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27. Business On Your Timeline with Nicole Ross
9 Plays7 months ago
“When you’re feeling stretched to the limit, simpler is better.”
In this episode, co-host Nicole Ross introduces her all-time favorite time management tactic—the Red, Yellow, Green Sticky Note Exercise. This surprisingly simple strategy provides actionable insights and self-awareness when you feel overwhelmed and off kilter.
Tune in to uncover the outsized power of small adjustments and become inspired to finally take control of your time.
In this episode, you’ll learn how to:
- Get specific about why you feel overwhelmed, overworked, and OVER IT.
- Use green, red, and yellow sticky notes to know what's working and what isn't.
- Delegate, delete, or dig in based on how each task makes you feel.
- Give yourself permission to rearrange your schedule to honor your needs.
- Figure out what to do when you can’t do it all.
For more inspiration, subscribe to Unbound Turnarounds on Apple Podcasts or wherever you listen to podcasts!
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Transcript
Introduction to 'Unbound Turnarounds'
00:00:03
Speaker
Welcome to Unbound Turnarounds, a podcast all about the challenges women business owners think about constantly, but rarely voice. We're Nicole and Mallory, entrepreneurs, friends, and co-founders of Business Unbound, a community helping women alleviate the headaches, heartaches, and backaches so work actually works for life. This is your safe space for the ups, downs, and the turnarounds.
Celebrating Season Two and Previewing Season Three
00:00:32
Speaker
Welcome back to Unbound Turnarounds and we have finally ended season two. We loved it. We hope you enjoyed it. But now we are moving on to season three. So this is our first episode of the new season and it's going to be about something different. We are getting into different aspects of time management because truly time is our biggest asset really.
00:00:57
Speaker
So we're tackling tactics, strategies to use when it comes to managing your schedule and energy. And we're chatting through different ways to incorporate restorative time away from your business. So we have quite a few guests already lined up for the season and we are very much looking forward to sharing them with you. But today we're actually going to share some of our own tactics starting with Nicole in managing time and how that relates to our businesses.
Nicole's Sticky Note Time Management Tactic
00:01:24
Speaker
So Nicole, you get to go first. Yes. And let's just dive in and tell us what your tactic is today that you're going to talk about. Yes. So my tactic, we call it the red, yellow, green exercise. It involves sticky notes, pens. That's all you need. It's already in your house probably.
00:01:45
Speaker
And kind of the point of it is that it keeps things simple. This isn't a giant convoluted exercise. It doesn't take all of your brain power. Like this is just a like, when you're feeling strapped for time, when you're feeling overwhelmed, when you feel like you don't know where your time goes,
00:02:07
Speaker
when you're feeling like maybe your time isn't going into the right things, that's when I pull this exercise out. The purpose of it is to really highlight, staring in your face highlight big shifts, small shifts, big problems, little problems, in between problems, but to separate them all out.
00:02:31
Speaker
I repeat this multiple times a year whenever I kind of just need to reassess and engage the landscape of something that's bothering me. So I've used it for time and energy and money and just general happiness. So you can use it for all of those things.
00:02:50
Speaker
Now, I know that you do this because you'll tell me. You'll be like, I'm doing the exercise. I'm our red, yellow, green. I'm R-Y-G-ing it. And I've done it before. We'll get into that too. But I think the power of it is the simplicity because if it weren't, it would almost be a barrier just to do it, right? So the power lies in the ease of executing it.
00:03:12
Speaker
All right. Tell us how to do it. What is that?
Green Sticky Notes: Identifying Successes
00:03:16
Speaker
So you're going to need just a few things. You're going to need green sticky notes. You're going to need red sticky notes and you're going to need yellow ones. So the green sticky notes, these are four items that are working well in your life. These might be things that you do very well. These might be things that are going well.
00:03:34
Speaker
These might be things that make you a lot of profit. These might be people that you really like working with. These might be systems that you love. It could be hobbies that are going well. Anything that's going well lives on a green sticky note. And you give yourself some acknowledgement for the things that are going well. And every single sticky note gets one thing, right? One thing. We're not making lists on sticky notes. That is not for today.
Red Sticky Notes: Recognizing Time Suckers
00:04:03
Speaker
So red sticky notes, here's where the things that are not going so well live. These can also be people that you work with. These might be clients in some cases. I have definitely let clients go after seeing them on a red sticky note. So that happens. Same with freelancers actually, but
00:04:23
Speaker
So red sticky notes are things that aren't going well, they might be processes that feel just really chunky. They might be time suckers, where you're like, what is even happening? They might be things that you're not good at. And you're like, good, I don't want to do it.
00:04:41
Speaker
They might be things that are not profitable. They might be projects that you just don't like. You don't like doing it. It might be a service you don't like. So anything where you think of it and your gut goes, ugh. Yeah, like, ugh. Yeah, or your chest gets tight. Yes. Yes. And you'll know what those things are. Yes. And again, one thing per note. We're not making a list of everything that you hate on one sticky note.
Yellow Sticky Notes: Areas for Improvement
00:05:11
Speaker
So then there's the yellows and yellows are a little bit easier to do after you think about your reds and greens. These are the things that are sort of fine. They're fine.
00:05:23
Speaker
like you're doing it. That person's fine. The process is, it's fine. These are things that I think of as like, they're probably actually red or green in reality, but because we have all the greens and because we have all the reds, they fall in between. So they're just not as green or as red as the other things.
00:05:43
Speaker
So they could be improved, so things that are like, they're okay, but I could probably make that a little bit better, a little bit less painful, a little bit more joyful. Those might end up on a yellow. But those are in-betweens. So I also like to say that you can include professional and personal items because they all influence how you feel, right? And this is an exercise about changing how you feel.
00:06:09
Speaker
So you can include personal things too. I often have things about horses on my sticky notes in the various colors. My horses have changed colors many times. So also feel free to do that. It also could be something in your family or health or any of that kind of stuff.
00:06:27
Speaker
I think that makes sense, though, because we always talk about, oh, work-life balance and this and that. But as entrepreneurs especially, I think most people, your career is part of who you are and your identity as much as we maybe try not to do that. I mean, it just is, right? And so if there's this big personal thing that's a red, how is changing all the things that are reds in your business going to help if you can't get rid of that big red one in your personal life? So that totally makes sense to me to do both.
00:06:55
Speaker
And it can also, so you bring up a good point, there are some things that feel red right now that might not be as red once you got rid of more red sticky notes. So a lot of the times if something is red, everything feels more red, right? The whole world is pink and you're just like, what? So that's just another thing to take note
Visualizing and Planning with Sticky Notes
00:07:17
Speaker
of. So the next thing you want to do is just arrange all of your sticky notes on a big countertop or a table.
00:07:24
Speaker
put all the reds together, put all the greens together, put all the yellows together. So again, the beauty of it is the simplicity in that you can immediately see, I mean, are there like a ton of reds?
00:07:37
Speaker
You know, like, is there a lot more reds and greens or am I feeling anxious and cruddy, but really there's only like four reds? Like probably if I got rid of these, like I'd actually be okay. So just seeing them all together gives you a really quick way to assess like, why am I feeling how I'm feeling?
00:07:56
Speaker
what do I need to solve? So just see them all together. Go through each one, just kind of take a look at it, and make sure that that color still speaks to you, like that's still how that item feels when I see it. You can always change things around. And then you want to consider the reasons behind all of your color choices. So when you look at an item, be like, OK, so why does this feel red?
00:08:22
Speaker
Why does this feel yellow? It's just kind of like, eh. Or what makes this thing so green for me? Does it add energy? Do I feel like I'm really good at it? Just take a look at everything holistically. And then look for some patterns. We'll talk about this when I made you do this at coffee. But oftentimes, once you see them all in a table,
00:08:47
Speaker
there will be some pretty obvious patterns, right? Like maybe a lot of your reds are about systems. Maybe a lot of your reds are about time. Maybe a lot of your reds are about people, right? So you're gonna start to see some trends. And then once you see those trends, you can be like, oh yeah, I get why this feels this way, okay.
00:09:11
Speaker
What I like about this, too, is it's not just saying, write down everything that's going wrong on red and yellow. Which, by the way, when I'm picturing this in my head, I am picturing pink as my red because, you know, the pastel post-it notes come in pink, yellow, green. So I have, just for all those people who are
00:09:30
Speaker
really type A, want to follow the rules, pink can be red. But what I like about it is we do incorporate the green. And I like what you just said because you said it's almost like a little bit of a gratitude practice, right? So you can have gratitude for the green, but it's also a way to assess
00:09:46
Speaker
I think that was really powerful what you said and I hadn't thought about this before it's a way to assess are there a ton of reds and a few greens which is like a big light bulb moment or more likely than not there's like a ton of green cause you've done the work on all these things and there's only these few reds that makes it feel bigger and worse and you can then take a step back and be like okay actually the world is not on fire and now I'm gonna work on managing these reds so yeah I'm glad we incorporate the greens into this practice.
00:10:16
Speaker
Me too, because it's something I often skip. I'm not a good acknowledger. The green section is also a really good place for things that you have already solved. So if you had things that you have improved over time and you're like, wow, that's actually working now.
00:10:31
Speaker
Like that belongs on a green and you should take a minute to acknowledge that you already solved it. Yeah. Like greens didn't always start as greens. Right. And also gives you a chance to look at patterns there too. Okay, well maybe this red relates to this green and this is how I solved it. So let's try that with this. And I also like that you said you can put people on both obviously, but the people on the greens, then you can send them a no and you can be like,
00:10:58
Speaker
You could tell them, I just did this. This is what I did. And you're a green. Thank you for being green. I have done exactly that. Congrats. You're a green again. Good job. Yeah, I don't usually send it to the reds. No, because you're doing something else with them. Yeah, that's not the delivery. So the whole goal is to eliminate every red sticky note. At the end of the day, that's what this exercise is.
00:11:25
Speaker
And the nice thing about having one thing per sticky note is that you're not tempted to just be like, now I have a list. I have a huge list on a piece of paper and I got to just like chuck through them. No, we're getting rid of them one at a time. Once we are rid of them, we are tearing them up. We are putting them in the trash and they no longer exist.
Mallory's Strategy for Reducing Meetings
00:11:45
Speaker
So you get this visual takeaway of like, I am making this better. So for every individual red sticky note,
00:11:56
Speaker
pull them off in whatever order you feel like you can handle them and think about, okay, what can I do to eliminate or delegate or improve this item? So you don't need to move a red to a green. That's not the goal.
00:12:10
Speaker
it may not be possible. Like there are things that you have to do for life or business and you just have to do them and you're never gonna love them. And that's okay. But they can feel better than they feel right now. So for some of those really tough reds, your goal is to move that maybe to a yellow.
00:12:27
Speaker
Right? And so think about what you need to do that. Then you can make kind of an action plan for each red sticky note. Ideally, there are some immediate changes that are going to come to mind that you see it in front of you. And you're like, you know what, that's not working. That doesn't work. You can also do future shifts if you can't solve it right now. Like some things are long term solutions. And that's fine. Your goal is to move it closer to a yellow.
00:12:54
Speaker
So you schedule those deadlines, you schedule your actions, you seek support, and you just make a plan for every single red sticky note. Once you're through them, you tackle those yellows. You know what? And you look at them because after you've taken off all the reds and you just have yellows and greens, some of those yellows are going to feel more green.
00:13:17
Speaker
because you don't have all the stressors anymore. Those are gone. That client that you just like butted heads with, they're not your client anymore. That person on your team, they're not on your team anymore. The system that's not really working, you found something else and that's working fine. So when you look at the yellows, you're like, okay, this yellow actually feels a little more like a lime green.
00:13:45
Speaker
Like it's got kind of yellowy green vibes now to me when I look at it. Like that's how I feel in my body when I see it. Or maybe it's got orangey vibes. Like this one actually, now that I've gotten rid of all the other reds, this one's probably gonna become my new red. Like it's not as bad as the stuff I already solved.
00:14:08
Speaker
I wouldn't mind getting rid of it. I wouldn't mind approving it. So, you know, that's the goal is like every single red one at a time. Now, how long do you think this takes you on average? Obviously, everybody's going to go process slower and have more things to write down. I mean, but the times you've done it, this isn't something where it's like, this takes you three hours, you know? No. I say making sticky notes. That's 20 minutes.
00:14:36
Speaker
You know, usually you have a pretty good idea. So within like a half hour, within a half hour. Yep. And I'd give yourself another maybe hour to like pick up all the low hanging fruit. Like there's going to be some reds that are just hanging out and you're like, I know what I need to do with that.
00:14:56
Speaker
I know what I need to do with it. So I'm just going to do it, right? Like I'm sitting here for an hour. This is what I'm working on. And if it means that I get two reds shredded for the day, great. So in an hour and a half, you can drastically change the way you feel from day to day or less. That's the goal. So I have actually made you do this. Yes. Well, I kindly suggest, I kindly suggested in my kind suggesting way,
00:15:24
Speaker
that we do this one time when I noticed that you were also very stressed. And so I'm wondering if you remember when we sat in a coffee shop and did this together. I remember it very well and very clearly.
00:15:39
Speaker
And I think we talked about it in one of our other episodes, but I'm going to go through it again. But I just want to highlight, this seems so simple again. And it's like we're dedicating an entire episode to it, you guys, because it has been that powerful for both of us. The changes we've been able to do, the things that have come as light bulbs, because we just took the space and the time
00:16:02
Speaker
to process and tune in and simplify. Yeah. And so honestly, I know this sounds like maybe you've heard it before. Maybe you've done it. Maybe it didn't work, but maybe this is brand new to you. Whatever the situation is, I do want to encourage you to do it again. Like we're giving this a whole episode because we really do feel like this is Nicole's number one toolbox strategy. She pulls out when she's feeling off kilter.
00:16:27
Speaker
So yes, of course I remember because it was impactful for me. So we were in Montana together. I came down. It was actually the start of talking about business unbound. That was the purpose of the trip. But before we even got into that, I do remember the lovely coffee shop because it has a name, the farmer's daughter, and my dad was a farmer. So I do remember it. We're sitting there. We were sitting outside. It was nice enough.
00:16:55
Speaker
you know, we both did the exercise and then we moved and we had lunch. We were sitting at this picnic table and I went first.
00:17:01
Speaker
And we're going through my red sticky notes. So this is another thing that I think is pretty cool. If you have anybody you could do this with and then bounce the ideas off of, especially for the reds and the yellows, like how do I, like what's your perspective on how I could change this? Now you might just know, like you said, but, but I think there is a power, but yes, it's almost like I needed, I read them all to Nicole on my reds and
00:17:30
Speaker
literally Nicole was like, you have too many meetings and you need to get rid of the meetings. And it was just like, my mind was blown. It was like a complete shock. I was like, but like, how can you, can you do that? Is that allowed? Well, and you know, I'll tell you too, the other reason to do it with someone else is that oftentimes they can see patterns and themes in all of these notes that maybe you can't see, you know? And so when you read them all to me, I was like,
00:17:58
Speaker
Oh, her time is like way too, way too fragmented. Like, of course she feels this way. Like, that's not how she works. Yeah. Yeah. So we discovered that was, yes, part of the problem. Too many meetings and also the way they were set up.
00:18:13
Speaker
So how we solve those, and it was, it was like four different sticky notes, but then we put them kind of all together. We're like, this is all one solution of reducing meanings. And what we did is, so I have contractors who work for more you, cause we're an agency, right? So I would have one-on-ones with each of the contractors every month. And for some reason I had thought in my brain, I'll have them one a week.
00:18:42
Speaker
Yeah, it's more manageable. Yeah. But all that really was doing, especially if they were, sometimes they were an hour, sometimes they were a half hour, maybe 45 minutes. All that's doing is putting a random half hour meeting in the middle of a day where now it's disruptive. You can't get into deep flow. It messes up your time blocks.
00:19:05
Speaker
And so you guys, it's so simple. We took those one-on-ones, we moved them to the same day, one day out of a month.
Optimizing Meeting Schedules
00:19:12
Speaker
And that saved me all those other days of piecemealing this meeting in. And so one day a month, I had at the peak of it, I think it was six, half hour, 45 minute calls. So that day was like,
00:19:25
Speaker
Yeah, but that's the only day. It's the only day a month, right? And now you don't have any of those meetings during the week. They're just gone. They're gone. And now actually, because our team is a little bit smaller, we're changing, we're focusing on, and they've been with me a long time. They're every other month.
00:19:43
Speaker
one day every other month because they don't need as much support. The clients have been with us long time too, right? So this even has shifted since then. So that was one of the solutions. That's like three hours a week that you're saving. It was like 12 hours a month. You basically got an entire day back.
00:20:02
Speaker
per month and now you're getting more like a day and a half to I mean yeah it's but it but honestly didn't ever it never occurred to me it just never occurred to me and it was such as this is like you guys this is the smallest tiniest change and it made such a big difference in how I felt
00:20:21
Speaker
managing just, it literally felt like I had more time when really I didn't, but all that, you know, leading up to a meeting and after the disruptions that that causes. So that was one of the solutions. I just like sharing this because it might give you guys ideas for solutions and thoughts as you're doing yours. Another thing is I declined meetings with clients.
00:20:44
Speaker
This was hard for her. This was harsh. Oh my gosh. Nicole was like, you know, you're not an employee. You don't have to take every call. And I'm like, what? What do you mean? Are they going to be unhappy? Are they going to leave? Because I won't take this recurring meeting every week that I don't feel is necessary.
00:21:03
Speaker
And I'm like, probably you're not going to decline the meeting and be like, this is dumb, I'm not coming. Yeah, they might be mad about that, right? But just thinking about it, these are good uses of your time. There's nothing wrong with that.
00:21:18
Speaker
Yeah, and because the relationship had been there for a while, the project management system was in place. Everything was in place. The meeting was more had become a formality, but not a need anymore. And it's a couple of them. And so literally after this, we went through our plans. Nicole helped me draft an email that I was so nervous you guys to send it. She couldn't send it right away.
00:21:45
Speaker
I didn't. I waited until that evening and I, you know, really was just like mostly those recurring ones. Like I'm still happy to have one-on-ones as we need them. And there were some, there were two meetings I kept because I was like, these are needed like every week, but it was okay. And nobody quit. And it was like, yeah, sure thing. Because actually I wonder, did they feel the same way? Yeah.
00:22:08
Speaker
Well that's what we talked about right i had to take me through i think every single meeting and be like what is this meeting for do we need is it valuable and you may have just given your clients permission to say what maybe we don't need this meeting.
00:22:25
Speaker
Maybe we don't need it. They want that time back too, probably, if it wasn't necessary. And then in the future, just giving myself permission almost, Nicole gave me the permission to decline meetings and say, you know what? I don't think this is needed. And I did do that because Nicole, I think you said something to the effect of people will always put you on meetings. They'll just add you on meetings.
00:22:51
Speaker
And it's up to you to hold that boundary if you don't think it's necessary. And I did do that. And I am very glad. There were other ways to communicate with these people. So I think probably a lot more people feel this way about meetings and clients. And so I guess this is our permission now to you to really evaluate that. This is everyone's permission. And the other thing that I think you struggled with a little bit was
00:23:18
Speaker
feeling like you needed to justify why you weren't going. And it's also like, you know what? If that's not a good use of time, your client doesn't justify to you what they're doing with their time.
00:23:34
Speaker
it's whatever they think they need to be doing, right? And your job as the contractor is to spend the time that they're paying you in the best possible way. Like that's your job. And if it's not in these meetings, then they would rather have, you know, Mallory in her case, like working on the systems and, you know, doing the actual work and not sitting in update meetings that she could have sent an email about. Right.
00:24:00
Speaker
or in the project management system that I set up for you to do just that. Already there, she did it already. Yeah, yeah, exactly. No, that's a good point.
00:24:12
Speaker
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00:24:32
Speaker
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Managing Cash Flow with Client Prepayments
00:25:01
Speaker
Then the other big takeaway that we landed was actually around money. So all of this, this is kind of this concept of declining meetings. And I think we even put a couple drafts of emails in our time management course. So if you are interested in this more, we do talk about that in that course. But I also used it for money. So it wasn't like I'm only doing this for my time management, right? And so I kept having clients paying late.
00:25:30
Speaker
And what would happen was that I would have to be paying my contractors at the end of the month, but I wouldn't have the client payments. And so cash flow became a little bit wacky.
00:25:38
Speaker
And Mallory saw my head explode when she walked me through those sticky nuts. And I was like, we can't have this. No, this is not happening anymore. So again, this was super scary. But we shifted to requiring clients to prepay for the month ahead for a minimum amount, which meant we had to make sure everybody was at a minimum retainer, which some weren't. And we switched it. So the clients' invoices then went out the middle of the month due at the end of the month.
00:26:07
Speaker
the freelancers' invoices were due at the end of the month, payment due by the middle of the next month. So instead of it all being one time a month, we staggered it and we required this prepayment. And if their payment wasn't received by the end of the month, the client, we paused services.
00:26:26
Speaker
the month ahead. Now, this was scary. I felt, are we going to lose people? I had conversations with a couple of clients and there were some who just weren't at that minimum retainer amount and we did part ways because it just wasn't worth our time to be working for somebody for four hours and saving them 10 hours of time when we really only ever worked four hours.
00:26:48
Speaker
but I had individual conversations and we gave them like two and a half months notice with plenty of reminders like next time this is your invoice schedule because they kind of got a couple back to back, right? So it was communicated clearly. I had my bookkeeper involved and honestly, it went fairly smooth.
00:27:10
Speaker
Like I, I mean, we lost one client and I heard rumblings. Maybe that one wasn't super happy, but I reached out and she never said anything. And so then we moved on and we've been doing it ever since. And honestly, it's been working a lot better. And when you talk about that out loud, right? What I hear is there's one month where it's different. That's it. They still pay monthly. There's one month to get on a different schedule by two weeks. That's it.
00:27:39
Speaker
and now they pay monthly again, right? So it feels like, it could feel like a massive change, but really, it's pretty tiny. Yeah, and I'm not wish, I wasn't wishy washy about it. I said, we've been doing some business audits. This is to keep the business in best practice. Like this is a healthy change. We've given it a lot of thought. If you have any questions, let me know, but this is the new process going forward.
00:28:05
Speaker
Not like, oh, what do you think? I mean, you can ask people ahead of time, but once you make that policy, make it, state it clearly, run it by someone else, my bookkeeper. Actually, I think Nicole probably read it too. And then that's it moving forward. And then you can also, when you bring in new clients, it's so much more streamlined. And that's just the way it is. And they don't come in with any other understanding. And so it's easier to sell for your new people.
00:28:28
Speaker
Yes, I was very proud of you. Those were a lot of hard things for you because we want to make people happy, right? That's our vibe. And we want everyone to feel okay. And it's like, yeah, but there are solutions here where everyone can actually feel okay.
00:28:46
Speaker
don't assume that something that's a red means that the solution will have everyone being mad at you. Right. Not necessarily the case. Because you're letting yourself down otherwise. You're putting their priority of being happy over your own when now you're feeling all of this. So yes, can you raise your consideration for other people to yourself? Like, can you bring that to the same level?
00:29:10
Speaker
Yes, speak your truth. And this is what we need to do now. And and you can be honest about it to some extent, right? Like this is what this is why we're doing this or whatever, whatever makes the most sense. Yes. So I was very pleased you did it exactly right. And it was a great example of why we love it, right? Like those were things that you could tackle that evening. And honestly, I don't I would have never
00:29:38
Speaker
got into that point on my, without that exercise. So this is why I'm saying it seems so simple and kind of silly. Like, why am I going to take this hour and a half when I have all this stuff to do? But it's creating the space to tune in and then having this practice laid out. So you don't have to think beyond that,
Nicole's Realization on Multitasking
00:29:55
Speaker
right? Just follow, follow the steps and you will hear, you will know what needs to come. It will, it will speak to you of what the next right step is. Yep.
00:30:06
Speaker
And I've used it for some similar things. So, you know, in recent years, it's been around money and processes and people more so. Lately, it's been more about time, which is nice timing since we have this particular season, this particular time. But I had always been
00:30:30
Speaker
kind of like the intentional multitasker. And we have people on this season who are talking about, I mean, the evils of multitasking. I know. Is it even a real thing? I don't know. I'm recovering. I'm trying. Monotasking is just not my default state. But I think that part of what happens when you're working for yourself, I do this at least, is to feel like, oh, suddenly I have all my scheduled flexibility.
00:31:00
Speaker
So I can't possibly be doing too much or be overwhelmed because I control my schedule. So there's no way that could be like, it must be something else. Something else must be the problem because like I can go ride during the day. So clearly I'm not working too much because the hours are different. Like I don't even know what my brain is doing, but it's doing those things, right? So.
00:31:26
Speaker
I've been recently realizing when I write down all the things, I realize how many there actually are. I don't think about them altogether. I don't think about them as distractions, but I remember in that same meeting,
00:31:43
Speaker
I had written down all the different projects so that Mallory was shaking her head. And I was like, no, no, it's fine. No, Mal, it's fine. No, here's why it's fine. And you were like, what are you doing? It was so much, you guys. It was so much. I know. I know. And I have gotten rid, like, that day, I ate my own dog food on that. Like, I shed.
00:32:13
Speaker
what, 80% of those things that were extras? Or one of them, I remember you shifted to quarterly instead of monthly, you didn't completely get rid of, like there were changes for each one, but you did, and I know that was equally hard for you. That was hard for me. Have I ever wanted them back? No, no, I haven't. Yeah, I've never wanted a red sticky note back, that's telling, but I started to feel that way again, and that's been years since we did that.
00:32:42
Speaker
And i started to feel that way again recently and i couldn't really figure out why just like sitting around in my house working and doing the things like my brain couldn't quite process. What why are you feeling overwhelmed like you went to the barn during the day i don't know why my brain is like but you went to the barn during the day like who cares if you're working till two am like clearly you're not overworked it's silly.
00:33:07
Speaker
And so I literally had to write down like, what is every single thing that I'm doing again? Like, have I gotten myself back into this place accidentally? And surprise, surprise. Yes, I did. Yes, I did. So yeah, for me, it's more of a realization exercise of like,
00:33:28
Speaker
oh, this is my tendency to take on too much and to assume that it's not taking much time. But then when you actually think about it all together, that's a lot of clicks. That's how I think about it now. What does that task take to get done? And is that my version of Mallory's half hour meeting in the middle of my day?
00:33:50
Speaker
Right? Like every time I do this, this is 25 minutes and I don't really think about it as being a big deal. But when you think about being interrupted for 25 minutes, five times a day, exactly like you said, and like we talked about in Stefan's bonus episode, like you can't get into a flow state. You can't do it. So that was really clarifying for me.
00:34:15
Speaker
And I had to, once again, realize, and I'm sure I will need to realize it again, I can't do it all as it turns out. So that's good. So the biggest takeaway is you realized, I can't say yes to everything. I cannot do it all. Well, and I'll tell you the other takeaway that was a bit of a identity downer.
00:34:42
Speaker
but useful is that I realize that I always say yes to things that I think are a good backup or a good backup of a backup or a backup of a backup of a backup because I have this like safety security addiction.
00:35:02
Speaker
I'm admitting I have a problem. And so I'm like, yeah, but if anything happens to that business, like I should have this other business. If anything happens to that one, I should have this other one. If anything happens to this project, I should probably have these other three like just in case. And that's what does happen. Like a lot of that has happened in the last six months and your girl is stressed. However,
00:35:27
Speaker
there is no amount of backups that are gonna make me actually feel secure enough. So I need to recognize that's the case. And this exercise is kind of what helped me get there.
00:35:36
Speaker
And then you've been doing some resilience coaching and that's to help you with the deep underlying issue. Yeah, right. See, you guys, I'm telling you so simple, big, huge changes and takeaways from this very simple exercise. How did you, of this most recent round, what were some of those actions that you took for people that maybe needed some permission and some ideas of how they might be able to solve their reds and yellows?
00:36:03
Speaker
Yeah, so this is definitely all the work in progress. Mallory has seen pieces of it. There's other things that she doesn't see. I mean, I wish Mallory were part of all my decisions in businesses. So just a smattering of things. I have, like you said, resilience coach now. So realizing that I have these patterns, which I'm not going to say are negative. Like me wanting to make sure that I'm OK,
00:36:34
Speaker
There's nothing wrong with that. You know, me trying to be incredibly responsible and being disheartened when that doesn't work out, like, yeah, well, I try to get A's. I don't know what to tell you. But we're also living in this world and this world where things don't always go to plan and you can do your best and still have it not work out. And so having a resilience coach was something that I invested in for myself and am very, very glad about.
00:37:04
Speaker
And I've made another friendship with someone that I would now consider a mentor, someone who's been in the business for, you know, 25, 30 years. And I send him just kind of like mindset quandaries, right? But just giving myself an extra network to be like, here's what's happening today. You have walked this path already.
00:37:30
Speaker
Please tell me if I'm insane or this is actually fine. Like I'm not sure anymore. That line has become blurry. I love that. So yeah, like building that support network is big deal. And he was an unexpected addition and an unlikely addition, but it's like the universe put him in your path right when you needed him. Yes. He sat next to me in a waiting room. I complimented his shoes.
00:37:55
Speaker
Yeah. And, and now he's also pseudo pseudo grandpa slash mentor, but I also want to just call out the resilience coach. So we talk with Lorcas on episode 15. And so if you're interested in more of this resilience coaching and insight, check out that episode.
00:38:13
Speaker
Yes, that was when I decided to hire her. I did not know her previously. So that was a big one. I've also done some work on delegating or deleting. So, you know, and this reminds me of something we're going to talk about later in the season about your, you know, actually we talked about it in the bonus episode at the end of last season. So clearing clutter is always kind of the default mode, right? And that is true. There are things that we can delete that we are doing sometimes.
00:38:43
Speaker
But there are things that we can delegate or do in phases. So for me, that looked like making a few, what probably seemed like small changes to roles at the agency. So getting a different person to QA kits before they go out. Seems small.
00:39:09
Speaker
But for me, at this point in my life, that is very stressful. And so whenever it comes up in my day, it triggers me and I'm like, I better make sure these are right because if they're not, you'll be financially ruined and everything is a disaster.
00:39:26
Speaker
Don't worry, Lorca and I are working on that. But just noticing the places where probably if you're going into something with that mindset, you're not doing the best job anyway.
Importance of Delegating Tasks
00:39:37
Speaker
What I need to do was just go ask my writer to do it. She is coming into it with a blank slate. She hasn't seen the campaign since she wrote it the month prior. She's fresh eyes. She's better at proofing than I am. And she brings no emotional baggage.
00:39:56
Speaker
And there's three of us. There's three of us. So if all three of us miss it, then I mean, really, what are the odds that anyone else will catch it? Right, probably not, right? And so these are the teeny tiny things that when I put them together, like even, you know, when I sent that message saying, here are some tweaks I want to make, I was like, dang, when I write them all down, they seem really small and weird.
00:40:22
Speaker
like, oh, like this took me probably like a week and a half just to be like, okay, here's what I think I need to do. And then I write them down and like, no one else is gonna think that this took me more than five minutes. Well, they're small, but it's the disruptions and the like the constant ticker tape of knowing they're on your plate. Yes, I get it.
00:40:44
Speaker
Yes. And so one of the things we did that's with you is I said, well, I wonder if I could just approve payments one day a week instead of approving them whenever, right? Instead of having something just like pop up to approve.
00:41:01
Speaker
Yeah, I think so. I don't think Mal would be mad. It might be more efficient. Like maybe I just don't have this in my life for maybe the first time. And also it's not because it wasn't, well, it wasn't like a million of them. But there's also some that are on retainer that don't need your approval. And so it was just those five times or dings up that you have to get out of your flow.
00:41:24
Speaker
How many clicks is it? I'm opening the spreadsheet. I'm remembering what the project was. I'm transferring it to my backup sweatsheet. I know you guys. I know. I'm trying to do a job. So little things like that. But the point is, give yourself permission to make small changes that emotionally help you to make everything feel a little bit less red.
Balancing Personal Pursuits and Guilt
00:41:47
Speaker
right? Because I spent a long time being like, Oh, this these projects don't really take much of my time. Okay, they don't take a lot of my time. They take 90% of my headspace all day long, every day me thinking about it.
00:42:03
Speaker
That's real too. Take them off the list completely. Just remove them from your list. Yes. Yes. So I'll give you one more example of how it can also apply to like personal life. So I have horses. Everyone who listens knows that probably.
00:42:22
Speaker
And I have one horse who's very well trained. He's older. He's so easy. Like he's he's perfect. I have another horse that is very untrained. He is wild. He is semi feral.
00:42:39
Speaker
But he's fun, right? So I have spent no less than probably five months fretting that I'm not spending enough time with the older perfect horse. And every time we go out, I'm like, I need to ride the one that's not trained so it gets trained. And also, I'm having more fun with that right now because it's a project.
00:43:01
Speaker
And so I would just like head to the barn with a car full of guilt, and then I would spend my hours there carrying around a backpack of guilt. And I was just like, what am I doing? Like, this is supposed to be fun, and I am ruining it. Nothing else is ruining it. Like, I'm ruining it.
00:43:22
Speaker
So what that meant for me was a 45-minute chat with one of my coaches to say, here's where I am mentally. Is it fine if this horse is just on a sabbatical? Is that OK? Am I ruining everything? Can I just focus on the one that's not trained for a little while?
00:43:45
Speaker
And of course, like many things that we think are massive, everyone else is like, what? Yeah, fine. Like, sure. Who cares? Like, meh. And I've spent, you know, months carrying around this, you know, backpack full of rocks about it. So it just like once you write it down, once you see things, it gives you permission to A, feel however you're feeling.
00:44:12
Speaker
because clearly there are reasons that you feel the way, like you're not just a crazy person. And B, it's pretty hard not to do something about the reds once you see them. Like your brain is like, you know what, I got some solving to do and I'm excited about it. So for me, that's, that's how it's been lately. Again, some small tweaks make a really big difference. No, it's so good.
00:44:39
Speaker
And I've seen the changes and in life and in business, there are the ups and the downs, which is all this podcast is, ups and downs and turnarounds. So this is a way, a strategy to pull into when you're kind of heading down the hill or stuck at the bottom of the hill and you want to climb back up. So I love that. I also love that it's something you can repeat as you need because there are these things and times.
00:45:09
Speaker
I've never done it, but you could totally do it when you're on an up and just make it even a higher hill, right? I guess I never really even thought about that. So more aspirational. What else would be green, right? How do I get it? Because let's go fully into mastery. I'm feeling good. Let's take it a little bit higher because you know eventually it'll come down again. So let's get rid of some of those reds before they even really become a problem.
00:45:35
Speaker
No, so it's really good. It's simple. It's Nicole's favorite time management strategy.
Encouraging the 'Red, Yellow, Green' Exercise
00:45:40
Speaker
It can obviously go across other avenues besides time management, but give it a try, you guys, and let us know. Email us, hey, at unbondboss.com, leave us a voice memo, go to our unbondboss.com website on the podcast page, leave us a voice memo. Let us know how it has helped you.
00:46:01
Speaker
Yes. We'd love to see your sticky notes. Oh yes. Pictures of sticky notes would be fun. Yes. Pictures of sticky notes. So thank you for sharing your tactic with us. Again, there's more on this concept in the time management course, but let us know what you think. And Nicole, thank you for being open and sharing your insights and what this has done for you so far. You bet. I hope it's helpful. Awesome. Okay. Well, take care of you guys. We'll see you next week. I will share my favorite time management strategy. All right. See you guys then. Take care.
00:46:29
Speaker
Thanks for listening. Hop over to UnboundBoss.com to join our community and leave us a voice memo. We absolutely love hearing from you. If you like the podcast, please subscribe, leave us an Apple review, and share your favorite episodes with other women entrepreneurs. Talk to you soon.