In this interview Michelle Cairns talks to Karen Meadows about the benefits of working with Tim Matcham and having him as a mentor

Michelle Cairns:

So hi, we’ve got Karen Meadows with us. Hi Karen.

Karen Meadows:

Hiya.

Michelle Cairns:

And Karen, can you just tell us a bit of a background about yourself first and how you got into working with Tim?

Karen Meadows:

Okay. So I saw Tim first at a Pin meeting, so he was presenting and the things that I remembered were butterflies and cabbage whites and blue lines. And they were really stuck in my head and I saw him speak a couple of times and help at the Cheltenham pin. So what Cheltenham and Gloucester pin as it is now, and he doesn’t live that far from there. So it was quite nice. He used to come quite regularly. So I saw him other than speaking and he kind of inspired me a little bit because I’ve got one single let property and we bought that because I don’t have much of a pension. So like lots of other people it’s a sort of pension investment.

And then I got into going to pin meetings and other sort of property networking meetings. And I did what a lot of people do, which is kind of the chasing shiny penny syndrome. So I was literally talking to people and making friends with people and then thinking their strategy was great. I’d have a go at that. I’d go and do a bit of training and then to come back and I’d be sort of attracted by something else because I met some new people. So I really didn’t know what I was doing.

And my main reason for speaking to Tim was because I wanted to decide on my strategy, something that was suitable for me. And it’s quite scary word strategy. Because you think, “Got to have this big thing”, but you have to know yourself and you have to know what you’d be good at. So I did things like Wealth Dynamics, which a lot of people do and it made me understand myself a huge amount because my day to day job is consultancy and I always get really enthusiastic about projects and the sort of get towards the end of them and I have really struggled to finish and I’m always looking for the next thing.

And I used to beat myself up about that, but then I did Wealth Dynamics (note Tim now uses Contribution Compass as a profiling tool) and that’s the kind of things that Stars (Champions in Contribution Compass language) do. And that’s where I was initially. And I have redone that recently. And so I’m now sort of moved down more towards the Deal Maker (Connector in Contribution Compass language), which is connecting people. And I do that all the time. I’m always, “Oh, I know somebody who can help you with that or I can put you two together.” And that makes me feel really good.

Michelle Cairns:

Yeah and there’s a lot of energy in that side of the equation, that creativeness, the connections, there’s a lot of energy there. And it’s very easy to kind of get distracted by all of those things. So having a mentor kind of brings that together in a more kind of purposeful way.

Karen Meadows:

Yeah. And I definitely need that. I needed to be able to sort of be focused on something to do. Tim gives you or gave me various actions, various things to do. And I find it takes me quite a long time to do things because I like to do my research. So, sort of weekly, we have weekly calls and I’ve started that, but haven’t quite finished, but I’ve also started that. And that’s me, I’m sort of juggling balls or several plates spinning at once. And I suddenly find that I end up with a whole pile of stuff that’s finished, which is great, but it takes quite a long time to get there because I’m working on lots of different things. I’m not very focused.

Michelle Cairns:

Lots of tabs open!

Karen Meadows:

Yeah, I need someone to sort of make me think about what I’m doing a bit more. So when you’ve got tasks, it’s much easier to do that.

Michelle Cairns:

And why did you choose a mentor rather than just trying to kind of figure it out on your own?

Karen Meadows:

Again, it’s focus, because there’s so much information. You don’t know what’s important or what order to look at things in, or when you need to know something. Well, if you’d go and research on the internet, there’s so much, and there’s so many different channels and there’s YouTube and there’s Twitter and there’s Facebook and there’s LinkedIn and there’s all these people producing all these documents and articles and it’s too much. So you do have to really sort of shrink down to what you were looking at, and really focus on it. So it helps to have someone.

Michelle Cairns:

Helps makes sense of all of that information. Because it’s not a lack of information that’s not what we’re sort of proposing.

Karen Meadows:

There’s so much stuff out there you really want a focus. And there’s so many books, you can read 50 books and they’ll all tell you something a little bit different. And I think you have to decide who you want, not follow necessarily, but whose path you want to go along and kind of stick to that path. Because the mentors and the greats and Simon (Zutshi) and various other people have got slightly different sort of ethical perspectives and all of those sorts of things. So, you find what fits you best.

Michelle Cairns:

So that’s it, isn’t it? Everyone’s got their own style and their own interpretation of that information and how they can guide you. So I suppose, what was it about Tim, that appealed to you in terms of a mentor?

Karen Meadows:

He’s very calm. He’s very calming and that’s quite nice because it’s very easy to get sort of upset about that. And sometimes I’ve spoken to him and I’ve said, “I’ve had a really bad week and I just feel like I can’t do this anymore.” And yet, he’ll sort of bring you back in and calm you down and sort of make you think about what you’re doing and the reason why you’re doing it. So it always comes back to why you want to do things. And that changes sometimes then my, why is slightly different now than it was at the start because life changes and things come up that you need to consider. And that was good. So, he was very good in that way. he’s just very gentle and I like that. Some people might not like it, but that works for me.

Michelle Cairns:

No, that’s great to hear. And are there any projects you’re working on at the moment? Or are you just kind of starting out and trying to figure everything out and make sense of it? Do you have an idea of what you want to do next?

Karen Meadows:

My background is environmental health. So we used to do housing as part of my environmental health degree in and so I’ve seen all sorts of horrible houses when I’ve gone out on placements and things like that. And that used to really upset me, that people were living in really bad conditions. And I think along with the creative bit of me, I want to make things look lovely. It’s not all about big cashflow and HMO’s and things are not the biggest driver for me. So I thought I would like to do some flips. I’d like to get some properties that had problems. Mostly for me, it’s about people. It’s about solving people’s problems. So I really want to talk to people who have got issues with their property and they don’t know what to do with it. And they’re stuck, whatever.

Karen Meadows:

So we get given so many different options, we learn about all sorts of things during our training. So it’s making that fit or help them. So apart from making something look lovely, I don’t think there’s one really specific, very tight band things that I want to work with. It really is about helping people, for me, that’s important. I’m a people person. I’m not very figures orientated. That’s all the Lords and all the Mechanics over the other side of the Wealth Dynamics (Conductor & Calibrator in Contribution Compass language).

Michelle Cairns:

That’s the byproduct.

Karen Meadows:

Those are the people that I need to work with.

Michelle Cairns:

Definitely. Well, that’s a big part of it, isn’t it, is finding something that works for you and the owners.

Karen Meadows:

It does. Even my cleaner came to me and said, “Can you go and see a friend of mine? He’s got a problem with his house. He doesn’t know what to do.” So I went and sat and had a cup of coffee and worked through lots of different scenarios, things he wanted to do that he couldn’t do because I went off in checked planning and I went off and talked to various people. And the area he was in, wasn’t suitable for an HMO, et cetera. So it was giving him options. And that made me feel really good that I’d helped him because of the people that I know. And I can draw knowledge from them.

Michelle Cairns:

Brilliant. Well, it’s great to hear that you’ve had the guidance and confidence with what comes with Tim’s mentorship. So that’s great to hear. So thank you very much for your time.

And for anyone who is reading this and would like to follow up, here’s a link book a call 

Click the link if you would like to find out more about working with Tim. Thanks Karen.

Karen Meadows:

Thank you very much.

You can also download Tim’s free ebook here