Meet Alex Muñoz | Owner and Principal

We had the good fortune of connecting with Alex Muñoz and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Alex, how does your business help the community?
I’d like to share a story (or maybe two) to help explain this. My Mom and Dad are from Cuba and my Dad was fortunate enough to have met an American at the plant where he was working in Cuba. This gentleman was a graduate from Georgia Tech and he asked my Dad if he had ever thought of going to college – my Dad said no but was intrigued. After some leg work, he became (I think!) Tech’s first international co-op student. What this meant was that he would work a quarter at the plant in Cuba and then come to Atlanta and go to school a quarter – this continued until Castro took over Cuba in the 1959 revolution. If he would have returned to work at the plant, they wouldn’t have allowed him to leave. He stayed here in Atlanta and brought my Mom over and my siblings and I were all born and raised here in Atlanta.
What does this have to do with your question?
My Dad, as smart and hard working as he was, couldn’t manage his way out of a wet paper bag.
He started his own company in the mid ’70’s and struggled mightily to be able to do basic things like meet a payroll, hold his employees accountable, develop and implement a strategy, etc. He was brilliant at what he was brilliant at and lost at what was outside of that narrow slice (“an inch wide and a mile deep”).

The other story?
My Dad’s sister was a physician. She made it through medical school in 1950’s Cuba (yikes!) and decided to also leave Cuba rather than live under socialism. Coming here, she had to learn English, learn a new culture, get accredited to practice medicine, etc. She truly busted her hump.
Meanwhile, she was also helping out her 5 sisters (and occasionally my Dad) to make it in this country. She made a lot of money and LOST a lot of money because, you guessed it, she couldn’t manage her way out of a wet paper bag.

Seeing this growing up, I was struck at how two people that worked so HARD and were so SMART could not achieve the level of success that they seemed to be due.
So I decided that I would do something about that.

Alright, so for those in our community who might not be familiar with your business, can you tell us more?
We work with professional service providers – think lawyers, doctors, engineers, trainers, PR firm owners, architects, etc. A short-hand way to think of it is “Anyone who needs a license to do what they do”; this approximates my Dad and my aunt. Targeting companies on the smaller side (we will work with folks who generate revenues of up to $50MM a year but our sweet spot is in the $3MM-12MM space), we like to engage with them to create a strategic plan. The idea is to create greater happiness and wealth for businesses and their owners. We get into the specifics of each business or client’s current strategic plan and then work ‘from the inside’ to make meaningful and financially rewarding improvements.
Our three uniques are:
1) We focus on business owners AND their organizations
2) Our compensation model is tied to owner success (and NEVER on an hourly model)
3) We implement what we recommend

I guess the thing that I want people to know is that, so far, I have yet to find a service like ours that works with the markets we work with, to do the things we do, the way we do it, and with the compensation model we use. Our focus is on the generation of results and we are willing to be held accountable to that,

Any places to eat or things to do that you can share with our readers? If they have a friend visiting town, what are some spots they could take them to?
I’m all about the relationships – in my personal life as well as business. As such, my itinerary would focus on spending time with my friend in such a way that we could REALLY connect and catch up. Life is too short to go to a bar where you have to scream just to be able to order a drink! Since we’re intown, and I like to get my four miles a day in, I would kill two birds with one stone and take him for a walk down to the Beltline. We’re in Morningside so it’s a bit of a walk to get to the closest access point but there are tons of places to hit on the way there so the distance goes by quickly, Grab a beer? Let’s do El Taco. More in the mood for a burger? Well there are at least 4 places that come to mind (Moes & Joes, George’s, Highland Tap, and the new Farm Burger).
What I really like is to be able to get surprised by the beauty of nature and have one of these “Wait, check this out!” moments – that happens in different places depending on the time of the year and the location.
Where we live lends itself to sitting out back and either cooking something on the grill or have tapas on the back porch – it’s easy for the day to gradually dissolve away as you solve all of life’s problems with a nice bottle of a Spanish red next to you…

The Shoutout series is all about recognizing that our success and where we are in life is at least somewhat thanks to the efforts, support, mentorship, love and encouragement of others. So is there someone that you want to dedicate your shoutout to?
Besides God, I would be nowhere without my wife, María. From helping me finish my undergrad AND graduate degrees, to listening to me rail about work (when I was an employee), to ultimately encouraging me to jump and start my own business 19 years ago, she has been there EVERY step of the way.
I still remember asking her how I could possibly start my own business alone and without a partner when she looked at me in the eyes (with one of our kids on her hip) and told me that I didn’t need to look for a partner – I had one right in front of me.
She has raised our five kids, been with me every step of the way, acted as a partner and co-owner of the business (while getting a second masters degree) and helps me rationalize and understand this crazy world.

Website: www.expertiseinresults.com

Linkedin: LinkedIn.com/in/CSRMunoz

Twitter: @CSRAlexMunoz

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ConsultingSolutionsResults