Behind The Scenes: 2022 So Far
Transparency and openness are a core part of my business, value-wise. I always appreciate those who lift the curtain and let reality show — in business, and in life — so sharing the behind-the-scenes in my own biz is something I’ve always wanted to do. Perhaps especially with kids in tow, because they add an extra special ✨something✨ into the mix.
So, here is the first of a series of “behind the scenes” type writings.
*I’m going to immediately jinx myself by claiming I’ll do these quarterly, but that’s the intention...
My plans for 2022 started strong and... to be honest? Waivered. I feel as though I borderline burned out at the beginning of the year, due to waaaay overcommitting to projects. Then my husband got ill. Then I got ill. It wasn’t the strong start to the year I had hoped for, but there were plenty of lessons.
So what was going on?
At the tail end of 2021, I’d had several enquiries come in; I’d taken on a retainer, and several long-term projects were still rolling on.
Partly down to a bit of a scarcity mindset (my husband works in the music industry and Covid has meant a lot of uncertainty), and partly down to poor capacity planning, I took on too many things and ended up feeling I had no time to do anything well. Cue spiral!
So early in 2022, (recognising where I was going wrong!) I invested in a few services to help.
The first was with Jess of Bliss Ethic. Jess is wonderful, and a systems whizz, and getting her to help me set up Dubsado workflows was such a brilliant investment. If you’re lucky enough not to have heard of it (kidding, love you Dubsado) it’s a tool that lets you automate workflows, emails and various other elements of projects. There are loads of different systems out there, but in all honesty, I couldn’t be bothered researching many. I’d heard good things about Dubsado so went with it. The path of least resistance is the one!
The amount of time and energy I’ll save in having to schedule standardised emails, proposals and other admin is huge, not to mention meaning I have a smoother, and hopefully, better quality client experience. It’s not everything, button me knowing there are things taken care of that I don’t have to remember to do is massive.
The second thing I did was to get help with planning my packages and capacity. When I first started my business, I had a verrrry loose idea of what I did and who I did it for. I just wanted to help people show up online and present their businesses and brands in a way that felt like them. So far so-so. Not getting clearer on this quickly meant that I was doing everything for anyone, which might work for some, but left me feeling overwhelmed and overworked. And not even really able to market the services I was doing.
I booked a session with the lovely Steph of Innovate and Thrive, and in a few hours, we’d cleared a lot of that confusion up. I felt much more confident (and excited!) about what I could do with my business.
“Having someone on hand to provide new perspectives, mindset shifts and inner work tools is so powerful. ”
Mainly, it involved getting clear on how much time I have. Reality check: I do not have 60 hours a week to work — if I’m honest with myself, right now I have about 15! It sounds so ridiculously obvious, but I just hadn’t been taking into account how much I could get done in any given week.
And so, armed with the knowledge and tools from Steph, I’m being much more careful with my capacity and looking at the number of projects I take on at one time. My youngest has recently started her funded childcare (HALLELUJAH) which gives us an extra day a week, but in reality, I need that time to work on Six Twenty Six because GOOD GRIEF DO I NEGLECT IT. Never posting on Instagram? NOT ENOUGH TIME. Zero marketing whatsoever? Not enough time. You get the picture.
My goals for Q1 (who even am I) were to stabilise my income, and while that’s still a work in progress (see that point above re. never marketing...) I feel a lot more confident about achieving that anytime soon than I did at the end of 2021.
The biggest ongoing investment I’ve made in my business so far is working with a coach. It’s been one of the best things I could have done for my business and my life. These things that we struggle with — business things, life things — are often so much more about mindset and deeper issues that maybe we don’t even realise are impacting our decision making. Having someone who provides new perspectives, mindset shifts and inner work tools is so powerful. I’m really grateful to have found her and to have the chance to do this work.
And boy am I glad I have her around because March was hardddd. I got Covid, which royally kicked my butt. Writing this a month on, I’m feeling mostly myself again, and mentally a lot more stable too. The anxiety of not being able to work when you’re self-employed is real. Not feeling up to or able to post on social media, not feeling able to actually do the work you’re being paid to do, worrying about whether you’ll get new enquiries, etc etc. It’s been a huge lesson, and a wake-up call to think about how I want to feel in this business, and plan ways I can arrange things in my business to take the pressure off if (God forbid) I ever got ill again.
So. That was the first (and slightly belated) quarterly round-up. I hope you find some of this useful, even if it is just to make yourself feel better about your own situation! (I jest).
Open conversations about business are so important. In this aesthetic-driven culture, we can so easily forget that all is not what it seems. Not everyone has their shit together, in fact I’d go as far as to say no one really does. The more honest conversations we have around business, mental health, the realities, the ups and downs (the wins!) the better for everyone.
I’d love to know how this first quarter went for you in your biz, what you struggled with and what went well. I’m always up for chatting in DMs, so feel free to slide on in there.