Building Your Plan to Win an RVA Pitch Competition

One of the greatest hurdles for small business owners is a lack of capital. This scarcity doesn't just limit your growth—it ripples through every part of your life. It makes it harder to provide top-tier customer service or market your brand effectively. Perhaps more importantly, it creates a persistent "survival mode" of stress and anxiety that prevents you from taking the bold actions required to scale.

Whether you are seeking a bank loan, family investment, or a grant from a local pitch competition, clarity is your most valuable asset. You must be able to articulate your vision, identify your gaps, and communicate—concisely—how your business makes the world better.

This April, BizWorks is hosting a Power Pitch competition. This is a premier opportunity among several funding events scheduled to hit Richmond in early 2026. If you’re ready to compete, the work begins now.

The $100 Blueprint: 3 Workshops to Prepare You for a Pitch Competition

You don’t need a massive budget to prepare; you need a strategic one. Here is a three-step path to getting pitch-ready for under $100.

1. Clarify Your Vision

Judges want to see exactly where your business stands today and where it is headed tomorrow. They need to believe in your "why" before they invest in your "how."

To sharpen this focus, join Your Path Counseling Center for our 2026 Vision Board Workshop. During this workshop, Ederis Martinez-Cunion, MS, LPC will guide you to reflect on 2025, envision 2026, and craft a vision board that you can use to help clarify and communicate what you are building towards.

• When: Jan 8th at 5:00 PM or Jan 9th at 1:00 PM.

• Where: Virtual

  
  

2. Quantify Your Goals

Vision inspires, but numbers build trust. In a pitch, you must communicate the scope of your impact through data. How do you generate revenue now, and how will that evolve?

The Henrico EDA is hosting a Goal Setting Workshop at the Fairfield Area Library. Led by Dorian Cunion, this free session introduces the "Balanced Scorecard" framework. This tool helps you explain how your internal processes and team culture directly drive financial growth—a key metric for any judge.

• When: Jan 13th at 6:00 PM.

• Where: Fairfield Library 1401 N. Laburnum Avenue Henrico, VA 23223

  
  

3. Refine Your Delivery

Once you have the vision and the data, you must package them. On January 22nd, BizWorks will host the Develop a Winning Pitch in 2 Hours workshop at Virginia Asset Management. Dorian Cunion will walk you through tailoring your message so it is clear, compelling, and impossible to ignore.

• When: Jan 22nd at 2 PM.

• Where: Virginia Asset Management 130 Wylderose Drive, Midlothian, VA 23113

  
  

Why will these pitch prep workshops help?

We don’t just teach theory; we understand what happens behind the judge’s table. Over the last three years, we have coached more than 10 businesses to secure over $100,000 in grant and pitch winnings.

We leverage Dorian’s experience as a pitch competition judge to inform our consulting. Whether you are a food truck owner, a salon founder, or a bookkeeper, we help you bridge the gap between "having a great business" and "being a great investment."

The Power of Perspective

The biggest challenge for most founders is "tunnel vision"—being so close to the daily operations that you can’t see your business from an outsider’s view. These three workshops offer you:

• Strategic Space: Time to step away from the "doing" to focus on the "thinking."

• Community: An opportunity to collaborate with fellow RVA business owners who share your challenges.

• New Frameworks: Proven tools that build the confidence and competency required to win.

Conclusion

Time is your scarcest resource. This blueprint requires just six hours and $100. By completing these steps, you’ll enter the 2026 pitch season with a clear vision, a data-backed framework for success, and the communication skills to secure your funding.

Ready to start? Register for these events at the links below.

• Register: 2026 Vision Board Workshop

• Register: Henrico EDA Goal Setting Workshop

• Register: Develop A Winning Pitch in 2 Hours

Have questions about your pitch? Message Dorian Cunion at dcunion@yourpathexecutivesolutions.com.

The ADHD Advantage: How Executive Coaching Turns Chaos into Sustainable Growth

If you are a small business owner or founder with ADHD, you are in good company. In fact, research suggests that 62% of Small Business Owners have some form of ADHD. It makes perfect sense: you possess the creativity, risk tolerance, and hyperfocus that are essential for getting a new venture off the ground.

But as your business grows, the very traits that helped you launch can sometimes become the bottlenecks that hold you back. The “thousand great ideas” can turn into a lack of focus. The ability to “do it all” in a sprint can lead to an inability to delegate. And the passion that drives you can eventually lead to the dreaded “entrepreneurial burnout.”

You might find yourself stuck in the day-to-day firefighting—reacting to emails, putting out operational fires, and struggling to find the headspace for strategic growth. You might feel that your revenue has plateaued, or worse, that your business is running you rather than the other way around.

This is not a sign of failure. It is simply a sign that you are ready to evolve from a Founder into a Power6 Leader. This is where executive coaching becomes not just a luxury but a strategic necessity.

The Chaos ADHD Can Cause

For many ADHD entrepreneurs, the biggest hurdle is the transition from doing the work to leading the company. You may struggle with the “delegation dilemma”—the belief that it’s faster to do it yourself than to teach someone else, or the fear that “good enough” work from an employee will hurt your brand.

Without a clear framework to manage your time, your emotions, and your team, you risk stalling your revenue and sacrificing your personal fulfillment.

Here are three ways working with an executive coach can transform your leadership style and your bottom line.

1. Mastering Emotional Regulation to Navigate Challenges

One of the most overlooked aspects of leadership is emotional regulation. For the ADHD brain, emotions can sometimes feel like a flood—intense and all-consuming. In our coaching work, we often refer to the “Red Level” emotions—those moments of intense frustration, overwhelm, or excitement that can hijack your decision-making.

An executive coach can help you recognize ADHD risk factors before they derail your day. By learning to identify when you are moving from a calm “Green” state into a stressed “Orange” or “Red” state, you can pause and choose a response rather than reacting impulsively.

This skill is critical for Navigating Challenges (one of the six core skills of a Power6 Leader). When you can remain calm in the face of a crisis, you protect your team’s momentum and maintain the trust necessary for a healthy company culture.

2. Breaking the “Everything is a Priority” Cycle

A common pain point for CEOs with ADHD is the inability to distinguish between what is urgent and what is important. When everything feels like a priority, nothing actually gets done. This leads to long days, low margins, and the feeling of running on a treadmill.

Executive coaching provides the external structure that the ADHD brain craves. We work with you to implement Strategic Prioritization. Instead of chasing every new shiny object, we help you anchor your daily actions to your quarterly goals.

Executive coaching can also help you clarify your vision so you can Guide Decisions effectively. This means saying “no” to good opportunities so you can say “yes” to the best opportunities—the ones that drive revenue growth and prosperity.

3. The Art of Effective Delegation

To scale your business, you must stop being the “Chief Everything Officer.” However, delegation is often difficult for ADHD leaders because it requires clear communication, patience, and follow-through.

Through coaching, we tackle the perfectionism that prevents you from letting go. We use frameworks to help you define “done” for your team so that they can succeed without your constant micromanagement. This aligns with the Power6 skill of Delegating Responsibilities.

When you delegate effectively, you don’t just free up your time; you empower your team to take ownership. This builds a culture of teamwork where everyone pulls in the same direction, allowing you to step back and focus on the high-level strategy only you can deliver.

Executive Coaching as a Solution

At Your Path Coaching and Consulting, we don’t believe in cookie-cutter advice. We use a proven, research-backed methodology designed to help you build the skills, competency, and confidence you need.

Here is what the journey looks like:

Step 1: The Diagnostic Leadership Evaluation™

We start by assessing where you are. We look at your current leadership style, your team’s dynamics, and your specific ADHD challenges. This isn’t a judgment; it’s a map. We identify your strengths and the specific bottlenecks slowing your growth.

Step 2: Education & Strategy

We co-create a plan. We don’t just tell you what to do; we teach you the frameworks of the Power6 Leader system. You learn how to Motivate Action, Build Trust, and Increase Productivity using tools that work with your brain, not against it.

Step 3: Implementation & Coaching

This is where the magic happens. In regular coaching sessions, we tackle the real-time challenges you face. We validate your struggles—whether it’s a difficult employee or a cash-flow crunch—and turn them into learning opportunities. We provide the “scaffolding” you need to execute your plan consistently.

Step 4: Reflection & Growth

We use tools like the 360 Growth Assessment to measure your progress. You will see tangible evidence of how your improved leadership is affecting your team’s morale and your business’s revenue.

Conclusion

You have already proven you have the grit to start a business. Now, give yourself the support to finish what you started.

Executive coaching isn’t about “fixing” you. It is about unlocking the immense potential that is already there. It is about moving from a place of overwhelm to a place of prosperity and fulfillment.

You deserve to run a business that supports your life, rather than a life that supports your business.

Are you ready to stop firefighting and start leading?

BOOK A CALL | Your Path

References & Resources:

• Executive Function Disorder & ADHD | ADDA

• ADHD as an Entrepreneur’s SuperPower

• Power6 Leader Framework

Professional Success Starts with a 4-Step Plan

When I took this video, I did not know it would be one of the last trips I would take to New York as the VP of Corporate Operations at 7-Eleven.

It was an exciting time. Sembe Cole and I had just completed board tours with the executive team from 7-Eleven. In the weeks leading up to this tour, our teams spent hours remerchandising stories, coaching store staff, and reviewing sales results to ensure we had a great story to tell.

The first win might be small.

If you had asked Sembe or me 20 years earlier whether we would be in New York, leading a tour for all of the VPs of Operations at 7-Eleven, we would have thought you were crazy. Back then, we were just two recently graduated black guys from Virginia, looking to learn the convenience store business and be seen as individuals worthy of getting our first promotion.

Even if you had asked us 13 years ago, when we were both Market Managers, he running D.C., and me Baltimore, we would not have believed that both of us would rise so high within the company. At the time, we had never seen two black men serving as Zone Leaders at 7-Eleven simultaneously.

Unexpected obstacles will occur.

You never know where your career will lead you. Back when I shot this video, I believed that I would end my career at 7-Eleven. Fate had another plan.

Now, instead of leading a 1000-store zone, I coach and consult business owners. I take the experiences and lessons I learned over my career and use them to advise founders, CEO, and senior leaders on how to build strategy, lead effectively, and grow their businesses.

4-Step Planning Process

I learned a lot over my years with 7-Eleven. One of the most important things that I learned was the 4-step planning process. The 4-Step planning process mirrors the scientific method. Its power is in its simplicity. To execute a 4-step you:

1. Define your current situation.

2. Build a hypothesis on how things could be better (typically a statement of if I do "x", then "y" will happen).

3. Write down the steps you will take.

4. You set a date to complete verification.

Learn from experience

Over my career, I learned different names for this process, but the foundation is the same. If you want to change your current situation, first you have to define it. Then you have to think about how it could be better. Then you take action. Finally, you evaluate if the action worked. If it did, mission complete, you win. If not, you learn from that experience and try again.

Within my coaching and consulting business, I help business leaders and owners execute the 4-step process. If you are curious to learn more about how I help leaders grow I have 3 options for you

1) Book a call with me

2) Visit my website and read more about my services

3) Purchase the Finding Fulfillment at Work Workshop recording, just $50

The Finding Fulfillment at Work Workshop provides a high-level overview of the

• Power6 Leader program I use to help emerging leaders grow their leadership skills

• Saboteur Assessment that I use to help people identify negative thought patterns, and develop resilience skills

• A hybrid goal-setting approach of using OKR and SMART goals to map our paths to success