Today’s Guest

About Jo Casey

Jo Casey has over 20 years experience of working as a trainer and consultant in the corporate, public and third sectors. Her flashy clients and workplaces have included Pricewaterhouse Coopers (PWC), The NHS, BT, Toyota Motors, Peugeot Business School, The Welsh Assembly Government, The Girl Guides UK, Vets4Pets/Companion Care, several Local Government Authorities, and The Department Of Work And Pensions. But she’s also worked with many no less wonderful smaller ventures, micro businesses and SMEs.

She’s a self-confessed nerd and has taught at college and university levels and is a visiting lecturer at the University of Chester. Jo has a Masters Degree in Coaching and Organizational Development and she’s an NLP Master Practitioner, MBTI qualified professional certified Emotional Intelligence EQi 2.0 consultant.

She’s been coaching for over 15 years now – clocking up over 1000 hours of coaching experience. Basically, she carefully treads that line between being passionate and a tiny bit obsessive about what she does (obsession often wins). Jo runs accredited coach training programs and coaches people from all over the world via the power of the internet.

Listen to this episode

  

What You’ll Learn

• The dangers of blueprints and following someone else’s model
• Why modelling others actually can be helpful in the beginning
• How to get in touch with your business model and working style
• What are the different options or elements you can include in your business model
• How to get clear on how you want to work
• Understanding yourself and the way you work
• Things to take into consideration when creating your business model
• The questions you need to ask yourself when putting together your own business model

Things We Discussed

• Our episode: Why You Need Resilience in Your Business 
• MBTI (Myers-Briggs Type Indicator®)
• The Fascination Advantage by Sally Hogshead 
• Wealth Dynamics by Roger Hamilton

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Related episodes

• 233: Jo + Holly ~ The Importance of Transparency in Business… and How to Get It
• BMP189 Rosie Slosek ~ How to Know When It’s Time to Set Up a Limited Company or LLC
• BMP151 Jo + Holly ~ Our Top 10 Life-Changing Business Books for Solopreneurs

Transcript

The transcript for this episode can also be downloaded here (no opt-in required).

Holly: Hello and welcome to the Business Mindset Podcast, episode 238. This is your host Holly Worton and I am back with another co-hosted episode with the fabulous Jo Casey. Today, we talk about something which I have mentioned before, but we delve a little bit deeper into it, which is: how to find the business model that works for you as well as a style of working that works for you. Now, I have talked about this before, but it is so tempting to follow someone else’s blueprint, I get tempted by it too, but I know that that rarely works for anyone. It is actually much harder to create your own blueprint but that’s actually what’s needed for the vast majority of people. So, in this episode, we share our own stories, we talk about our own businesses are evolving and we guide you through some ideas on how to find your own business model. So, what are you going to learn today, we are going to talk about:

• The dangers of blueprints and the dangers of following someone else’s model.
• We talk about why modelling others can actually be helpful in the beginning, but also a bit tricky.
• How to get in touch with your business model and your individual working style.
• What are the elements and different options that you can include in your business model.
• How to get clear on how you want to work.
• Understanding yourself and the way you work.
• We talk about things to take into consideration when creating your business model and the questions that you need to ask yourself when you are putting together your own business model.

I am super-excited about this episode, because I think this is worth talking about and repeating more than once; and this is another extended episode that I hope you find really, really, useful.

Holly: Hi Jo!

Jo: Hi Holly! How are you doing?

Holly: Good, good, how are you?

Jo: Yeah, I’m good!

Holly: So, I am really excited to talk about today’s topic, which is: finding a business model that works for you and finding a way of working, a style of working that works for you. So, this is a very timely episode I think for both of us, but particularly for you. So, would you like to share why we were inspired to talk about this?

Jo: Yeah, so my business has been very much focused on doing one-on-one coaching with folks; so, a full coaching practice for me, is around about 15 people and that’s made up of people who are in, I have this six-month – soon to be nine-month program – called the supernova collective where people get a coaching session a month as well as group calls and workshops and things. And I also have one-on-one clients, on a six-month program. And that worked really well for the past few years. And then, so we are recording this in January 2018, so I have two kids, I have a 17-year-old and I have a 8-year-old and we have the normal coughs and cold and things like that, and there is normally a fair amount of juggling that goes on; but this year, come the beginning of September, my 8-year-old was just off school so much with chesty coughs, chest infections and things like that and it culminated in her being in hospital in November for a week and then we had several trips back to Accident & Emergency and it turned out that she has got acute asthma which was undiagnosed for a number of years which was why every winter she was getting these kind of chesty coughs and things. And so, whilst the prognosis is really good, it meant that I had to have a serious think about how much time in my business at a certain time I was able to commit, because I had 15 clients that I was managing and I had a child off school, or I was in hospital or there were just days when I couldn’t do calls; and it kind of forced me to rethink my business model a little bit and being so reliant on me being present at a certain time with people. My clients were amazing, they were so understanding as you would hope most people would be; but even so it didn’t feel great to be having to reschedule calls and things like that. And it just made me rethink things and so for this year what I am going to be doing is I am going to be cutting down on the number of one-on-one clients that I have.

I am shifting over to doing some higher level, higher investment level done for you services; like I love working on messaging with people; so, I am designing a ‘done-for-you’ messaging and website package where you will get your copy done, you will also get your website redone. So, it is kind of graphic design and copyrighting, but also coaching around your message, so that is going to be aimed at folks who are just that bit further along in their business, maybe in their third or fourth year and they are ready for that stepping into their next level of their business, and I love helping people translate that into their language. But, that’s going to be a kind of three-month service where there is some coaching but there is an awful lot done for you stuff behind the scenes, which means that my time is freed up a little bit if I need to doing stuff at 11pm, because you know my kid has been sick all day and off school, then I can do that.

And I am also going to be launching, it might have launched by the time it goes live actually, a membership academy, so that I still get to serve the people who are at the beginning, or the earlier stages, of their business; and I still get to have some hands on because I am going to be doing monthly office hours coaching with people in group; but it means that my time is freed up, not that I will be working less but I can work more flexibly because I can focus more on creating content: courses and workshops and resources and things like that, which again frees me up in terms of flexibility with my time. Again, if I have to, I can be doing it at 11pm at night – ideally, I don’t want to be, but it feels right for now, it feels like a really good move; and it also kind of forces me to look at things I am doing this service with who are a bit further along in their business and doing some done for you stuff. That feels really good and it is maybe something that I wouldn’t have been brace enough to start off with had circumstances not been what they are. And I am still going to be doing my group program, my Supernova, because that is just amazing, and I love it. It just means that I have a bit more flexibility in my time. Because, I don’t know if I am going to be available in the same way that I did before.

Holly: And I think that’s something that a lot of service-based business owners come to a conclusion of, at some point in their business. We are exchanging time for money, and while we may love that, sometimes we need to have some other kind of income supplementing ourselves, whether it is passive income, or self-study online programs; or something like you said the website work, that gives you the opportunity to serve people and help people but in a way that doesn’t mean two people showing up at a specific time, for a Skype call and doing a coaching session.

Jo: Yeah, exactly. So, I think sometimes these things are kind of dictated by circumstances, and sometimes it’s more just that evolution of a business, and you work out there is a point that people get to where: I can’t earn any more money because I don’t have any more hours in the day. So, I keep working with this model, or… and for a lot of service-based businesses that is the nirvana that you think that you will never get to. I can remember reading all those articles and seeing those webinars ‘are you still exchanging time for money?’ and thinking: Oh please! Please someone just pay me for my time, that would be amazing right now. But, you do get to a point where you are limited in a way. And the term ‘passive income’ always make me chuckle a little.

Holly: Because it is not totally passive!

Jo: It is not totally passive. It is not remotely passive really, I think. The idea that you can create something once is amazing, but then you have to be marketing it consistently, you have to be maintaining it consistently. It is a lovely idea, but there is still an awful lot of work that goes into it, it is just a different way of working.

Holly: Yeah, it is. And it’s a more flexible way of working as you said, because you can be marketing your book, or your course at 11pm, at 6am, at times that are convenient to you, rather than having to show up for a call with someone.

Jo: Yeah, yeah, exactly. So yeah, that’s the way, the reasoning behind why I have come to this point. How about you? So, you are also going through a bit of a kind of changing up things in your business. So, what’s prompted that for you?

Holly: Well I am, but I am not as far along in the process as you are; so maybe it’s is useful for people to hear because I don’t have all the answers yet, I don’t. I have not come out the other side of it. So, as you know, my first business was Eco hotels and nature has always been important to me, and the planet, and being kind to the earth, and being outdoors and walking and all of those things are so important to me. And my husband once said to me: you know, you love nature and ecology so much, why is that not a part of your business? Because of course my business is business mindset. And that stuck with me like a thorn in my side, and it has been bugging me ever since. Now, I have a meetup group where I take women walking and that’s kind of like a hobby thing, it pays for itself, but it is not a money-making thing, and I have written my books about walking. But I have gotten to the point where I feel like I need to bring more of the outdoors stuff into my work. And I don’t know what’s that’s going to look like. I don’t know whether that’s going to be more doing coaching and walking, I don’t know if that’s going to be taking women outdoors when I do the business mindset stuff. I don’t know what that’s going to look like yet, but it is going to be more of the nature stuff. And I am also talking about writing a novel for some time, and I had started one, and then I got kind of an idea for a new novel that’s very earth-based and very nature-based – so I think I am going to be working on that. So, my writing is going to go off kind of more into the fiction world, rather than into the non-fiction world. I am still in that murky middle where I am getting the hints and kind of the green flags of where my path is leading, but I don’t have a clear sense of what I am going to be offering or what things are going to look like in the future.

Jo: So, I didn’t know you were writing a novel! That’s very exciting, I can’t wait to read that!

Holly: {laughing} Well I will let you know as soon as it’s done!

Jo: I would be upset if you didn’t! I think it’s really interesting what you are saying because what you are describing is what I think happens to a lot of people who either self identify or we would identify as conscious entrepreneurs is that there is this calling, there is this kind of north star, there is this guiding universal essence or whatever you want to call it, that keeps tugging away at you and won’t let go. And it is just poking you repeatedly, until you listen to it, and just saying: it’s not right, you can see the green shoots you can see the path, but you can’t quite see what’s there yet and I think that happens to a lot of conscious business owners. And it can lead to real frustration of thinking: well, you know, I have worked so hard to get to this point it should be that I am really happy and satisfied now, why I am not? And I think it is because your inner compass, whatever it is that you are meant to be doing, whether you want to call it your why, your guiding star or whatever, it wants you to be following that path.

Holly: It does, but it is also really scary, because I have kind of pivoted in my business so many times; so, as I am looking at this way forward and I am seeing these clear signs that it needs to be more nature-based, I am thinking: holy shit, what if my path is to leave the business mindset stuff? I have been positioning myself as the business mindset person for so long, for the last three years, and what if I drop all that and I am doing nature coaching…I don’t even know but something involving nature and the planet. What if it is a massive change, that scares the shit out of me, because it makes me feel like on the one hand I would be staying true to my path, and the things that are deeply important to me. But on the other, I feel like it makes me look really unprofessional, like every few years I just drop my business and change and so it is really scary.

Jo: Yeah, it is, and I went through a big kind of change up this time last year in my business, and we did an episode about that and I know that feeling of fear, very intimately, very well. But I also know some of the lessons, and the wisdom that people like you passed onto me Holly which is trusting that the universe has its best intentions for you. And that…you talk about your guides, they are not going to mess around, they’re not going to be leading you in a way that isn’t the right path. And so, ultimately, the closer you get to the thing that you are meant to be doing in this moment, I think the easier it all becomes, eventually. When we are in that kind of messy middle, and we are looking for certainty in a process that has no certainty, in a process that is evolving, when we are looking for this path and this kind of: give me the blue print I want to know what the steps are!

Holly: And there is something that I feel drawn to mention, because I think we have all had that client who changes her niche every month or so; because they try something they get bored of it, it doesn’t work, they change again, they change again. And, I think there is a difference between that, trying, trying, trying new things and giving something your full go, committing to it, being devoted to it and then realising that your path is slightly different.

Jo: Yeah! Or, the path itself is shifting. So, I… {laughing} suddenly I am the spiritual one!

Holly: Excellent! Give it to me Jo! {laughing}

Jo: {laughing} So, my gut feeling for what it’s worth says that you are not going to… I think we have this fear that to evolve we have to burn down the last thing, before we can build the new thing. Evolution isn’t like that, sometimes even though it may appear that way, actually it is just clearing space and you are not going to totally lose the mindset work, because that’s such an integral part of who you are and your gifts. So, I think it is more that it is just evolving into the next phase of how you do that. Maybe deepening, maybe expanding, but I don’t see this as being a: let’s trash the whole thing that has gone before but it can feel like that. Because, right now, there is certainty around: well, I know how to do this, I had my thing but then this new thing, I don’t know what that is yet; and I know that’s really scary, it is like being in no mans land a bit.

Holly: It is, that’s exactly what it feels like, it is like trying to train myself to pay attention to the clues of what’s coming, and also being aware of the things which no longer feel right for me so actually last night I started two pages in my journal: things that feel right, things that don’t feel right. And I am just making a list, so I can just look at them and see and become aware of them.

Jo: I think that’s so important, that is such an important message for people to not just hear the once, because we have been doing this quite a while and we need to hear it repeatedly. We have quite a binary black and white world, especially now. You do it this way, there is one right way of doing things.

Holly: Urgh.

Jo: Yeah! And it is totally not true, and I think one of the the exiting yet terrifying things about being a conscious business owner, having a meaningful business, is that there isn’t always a blueprint, we are making our own…what is the word when they are map making – typographers?

Holly: Yeah, cartographers.

Jo: Yes cartographers, we are having to be our own cartographers as we are moving through this, because we are pioneers, this industry, this way of doing things, is still so new and it is still evolving as we evolve. And so, there isn’t a blueprint, we have to go inwards and pay close attention to what feels right for us, and I think there is re al distinction I about what feels right and what feels scary; and what doesn’t feel right and what feels scary. Because it can be the right thing and still be terrifying as you said.

Holly: Exactly, and I think we have mentioned that before, but it bears repeating every time that we can. So, you mentioned blueprints. Blueprints are so seductive because we see all these online entrepreneurs offering the free download, opt-in and you get their blueprint to whatever; and that can be so easy, it is like getting a franchise of McDonalds. You take someone’s blueprint, you plug in your thing, and you have got a successful business. So, do you think there is any merit to looking at these blueprints or to modelling other people or is it just…

Jo: I think they can give you a high-level overview, and a guide. So, it is a bit like signposts on the road. So, it is like: oh right, these people have gone this way, so there is probably a bit of an easier path that way, I can follow that, but actually I think I need to take this little bit of deviation. You have to be able to make that your own and I think the problem is that the blueprint can only give you that very high level: these are the steps that one person took, maybe they are even the steps that 100 people took, but that doesn’t mean that they are going to be the right steps for you to take. And it doesn’t mean that they are going to give you the same results, because you don’t have the same ingredients in there, you don’t have the same…such a myriad of things that go into, particularly in a service-based business. So much of it is personality, so much of it is connections, can you invest in Facebook ads, do you happen to know somebody who can introduce you to the person who does the featured podcast for Apple? Do you know… So, there are all kinds of additional things that might have happened that meant that the person wrote the blueprint, that’s what kind of helped them to be successful, but they can’t include all of that in the blueprint.

Holly: Yeah!

Jo: And it doesn’t mean that it is always going to work for you and the thing about blueprints is that they can be a reasonably high level, but if you try and follow them slavishly, I think a couple of things happen on is that you get really disappointed really quickly.

Holly: It’s not working!

Jo: It’s not working! I can remember following a blueprint to do a tele-summit, this is going back six or seven years and it went so badly wrong on so many levels. Things like, I have forgotten to hit record, when I was recording some to the interviews and I had to go back rerecord them; I had no idea how to write sample emails that people could share and things like that. But, I was following this blueprint that was apparently going to get me at least 1000 people on my email list. And when I was starting out, despite the fact that I had no clue who my client was or who I was working with or anything like that, that’s when I knew I needed to be, to be building an email list. It was so much work, I cried so many times, there were so many 2am things with it. Do you know how many people I added to my email list?

Holly: How many?

Jo: 62

Holly: Well 62 is better than 0!

Jo: I felt like such an enormous great big failure. Yes, I made so many mistakes and things, but I think it kind of has this double-layer if we are not careful. The first is that we think we are failures and the second is that we get really cynical about all the information out there and all the help out there. And that’s because a lot of these things are over-sold, because one thing that marketers are really good at doing, is giving you the best possible outcome for whatever their product is. So, they are the two big dangers with blueprints. The other one, I think, is that it takes us away from listening to that inner compass.

Holly: Yes!

Jo: And that voice that’s saying: this feels right, this feels off. And so, we carry on doing the things that feel ‘off’ because we say: well it is in the blueprint, such and such did it, we should be doing it.

Holly: And that’s giving the other person responsibility for your business.

Jo: And I think it waters down our essence, and whether you talk about essence being some ephemeral, kind of spiritual thing, or essence just being your personality, your style, your brand if you like in the world, it waters it down because you can’t be yourself, and that’s so important.

Okay, I think it is also important to talk about our way of working, our particular style of working, because there is also a lot of stuff out there about how you should be doing things. We were laughing a little bit before we started recording about…I have been looking at these bullet journals because they seem to be everywhere at the moment, and so I was watching a little video about how to do it. And I was like: that is just the antithesis of how I work! Yet, I know so many people who love them.

Holly: They are gorgeous, every time I see them I think: Oh, that’s so beautiful! But, I don’t want to do one, it’s not for me.

Jo: I know, for me, if I have…even things like to-do lists they are necessities to keep me on track, I take no pleasure in them at all; and yet I know other people who love their to-do list, who love their bullet journal, who love nothing more than ticking something off their list and that’s not me. I actually find it really, really, restrictive. I have a client that I am working with at the moment who is quite similar to me and she has this big project and so we have been chunking it down and things. She was going: it feels just so overwhelming and so rather than list it out she did it as this beautiful, almost three dimensional, like a mind map. And so…

Holly: I hate mind maps!

Jo: {laughing} oh do you!

Holly: {laughing} Hate them! But they are lovely!

Jo: For some of us, it is the process…I can’t get on with doing them on a screen or anything, there is something about physically taking bits of paper and post-it notes and things like that and moving things about, physically moving things about; because I have quite a kinaesthetic learning preference, that can be really useful and just suits the way that I work. And my client was similar and so rather than it being this chronological project plan: I have to do this, then this, then this, and then this. We have taken it back to bringing back the element of play and creativity which is… she is going to for each section of this project, she looks at this mind map, and this plan and she thinks: which one am I called to do, which is the most fun right now, and that’s the one that she is working on. And so, it is just a different way of approaching it, because otherwise it just feels heavy, and constrictive, and so it is just finding the way that works for you. Now, if you want to some productivity expert they would probably say: oh, that’s not a good to do it, you need to be using Trello, or Asana, or a list. But, that’s not going to work for everyone and I think it is important to be able to have the confidence to say: I am going to find a way that works best for me to be getting the stuff done that needs to be got done.

Holly: Exactly. So, how can people find, how can they get in touch with their best way of working and the best business model for them? Because I think as you have said before, the blueprint model is the easiest way; because someone is telling you how to do it, but the way that usually works for people is getting in touch with that inner compass and finding what’s right for them. So, how do you get in touch with that?

Jo: I think it is a different process for different people; but there is something about having periods each day where you are still and able to listen.

Holly: Yes!

Jo: Now whether that be journalling, whether that be walking, whether that be meditating or chanting, or praying, whatever that is. For me, I meditate, I do mindfulness meditation, I do yoga, I walk the dog each day; and so, it is in those moments that I get my inspiration. I also think it is important to listen to the where you find joy in your life and in your business and where you find whatever the opposite of joy. So, I know when I have some physicality, some freedom to create, a bit of space, I need lots of space in my calendar where I don’t have calls and things, that’s when I feel most creative, that’s when I get inspired. I also find that when I am interacting with people, I like to bounce ideas around with people so my mastermind buddies and people… we will bash ideas around. It is that kind of: have you thought about doing this? Have you thought about doing that? I know that I need that as part of my process and then I go away and work on it.

Holly: So, you mentioned that you need to have downtime to have that creative process bubble up and happen. Do you block out time in your calendar for that? Or do you just let it happen naturally by not scheduling in too many calls each day?

Jo: I do a bit of both. So, I have to say, if I block out some time and go: I have to be creative there, it is a bit like lying in bed and going: okay, go to sleep now. But, what I do is that I limit the number of calls that I do each day, it doesn’t always work out, so some days they are back-to-back, but there are also points where you just have to go: okay, I just need a break, I need to go and do something different. Yesterday evening I had a really full day, and I had loads of stuff I was intending to do, in the evening, I didn’t have any calls on, which is unusual for a Monday evening for me. So, I had all these things and then I thought: do you know what, no, you need to take a break and your brain needs some down time and so I went and did some crafting stuff and it was delightful. My cortisol level dropped, and my stress level dropped, and that’s when the ideas started flowing again.

Holly: Excellent.

Jo: So, it is also about listening to the things…sometimes pushing is not in fact, sometimes it is counterproductive

Holly: Totally.

Jo: It just doesn’t help at all. How about you, though, because I know that you have a different process, you do tend to block out time and you go away for your weekend retreats that you book for yourself.

Holly: So, I do a bunch of things, I do my Workcation weekends, but those are specifically for working on a project so that is creative time, but when I already know what the project is. In terms of downtime I usually go to… well for most of last year I was alternating between going to Glastonbury one weekend a month and then the next month I would go to Avebury. Glastonbury / Avebury, because those are my two places where I feel really strong and beautiful energy; and it helps me to relax and have downtime and then towards the end of last year I started going to Avebury every month, so that’s been my place. One thing that I recently discovered, as recently as last Sunday, I went on a meetup group that did forest bathing, which is a Japanese concept of getting out into nature and bathing in the energy of the forest, and you know that reduces your stress levels, the trees are putting out chemicals that can help us relax, and it is essentially just bathing in the forest energy, as opposed to getting a bathtub out in the forest {laughing}… And I hadn’t done that before, so I spend a lot of time out in nature, usually walking, sometimes sitting still; but I had never been guided to slow down in the way that we did in this meetup group and it was absolutely beautiful. We did really slow walking, we did exercise to hear, we pretended to be a deer listening to the sounds that could be dangerous, walking very slowly. It was just gorgeous. And at the end we did an exercise where we connected with the tree and that was where my idea for the novel came through – the new novel, not they one that I have been working on – and that was just absolutely gorgeous. And I went away with this deep sense of relaxation that lasted all through the afternoon, the evening, and into the next morning. It was just really really lovely. So, there are are so many things you can do to just give yourself that time and space to let the ideas come in. And I think that’s such an important part of running and building a business, is giving yourself that space to get the creative juices flowing.

Jo: Yeah and it is really easy to kind of block out that urge as well, by just staying busy. We are really good at staying being busy, especially if you work for yourself, because you know there is nobody shutting the lights off at 6 o’clock and saying: go home, the office is now closed. You can carry on working because technology gives us that opportunity to and it means that we can stop listening if we are not careful.

Holly: So, let’s, I think it is useful for us to talk about: what are the different options of business models, so when people are thinking about what works for them, what can they take into consideration? What are the options?

Jo: There is a whole host of them. I think there are a couple of kind of key questions to ask yourself, first of all: how do you like working? And how do you do your best work? What are the kind of circumstances that are around you? So, a couple of key questions that I always ask my clients, because I work with service-based business, how do you like working wit people? Do you like to go deep, so you spend time with one person where you can go deep with them over a period of time? Do you like to do kind of more group work that doesn’t go quite as deep, you can touch more people, but it doesn’t have that depth, or longevity, of work? Do you like doing the face-to-face stuff? Do you like doing virtual stuff and online stuff? Does your business and your modality and your methodology lend itself to that? How do you find most of your clients and where are they? There is a whole host of questions to ask yourself, because you can do one-on-one in person, you could do a mixture of in person and virtual. You could do groups. This is all, with people who come into contact with people, talking to people, so it is live, it is interactive. So: Do you want to do groups? Do you want to do individuals? Do you want to short term? Do you want to do longer term? Do you want to do deep? So, I have got one colleague, he does quick intervention therapy. He will do 90 minutes in person, he charges quite a lot for it, because he says: you know, I don’t want to see them again! {laughing} In the nicest possible way!

Holly: Yeah, yeah, yeah! He wants to get them sorted and off and doing their thing.

Jo: And then I can’t remember who it was who was telling me this, forgive me if it was you Holly, but I don’t think it was. It was a colleague who was another coach and she had met somebody at an event who was a coach and has been a coach to the same people… for 20 something years.

Holly: Yeah, I think it might have been me. It was a friend of a friend who had her psychologist, her counsellor had kind of fired her as a client, because I think they had been seeing each other for 25 years. And, this friend of a friend was devastated, and she had contacted the counsellor, and said: can we start again, please? Can we keep this up? And I was just shocked that this therapist had let it go on for so long. Like really, 25 years? Weekly sessions for 25 years, that’s a lot!

Jo: Yeah.

Holly: I would not feel good about that!

Jo: I wouldn’t because I know, I tend to work I think a year maximum and then sometimes people come back. But no this is a different example. They had met this I think it was a coach or therapist, and he said: how long do you work with your clients for? And she said: oh, 3 months or something and he said, really? I have been with these people for 25 or something years. And she was like: woah! And he said: how can you just abandon them just like that?

Holly: What!?

Jo: Yeah! It was just a very different way of doing things.

Holly: What if this person has some co-dependency issues!

Jo: Well, yes, there is probably that. So, obviously that is an extreme example I would imagine but I can remember talking to another client here, and I asked her this question and she said: oh no, once they are with me they are with me for life, I want to be in their world for the foreseeable future, because as they evolve, our work together with evolve. And I thought: okay, that’s great. Whereas I know for me, a year is kind of the maximum that I want to work with people, without at least taking a break and you know we both need to go off and then maybe come back. So, it is thinking about: what is the duration that you want to work with people for. And then how? How do you do your best work, is it in person? Is it in a group? Is it doing that kind of one-to-one intensive stuff? Is it doing it over a period of time? Is it, I have got another colleague who has just started doing weekend intensives with people and is loving it! From moving away from doing a one-on-one coaching model, to doing weekend intensives with people. So, do you like to run groups? So, there are all kinds of ways of doing it and then having a mixture. Do you want to introduce content? Do you want to have more of a teaching, you know…a kind of hands off, evergreen, I can’t think of the word?

Holly: Like a self-study course?

Jo: Yeah. That type of thing.

Holly: And we have been talking a lot about service-based things but a lot of us are creators, so do you want to be creating, do you want to be writing books? Do you want to be creating programs? Do you want to be creating stuff?

Jo: There is all of that stuff, and then each of them will have different ways of charging, different ways of structure and different ways of marketing. They will have different marketing needs. We have talked about this before, if you are doing stuff with groups or product-based, then you need a larger audience, because you will tend to be charging less than with the one-on-one work, so you need more people. So, you will tend to need a bigger list size to sell to them. So, there are all kinds of things that go into the mix and then of course the circumstances: How much time do you actually have? If you are still in a full-time job, can you really run a group program effectively right now? Because that is going to take an awful lot of hands-on work. You might be better just having one or two clients or producing a product and then marketing it until you can transition. Again, there is not a one size fits all.

Holly: No, of course not. And you have also got to look at what schedule do you want to work? Do you want to be working 9-5? Do you want to be starting in the early mornings, do you want to be starting afternoons and evenings? Like, when do you do your best work in terms of time of the day? Because my brain doesn’t work very well in the morning, so I don’t usually start working, or accepting calls, until 11am. So, I think everyone is different, in that aspect as well. And how many calls can you energetically take a day reasonably? I prefer not to do more than three calls.

Jo: Me too.

Holly: And I only take calls three days a week: Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday. Thursday and Friday, I don’t do calls.

Jo: Yeah, I can remember buying a blueprint (!) of how to market your coaching and healing business, many moons ago, and the structure was, it was like you had a schedule of taking eight calls a day, it was based on taking eight calls a day, five days a week. I was like: oh my God, I would have no brain!

Holly: Oh my God, I would be just shattered by the end of the day.

Jo: Absolutely! 45-minute calls with 15 minutes break in-between. No! That’s too much.

Holly: And, we talked about duration, but also duration of the calls. If you do coaching or therapy calls: do you like 45-minute sessions, do you like hour sessions? Do you like 90-minute sessions? Do you like VIP days? How long in an individual session do you like to work with people? I love 90 minutes, anything less than that and I feel like I want more. But anything more than that and I think that I would be burnt out. So, you have got to play around with that.

Jo: You have, and that’s the thing that I wanted to stress, it is about really diving in and working out, and sometimes you won’t know the answers initially until you start trying it. What lights me up? What is the best way of working? So, you experiment with it, you get the data, you then act on that data and you tweak what you are doing, until you find a mix that works for you. And that’s why blueprints are so limited in what they can help you with.

Holly: And that’s why you have got to not be a perfectionist in this area and just pick one thing and do it. Do it and try it and see what you think and if you don’t like it you tweak it and you do something else. But you can’t sit, I don’t want anyone to listen to this episode and think, okay so I have got to map out all the different options and I have got to get it right from the start and pick the best thing… no, just pick one thing and do it, just see what happens.

Jo: And if you have a real strong reaction to it, then you can kind of think: maybe this isn’t for me. But if you kind of think: oh, not too sure; stick with it for a bit. Because that’s the other thing that you will find that sometimes it takes a little bit to kind of bed in or iron out the teething problems until you kind of get something right. It is like you know most group programs, or most training programs, that most people run – it is not until you run it for the third or fourth time that you tend to have found: ah now it is really working. And same with coaching calls. We talked ourselves a few months ago that when we first started doing coaching calls we prayed the client didn’t show up, because we would be so nervous.

Holly: {laughing} yeah!

Jo: And now…it is fine it is just what we do. So, it is about also giving yourself opportunity to grow into these things, give yourself a good run at it. That’s the other thing that I see people doing so many times. They choose a niche, or they produce a product, or they have some services and then three months later they have changed it all. And it is like: But, you haven’t given it enough time to bed in, to see if it was working, and actually go deep enough into it to get what is needed, and to build up a head of steam behind you.

Holly: Yeah, that’s what I was trying to say at the beginning; it is not like you trash everything and start from scratch whenever you feel like it, it is once you have found something stick with it until it works and then pivot into something new if you feel the need to. But, I have seen so many clients have that tendency to just trash their niche every couple of months because it was too hard, or once they started realising it wasn’t easy, they just think: well, the next thing will be easier.

Jo: This is the other thing, that I kind of want to stress: this isn’t going to be easy, it is is going to be difficult! And it is going to be glorious!

Holly: Yeah

Jo: And you can have both of those things but if you are looking for easy, and a kind of instant success and lucrative, then you are going to be really disappointed because that’s not how it works. And the people that I just love working with, I almost think it is like this industry and maybe it is any journey of entrepreneurship, it is a bit like the universe starts you on a Bootcamp. And you know when you see An Officer and a Gentlemen and things, and people join the army, or something, and the whole point of Bootcamp is to break you so that they can build you up again. With entrepreneurship it will break you and it is at the point where you kind of go: ahh that didn’t work, and this really hurts, and it sucks, and then it is: can you get up the next day? Because that’s when you will have your real break throughs. If you are: I am looking for the easy way, that is just going to feel easy and not like work…

Holly: It is not going to happen. I think that’s a great analogy, but I think entrepreneurship is even harder than that because the military breaks you – sorry, guys! – and then it builds you up giving you their structure, their blueprint; whereas entrepreneurship breaks you and then you have still got to figure out what the structure is.

Jo: But honestly, it’s great {laughing}

Holly: We love it! We love it. It is just not easy.

Jo: It is not easy, but you know what, life is not easy. I think… (I sound like my grandma now) I think anything worthwhile is hard.

Holly: Especially like a conscious, spiritual, business… your business is forming you as you are building it, you feed each other, and it grows you. And so, if you are a person who is consciously wanting to grow and evolve as an individual, like your business is going to do the same. If you want something easy if you want a blueprint, buy a franchise, build a McDonalds.

Jo: That’s true, oh God I feel like we have really… {laughing} Do you know what if you listen to this and think: Oh no, that’s too hard, that’s not for me. Do you know what? That might be a good thing.

Holly: Yeah, yeah.

Jo: Because honestly, I think the people who do best in this industry and in this field are the ones that go: oh yeah it is hard, but my why is big enough, my desire to do this, the calling that I have is big enough, that I am going to work out how to get past this obstacle and through this.

Holly: And if you need some help you can reference our episode on resilience which is a great compliment to this podcast. {laughing}

Jo: It is. I am still laughing at your comment!

Holly: It is like Bootcamp, only worse. {laughing}

Jo: It is like in an Officer and a Gentleman where he is in the mud and he is sweating and he is being screamed at by the guy and he is crying: I have nowhere else to go! It is worse than that! {laughing}

Both: {laughing}

Holly: And yet, it is so much fun!

Jo: It is it is so much fun.

Holly: It is so meaningful.

Jo: We get to do things that light up our souls and touch people’s lives and make an impact in the world and shift the needle towards kindness. And that’s amazing.

Holly: So, is there anything else that you need to say around helping people who are listening to this understanding themselves and understanding the best way, the best working style?

Jo: So, there are a couple of resources that I like to go to, I am a big fan of the Myers Briggs type indicator; because it can be really enlightening to help you understand why you are more naturally inclined to do certain things, and why certain things just: ugh! And it is not that one is better than the other, it is just that’s your natural tendency. And so, the more you can work with your natural tendency, the easier you will find it; and the more that you can mitigate for the times when you are not able to work in your natural… So, if there are areas of your business where, if you are not a very structured person, but there are areas where you have to do structure, things like doing your books, or doing your accounts and things. It gives you insights on how you can mitigate for that. So, I am a big fan of that how about you?

Holly: I love it. I love it. We always seem to find a way to bring Myers Briggs into an episode but… I have not actually done any proper evaluation, I have just done the free online things a couple of times over the years. It has always come out the same, I am always an INFJ. Of am I INFP?

Jo: You are a J. You are totally a J.

Holly: You are a INFP.

Jo: Yes, I am an INFP. And if these letters are making you roll your eyes and think: what are they talking about, then we will put the link in the notes.

Holly: Yes, it is definitely going in the show notes.

Jo: There is one, 16personalities.com has a pretty good one. What I would say, is just use the online assessments as a guide, take it with a pinch of salt. To really get the most of it, you can really benefit from having a feedback session from somebody who is trained. Actually, Holly maybe that’s something we could do, I could give you…we could do a podcast episode and I could feedback your Myers Briggs and go through the Myers Briggs type indicator.

Holly: Yes, I like that!

Jo: Shall we do that?

Holly: Yes, we should, stay tuned!

Jo: That will be our next Episode then….

Holly: So, there was another thing that you were going to recommend.

Jo: The fascination advantage. So, Sally Hogshead, has something called ‘the fascination advantage’. Which is less about how you see you and more about how other people see you and it can be really useful for marketing. It is more of an external thing and I think again with all of these things take it with a pinch of salt. I do know some people who wear it as a badge and say: oh no I can’t do that because I am a… and give their type or definition. There are a number of the different psychometrics out there, and there are some really cool interesting ones that I have not dove into too much; but I know there is kind of goddess archetypes, I know some people do. There is a whole host out there, but the more that you can understand your tendencies and your most comfortable way of doing things and use that to your advantage, play to your strengths rather than constantly trying to work against yourself because you think: this is the way I should be doing it, because John Lee Dumas, or somebody, tells me I should be doing it, or somebody else. That works for him because he is John Lee Dumas.

Holly: He is different, he is not you.

Jo: He is not you. The more you can do your own work about discovering your easiest way of doing things, and knowing that you have options, in fact you have so many options that can sometimes be a problem. Lean into what feels good; where am I at my most productive? Where am I at my most creative? How can I get more of that in my life and my business? Then that can put you on the path, but it is an ongoing evolving path.

Holly: Yeah it is! I think the more that you can get to know yourself the better and a lot of these things really help. I know Wealth Dynamics, I think it rebranded itself as Talent Dynamics, was massively important in understanding myself because I am a creator above all else, and it was like I kept having this compulsion to create things, but I felt like that was wrong, like I should be doing client sessions instead of creating. But then I realised that I am creator, so I have this natural compulsion to create and once I started accepting that that was when I started writing all my books a couple of years ago, so it can be life changing.

Jo: That’s really interesting! Okay.

Holly: I think we have covered it.

Jo: I think we have, I think this has been fairly comprehensive.

Holly: All of you who are listening, go away and find your business model. {laughing}

Jo: Yes, find your business mode, do that exploration. Give yourself permission to think: how does business work best for me? Yes, take what you can from other people, but ultimately you are your own compass with this.

Holly: So, that was kind of an abrupt ending; but we both kind of naturally fell silent at the same time so we figured that we would just stop there. So, I hope you found this episode interesting, and useful. Please drop me a line and let me know what you thought about this week’s episode. You can email me: [email protected], or you can find me on Facebook, Twitter or Instagram and get in touch there. I would love to give you a shout out on the show if you send me your comments.

I would also love for you to join me in my private Facebook group: Business Mindset Alchemists, so we can continue the conversation there. Podcasting is such a one-way conversation, Jo and I have just been talking at you for the last I don’t know how long, we were talking at you; so, we’d love to hear what you have to say. Jo is in my Facebook group and so she will see your comments as well if you join us. Business Mindset Alchemists is a group dedicated to exploring business mindset and how you can get the mindset you need to achieve your dreams in both business and life because everything is connected. If you head over to: https://www.hollyworton.com/group and you will be redirected to the group.

Finally, whether you have been listening to the show for a while, or you have just heard your first episode, if you are drawn to learning more about mindset work, and you would like learn more about how you can work with me, please get in touch or head over to: https://www.hollyworton.com/call and you can book in a call with me to learn more about how you can change your mindset using heart-centred energy work. And again, thank you for listening and if you enjoyed this episode please leave a quick review on iTunes, it would mean the world to me. And remember to visit: hollyworton.com/238 for the show notes on this episode.

Next week’s episode is another solo episode with me, so I look forward to joining me again next week. Thank you so much and have a great day.