Angel Lyra Swanson is the owner of Beira Consulting. Read our interview with Angel about her experiences with Xcelerate Business Advising. 

‍

What inspired you to start your own business? 

A few things contributed to my starting Beira in 2022. I had been considering this possibility for years. The idea would surface; I would deliberate; weighing risks and opportunities; then I would put it back on the “someday” shelf and go back to work. Then COVID happened and – like for so many – fissures in the systems of our lives became harder to ignore and the benefits of staying the “safe” course became less compelling. 

‍

I had been working inside a large consulting firm that allowed me to explore my more intrinsic interests in how culture and power impacted our ability to achieve our program goals. I was grateful to my manager for letting me redefine some aspects of my mid-level role to help address gaps in our services as problem solvers and program designers. 

‍

Then, like so many working parents, I juggled salary work from a makeshift home office, online kindergarten facilitation, and a range of now amplified pre-COVID persistent issues related to extended family, health conditions and major home projects.

‍

It’s a long and somewhat familiar story at this point. What ultimately did it for me was the confluence of compulsion for agency and a loss of confidence in the trajectory of the time to get me where I wanted to be. Less passive, more active. 

‍

We moved cities, we had another child, and we acclimated. I took some time off from salary work and after a few months, I got a call with an opportunity for another job. The opportunity sounded like an excellent fit in many ways. I really enjoyed the team that reached out and was excited for the work itself. But I could not shake the feeling that I could not go back to salary work like pre-Covid. Before I knew it, I was offering them another way to work with me to address specific aspects of the work that matched what I had to offer. They could hire my company. They asked for my business details and after a quick visit to the Secretary of State of Oregon’s website, we were off.

‍

What were some of your key goals that you worked with Xcelerate on this year? 

Support with clarifying my products and services and streamlining systems for project scoping and completion.

‍

How has your identity as a woman and any and all other intersectional identities impacted your business?

Growing up in the US with a non-US parent, forced to navigate this country's flavor of prejudice and sexism, planted the seeds of my evolving worldview and directly impacted my personal and professional work. I named the company "Beira" because of the beauty in liminal spaces it evokes for me. This is a Portuguese word that means barrier, edge, or frontier, and is often heard in the phrase "beira do mar" (shoreline). As a multicultural Gen X female with adult diagnosed ADHD,  I have felt firmly that I live in a liminal space and that it is on the edges that we find the richest, most powerful growth.

‍

What were some of the challenges you faced this year and how did working with Xcelerate help you to overcome these challenges?

Systematizing in a way that is sustainable is tricky. When navigating the ins and outs of running a business with all the passion and neuroatypical ways it helps to have a coach who has endless compassion and intelligence to help build a way to do this.

‍

Are there any wins or achievements you have celebrated this year while working with Xcelerate? For example - hiring new employees, paying yourself, quitting a day job, achieving profitability, opening a new location, increase in sales, launching a new product. Please be as specific as possible.

The work with my coach to help me identify my zones of genius allowed me to look more closely at my offerings and build the confidence to invest in areas that I had been wary of approaching in the past.

‍

How do you personally define success for you and your business?

Success feels like finding that right fit with a client and a team and creating something together that inspires practical actions and sustains creativity and wonder about why we are here in the first place!

‍