Julie Strong is the CEO of C1S Group, a leading construction and engineering firm based in Dallas, Texas. Julie has more than 19 years of experience in the mechanical design and the construction industry. She is responsible for finance, business administration, and human resources, and she has managed construction projects across a wide variety of market segments, demonstrating success on over $25M of projects from initial estimate, through design, construction and commissioning. Under Julie’s leadership, C1S has been named in the Inc. 5000 list of Fastest Growing Companies for four consecutive years, and has been named in the Dallas 100 list of Fastest Growing Private Companies. The company has also been named among the 50 Best Places to Work by Inc. Magazine, and has been part of Outside Magazine’s list of Best Places to Work since 2013. Julie is a graduate of The University of Texas in Austin and received her Master of Business Administration from the University of Texas at Dallas.
Entrepreneurial Role Models:
Julie’s dad
When business started difficulties overcame:
“We were small, it was stressful and uncomfortable, there was very little work, thankfully I had a pay check for a while but when I committed to it too both of us had all our eggs in one basket, that was very scary for us as a family, we have 2 small kids, the risk was just higher then. We were sort of in a place then where if we didn’t get this thing going it was going to be a pretty big change to get back to what we did before”…[Listen for More]
Favourite Books:
- Traction: Get a Grip on Your Business Book by Gino Wickman
- Man’s Search For Meaning: The classic tribute to hope from the Holocaust Book by Viktor E Frankl
Favourite Quote:
- “We are on a journey that will never end”
- “Laugh often and much”
Recommended Online Resources:
Harvard Business Review – Find new ideas and classic advice on strategy, innovation and leadership, for global leaders from the world s best business and management experts
Best Advice to Other Entrepreneurs:
“Find a way to enjoy it, if it was easy everybody would do it, it’s going to be hard but you got to find a way to enjoy it, sometimes you have to be real intentional about what you’re feeling good about because some days you’re not feeling very good about some stuff and other days you’re just on top of the world, but between those peaks and valleys you’ve got to find a way to enjoy what you’re doing because that will translate to the people that you work with, it’ll translate to your clients, nobody likes to work with some grumpy stressed out leader, it’s not very inspiring” …[Listen for More]
More About Julie Strong:
Neil’s Quote at the Beginning:
“Questions focus our thinking. Ask empowering questions like: What’s good about this? What’s not perfect about it yet? What am I going to do next time? How can I do this and have fun doing it?” Charles Connolly
Other Quotes From the Chat with Julie Strong:
- “We are on a journey that will never end, there is no getting there and if you spend all your days just pining for the there, oh when we do this it’ll be great, when we get there it’ll be great, when we accomplish X it’ll be great and just spending your days a little more in gratitude for where you are and recognising the accomplishments you’ve made and being grateful to those who’ve helped make it happen it just helps keep your head in a better space for the risks and challenges of running your own organisation”
- “Don’t be surrounded by yes men”
- “We didn’t start this to grind away our professional careers being miserable”
- “We held ourselves back by being pennywise and pound foolish for a while”
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