1102: LuAnn Featured: Only Girl on the Jobsite: LuAnn Nigara on Leadership, Profitability, and Owning Your Role

Today With Renee Bier (Only Girl on the Jobsite): Today, I’m bringing you something a little different—and extra special. This episode originally aired on Only Girl on the Jobsite with my friend Renee Biery, and now I’m thrilled to share it right here on A Well-Designed Business®. Renee invited me on her show to dig into one of my favorite topics: leadership in interior design, especially when it comes to managing construction projects. We tackled the tough stuff—what leadership really looks like on the jobsite, why so many designers shy away from it, and how to step into your power to protect your profit, your timeline, and your reputation. You’ll hear some classic LuAnn straight talk, but also the heart of what I’ve seen over 40+ years in business: that leadership is a choice—and a critical one if you want to run a profitable firm. This conversation is packed with strategy, a few rabbit holes (the fun kind), and actionable insights that will shift the way you show up as the CEO of your business. Whether you're new to construction management or you’ve been around the block, there's something here for you. And if you missed my original conversation with Renee, this is your chance to catch it now—right here in your AWDB feed. Check the Only Girl on the Jobsite Podcast! I am honored to host LuAnn Nigara today to talk all about leadership in our industry, the struggles and the underlying reasons why stepping into leadership is so critical for the health and profitability of our business. LuAnn Nigara is a celebrated media personality, keynote speaker and seasoned entrepreneur. Recognized as the “go-to” keynote speaker for leaders and entrepreneurs to launch their life and get out of their own way, she always delivers a dynamic presentation. In her third business launch, LuAnn Nigara Inc., she provides business resources for entrepreneurs through live events and LuAnn University. LuAnn has published three books, is a sought-after columnist and has captured international attention for her weekly podcasts “Window Treatments for Profit” and “A Well-Designed Business®” which has more than 1000 episodes and 9 million downloads. LuAnn shares her story of how she started her podcast, The Well-Designed Business® for designers when her business was a window treatment specialist and why she decided to lean into us crazy designers and this crazy industry of ours. “The more authority, the more expertise that you can gain in a particular area, the more impact you can have.” says LuAnn. LuAnn knew she didn’t want to start a podcast as a hobby, it was going to be her business. She was going all in. She did a deep dive and spent several weeks researching and time spent figuring out what she could talk about and not get bored of. “Because you can’t just pick a topic and then do all of this work to set up all of the technical, the background and all of the infrastructure and then be like, well, seven of those conversations and I’m done. And so I was exploring all the things that were interesting to me as a human, as a person, as a window treatment professional, everything. And what I knew was interesting to me was business.” shared LuAnn. “That’s what I can talk about all day, every day. Whether it’s your business as a designer, your business as a window treatment person, your business as a bricklayer, your business as a digital marketer, it’s there’s marketing in there, there’s sales in there, there’s operations in there, there’s finance in there, there’s so many critical things that have to be understood well enough and two or three areas that you have to be a master at in order for all of it to coalesce and become a profitable business.” says LuAnn