Services. And so here we go. I'm so happy that y'all are here this morning, cassie and Courtney. So welcome, hi, carol, it's great to see you. Cassie and Courtney so welcome, hi, carol, it's great to see you. Yeah, thanks for having us. I'm so excited to have y'all. So let's just dive right in. Like, what was it like? I mean, take us back to the beginning of the start of Impressa Advisors and what inspired y'all to start this company.Impresa Advisors: 1:02

Well, courtney and I have had very full and successful careers up until this point, to the point that we decided to start our own firm. We've operated as C-suite executives in the respective organizations that we've worked in, and I think it really was a matter of life circumstances, personal family circumstances, and really just being at a point in each of our respective lives where we were ready to make that jump and take a risk, to venture out on our own. And I think when we met, it was a natural connection and we just hit it off immediately and just kind of knew the path forward from there.

Carol Park: 1:46

Yeah, it sounds very exciting and you were so right. I mean starting your own business where you both were in the level executive positions I'm sure doing very well, very secure. So launching your own business is risky business, right? This is all about vulnerability. So tell us a little bit about what that was like, especially as women at being entrepreneurs and launching this new business. Tell us what that was like.

Impresa Advisors: 2:20

Sure. So, as Cassie said, we had an undeniable connection as soon as we met. We had traveled similar paths in our corporate, although different paths, but they had these really interesting inflection points that were very similar points. That really gave us an opportunity to pause, reflect and think individually and then coming together and being able to share those experiences.

Impresa Advisors: 2:49

Early on, cassie and I did a lot of storytelling with each other to connect, and as the more stories we told, the more connections and similarities to the path that we traveled, and so that was sort of the root of starting Impreza, because we weren't doing this alone. So this thought of venturing out and taking the risk, it's still super scary, but you're jumping with someone else and somebody else who has had similar life experiences up to this point, who has been part of your life. We met through a mutual connection, serendipitously, and it was just the perfect timing, and so it sort of felt like we were supposed to meet at this time and let's take this introduction that the universe put in front of us and jump in together into this endeavor. And so doing it together helps to. While the risk is the same, there's some comfort in knowing somebody's in it with you.

Carol Park: 3:48

Absolutely, absolutely Sharing that risk, together having the connections to feed off of each other, to know each other's strengths and probably weaknesses. I mean because we're human beings, so I'm sure that y'all's strengths and weaknesses y'all also play off of each other in that way. So did y'all go just what I would call kind of cold turkey you just quit and started. Or did you say let's stay where we are, we'll kind of start building things and then we'll make the jump. Or did you just jump? Were you just all in?

Impresa Advisors: 4:22

I think we, you know, we sort of did this in phases. I made the decision first, a few months before I met Courtney actually, that this was the path that I wanted to pursue. And again, it was really the universe lining us up perfectly by the time Courtney was ready. It was sort of a no brainer, let's jump in. So again, I think it was really we were just ready at the respective points we were in our lives.

Impresa Advisors: 4:51

Yeah, and for me, the universe kept sending signals, and that's been one of my big learnings that Cassie and I have shared. As for our storytelling is, if you're watchful, there's always signs, and for me, I kept trying to go down one road and universe kept pushing me back into this entrepreneurial spirit, in this consulting, really supporting startups, uh, and I tried to ignore it for a while and then the universe just kept hitting harder and harder. At a point where I met Cassie and I was like, okay, fine, I get it. I get it like this is where we're supposed to get it Like this is where we're supposed to be.

Impresa Advisors: 5:25

It's time, this is where we're supposed to be. But I think you know that was. That was part of. What also gave us comfort in each other was that we had gone through that self-reflection and the realization that we're in a point in our lives where we're confident in who we are and we know what we bring to the table and we're also super transparent about what maybe is not our strongest muscle and our you know quote unquote weaknesses, which just is an area where I just haven't worked as hard to develop it quite yet and super open about all of that and bringing it together onto the table as we're going. Yes, let's be partners and what does that actually mean? How do we work together? But again, not doing it alone and doing it with full, open, transparency and arms welcoming each other's journeys up to this point into the conversation. Yeah, absolutely.

Carol Park: 6:17

I know. When we talked prior to the podcast and I was just getting to know y'all a little bit you said that with every entrepreneurial company, every business, every idea that people start, they will hit some point where it becomes a whoa, what do we do now? And then there's a lot of decisions that have to be made. Do we keep going? Do we pivot? To? You know so many different options. Was there a certain point, even as y'all were building Impreza, that you realized, oh, oh, what do we? What do we do now? Do we pivot? Do we? Do we shift? Did y'all reach a moment like that?

Impresa Advisors: 7:00

That's a great question, carol, and we absolutely see that almost every day with our clients, our partners, and I think one of the things that I knew when I met Courtney we're both former athletes, endurance athletes at that.

Impresa Advisors: 7:17

Immediately, one thing that I sensed was okay, we are both the kind of people with the life experience of when stuff gets hard and we hit those points whether it's in business or personal lives of this is a make or break moment. We can decide to push through and keep going and figure out what are the next three things we need to get done, to keep going or say this isn't working. I knew that Courtney was going to be that partner who's like if we're having a hard day, that's okay, it happens. But what are the next couple of things that we need to get done and push through? And I I don't really feel like we've had any of those moments that make our break where, if we didn't push through on this, we we would have to stop and fold up shop. I think that we just have that mentality every day of we're going to keep going Again. Former athletes, we love to win, we do not like to lose or fail, so it just it really hasn't been an option for us up until that point.

Impresa Advisors: 8:13

One piece of resilience right, yeah, resilience, yes, but resilience with, again, the resilience with intelligence. So, while we have continued to push forward with the spirit of Impreza, supporting startups in that early stage, what we have changed is how we've thought about how we serve our clients. So, while we have not changed in what we believe the value of our firm is the direction our clients that we're going to serve and where they are in their journey, what has changed is how we support them so much, like Cassie mentioned, we have partners, so we've got our clients that we support, and then we have strategic partners that we have brought on, and part of that is all wrapped up in this idea that our firm's value proposition is to give our founders time back. So we support that back office support. Let the founders do what they do, which is be visionaries in technology and in science, and we support the business aspect of it, and we've done that with Impreza as well.

Impresa Advisors: 9:25

So we brought on strategic partners where we believe that either our time isn't valued in that space or we know that we don't have as deep subject matter expertise as maybe our clients might need and we're able to pull on those strategic partners when necessary. So being agile in our business model has really helped us to be able to continue to move forward. So we've adapted Impreza's value proposition, if you will, a couple of times, but never the intent and never questioned. Do we belong in this space? Because we absolutely believe we do.

Carol Park: 10:35

Yeah, I'm so amazed by y'all's business too. I know I shared with y'all in addition to being a therapist, me and a couple of co-founders actually started our own business, which, snowy day here in Texas, worked from home. Yesterday was a telehealth platform for therapists that was HIPAA compliant. And this was before. This was a thing certainly before COVID, and when we had started and hired a developer, we were tracking along, it was going okay, not great. And then we didn't hear from them. And one day I was like I'm just going to go to their office before I start work this morning and they were shut. I mean, they were closed, with a sign on the door do not let them in.

Carol Park: 11:23

And the moment of panic and that was certainly a moment of oh, do we keep going? Do we say, maybe this is where we stop because we had already spent investment money, we didn't have a product and so, long story short, we did decide to keep going. But these are the things and thinking of y'all's business where advisors who understand startups and could give advice at that point or help us navigate, that probably would have been nice, we just navigated it and kept going. But these are the stories and I know when y'all talked about, there will always be something, and this is the uncertainty, the risk, the emotional exposure that we talk about with the vulnerabilities. So how do y'all help companies as they navigate the vulnerabilities? Do you share some of your own stories, your business Like? Do you share maybe, failures, because we all fail, right, as human beings, but how do y'all navigate that?

Impresa Advisors: 12:30

Well, we absolutely. If you haven't figured this out about Courtney and I already, we are definitely storytellers and we again, with a lot of experience in our respective careers, have a lot of stories to tell and they're not all knock it out of the park wins. So we absolutely bring that experience in with us. We share that with our clients. We share when other colleagues tell us about their hardships or their losses or failures. We remember that too and sort of keep that in our portfolio of things to remember as we help our clients build and grow and overcome.

Carol Park: 13:08

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Is there any particular aspect that y'all have found? And maybe not, but as being women in C-suite advisory position, that has brought certain challenges.

Impresa Advisors: 13:23

You know, I don't. I think Courtney and I would describe ourselves as number one, being very good at what we do. Two, we happen to be women Dig down deeper. We're both mothers, we have families, we have a very full personal place to manage and balance, so we multitask with them along the best of them. I don't know that there have been challenges, but I have to say I think we bring a lot of strength to the companies that we work with because we are very adept to multitasking. We, um, I think we have a lot of emotional intelligence and being one step removed from the founder's position, I think that gives us a unique perspective to be a little bit more objective. Um, so I don't, uh, I don't really feel like there have been challenges as women.

Impresa Advisors: 14:15

No, and I feel like we we tend to.

Impresa Advisors: 14:18

We get to.

Impresa Advisors: 14:19

We're in the luxury position of choosing who we work with, and one of the first things we do when we start to get to know potential clients or strategic partners is we tell stories, and Cassie and I don't shy away from who we are outside of Impreza.

Impresa Advisors: 14:34

In fact, we bring it to the table and we encourage others to share as well, to put it onto the table that we're all something outside of what we do on a nine to the table and we encourage others to share as well, to put it onto the table that we're all something outside of what we do on a nine to five basis and what we're trying to build because Cassie and I are building at the same time our founders are, which also is helpful in a shared experience. Yes, and that is super uh, seems to be impactful and resonates with our founders going. We're in it with you. We're trying to grow in present, just as you're trying to grow your agency as well, and so putting all of that again on the table and bringing about a bit of humility and just humanizing the relationships we feel like gives us a big advantage, and we just happen to be females.

Carol Park: 15:15

Yeah, yeah, I like that. I also was thinking you are kind of in that parallel process. You're in that advisory position helping them from the business side, but you're also building your own business. So they're building theirs, you're building yours, but again all of your experience in there too. What business goals and values drive and lead y'all as you continue to build your business and help other businesses grow too?

Impresa Advisors: 15:48

I think one of the first things that Courtney and I agreed on is we want to help businesses that are really working to make a difference, and it doesn't have to be a lifesaving business, but something that will affect whatever audience it's marketing to and move the needle for them.

Impresa Advisors: 16:03

One of the other fundamental things that two of them, rather that we look for are founders and partners who want to grow and who are open to be coached, because those are things that we believe in about ourselves. We're always looking to grow and we are coachable, either with each other or from external sources and events. But the other sort of underlying thing is we want to have fun. I think we've both done things in our careers where we've done it because we've had to and that was the company party line and that's what the job was and now we're at a place where we get to choose the people that we work with. We are looking for people with really positive attitudes and energy and who want to go have fun. So I think those are some of the primary things we keep in mind every day as we work.

Carol Park: 16:58

I remember that, when we had our conversation too, that y'all said you really want to work with companies that can make a difference in some way in people's lives or whatever. And I do remember that, which is part of why I asked the question. So, yeah, I think that's fabulous. So, and the having fun, yeah, especially at this stage. I mean, y'all are young, but you still you don't want life to just always be a grind right. It's too short, so to have some fun in there too, so OK. So how do y'all continue to grow your business? So, again, you're in this parallel process, helping others continue to grow theirs and build theirs and and make a difference. How, how do y'all grow yours?

Impresa Advisors: 17:48

I don't know that we have a secret sauce to growing the business. We get most of our business through referrals, so part of it is just doing a good job, delivering on what we commit to do, providing the value we know we can bring to the table, and that seems to help and continue to have referrals. For the part of the business that comes to us, that's not referrals, that's Cassie and I getting out there and engaging with folks and being part of the conversations, partly for us and also partly for our clients. Anytime we go to any sort of intentional networking event, we're networking for Impreza and we're also looking for potential opportunities for investments or partners for our clients, and so we've gotten really good at listening. And, again, we're storytellers, so we get connecting with folks and telling our story or a client's story. We've gotten really, really good at making that just a natural part of our DNA.

Impresa Advisors: 18:48

Cassie and I also seem to have a knack, for anytime we go out it's an opportunity to meet somebody new, and so there's multiple stories of us going to coffee shops or having a drink at a bar and all of a sudden it turns into a business opportunity because we're not afraid to say hi, I'm Courtney, I'm Cassie Right and just make that introduction and start from there and see where the conversation flows. We've also learned a lot from those types of connections that we brought back to our clients going oh we met this person and they were in this field, but they gave us this piece of advice. We should look into this, and that might take us into a slightly different direction than we anticipated. So we look at every opportunity to engage with someone new as an opportunity to hear their story and possibly learn something yes, it's where y'all started, even where the start of your business.

Carol Park: 19:40

it's about connection, and so y'all are good at connections and making connections and being connectors with others, and so that just continuing to build and grow. And, yeah, I think best referrals are from people that you've worked with that felt like they were helped, they found success, and then they refer you. Even as a therapist, I think the same that when a client tells someone that they love or friends with, hey, you know you may be struggling, there would be somebody you would want to see. It's that's the referral that means the most, because they've actually been helped or found the services to be helpful. So, yeah, well, any specific advice you would give to other entrepreneurs that are thinking of starting a company, that have started a company Our viewers or listeners are kind of lucky here, because they they're going to get some free advice.

Impresa Advisors: 20:42

Yeah, I would say I think you'll know the moment. At least for me, you'll know when it's the right moment to make the leap, to take the jump. I attempted to take the jump several times and it just never felt quite right until now, Um, and there was just an internal gut. So I'd say trust your gut. Your intuition is there to guide you and to protect you and to tell you when it's right and tell you when there is an opportunity to learn. And the other thing would be that you know, on those hard days, one to expect them and, when they happen, welcome them with open arms and a readiness to learn and recognize that you've already survived a hundred percent of your bad days and you would survive this one too, and to keep pushing forward.

Carol Park: 21:26

Wow, that's great advice. That's great advice, kathy, you have any advice.

Impresa Advisors: 21:30

I do, and I'll just add to that that you don't have to know all of the answers on the first day. You know whether it's you're contemplating going out on your own and starting something. You have an idea. You know big ideas. Don't just have it's not just an aha moment. For most of us it takes many iterations, many days of refinement and I hate this word, but pivoting. You've got to keep adapting and adjusting. So just keep going and be flexible and keep editing your product, your ideas, and know that it's a process and that you don't have to know everything the first day is the best piece of advice I would give to someone thinking about starting a business.

Carol Park: 22:14

Yeah, that's fantastic advice. So tell me a little bit more, too, about your company. Do you work with it sounds like primarily startups, and are they? Well, startups are typically smaller, but do you work with really small companies, Then? Do you as they grow? You continue to work with them as they?

Impresa Advisors: 22:36

tell us a little bit more about your company with them as they tell us a little bit more about your company. So we work with a range of companies really so startup from pre-money, pre-fundraising to small to medium businesses that don't identify as a startup at all. I would describe my skill set and expertise as being very focused on people, but on the external part so communications, fundraising, investor relations Courtney is an expert on everything people, internal and business administration. So I think we're a really good fit that way. But that means we can operate in that range of startup to mostly established business. But maybe they are operating a business on a multiple day mostly established business. But maybe they are operating a business on a multiple day, multiple states, and they haven't had a chance to create fundamental procedures or an employee handbook, for instance, and we'll come in and do some projects that way.

Impresa Advisors: 23:30

What we really love to do is operate as a fractional portion of our portfolio company's C-suite, so we join their team seamlessly as if we were there from theuite. So we join their team seamlessly as if we were there from the beginning. Sometimes we are there from the beginning and we are the ones who worry about those business fundamentals. So, just like Courtney said earlier, they can focus on being a founder and being that visionary, but we will absolutely take on acute projects. So someone, a startup, needs to get ready for a fundraise and they just need our help getting ready for that or coaching on that Go to market strategy, very specific things. We'll jump in on that also.

Carol Park: 24:11

Yeah, so y'all really come in at all sorts of points, from a beginning point to a mid, to trying to exit. Even you even work with the exit strategies with businesses as well yeah, yeah, and then we, we're we are.

Impresa Advisors: 24:27

Our intent is to build long-term relationships and connections with these founders. Rather, if we get to champion inside and be part of the visioning everything everything from designing processes, putting in place the proper operations, making sure we have the right talent on the team at the right time. That we're focused externally from our marketing investor perspective, that the founders and their executive teams are leading and building a company in a way that they anticipated it to be from a culture, strat and strategy conversation leading towards an exit. And then we also support the exits. We've got some M&A experience in our background as well to help that exit process occur, which can happen in a multitude of different ways.

Impresa Advisors: 25:13

But our joy is being part of the journey and doing that right along and being adaptable, because a startup that is pre-seed has a very different need of a functional C-suite than a startup who's nearing an exit. Those needs are strategically and functionally different. And then you've got the companies in the middle and those are also very different in terms of what they need. And so we are adaptable in the way that we support all of our clients. But we've got a nice portfolio that's got sort of all of them in different stages of the organization, which makes it fun for Cassie and I. Going back to what Cassie said, we got in this to have fun.

Carol Park: 25:54

Yeah, yeah. Well, I also hear how the synergy with y'all started and continues and your experience that you were already C-level executives and had lots of experience before even coming into this where you're going to consult and advise and bring others to the team to consult and advise. So, yeah, I hear how y'all hit it off from the beginning and came up with your company. So any final words to our audience, anything that you would like to say?

Impresa Advisors: 26:33

Thank you, carol, for giving us the time, and certainly if anybody that's listening wants to connect. Kathy and I, of course, love to share stories, so we'd love to a chance to connect and share and learn, yeah absolutely.

Carol Park: 26:46

Thank you so much for being guests this morning. It was delightful and I just wish you continued success as y'all have fun and make a difference with the companies that y'all are advising, strategizing with, helping to grow. So best to you both and thank you again for being our guest this morning.

Impresa Advisors: 27:06

Thank you so much.