Unlike most designers starting out on their career journeys, Melissa Oholendt had a startling level of clarity about her future ambitions while still in design school. She knew that she wanted to run her own business as a residential designer, but that course was derailed when a well-meaning professor told her that the industry wasn’t the place for upstart solo entrepreneurs.

“That was in the early 2000s, and the industry was different. You apprenticed under someone, if you were lucky; you got to buy their book; and then you could become head of a firm,” Oholendt tells host Kaitlin Petersen on the latest episode of the Trade Tales podcast. “Having that conversation with the professor really just shifted my world and made me doubt everything. It threw me off my axis.”

In response, Oholendt pivoted, eventually ending up in corporate finance. Still, fate found a way to remind her of her original ambitions. After a few years, she picked up a photography hobby that turned first into a side gig, then a full-time job shooting weddings. This led to lifestyle shoots, which quickly turned into interior photography work. Already at the helm of her own business, she quickly decided to shift her focus to design, launching her firm, Oho Interiors, in the fall of 2019.

When the pandemic hit a few months later, her business exploded. In the years since, she has maintained that growth, expanding to a nine-person team spread across offices in Minneapolis and Black Forest, Colorado. This year, she’s chasing a new goal of stepping back from the day-to-day minutiae and becoming the firm’s creative director—a feat that will require a finely tuned internal review process, but that she feels will ultimately help Oho Interiors reach new levels of success.

Elsewhere in the episode, she shares the business partner who helped her firm set its sights higher, the strategy behind identifying an Instagram audience, and how she stays above the emotional fray when discussing finances with clients.

Crucial insight: During the design of her own home, Oholendt realized how valuable it was to have a direct line of communication to one of the architects working on the project, so at her firm, she makes sure to be present during the client intake process. “I don’t want them to feel like there’s a gatekeeper they have to get through to talk to me or anyone else at Oho, so I am still that person who takes those inquiry calls and does that initial vetting,” she says. “I also think that I have the ability to build trust quickly with people, and allow them to feel comfortable with making a very massive investment after a phone call.”

Key quote: “We are always talking about money and trying to make our clients as desensitized to the conversations as possible, because when we are able to do our best work is when we have full disclosure from them on where they’re comfortable financially.”

This episode is sponsored by Joon Loloi. If you like what you hear, subscribe on Apple Podcasts or Spotify.