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Latasha Brooks is a serial entrepreneur, business coach, mentor, event planner, motivational speaker, designer, executive producer, and author who is best known for mentoring and coaching up-and-coming business owners. She focuses on far more than simply profiting or expanding her businesses; instead, she uses her skills and knowledge to give back to the community and help those who need it the most. Despite becoming the business guru who is affectionately called “Coach Brooks,” Latasha’s introduction into the business world was anything but ordinary.
Latasha credited her introduction into business taking place when she was only in sixth grade. She had been passionate about performing arts and was preparing for an upcoming audition at the top-performing arts theater in Jacksonville, Florida. However, on the day of her audition, she was needed by her older sisters for help on a project concerning event planning. Latasha was forced to make the difficult decision of helping her sisters instead of attending the audition, which she feels allowed her to separate her passions and move towards a business life.
Latasha went on to land her first corporate job at eighteen years old and later graduated from the Florida State College at Jacksonville. Working in corporate America, she learned the ins and out of the business world, noting the methods in which businesses operated. She noticed the stark contrasts between the operations of corporate America and small businesses, noting that “everything that corporate America is doing, small business owners should be mimicking.” She began coaching small business owners on how to improve and expand their businesses, something she has been doing now for over thirteen years.
This eventually manifested itself in the Moneybaggs Mentoring Program, a hands-on program where Latasha personally mentors and meets with small business owners and entrepreneurs. The program launched in 2020 but took full effect in January of 2021 when it started accepting members. Not only is it an extremely hands-on program (initially beginning with Latasha meeting with the mentees for thirty days straight!), but Moneybaggs Mentoring was also the first mentorship program of its kind to allow its payments to count towards business credit for the owners attending. This means that while owners are attending the program and building payment history with a vendor, while learning from Latasha, they build a strong business credit profile as Latasha reports their positive payment history to the commercial credit bureaus.
Latasha made an analogy of operating a business being similar to operating a vehicle on the road. She describes the beginning of her own journey in business, “I was driving in circles, I had no destination…I wasted money and time. 90% of business owners are just driving…The reason behind her passion is very personal for her. “I do for people what I wish someone would have done for me.” She compares mentors to GPSs, a guide to the destination. Through her coaching and mentoring, Latasha provides small business owners with the necessary tools to get to their destinations and find the path to success.
Latasha is far more than just a businesswoman or coach. Her many talents and continued efforts to give back to the community have garnered her multiple awards across multiple states, including the Farbe magazine 2020 Business Coach of The Year, the Iconic Woman Award in Virginia, the I AM SHE Award in North Carolina, and the Pretty in Pink – Honoring Outstanding Women Award in Florida. She has planned fashion weeks, business summits, government-sponsored events, become a renowned motivational speaker, created a highly successful business-centric TikTok, and blossomed into a budding author. She published her 2021 autobiographical book, “Paid and Free,” a few book collaborations with great authors like Les Brown, and has two more new releases set to come out in 2022. She is even venturing into the world of television, becoming an executive producer working on her own original show. Alongside wearing the many hats she does in her professional life, she is a wife and mother who is recently pregnant and expecting her third child.
“Entrepreneurship is like a roller coaster.” Latasha has been navigating the ups and downs of the business world for a long time now, so what is her advice to small business owners who are struggling? “I would tell them to not do it by themselves…Entrepreneurship is very lonely. Do it with a like-minded group of people.” With the right guide, any business can find the road to success. For Latasha, her success comes from seeing the people she has coached thrive and prosper in the ever-changing business landscape.
- A.D. Imholt