Bridget Schonland

I don't think there's one single achievement - it's the joy and happiness when clients contact me post 90 days and invite me to their kids' birthday parties, their Christmas dinners, and sit at their Thanksgiving tables. That, for me, is my biggest achievement. No client is more important than the other. I've done medical professionals at the top of their game and top music people, and they're all just as important as the other. Just because you're a famous musician or you run a music label or you're a world-famous heart surgeon doesn't make you more important than the next guy. I think my expertise is people skills - I enjoy being with people and helping at destination. I'm a natural empath and I always want to help. I just love what I do, I love people. I'm a social butterfly, I love networking, and I just made a business out of it.

Just to be authentic. What you see is what you get with me. I know it sounds so cliched, but we are so surrounded by fake social media and it drives me nuts. It's just not who I am. I won't be doing TikTok dances and driving around in a Maserati that I haven't paid for and wearing Louis Vuittons. For me, everything needs to be authentic, and I've turned away a lot of clients because if they don't like my authenticity, we're probably not a good fit. I'm at a stage in my life where I'm here to do authentic work and be myself, and if it doesn't work, then it doesn't work. Right away when I do my client intakes, I know whether that client and I are gonna gel. And I am very polite - if I'm not the right fit for you, then I'm not going to do you justice, and I won't do our relationship any justice. What you see is what you get. And love what you do - I just love what I do.

The biggest challenge is that relocation management companies are becoming more and more AI, automated, and platform-driven. You hardly ever talk to a human - you become a number in this system. They'll say here's your portal, log in, but there's no human interaction. The RMCs just monitor payments and act as an invoicing system - they're in it for the real estate commission. They take 60% of the commission, which means the realtor is no longer incentivized to handle relocations correctly or answer 100 questions about a family's needs. The opportunity I see is that people are really craving that human interaction that companies are getting rid of. There's a 10% gap that falls between the HR department handing over to the RMC and the 40% failure rate with corporate relocations - 40% of corporate relays fail within a year, meaning they go home, and that can cost a company 400% of that executive's relocation package. Companies need to flip this on its head - the family needs to be 90% of what a relocation involves, and the executive needs to be the 10%. Because if his family are happy, trust me, he's showing up at his desk getting the job done, not being distracted and running home every 5 minutes to help.

The spirit of Ubuntu is central to who I am - it's a phrase from Africa that means we are in this together, we do this together, we support each other, we help each other. It began as a tribal thing, but I honestly believe that people who have that ingrained in them are the ones that tend to want to help people and work together and create communities. I think at the core, most people just want to help each other and they want to have community. I teach my clients how to move to Nashville and integrate into the Nashville community - don't come here and bring your beliefs, you can celebrate your cultures and beliefs as much as you want, but you have to understand that when you move to a new community, you have to integrate into their society. It's something I learned very quickly when I lived in Europe. Authenticity is everything to me - what you see is what you get. I'm here to do authentic work and be myself. And I believe no client is more important than the other - just because you're a famous musician or world-famous heart surgeon doesn't make you more important than the next guy.