Karina Mikhli: Generalist community builder
There is nothing quite as lonely as feeling like ‘it’s just me’. You can choose to suffer alone. You can opt to solve the problem by yourself. Or you can reach out and find your people.
Karina chose options 2 and 3.
Early in her career, Karina experienced the same pattern every 9-12 months. She would do great work. She would then get promoted or she would be let go (having solved the problems she was brought on to tackle), or she would move on.
She didn’t have mentors to shine a light on the fact that she was supremely competent, and perhaps it was the companies that didn’t know how to keep challenging her.
She thought this was just her and solved the problem by painstakingly finding recruiters and employers who would listen to her background and understand the value she offered.
After years of facing this frustrating dynamic, she stumbled into becoming an operations consultant and then a fractional #COO (before that was really a thing #trailblazer).
Her knack for solving off-the-wall problems and knowing when to call in the licensed experts (CPAs, Lawyers, etc) made her a natural to drop into any vertical and get the operations house in order.
Soon enough, she was thriving in her fractional career.
In 2022 she joined a client in a full-time capacity and spent a year immersed in that company.
When she returned to the #fractional marketplace early this year, things were different.
More people were interested in fractional work. Yet, finding opportunities was harder.
This time, instead of feeling like it was ‘just me’, she thought: I wonder if there is a fractional tribe out there to make this less lonely.
Karina looked around and didn’t find a community that was quite what she had in mind.
So, she posed a simple question to her network: would you be interested in a community for fractionals of all functions to connect, collaborate, and learn from each other?
Within days of setting up a landing page and free Slack channel, she had 50 people engaged in a real fractional community. Five months later, Fractionals United is up to 2,400 members who help each other navigate this new way of working.
Once again, Karina jumped into solving a new set of problems, like how to build and scale a community with grace, curiosity and tenacity.
She is living the message that she would offer to her past self:
It’s not just you
You will find your people, they are out there
Meet Karina Mikhli: Fractional COO | workflow consultant | accidental founder | automation geek | teacher
She helps businesses solve problems from workflow optimization to freeing up the CEO to focus on their areas of strength. Drop her a note if you need a sharp operations mind on your team. And, she is building a flourishing community where fractional leaders can connect, learn and grow together.
Join us in Breaking the Mold: Generalists Who Thrive in a Specialist's World as we explore real-life examples of generalists connecting dots, innovating, and solving problems.