070: Have a Team But Can’t Take a Vacation?
When you hear people talk about taking time off, do you wonder HOW they do it? After all, you might be the one responsible for the day to day operations of managing your clients and team and this makes the idea of vacation sound like some sort of fantasy.
In this episode, I am sharing the two areas you have to examine if you’re ready to take a step away from your business and want to ensure that things can run smoothly while you take a break.
You’ll hear about the limiting beliefs many people run into while stepping into the identity of Agency Owner and CEO. I also talk about what it looks like to spiral up and what you’ll want to keep in mind to spiral up successfully.
What’s in this episode:
- What it looks like to be in the place of spiraling up
- The identity of being a done for you service provider plus team
- Two areas to examine if you want to step back from your business (and keep it running without you)
- Limiting beliefs people have about stepping into the CEO and Agency Owner role
- What you want to pay attention to when spiraling up in your business
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EPISODE 70 TRANSCRIPT:
Download the Episode 70 Transcript
Welcome to The Scale Your Way podcast episode number 70.
You’re listening to the Scale Your Way podcast, where we share simple, proven strategies just for fun for you service based companies here, you’ll learn how to scale your business on your own terms so that you can have more time, money, create a bigger impact and a better life. I’m your host, Nicole Jackson Miller. Let’s dive into today’s episode.
Hey there. Hello. Hello. Hope you all are having a great day today. Today, we going to talk about if you currently have a team, you still can’t take a vacation, what to do. So for those of you who don’t know me, hello, my name is Nicole Jackson Miller and I help done for you. Service providers step in to the agency honor roll and really lead a team they love so that they can impact more people and the people I’m talking about his clients, their team and themselves too. So part of my mission is to really help people with their people. And so it’s not about prioritizing one group of people over another, for example, like having really happy clients and having team members that are really unhappy or having a happy team. But having unhappy clients are like everyone else is great. But you’re just not feeling great in your business. We really want to make an impact, a positive impact on all of your people, including you. So today I want to talk about if you have a team right now, you’ve delegated client, you know, a good portion of client delivery, but you feel like you still need to be super involved in the day to day operations. So I’ve talked to a lot of people who are interested in my new program agency, which is specifically designed to help you delegate 50 percent of client delivery or more in 12 months or less. And so there’s a few people who have shared that they’ve already delegated about 40 to 50 percent, but that they’re still a hundred percent involved in the day to day and they can’t step away.
And so if you have been feeling this way, I want you to know that this is a natural part of transitioning from being a done for you service provider to stepping into the role of agency owner. The problem is, is that a lot of people find themselves in this spot and then think, this isn’t for me, it’s too much work. And so what I want you to know is that you are in a place that I like to call spiraling up.
And so if you think about business and business growth, it is not a straight line upward. Unfortunately, when I figure that out, if I ever figure out how to do that, I will absolutely let you know. From my experience, growing in your business is more like spiraling and it’s not spiraling out, even though sometimes it can feel that way, it’s actually spiraling up. And once you spiral up to a new level, there are going to be certain things that come up that you are going to have to revamp in order to be able to grow to the next level. And oftentimes I’ve like I’ve kind of seen some trends and categorized them into three different areas. So the first is your actual service. The second is your team and the third is your operations and leadership.
So what happens when you reach this point is that something may come up around team or something may come up around your services or something may come up where you’re in this point now where you’re like, OK, well, I have a team members, but I’m still so involved, what am I doing wrong? And we tend to look at this as a really negative thing when in fact it’s actually pretty positive. So I want to explain to you the identities that we need to work through as you step into an agency on role. So the first identity and where most people start is that they start as a done for you service provider, meaning that they’re pretty much the only ones offering the services to the client. And what this looks like is that they are managing themselves and doing the work and they’re managing their clients in making sure that they, the clients know what’s going on, that the delivery is approved. They’re really managing that relationship.
OK, so what everyone wants to get to is to the agency owner and CEO identity. And so instead of managing your clients and yourself, you are managing other people like implementors and then eventually managers and leaders on your team to be working inside of your business. And there’s a few other things that will shift and change as well. But when it comes to your role in who you are managing and what you are doing, that is really the big shift or the big change between being a done for you service provider, being an agency owner.
Now, what happens is that during this transition, there’s this weird middle ground that you’re not necessarily a done for your service provider anymore, doing it all yourself and you’re not necessarily an agency owner and really stepping into a CEO role. You are like in the middle. You’re a done for your service provider plus team. This is usually necessary to go through this identity, but it can be the most frustrating because if you look at who you’re managing, you’re still having to manage yourself and your clients. You’re also having to manage your team and maybe even some leaders on your team, probably not quite yet. It’s probably mostly implementors.
So what happens is that if you’ve ever said this to yourself before, why do I have a team? Because I feel like I’m doing just as much, if not more work than before. You are very likely in the transitional period. And it’s OK. You have to go through this transitional period in order for you to shift into being that agency owner and CEO. So congratulations. You have delegated client delivery, right? You’re not the only one implementing for your clients. And I think that’s amazing. But now it’s time to remove yourself from having to be involved in the day to day operations. So I want to go over to different areas of what you want to look at. If you are currently in the spot and you’re wanting to be able to step away from your business knowing that it would be able to run without you, which it can’t right now.
So the first is we really need to examine your beliefs around what’s possible. And I know this to be true because I have been in this position myself. I had an agency and as I was shifting from being a done for your service provider to an agency owner, there were a lot of thoughts that were going and beliefs that I had that were going through my mind that actually weren’t serving and supporting my growth. So I want you to ask yourself, when it comes to actually removing yourself from the day to day, whatever that includes, whether it’s answering team questions, answering client questions, jumping in, if there’s an issue, what beliefs do you currently have around removing yourself from both client and team management?
So I’ll share with you a few things that have come up from people that I have worked with and from some people who are following me on Instagram or have shared with me some of their thoughts of why they think it’s probably not possible for them to remove themselves from management.
The first thought is that no one can do this but me. Have you ever thought that before? If you want something done right, just do it yourself, right? No one can do this but me. Maybe you’ve tried it before. Maybe you’ve tried bringing on a manager into your business or you’ve tried handing over some of the things and it didn’t work. OK, that happens. So I believe that fifty percent of life we are failing and things aren’t working out. And that’s cool. Right? And fifty percent of the time, you know, things are working out. So it’s very common that you’re going to do something and it won’t work. But we’ll get to that in a minute.
Another thought is that I’ll lose all my clients if I’m not here. Things are going to go wrong. It’s not going to work. Right? So we really need to understand what those beliefs are, because if any of those beliefs are running through your head, then some of the tactical stuff that you can do might not work. I say might, because if you’ve tried something before and it hasn’t worked, there is a very strong possibility that there was something like not in place when it came to the tactical stuff that you could implement to make it work better. But again, if you are believing that like you’ve tried it before and it won’t work, then you’re not going to want to be in a place where you actually are able to shift that. So it’s really important to understand, like, what are the thoughts and beliefs that you are currently holding on to in? Are you in a spot where you are willing to do the work to shift those beliefs and implement what is needed to be successful into stepping into an agency on a role? And if once you do that and once you get really clear, sometimes just writing it down on a piece of paper and it’s like, oh, well, this is part of the reason probably why it’s not working. Right, then we can put that to the side and then we can get to the tactical stuff, which is the second thing that I want to chat with you about.
So if you’re in at a point right now with this, like take a look at your beliefs, take a look at shifting those beliefs and then take a look at your services, your team and your operations, what would need to happen tactically in order to remove yourself? So for your services, it could be some of the things we talk about inside of agency is creating a scalable service. So you may have already gone through this exercise where you’ve created a service where you can have implementors implement the service. Great. Now, what do you need to shift anything else to make it work so that you’re not involved in the day to day management and you can hand that off? How about ideal clients? That’s another thing that we we take a look at. Sometimes you may find that the reason why you feel like you have to be inside of your business all of the time is because you have like one or two not ideal clients that are expecting you function the same way that you function when you were a done for your service provider and didn’t have a team. So what’s going on there?
We might need to look at your delivery process. How can we streamline your delivery process so that you are actually able to step away and have team members that can support that delivery process? And it’s really interesting about that, because I have had clients who have said, you know, I thought I was helping by being involved in the delivery process and I realized I was actually not being helpful and holding my team up. So we want to make sure that the right systems are in place and you don’t just, like, piss out and don’t come back or support your team. But we might have to look at revamping your delivery process when it comes to your team, the team members that you have right now, are you hiring strategically? Are you delegating profitably? Are you measuring their success so that, you know, if it’s working or not? The team that you have right now is that the team that’s going to get you to that next level, to that next spiral? OK, so those are all things that you want to take a look at. And lastly, you want to take a look at your operations and your leadership.
So when it comes to your company, like what is the end result you’re creating for your company? What are your goals around that? And then how are you showing up when it comes to leadership? How are you leading the effort? And this is really what also changes in the done for you service identity versus the agency owner identity. You start making different decisions. So the answer to a problem is no longer going to be I’ll just step in and do it myself. Usually. It’s going to be like, what do we need to revamp? What creative solutions do we need to come up with so that we can handle this as a company and make it better for the future and actually make decisions that will support the company long term, right? We’re moving, so done for your service provider, a lot of times it’s very short term focused. When you step into agency owner and CEO role, it’s much more a long term focused.
OK, if this is the direction we want to go, if I am wanting to remove myself even further for client delivery so that I can really run this business and grow this business or just have some time to be able to think the answer to this challenge is not going to be to just work harder. Right?We need to start shifting that. We need to start thinking smarter. We need to start making different decisions. And it’s like a muscle that you have to practice. But once you practice this muscle and really build this muscle, so you practice and you build the muscle, you will be able to really start thinking like this more regularly and without even thinking about it. So those are some of the things that I want you to take a look at. That’s right. We need to look at your beliefs and what you are telling yourself is possible.
So, again, if some of those beliefs is no one can do this but me, I’ve tried it before and it doesn’t work, I will lose all of my clients. I want you to really identify what are those patterns? What are those thoughts that are running through your head. Right? And how can we start disproving some of those thoughts, too, so no one can do this but me? That’s not true. Someone could probably do it better than you. Right, because you probably don’t even really like being involved in the day to day as it is. Or maybe you don’t mind it, but you know that it’s not your zone of genius. You know that you need to be doing other things. Maybe that’s marketing or sales or relationships. You’ve tried it before and it didn’t work. Remember that like fifty fifty rule. It’s like, well fifty percent of the things that I try aren’t going to work. Right? And you need to, you need to gain that experience in order to be able to inform your next step decisions. That’s why we have spirals. So each spiral. Right. You’re taking the experience that you’ve gained within that’s that last spiral and you’re making changes so that you can actually continue to grow. I want you to take a look at those beliefs, write them down and and really be aware of what you’re telling yourself and what you’re believing.
And then the second piece of it is to start looking at thinking differently. And what specifically when it comes to some of the tactical things that you can be doing inside of your business. Now, if you are ready to get support when it comes to the tactical pieces. So you’re like, listen, I know I have these beliefs. I’m working through them, I’m open to changing and I’m ready. I can help you with the tactical stuff. The tactical stuff is I don’t want to say it’s easy, but it’s pretty impossible to implement if you don’t have your beliefs on board.
So if you’re like, yep, I’ve got it, I’m ready to implement some tactical strategies to be able to remove myself further from client delivery. My program AGENCY is going to help you do this. So AGENCY is a program that is specifically designed to remove you from client delivery so that you have more space and time to be able to be focused on running your business and really leading a team that you love, this program is for people who want to make a bigger impact when it comes to all of their people, when it comes to themselves, when it comes to their team and when it comes to their clients, too. And you probably want to do this in a way that is profitable for you. So to do it in a really strategic way. And so that’s what this program will help you do. And if you are interested in learning more, you can head over to NicoleJacksonMiller.com/apply. There’ll be more information on the page. And if you feel like it’s aligned, please apply. If you have questions about it, don’t be afraid to reach out to me. You can reach out to me on Instagram, send me a D.M. and we can chat more about it. But this is again, it’s really important that you take a look at those current beliefs and you recognize them and that you’re open to shifting them before you start implementing some of this tactical advice, whether it be through my program or any other program, too. So I hope this was helpful for you today. This is the stuff I feel like a lot of people don’t talk about when it comes to hiring and team members. It’s very much like create a job post, do this, do this right. But we sometimes can ignore those underlying beliefs that we carry that make it really challenging to be able to implement new strategies, to be able to lead team members. And so it’s really important that we examine this so that you are able to have a team and that it actually is giving you a return, which can be I mean, obviously a financial return, but also a time return so that you can have the time to take some time off, go on a tech free vacation, to run your business, to be able to work on a personal brand, to be able to do some personal projects. This is what we’re creating here. All right, everyone, it was so great to chat with you today. And I will see you next time. Bye.
Thanks. Thanks so much for tuning in, if you are ready to stop settling for being a done for you service provider and really fully step into the role of agency owner and CEO and lead a team that you love that just delivers excellent client results, then you have to check out my new program called AGENCY, which is specifically designed to remove you from at least 50 percent of client delivery in 12 months or less, so that you can have the time and the space to be able to run your business and, you know, to take a tech free vacation, too. That’s always nice, right? So if you’re interested in learning more, head over to NicoleJacksonMiller.com/Apply. You can learn more about the program. If it looks like a good fit, then apply. And we will send you before our call. We’ll send you a free business assessment that will really explain more about the framework that we use to remove you from client delivery. And it’ll give you an assessment that you can take to really show where you are now and where you’re going. We’ve had so many people get a lot of insight just from taking that assessment, so I can’t wait for you to check it out.
