Today we’d like to introduce you to Dari DeSousa.
Hi Dari, thanks for joining us today. We’d love for you to start by introducing yourself.
I have spent a career in the hospitality industry and found my way into Human Resources. In 2020, hospitality was hit hard by the pandemic. As an HR professional, I spent so much time furloughing people, reducing hours, reducing salaries, then going back and laying people off, closing hotels, and closing restaurants. It was so hard on so many in our company. For hotels that were able to stay open, I spent time researching and writing COVID plans for locations in five different states. Every state was different, so every plan was different. By July 2020, the company I worked for made the decision to reduce our West Coast team, and I volunteered as tribute. I was pretty burnt out at that point, I had been job-seeking, but there were just no great HR roles to be found in San Diego. I had thought about becoming a consultant previously but was always too nervous to pull the plug. In the craziness of the pandemic, I did it and left corporate world and started my own business 07/28/2023. I gave myself a year to see if I could be successful and enjoy working for myself. I just celebrated my third anniversary, and I’m happy to move forward in this role.
We all face challenges, but looking back, would you describe it as a relatively smooth road?
In the beginning, the struggle was figuring out how to manage my business in a financially thoughtful way. Getting clients, getting new clients, figuring out how much to charge for services, figuring out what services I wanted to provide…all of it was a bit trial and error. I also learned to contract out what I am not skilled in. Such as designing my website, why struggle for days and weeks for a “so-so” product? I hired someone, and I was thrilled with the result. I also do not do my own taxes; that is something I wanted to make sure was correct from the start. My business tracking, my P&L, receipts, banking, and ensuring my quarterly estimates were filed timely. The other thing I had to learn was to not always work IN my business. If I spend all waking time doing client work, when am I organizing billing? Or writing a blog article? Or finding new clients? Figuring out the balance of IN my business and FOR my business is an ongoing challenge. I try to take Fridays as a “CEO Day,” where I focus my time FOR my business.
Thanks for sharing that. So, maybe next you can tell us a bit more about your work?
I am a Human Resources generalist. My experiences have been broad and employee-focused. I am a California specialist. I have spent a lot of time conducting employee investigations, Labor Relations, employee morale/team building, facilitating internal dispute resolutions, providing leadership training and coaching, and working with teams to get the heart of their issues in order to move forward, creating a more supportive working environment. I am a very strong trainer and public speaker. I am now in the mediation arena; I find that if people can have meaningful conversation about a conflict with a guide to help them agree upon solutions – then conflict resolution is possible.
I’m known for my high ethical standards, large-scope project management, strong technical knowledge, and delivering more than is expected. I am also known for my high energy and high-volume capacity.
I am proud of my creative solutions to challenges and that I often work outside the normal expectations of HR. I do a lot in operations, strategy, and I ask questions that get people thinking. I will ask leaders, “What are you trying to accomplish” and then ask them to let me help them get there ethically, legally, and in an employee-focused manner.
Before we let you go, we’ve got to ask if you have any advice for those who are just starting out.
My advice to anyone just starting their own business is to ask questions from a few different sources and then just start. Don’t overanalyze things, you can get bogged down in trying to make it perfect. The beauty is that you can adjust along the way, make tweaks, make changes. Also, don’t spend a ton of money on everything you see come your way. Spending $5K on an SEO might not be the right solution. Find ways to evaluate the worth of things you spend your money on. If you pay for a leads site, then track how much you spend versus how much you earn monthly. If a product/add/site/tool doesn’t make sense financially, then change it up.
I also recommend making small goals. In corporate world, goals are often set for you. Create your own milestones and reasonable due dates. Celebrate those successes! If you have a failure, then analyze what happened, and make structural changes to prevent that same mistake going forward.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://desousaprofessionalhrgroup.com/
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/daridesousa/
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/darijdesousa/
