Episode 69: Starting Mission-Driven Organizations with Melissa Bloom

Want to keep making a positive impact in the world outside of teaching? Melissa Bloom is here to help. Bloom is the founder and CEO of Expanse Strategists, where she partners with purpose-led CEOs. She's all about transforming businesses so they can positively impact society.

Melissa began her career as a high school English teacher and progressed through the administrative ranks. After four years as an assistant superintendent, she decided to step into the corporate world. She saw similar successes there, to which she credits her "superpower," AKA her background in education.

An expert in business education and women's leadership, Melissa's insights are rooted in her predictable success model guiding teams toward transformative growth. She's also the author of Queen Bee Chronicles: Empowering Women to Challenge Biases and Spark Change.

In this episode we discuss her journey and what she's learned along the way, which is a lot! You can follow her here on LinkedIn.

 
 
 
 
 

Read the transcript for this episode:

Welcome to educator forever, where we empower teachers to innovate education. Join us each week to hear stories of teachers expanding their impacts beyond the classroom and explore ways to reimagine teaching and learning.

Dr. Melissa Bloom is the founder and CEO of Expanse Strategists, where she partners with purpose led CEOs. She's all about transforming businesses so they can positively impact society. Melissa began her career as a high school English teacher and progressed through the administrative ranks. After four years as an assistant superintendent, she decided to step into the corporate world, crediting her background and education as a superpower. Her journey through various C suite roles has shaped her unique approach to leadership and success. An expert in business education and women's leadership, Melissa's insights are rooted in her predictable success model guiding teams towards transformative growth. She's also the author of Queen Bee Chronicles, empowering women to challenge biases and spark change. Hi, Melissa, welcome. I'm so glad to have you here.


Dr. Melissa Bloom  

Hi, thanks, Lily. I'm excited to be here. Yes,


Lily Jones  

Awesome. Well, I always start with the same gigantic question, which you can take in any direction that you Okay, which is tell us about your journey as an educator?


Dr. Melissa Bloom  

Sure. I started off as an educator, that was my first job out of college actually wasn't my first job out of college. But it was my first real job out of college, started as a high school English teacher. And I looked like a kid, I'm pretty sure. So that was a little intimidating. At first, I did that for five years, while I was earning my administrative degree for being a principal did not go into being a principal right away, actually, I left to do consulting for our regional office of education. So I worked kind of as a liaison with the state with grants and things with schools. I did that for two years. And then was asked to go back to the school where I started and be an assistant principal did that a few years. And then I got called into the superintendent's office, and they said, Hey, we're gonna make you principal next year. And I was like, oh, no, no, no, no, I, I don't want to be principal. Like, I'm good. I'm good. I just kind of got this thing figured out. And it was like, nope, we've already got it figured out. You're the principal. So that first year is, there's I don't think there's a harder job on this planet than being a principal, quite honestly,


Lily Jones  

I believe that I've never been. But I absolutely believe that. Oh,


Dr. Melissa Bloom  

my goodness, that first year, I don't think I slept ever. Did that for four years turned out to really love it. High school kids are hilarious, and just a different breed. And then I did four years as Assistant Superintendent for curriculum and like hiring basically. So that was exciting. Then it was like, I don't know what I'm going to do with myself. I had my doctorate, there wasn't really anywhere to move up in the district I was in. And I live in Illinois. So if you're going to get a different superintendency, you're probably moving. And I had three kids, and we had just moved. And so that wasn't really an articling option. No, no, my husband's a teacher too. So there were complications that and that's what led me to seek outside of education. Yeah,


Lily Jones  

so interesting. I love hearing about people's different journeys. And I love to like, the things that you thought that you might not like, like you ended up liking in some ways, right? Like, it's always not the binary. No, no, it's something that you can learn from it new stuff. Yeah, absolutely. And so thinking about, then your next step, you know, I think you then transitioned into the corporate world did. And so I'm wondering a little bit about how that transition happened. And also just personally and professionally, what you kind of reflected on in your own skills and experiences to make that leap efficiently.


Dr. Melissa Bloom  

Yeah, so it's interesting, because I didn't really know anybody who had left education to do anything corporate or outside of education. So there wasn't really this community to ask, Hey, how do you do this? So I just started applying for things that I thought I could do and that I had transferable skills. And I was kind of looking at, not for profits, honestly, because I have I have a lot of experience with volunteering and not for profits. And I was applying for positions now I realized I probably had no right to be. But, you know, I was thinking well, what of my skills are transferable? It ended up being interviewed by a company that was running the Marzano Research Center and in charge of Dr. Marzano knows evaluations for teachers and leaders and I end Have you had for it? And I thought it was I thought it was terribly. And I was like, oh, shoot, that would have been a really cool job. Surprise, I got a call back. And I ended up taking that position. So I worked with Dr. Marzano for actually worked with Dr. Mercer the whole time I was in that role. But that was really exciting. Because I mean, who hasn't read a book by Dr. McDonough? Right. So that was really neat. You the imposter syndrome is real. You just like I had it going into a principal ship, right? Sometimes you kind of need people to say, yeah, you can, you can do this. In that role. I didn't have a whole lot of need, at first to have business acumen. You know, I was still very much in academics, talking about stuff I talked about before, you know, I lead evaluation and my prior role. So that wasn't very uncomfortable for me. But as the company started to grow, and I started to get promoted, I had a lot of different titles. And the four years that I was there, I needed to start picking up more business acumen. And the biggest, I think the biggest thing people would have gotten going for them is to not wait until you know you need it, it's to start educating yourself in advance. And sort of demonstrating that you have the wherewithal and that the ability to to move those skills in a transferable way. Because the corporate world doesn't always realize that, you know, so, for example, a few years later, we are our CFO left. And we didn't have a CFO for a year in the company. But I had picked up enough financial awareness, and I knew how to pick up what I didn't know enough to keep it going for a year. So I did that for a year to get hired someone else? Yeah. I mean, everything in education is so transferable. It's just, sometimes you have to prove it a little bit that only two other people but to yourself.


Lily Jones  

Yes, absolutely. And I think it's like, I absolutely, positively agree that teachers can really do anything and transfer skills. But that's not to say that there aren't new things to learn. And so I think sometimes that is like the piece that gets missed. Yeah, that there are always things to learn. And of course, in a new role, there's going to be a huge learning curve,


Dr. Melissa Bloom  

any new role.


Lily Jones  

Yeah, absolutely. But teachers, you know, we're experts on learning, we can figure it out. But I think that that also feels different. Sometimes it has, for me starting a business and learning about business stuff, and all sorts of things that were like are very outside of my comfort zone, right? Um, just that effort, you know, and focus of being like I am learning this specific skill right now, can feel exciting and intimidating. It can.


Dr. Melissa Bloom  

And it's not comfortable to be in a place where you don't feel like you're an expert in something. And you know, when you've been in education for awhile, you, you've been an expert in your classroom and your subject area. And then it's like, I don't even know what I'm talking about. Yes. But you do you know that? How many times did we all get thrown a new classes last minute? And have to? I mean, I always felt like I was teaching something I'd never even read before. Yeah, just staying a week ahead of the kiss. We know how to do it.


Lily Jones  

Yes, absolutely. So that is your role that you were just talking about, you know, you were the CFO, you wore many hats? And what would you say you kind of learned through that process?


Dr. Melissa Bloom  

Well, when I left the company, I was president. So I reported directly to the CEO. And first of all, I learned that I could pretty much pick up whatever I needed to, and in the business world, and I learned to stop being intimidated by new things. Because really, everything is just kind of a layer, you know, on top of each other. And I also learned that I don't need to be an expert in everything. You need to hire experts, once you get to a certain level. Nobody wants you to be the expert, because that's what you hired them for. Right? So I really learned how to develop a good team around me. And they're always had that philosophy. You know, when I when we hired a new principal to replace me, my philosophy was I want to hire principal who's going to do a better job than I did. And so when, when I looked at the team, we were hiring that was sort of, you know, I want to hire somebody, people that are going to fill my gaps and make me a better leader, but also that I'm gonna make them better leaders. So that was a really big takeaway. Oh,


Lily Jones  

yes, absolutely. I feel like that's a big one I have been doing as a business owner, starting off and having to do all the things right, like, right. Alright, I'm just gonna try and figure it out and learn all the things and things that I'm not good at. Yeah, ie graphic design.


Dr. Melissa Bloom  

How much do you need to know before you ask somebody else to step in? You know, that was another thing? How much do I need to know to understand it? And then I can, you know, yes, add on, or hire for it? Yeah.


Lily Jones  

And hire somebody who's better? You know, I think that that's been so freeing to me, it'd be like, okay, like, yeah, I have, I'm glad that I had the years of having to do things all on my own, because I have that baseline of like, okay. I basically know how Facebook Ads work. But I don't want to run on myself. I can give directions and look at the data and understand the things are working. Because I was really in the weeds. But now I have somebody doing it. Who is so much better than I ever was. Because that's her only you know, that's her specialty. Yeah,


Dr. Melissa Bloom  

yeah, I miss over the sales department too. These are the things I was like, Are you kidding me? I was over sales to I didn't. I'm not a salesperson. I mean, actually I am. We're all salespeople. Once you get to corporate, you kind of realize you're a salesperson, right? But I didn't think of it that way then. And I didn't pretend to be the expert with the sales team. You know, here's our strategy, I can look at the data. But if it's not working, we need to kind of figure this out together. And I think that's another thing is just being humble about what you bring and what you don't bring and listening to, you know, to people telling you when they have more expertise in an area than you do. Absolutely.


Lily Jones  

And you don't have to know it all.


Dr. Melissa Bloom  

No, no, give yourself some grace. Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. There are a lot of times I apologize, believe me.


Lily Jones  

That's great. And so I know now you've started your own business. Can you tell us a little bit about that? And how that came about?


Dr. Melissa Bloom  

Yeah, sure. So the company I was at left as a president, it had we had gone through COVID. Right. And it was, it's an education company. And we were putting people in schools. So really difficult time in schools, right. So I learned very quickly, we learned as a team very quickly how to pivot and deliver what we needed to deliver and not lose clients. And that was pretty affirming, you know, to be able to do that. And at the same time, I was leading the scaling of the company had had a fabulous MIT has a fabulous mission very, you know, very impactful on society, to change, to close the education gap for an an equity for all students. To do that, take scale, right. And I scaled the company, we scaled to 100%, an operating profit in a year 57%, and our professional services. And by the end of that, that time, I thought, you know, if I really want to have an impact on missions, and remember, I had been interested in not for profits to I like, want to help people change the world. I thought, if I could help other education companies and not for profits, do what we just did here. Maybe we could all collectively speed up this change real world thing, because there's a lot of really great missions, and it's going to take a lot of people to change education, systemically. So yeah, it was a little bit of a philosophical leap of faith. I guess it goes back to being called in until I was going to be principal, that must have been a life altering decision making.


Lily Jones  

Yes, I love that. I mean, I think that's fantastic. And I absolutely agree. I mean, there are so many things that need to change in education, so many people who have really great ideas about how to change things in education, and also can't do it all. And so I think that one of the best things that people can do you know, is get some mentorship and some guidance from people who have been there and done the things that they want to do. So I truly appreciate that as a mission. And I think you have to have a strong passion or mission when starting your own thing.


Dr. Melissa Bloom  

Yeah, for sure. And you know, there are benefits. You know, for those of you listeners that are thinking about stepping out into corporate, and I've learned and talking to people, now that I'm in this role. The education is such a strange world. For people who haven't worked in it, even if they're running an education company, they haven't actually worked in the district office. The budgets are strange, the hiring cycles or the calendar years. Yes, there's all these records. So being able to bring that to an education company with not only bite at Tech and corporate experience, but I actually sat in the decision maker seat and like, decided, if we're gonna buy this education tech or this program is a huge benefit to


Lily Jones  

Absolutely, yes. I mean, I've been in that situation so many times at education company is where people have a very different idea of what it's like to be in schools, and I think especially like be in schools recently, right. People think sometimes, like, their own experience being a student can be applied in all sorts of situations, which is not true. And I think just like the reality of being a teacher or being an administrator or being in the district office, all of those things, you have to know it by having done it.


Dr. Melissa Bloom  

Correct. Correct. Yeah. And we already put so much on educator shoulders. Yes. Did I?


Lily Jones  

Absolutely, then I think it's hard for people to understand.


Dr. Melissa Bloom  

It is. It is yes. So that's the other, I just, I want to be able to bring a real voice of customer, maybe to companies that don't have that right now.


Lily Jones  

Mm hmm. Absolutely. Yeah, absolutely. And just like, I mean, if you can do it at the beginning, right. Like, I've also been in so many situations where it's like, a company has developed an education product that they've been working on for many years, and then now, five years later, are testing it in classrooms. Right?


Dr. Melissa Bloom  

Like, let's not do that, right? Well, in the model that I use, you know, really sets up the right cadence of, of when you should do that, right. So, gosh, please don't develop a tech product and wait for five years to find out if it's a sustainable market. Right. Bad idea?


Lily Jones  

Yeah, don't do that. Don't do that. Awesome. Well, I'm so excited about the work that you're doing. And I, I love hearing about your whole journey. I'm wondering if thinking about our listeners, who are maybe like, how can I use my skills beyond the classroom? Or maybe I want to move into the corporate world? Or maybe I want to start my own education business? What advice would you give them about transitioning outside of the classroom or outside of the school building?


Dr. Melissa Bloom  

Well, now I know that there are communities, you know, LinkedIn is full of other people who are looking to do that. There are coaches now to do that. And that's a huge benefit that I did not have, or I didn't know is out there, if it was probably was. So first, I would familiarize yourself with what other what other people done that was successful for them, no need to recreate the wheel. And then the other thing I've told people who have asked me is to sit back with your resume, because education is so lean, goed, right. Sit back with your resume, maybe maybe have somebody who's in corporate friend or relative or whatever, sit with you, and talk through the education speak and transfer it to real world other people understand that aren't sitting in a classroom, you know, classroom management, what is, is that you've got teamwork, you've got you know, leadership, you've got the leadership development, there's all sorts of things that are transferable. But if you just put a education resume in front of a corporate person who's never hired an educator, they don't know how to make that transference.


Lily Jones  

Absolutely, yes, I always give the advice of like, give it to a friend who's not in education. Can they understand what you're talking about? I just use so many acronyms. And then there's like regional acronyms that people share s and things like that, where it's like, we don't know what that means.


Dr. Melissa Bloom  

So TPT is a is a great tool for that, too. Yeah,


Lily Jones  

absolutely. Absolutely. And then thinking about it, I think with that lens of like, is it telling my unique story to


Dr. Melissa Bloom  

write? Right? Yes. In any way with the hiring market, the way that it is? I think that's really important to tell that unique story and and why does education give you value add over somebody who went a traditional path, and maybe they've worked in that field before? What are you bringing, that's very unique to that position?


Lily Jones  

Definitely. Yeah, I think like, that is all a good thought exercise to do in the application process to Yes, really reflecting on your experience, which is hard sometimes I was to be like, What have I learned over the past 20 years?


Dr. Melissa Bloom  

It's really hard. You know, I always thought, Oh, I'm gonna write that down. That would that will be a good example someday and I could never remember them when I Yeah. So maybe if you're ever thinking about do I start writing things down? That might be helpful?


Lily Jones  

Even just like some chicken scratch on a notepad? Gosh,


Dr. Melissa Bloom  

right, right. Yeah.


Lily Jones  

I know. I've always wished I had more pictures of myself as a classroom teacher. I didn't have any. Yeah, I have like one. Actually.


Dr. Melissa Bloom  

I don't think I had any. Yeah. So I have to go post some yearbooks or something. That's a very good suggestion. Public speaking? I mean, what principle doesn't public speak? Oh, right. Yeah. And you're in front of community. And you're like the PR person in some roles. I mean, there's just so by the time you're a principal you wear like, every hat, in every position known to man. I mean, sometimes your doctor sometimes or the police, sometimes your counselor sometimes there's a lot.


Lily Jones  

Yes, absolutely. In the financials and the counseling people,


Dr. Melissa Bloom  

family, family counseling. I mean, it's like everything. Yes. All the things scheduling, I got scheduling, right.


Lily Jones  

Absolutely. Absolutely. I mean, I think that's a vote of confidence for people to when you really sit back and you're like, What do I do all day, every day? Yeah, probably 1000s of things of things. And so it's like picking those apart, making the time to reflect because as you say, like, because we're doing 1000s of things, we don't have time to reflect, or really keep that list, or at least have the mental space to even think about all that we've learned. So I think like carving out that time and seeing it as a process to absolutely.


Dr. Melissa Bloom  

Well, and when you start to apply, you know, to Well, I think this is true, even if you're applying it within education, but being able to quantify your success, you know, that's almost an expectation and corporate know, I talked about, you know, scaling to under percent. It's a little harder, I think, when you don't have a comparison, but the teachers have a lot of data. So thinking also about how you can structure that data to mean something as an outcome for the position that you're interested in?


Lily Jones  

Absolutely. Yeah. I think it's just a different way of looking at things. It is so and positioning yourself. And again, like it doesn't have to be perfect the first time that you try it out. Yeah.


Dr. Melissa Bloom  

And there are a lot of education companies that hire former educators, too. It's like you have to go completely out of the realm of education.


Lily Jones  

Absolutely. Yeah, absolutely. Well, I love all that advice and hearing about your journey beyond the classroom and your awesome new business. And so I'm wondering if you can tell people where they can connect with you.


Dr. Melissa Bloom  

Yeah, absolutely. I'm most active on LinkedIn. So so far, I think I'm the only Melissa bloom in education world and LinkedIn, but my handle I leave isn't also bloom slash ies. And my email is in bloom at expense strategists.


Lily Jones  

Wonderful. We'll put all the links down below to thank you. Awesome. Thanks so much, Melissa.


Dr. Melissa Bloom  

Appreciate it. You too. Bye bye.


Transcribed by https://otter.ai




Lily Jones