When Jaclyn and I met, she had just resigned from her role as a full time teacher, and was recently single. She was working on building a business which combined some of her many passions: Purple Mountain - yoga for kids.

Jaclyn had been chatting about this new business with a good friend of hers, and was expressing her lack of confidence about how to run the business ‘properly’ from the beginning. She knew she had great ideas, but they lacked structure, and having never run a business before she was nervous that she was missing key information and skills. Jaclyn remembers saying to her friend,

“I just need someone who gets it. Someone who knows business, but also gets it.”

Her friend, who had attended a Communications Planning workshop with me at the local neighbourhood house, immediately responded: “You need Bonnie.”

Fast forward a few weeks, and I was sitting in Jaclyn’s family dining room, paper, textas and sticky notes all over the place. There were cups of tea and snacks, and Jaclyn was bubbling over with excitement about her new venture. 

Over the next 6 or so hours, I listened, made notes, asked questions and shared different tools and models. By the end of the day, we had mapped out a full business plan on a page, including Purple Mountain Yoga’s target market, what services it was offering, and how Jaclyn was going to take it to the next level over the following year.

“I went from feeling burned out and scattered but dreaming about this new opportunity, to feeling really excited and capable."

"In a day I suddenly had structure, I knew my ‘Why’, I had clear messaging and I knew exactly who I was serving and the value I was providing,” said Jaclyn.

“It was huge! But I also had instant actions I could take so I could easily feel like I was doing something proactive straight after the session,” she said.

Since that meeting, years have passed, and Jaclyn’s journey has taken her to Queensland, India, and back to Lutruwita/Tasmania, where she now works at Environment Tasmania managing their social media campaigns and content.

Jaclyn, and her friend Bec (who was the one to recommend me originally) also engaged me to work with Environment Tasmania to co-create their Communications Strategy. According to Jaclyn, that training day was invaluable.

“No matter where I am or what I’m doing, I keep coming back to the frameworks and tools and perspectives I learned from Bonnie,” said Jaclyn.

“I love that Bonnie has strong values, and is progressive in shifting business culture. I always learn something from her," she said.

Skye Cusack is the Founder of a small creative agency previously known as BluSkye Marketing. Skye contacted me when she realised that the brand (and some of the work) was feeling disingenuous to the whole team. 

They had started the business strong with a thorough business and brand strategy, but very soon after the launch and for the following two years they had felt trapped and silenced.

They knew they wanted to go in a more authentic direction, but that’s all they knew.

At that stage they were thinking about a minor change to the branding so it was more authentically them, but they hadn’t planned a major overhaul of the mission and identity.

Skye mentioned that once they decided they wanted to take some action and have a strategy session, the whole team knew they wanted to work with me.

Skye and one of the staff members had worked directly with me before, through my mini-coaching sessions. They also followed me on Instagram, and had me as a guest on their podcast where the third member of the team had listened to me wax lyrical about money and capitalism in business. And so, there was already some trust established. 

The team said I felt familiar, they trusted me, and I align with their values and philosophy. They also trusted I could get the job done. Skye in particular knew I could ask some gnarly questions with kindness, which might lead her down the path she was seeking…

However, the budget was small and they knew they could only invest in one hour of support with me. They prepped for the session by having an internal discussion about values, services and dreams, so that the team was on the same page about that prior to the 1 hour strategy booking.

During the session, we talked about the current situation, and where BluSkye wanted to go in the future. Through a series of questions, I uncovered a lack of pride and joy in the current work and brand, which ended up being the catalyst for a huge lightbulb moment.

Skye spoke about feeling overwhelmed in the session because of the rapid progress. “I remember thinking, what the hell? We’ve been here for less than an hour!”

“You have a great way of pulling the right threads. You say ‘I hear you are saying this, but why don’t we explore this more…’” she said.

“I never would have thought about whether we were proud of our work without you pushing me a little. I felt really seen, and I felt like you ‘got it’ even more than I did!”

“And when you said that it sounds like we are a ‘creative advocacy agency’ - I’m not joking when I say it changed my life! It rocked my world!” Skye said.

After the session, once the team was clear on the new direction (and let me tell you, I could feel the energy through the screen!) they went away and collaborated on a new name. This part of the process was a team effort, with each individual putting their spin on the final moniker: Project Loudly.

Skye also found the strategy session to be a huge help when briefing the graphic designer, because they’d already unpacked the heart and soul of the business, and could articulate it clearly.

“I feel so good. I feel proud to talk about my business, and we can confidently take our brand to new clients knowing that we’ll be attracting the ‘right’ people. I really don’t think we could’ve done the work we did to relaunch this brand without you.”

Before the rebrand, Skye felt that 36% of clients their business attracted were aligned with their values and mission. Now, since the rebrand, the number has risen to 91%.

Project Loudly is a creative advocacy agency for changemakers. They work with people or organisations looking to make change for social justice.

The team offers a range of creative services, like writing, music, graphic design, photography and promotional campaigns.

Project Loudly is proud to be a First Nations, queer and disabled owned business.

You can find them on Instagram here.