Fix My Fees
She Took a Receptionist Job to Spy on the Company | Sheela Abdi | Fix My Fees Ep. 41
Sheela Abdi took a three-day temp receptionist gig for one reason: to scope out a company from the inside before deciding whether she wanted to work there. Three days later she walked into the CFO's office and said, "I'm not a receptionist." She left as their HR Director. That's the whole personality of this episode. Sheela is a senior people operations executive with 20+ years across music, entertainment, streaming, and beer — Bug Music/BMG, Pabst Blue Ribbon, Insomniac, Live Nation, Pluto TV through its exit — and she's spent that entire career refusing to be the version of HR everyone expects. Today she runs Limitless HR Group, a fractional people operations team that gives business owners a full HR department without the headcount. Host Tavious Washington digs into why the companies that want HR least are usually the ones bleeding money without it, what actually changes when culture becomes a line item, and why "no" should almost always be followed by "but." In this episode: • Why "no, but — can I show you this?" beats a compliance lecture every time • The transferable skills you already have and can't see in yourself • When a growing business should actually bring in HR (hint: earlier than you think) • Scaling Pluto TV to an exit, and what the founder wanted repeated at his next company • The Zen Zone she built for EDC Vegas staff on almost no budget — and the headliner who wandered in by accident • Undercharging, executive coaching, and learning to believe her own numbers • Fractional HR: the whole department, none of the overhead or liability Chapters 00:00 — Not your typical HR guest 01:51 — What Limitless HR actually does 03:07 — The companies that don't want HR need it most 06:31 — "No, but" — finding another route to the same outcome 07:32 — The client who leaned over her desk and said "you hate this" 09:02 — The transferable skills she didn't know she had 11:43 — 2008, layoffs, and landing in entertainment 12:49 — The receptionist recon mission 14:50 — Becoming an acquisition-side HR executive 15:27 — Pabst Blue Ribbon, Insomniac, and companies that don't want HR 17:10 — The biggest misconceptions about HR 19:16 — When should a business bring in HR? 20:00 — Scaling Pluto TV to exit, then building Telly from day two 22:53 — Sturdy, and building culture for creatives 31:47 — The Zen Zone at EDC Vegas 36:04 — Why she leads with people instead of numbers 37:33 — Learning to charge what the work is worth 40:15 — Who she is when the business hat comes off 46:54 — Who should be calling Limitless HR 49:10 — What a fractional HR department actually gets you Connect with Sheela Abdi Limitless HR Group → https://www.limitlesshrgroup.com Email → sheela@limitlesshrgroup.com or info@limitlesshrgroup.com Men's mental health nonprofit → https://www.amindspursuit.org Fix My Fees Merchant services is boring. The people in business aren't. Every week, Tavious Washington sits down with operators who did something interesting and asks how they actually did it. Website → https://www.FixMyFees.com Want to be a guest? → tavious@fixmyfees.com Instagram → @fixmyfees Keep more. Grow more. Live better.
