Always Had a Plan: La Tonya Roberts on Going Full-Time, Pivoting Smart, and Getting It Done

Listen on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/episode/6IuoauRwsPm1PRrIjw4oYh?si=KT3goplYTGO4f_7t5oAZ3A

Listen on Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/9-the-scrappy-strategist-how-la-tonya-roberts-went/id1878384628?i=1000759504690

La Tonya Roberts has always had a plan - and the grit to execute it. From running a lemonade stand outside a military base in Alaska at age 7 to pitching her parents with formal PowerPoint presentations for Christmas gifts, La Tonya's scrappiness has always been strategic. Today she's the founder of Harmony Consulting Group, a fractional COO, AI strategist, and host of the podcast Systems That Set You Free - and in this episode she walks us through every pivot that got her there.

Growing up as an Army Brat, La Tonya moved every few years - California, Germany, Alaska, South Carolina, Maryland - before eventually landing in Atlanta. That constant change didn't slow her down. At age 7, stationed at Fort Wainwright, Alaska, she was already reading the market: she set up her lemonade and chocolate bar stand right at the entry point to base housing, timed to catch soldiers coming off their morning PT runs. Strategic at seven years old.

That same instinct followed her into her teenage years, when she was delivering full PowerPoint presentations to her parents to negotiate for things she wanted. Her mom still tells the story. Her dad eventually adopted a simple policy: as long as she wasn't hurting herself, he'd let her run with it. Her kids now do the exact same thing to her - and she admits they're better at it than she was.

La Tonya went to a technical high school where she majored in cosmetology, started working as a shampoo girl in 10th grade, and had her own stylist chair before graduating. She earned a full academic scholarship to college, worked through undergrad, and got introduced to consulting through her dad - who retired from the military and walked straight into a suit at the Hoffman Buildings in Alexandria, Virginia. That informational interview changed everything. By 2006, she was a consultant. By 2013, she had her first side business doing resume writing and interview prep. And by 2020, she was ready to go all in.

The leap to full-time entrepreneurship wasn't impulsive - it was engineered. After years at Booz Allen and then Deloitte, La Tonya moved to Atlanta to lower her cost of living, partnered with a longtime friend, landed a DEI contract, and grew the book from $300,000 to over a million dollars in a year. She designed her own role, negotiated herself into it, and walked out of Deloitte on June 18, 2021 - two days shy of her self-imposed one-year deadline.

Today, Harmony Consulting Group focuses on three things: strategy, AI integration, and operational excellence. La Tonya works primarily with visionary service providers - coaches and consultants who have the big ideas but need someone to build the systems behind them. Her job, as she puts it, is to get them to slow down long enough to make their business repeatable, trainable, and scalable. The KPIs she tracks: MRR by segment, sales conversion rates, retention rates, and team satisfaction. Once people come in, she says, they stay.

On AI, La Tonya is direct: stop being scared and start having a plan. She uses Blockbuster and Uber as her go-to analogies - if you're not evolving, you're pricing yourself out of the market, both with clients and with talent. But she's equally clear that AI is a tool, not a replacement. Someone still has to manage the process, catch the hallucinations, update the prompts, and bring the human judgment. She works with clients to build hybrid human-AI teams that run with excellence - not just efficiency.

In the lightning round, La Tonya revealed she sends calendar links (always), uses ClickUp and a handwritten to-do list side by side, keeps her managed inbox under 10 unread, never sends emails after 9pm, and has named her ChatGPT Chatasia - who greets her as a sassy DC woman and gets things done. Docking station, not a bunch of wires. Reservations always. Couch is for Netflix only.

Jack's final verdict: strategic scrappiness that has evolved into real sophistication. La Tonya's response: fifteen years ago, we were just surviving. Now there are systems that set you free.

Connect with La Tonya Roberts

• Podcast: Systems That Set You Free (Spotify, Apple Podcasts, YouTube)

• Website: https://www.harmonyconsultinggroup.org

• LinkedIn: https://www.LinkedIn.com/in/La-Tonya-roberts

• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/thelatonyaroberts

• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thelatonyaroberts

• TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@thelatonyaroberts

• YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@TheLaTonyaRoberts

Connect with Jack Tompkins

• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jack-tompkins/

• Pineapple Consulting Firm: https://www.pineapplecf.com

• Speaking: https://www.pineapplejacktompkins.com/

• YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCalnj5yLU0ZH9y_tVl1J4ng

About Pineapple Consulting Firm

• Franchise Dashboards: https://www.pineapplecf.com/franchise-dashboards

• White-label Dashboards: https://www.pineapplecf.com/white-label-dashboards

• CFO Dashboards: https://www.pineapplecf.com/cfo-dashboards

• Fractional Analyst Services: https://www.pineapplecf.com/fractional-analyst

• Looker Studio Support and Training Services: https://www.pineapplecf.com/looker-studio-expertise

• QuickBooks Online Dashboard: https://www.pineapplecf.com/quickbooks-online-performance-dashboard

• Ecommerce Dashboards: https://www.pineapplecf.com/ecommerce-dashboards

• Business Coaching Practice Dashboards: https://www.pineapplecf.com/business-coaching-dashboards