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10. Low-risk, high-reward business with Sarah Cauble
19 Plays1 year ago
She’s a proud mother of two—a young daughter and a boutique web design business.
Sarah Cauble is a self-proclaimed work-from-homebody, but her favorite title will always be “Mom.” It only took three months interning in the corporate world to realize that life wasn’t for her… and never would be. While entrepreneurship feels risky to many, she thought, “What do I have to lose? I can always apply for a job if it doesn’t work out.”
More than a decade later, it’s safe to say things are working out just fine, thank you very much. In this episode, Sarah shares how her desire for family, flexibility, and financial simplicity helped her create a company that works around her life—not the other way around.
Rapid growth? Heck no. Managing a team? No need. Complex systems? Hard pass. “I have no ambition to grow,” she says without a hint of apology. Learn how she built a low-risk business that put family first—and how those motivations are evolving as her daughter heads off to Kindergarten.
Come feast or famine, Sarah’s story underscores the importance of being intentional and surrounding yourself with people who always have your back. And when that isn’t quite enough, motivating mantras, a good cry, and a cup of green tea just might do the trick!
For more inspiration, subscribe to Unbound Turnarounds on Apple Podcasts or wherever you listen to podcasts!
LINKS:
- Connect with Nicole
- Connect with Mallory
- Connect with Sarah: https://sarahcauble.com/
- Boomerang for Gmail: www.boomeranggmail.com/
- To do list: https://teuxdeux.com/
- Self-hosted Invoicing: https://www.pancakeapp.com/
- Time tracking (I use the free version): https://toggl.com/track/
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Transcript
Introduction to Business Unbound
00:00:02
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.
00:00:32
Speaker
Welcome back everyone to Unbound Turnarounds. We are here again. And Nicole, are you here?
00:00:39
Speaker
I am. Yes. I'm from the frozen North once again. How's it going today? It's going okay. It's 17 degrees. Thank you for asking. And tomorrow will be a low of four and I'm trying not to think about it. It feels like February, but it's October when we're recording this. Are you recording from the sauna is my question for you. I know. I wish that I could know that sauna has been a gift to my new Canadian life. I am happy for it.
00:01:10
Speaker
I love it.
Meet Sarah Cobble
00:01:12
Speaker
Well, today we are super excited to welcome Sarah Cobble to the show. She is a web designer with over a decade in the industry, been working with agencies and small business to create these really intuitive user experiences. And she has this real knack for creating a subtle interplay of typography and color and imagery.
00:01:33
Speaker
And when she is not pushing pixels around, she can be found spending time in the great outdoors with her husband and daughter, restoring their 1890s fixer upper, or snuggling up with a really good book. Or sometimes a probably not as good book, too. It really just depends.
Why Women Start Businesses
00:01:48
Speaker
A self-proclaimed work from home body, which by the way is a term I will be stealing for the rest of my life, Sarah designs from her home office nestled between the mountains of Montana. So we actually met Sarah through a close friend of mine here in Bozeman and we are really glad we did and welcome Sarah to the show.
00:02:05
Speaker
Thank you. So just to remind everyone what we're into on season one, we are digging into the whys behind women who start their own businesses. And we've learned already that those motivations are really diverse. And today we're excited to share Sarah's perspective as a working mom, since that role really influenced her decisions around entrepreneurship. So just to kick us off, tell us a little bit about how your professional career started.
Sarah's Career Path Choices
00:02:34
Speaker
Yeah, sure. So I think it took a unique, straightforward path. Straight out of college, I went to school in Missoula, Montana, and I moved to Bozeman for an internship. Just to summer internships was only about three months long, but I quickly learned how the atmosphere was where I was working. And so in an office or on these long film shoots, I just
00:03:00
Speaker
And it wasn't for me, even just kind of the lifestyle around some of the longtime employees there just wasn't quite where I wanted my life to go. And I really knew that very early on.
00:03:15
Speaker
They offered me a job, but I declined it.
Starting in Entrepreneurship
00:03:18
Speaker
And I was like, okay, I'm just going to nanny part-time and figure out what I want to do for myself. And at the time I was designing my own website, kind of a portfolio, and I was really loving doing that. I'd taken one web design class in college and I'd taken other design courses because I have a media arts minor.
00:03:41
Speaker
just starting to do some work for some family members, you know, who needed a website, some friends. And since I was so young, you know, money didn't matter at the time. So it was just kind of like I could just, I was making the same amount I was in college. I could sustain paying for rent and food. And that was all I needed to do.
00:04:02
Speaker
So it was really an easy way to ease into entrepreneurship because as I started to get paying clients, it was just icing on the cake. It was for me a really natural way to get into it and start making my own money and that sort of thing.
00:04:19
Speaker
So for probably two or three years, I was nannying or waitressing and then doing web design on the side. And then I secured my first kind of ongoing client work and that allowed me to quit.
00:04:36
Speaker
waitressing and have more time to take on my own projects. And I always knew I had this baseline to keep money in the bank, I guess you can say. So that's been huge, actually, my whole career now at this point, 15 years later, is always having some kind of ongoing work.
Low-risk Career Reflections
00:04:55
Speaker
So it seems like kind of a bit of a contradiction I'm curious about that you have described yourself as, you know, a low risk person and we'll get more into that later, but always wanting to have money in the bank and just that easy going lifestyle. At 21, 22, you also chose not to go in the career direction that most people would say like, this is the guarantee of what that is. This is ongoing work. That means a salary. That means a paycheck.
00:05:20
Speaker
So how did you square that in your mind of saying this thing that everyone else would find risky? I actually find less risky. Yeah, I think just because of the time I didn't even know what it would feel like to have a salary or quote unquote real disposable income.
00:05:39
Speaker
So for me, there wasn't really a risk. It was like, worst comes to worst, I can apply for a job. And I even did here and there apply to a couple of design positions, but some of them at the time required moving. I was like, I don't want to move. And so for me, it felt low risk still, because I was like, what do I have to lose?
00:05:59
Speaker
22 years old and I can nanny or waitress I've been doing this since I was 15 like what's a couple years and it is contradictory to my personality because I was always very type a like I gotta get a degree in four years I gotta get good grades I gotta do this in this but for me I guess once I got to the career part I was still so unsure exactly what it was gonna look like for me I didn't even know I was gonna be a web designer that I
00:06:25
Speaker
It just happened and it felt like an ease into it. I don't know. I love that. I'm always saying to friends who are concerned about going out on their own, it's that same thing where it feels risky to a lot of people, but to me,
00:06:42
Speaker
I'm always like, I can't be fired. I can't be laid off. I get to be in charge of how many clients I take on and therefore how much I make. There's a lot of risks that I think people don't really put on the pro and cons column that it's actually maybe a lot less risky than you initially think. Yeah, it totally is.
00:07:07
Speaker
So this is interesting to me though, because you were so young when you made this decision to do entrepreneur work. So tell me about the why that you chose that.
Designing a Family-friendly Lifestyle
00:07:19
Speaker
Cause you know, when you're older, there might be different why's and I'm sure it's probably shifted now that you have family, but what was it about that lifestyle in the beginning when you were younger that you really were drawn to?
00:07:30
Speaker
Yeah. In the beginning, I was really drawn to not being in an office. That was huge. And yeah, just kind of establishing more of the lifestyle I wanted, which involved travel, family. And I wasn't really seeing that family piece in the one office I was in for three months. Great. Did I know people have families and, you know, can make other lifestyles work, but I just wasn't seeing that. And it was just
00:07:54
Speaker
so clear right away. I was just like, that's really what I want. And I even knew pretty early on too, also from manneying, I always knew I wanted to be a mom. I wasn't ready then, but I knew that was a goal that I, or not even a goal, just a really important piece of my life I wanted to make happen. And so I knew going into it that I wanted to somehow make it work where
00:08:18
Speaker
I wouldn't have to be away from my child. I wouldn't have to put them in daycare because also both my parents were entrepreneurs. My mom had an in-home daycare and then my dad was a funeral director and I had a funeral home business. And so I'm seeing them do things on their own. So I just always knew you could make your own work.
00:08:37
Speaker
and I really seeing my mom have a daycare like was great because it allowed her to stay in home with my two youngest sisters and I also saw that some of those parents weren't seeing those kids for a good chunk of the day and I do not judge anyone who has their children in daycare but I knew for me I just really that was really important to me so going into it once I met my husband and we had these discussions even before we got married we talked about how
00:09:06
Speaker
We both wanted to work from home and we were going to tag team working and tag team parenting. And so that's what we've done for the last six years. So we haven't had any childcare. We don't have family support. We have just made our days work where one of us is on parent duty and one of us is working.
Work-life Balance Strategies
00:09:25
Speaker
And, and that's really allowed me to nurse and do all those really hard things in the early days. And now my daughter's in kindergarten and it's like,
00:09:32
Speaker
Totally new chapter last few months getting used to well, she's not even in the house and it's pretty quiet and doing work and that sort of thing so that was a huge huge driver and it's kind of strange that I knew it so early on before I even
00:09:48
Speaker
kids were even really a thought. We weren't planning yet, but it was just like, this is how we want our life to be. And travel was a huge component too. We want to be able to go places where and when to work remotely, that sort of thing. So yeah, it's...
00:10:03
Speaker
been really great. Like I don't know anyone else who's set up their lives the way we have. I would love to meet someone who's done this. And I do think it is if you want to do it. But for us, it's been really great.
The Importance of Support Networks
00:10:17
Speaker
And I will say one piece of that puzzle though is that we both work around
00:10:22
Speaker
32-ish hours a week so we're not working 40 hours so you know we are like a salary and a half or so you know however you want to put it down on paper so that is a sacrifice that we make but it's allowed us to have it all so to speak and it works for us and honestly even
00:10:42
Speaker
When my child is out of the house, I don't think I want to work more than 32 hours a week. It's really been the perfect work balance for me. Sitting at a desk all day long gets long and hard on your physical body and your mental health. So just cutting it a couple hours short every day compared to a lot of people has been really huge.
00:11:05
Speaker
Well, and I think that's one thing that also holds people back from feeling like they can do this is those conversations that you were having with your husband, even before he was your husband, about how is this going to work? Like physically, how is this going to work in our lives? So what were those early conversations like between you two? What were the logistics that you worked out that have made this business possible while you were both working from home and has that
00:11:32
Speaker
I mean, obviously you wouldn't know everything that you needed to work through up front, but I think that open communication is something that people would be really eager to hear about as they think, how could I make this work?
00:11:47
Speaker
Logistically, we didn't really know until we were in it once our daughter was born. So once she was born, we started to learn her routine and that changed as she dropped naps over time and that sort of thing. So in the early days, naps were huge for us and routine was huge for us. And I remember being jealous of some moms who just
00:12:08
Speaker
let their kids nap on the go or they did all these things. And my daughter was just never that way. We had to like dark room, get consistent. I can't rock you to sleep. I got to lay you down, walk away and you're good. And that was really huge. And in those early years, uh, just being able to work. So we would always both be working during nap times and then we both split the day in half. So usually it would be one person works eight to noon and then the other noon to six.
00:12:35
Speaker
It was like roughly kind of our hours and our shifts. And oftentimes I would do the morning work shift, but we'd switch sometimes. And it was nice because you just have that flexibility. Like, you know, I don't really want to work this morning. I'm going to have a slow morning with my daughter. We want to go by very story time or whatever it was.
00:12:51
Speaker
And even with a work from home job, a lot of those jobs want you to be at your desk, 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. And so even with a job that's work from home, I wouldn't have that ability to be flexible around, what do I want to do with my daughter today? Really making her a priority. So that's really kind of how we logistically, I think, mapped out our days. And now it's a little different now.
00:13:18
Speaker
Um, we have like shared calendars, that sort of thing. So we kind of know what's going on, but yeah. So there, it can't, I really love hearing about the success of it and how much joy it's bringing you, but I just know that it's probably not all roses. So on this show, we do talk about the downs as well as the ups. So if you're open to sharing how
00:13:43
Speaker
When those downs have come, how have you leaned on a support network to really help you get through that period? Yeah, for sure. So early in my entrepreneur days, I met a couple people through Twitter of all things who were also freelancers, and I became friends with them.
00:14:06
Speaker
Slowly one of those friends started a mastermind group and then we started getting together. I hear remembering how often maybe once a month or something and it was really, really well planned out, you know, with questions every month and really pushing each other and holding each other accountable. And also being there for those hard questions like,
00:14:26
Speaker
when things are hard and when you don't know what you're doing or that sort of thing. And I've definitely leaned on those people because they know exactly how you feel, you know? And even in recent years now, we don't have that mastermind group anymore, but we still get together somewhat regularly just for dinners and we talk and, you know, inevitably usually work
00:14:50
Speaker
stuff comes up and they've been huge in that. And this year particularly has been a pretty challenging year for me in terms of I've had a lot of feast or famine and that's really hard on me mentally. I do well with just a good balance of work and I don't want to ever be overworked or underworked. I don't do well in either arena. And that was a result of one of my long time clients and actually also
00:15:20
Speaker
family owned business. My in-laws owned a publishing company and I was always doing about five hours of work a week for them. So they were my very first client and I maintained them through all that time. I've had other agency partners over the years as well, but they were just always there for me. So that's been a huge shift and
00:15:39
Speaker
I experienced just a lot of that feast in Baman and my friends were there for me through all that and really listened to me. And just even one was just trying to find ways, like, how can I help you in my business? Like, what can I do? Like, I'll hire you if I can. It's just huge. And ultimately, fortunately, I ended up getting approached by an agency that needed exactly what I wanted, which is crazy about like 10 hours or so.
00:16:08
Speaker
a week of ongoing work. So now I feel a lot more settled and I can still take on my small business clients and other agency projects. And it's just now things have evened out a lot more, which has been so good because
00:16:25
Speaker
Feaster family is very real, I think, in a lot of service-based businesses. And for some people, it's hard to say no to work. And I used to be really good about saying no, because I don't like to overload myself. And I don't do good work if I do. My mental health isn't good if I do. And when you get in that anxiety state of, oh, I don't know if I'm going to have me work, but summer was so slow, I've got to say yes to everything. And then it's just not good either.
00:16:53
Speaker
We feel this so hard. We have both felt this.
00:16:58
Speaker
Yeah, it's really hard. But then being able to lean on your friends. And that's how I've gotten through. Nicole gets a text for me, and she supports me, and I can do the same for her when Google changes the algorithms and screws up her other business. Oh, God. Yeah. So this is the part of the journey that I find really fascinating.
Managing Work-related Anxiety
00:17:22
Speaker
So like Mallory says, if she has a problem, she can come to me.
00:17:26
Speaker
And I feel like in her moments of anxiety, a sense of calm and I will try to advise her the best I can or not advise her if that's not what she needs. But then when it happens to you, it feels very different, right? And no, it does.
00:17:41
Speaker
Yeah, you know that place for you, it's feast or famine that triggers some of that anxiety, makes you not work your best anyway, probably not the best in your family in those moments either. What are some of the things that you found help your mindset in those moments when you can identify, here's what's happening, this is why I feel like this, then what do you do? How do you turn that around from becoming kind of this spiral of anxiety?
00:18:09
Speaker
Yeah, it's really hard. I'm crying about it, talking to people about it, getting out the feelings, number one. And number two, I do have some mantras or just facts that I have written down that it's like, I always do good work. I always get my work done.
00:18:28
Speaker
This is a brain surgery. Things can wait. Just certain things like that to really remind me what the actual reality is, whether it's feast or famine. If it's famine, things always work out. We always have money. Work will come. I can always send cold emails. Those types of things. Those are huge for sure, in addition to just talking it out with people and crying. Now I'm convinced that you're my spirit animal because...
00:18:55
Speaker
This girl, well, A, loves a good cry. And B, loves mantras. Like, for me, that is also something that my brain will get into the loop, right? We all know the loops. I literally read something different. My brain will go, oh, well, that's probably true, too. Oh, yeah, that's probably true, especially if it's something that I wrote, right? When in that woman, I felt that way. And I was like,
00:19:21
Speaker
Oh, well, you can probably trust her because your past self said it would be fine. So yeah, it's probably going to be fine. But I do the same thing. And Mallory said, when Google throws me for a loop, I have a couple of phrases now that I go back to, which is the answers are out there. There are people who can help you. You just need to mind them.
00:19:41
Speaker
And that feels a lot better than I will turn out all the lights and spiral into my house by myself. Yeah. I think you have a bracelet too. Don't you have a bracelet that says something that you wear? Yes. My bracelet says, or it'll be fine, which is a real expression of my personality. It's not, everything's going to be great, or you're going to be okay. It's just telling your brain, let's consider that there's another option that is less dire. Yes.
00:20:10
Speaker
Yes, that is how I get through life as well. I love that as a little reminder though to have on your wrist when you need it. Yeah, that's a good idea.
00:20:20
Speaker
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00:20:40
Speaker
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00:21:09
Speaker
Let's go back to that idea about the low risk business, because I think it ties into some of this mental wellness.
Maintaining a Low-risk Business
00:21:15
Speaker
So first, what I'm hearing is there's some self-awareness happening of understanding now, like, what triggers me? What is potentially not good for my mental health? And then are you using kind of that low risk business mentality to combat those feelings coming? Or talk to us more about how that low risk type of entrepreneurship really resonates with you.
00:21:38
Speaker
Yeah, I think I probably am doing that because I think, like I said, where I've found my sweet spot is knowing that I have some kind of ongoing contract work to just keep me at that baseline. So I'm not worried. Can I pay my mortgage or feed my kid or something? You know, it's just that baseline. And then just having been in the business this long now, I'm confident in myself that I do always get projects, you know, things come in.
00:22:05
Speaker
Maybe I'm not at the level where some people are, where they can just always be project to project basis in every aspect. But for me, I'm just not there. And I don't even know that I want to be. I do really love collaboration and working with some people regularly that I really love and respect. And I do love people, you know, just because I want to be work from home doesn't mean I don't like collaboration and interacting with people.
00:22:30
Speaker
But yes, I do like it in my own way. So I do think for me going into it and maintaining this low risk, which is mean I don't have a lot of overhead. I don't pay for an office. I have an office in my house. It's so low compared to like, it's probably a few hundred dollars a month or something.
00:22:48
Speaker
So it's really low compared to a lot of businesses. And for me, that does keep my anxiety at a baseline and keep me not worried about do I need to go get a job or that sort of thing. And knowing I can hunt down work, you know, I sent a lot of cold emails this year. I have I don't always have to do that. But this year was such a big change for me. I had to do that. And I did get work from it. And you know, it does work. It's not
00:23:14
Speaker
you don't hear back from everyone, you get some responses, sometimes no work, you might get a small slice of a percentage of those emails you sent out. So that's really huge. And I think even with my husband too, he's an artist and an entrepreneur too, we're kind of in this transition where we're coming up with some ideas for him in regard to his own businesses. And they're also very low risk service based
00:23:40
Speaker
businesses because it's just such an easy entry. And I think for anyone who wants to be their own boss and wants to set their own schedule and create their own lifestyle, it's a good way to start. And maybe you're that person who down the road, you want to get a business loan or invest your life savings into something. And you could totally do that. But I know for me, that's not a good fit for me. I like.
00:24:05
Speaker
just being a freelancer. That's why it's so funny. I even hate to call myself a small business owner because it's just me. I just have a website where I sell some services. Like it's a very small business owner. Yes. Yeah. And I really have no ambition to grow it or hire people or have contractors. I know that for myself and I've always known that. So for me, I think just figuring out where you know you want to go, I think.
00:24:31
Speaker
in terms of being a business owner. And Mallory's heard me talk about this before, but there was a time in my original agency where I just decided to stop pressuring myself to grow it. And it was such a sense of freedom because everyone, well meaningly, of course,
00:24:49
Speaker
wants to support you in the ways of telling you how you could grow your business and what you could do next and just realizing that I didn't want to do that. I didn't want to do what it would take to grow it and then I didn't want to manage it once it did.
00:25:04
Speaker
was so freeing, right? And it gave me the space to start other things down the line a couple of years later, started my website project a couple of years later, starting this with Mal, because I gave myself permission not to just endlessly grow. That wasn't what I wanted. And a lot of people don't talk about that, but I think it's so refreshing to hear someone else say, I have no ambition to grow this. And I think that's important.
00:25:28
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, it's really interesting. One of my very smart mastermind friends, she had a post and it was talking about, you're not making a profit if you don't have a lump sum left over at the end of the year. It's like, oh yeah, I'm like not a profitable business. I pay myself everything that's left over.
00:25:44
Speaker
I plan to keep on doing that from here on out and I'm like that's fine with me. It is interesting like can service-based businesses versus product-based businesses are very different too. I think you can scale service-based businesses obviously but it's harder and
00:26:01
Speaker
You do have to grow a team and that sort of thing. And yeah, like I said, I just, I knew that wasn't for me. And I like just being a freelancer and still working in those agency capacities, but at my own leisure and when projects I ought to work with. Exactly.
00:26:18
Speaker
Yeah. Well, and I'm curious, you know, you talked a bit about your husband's work as well. And I'm wondering if there are things that you've seen in this unique position of having two very small business owners. We'll say that for now. What differences do you see, if any, between how a man is approaching this and seeing his business versus how you as a woman manage your business?
Business Approach Differences
00:26:43
Speaker
Are there different things that you've seen in terms of mindset or even just how the businesses are run?
00:26:48
Speaker
that you think might be man versus woman? Yeah, it's hard to say if it is man versus woman or if it's personality type. It's interesting. I don't know if you guys are into Enneagram. I'm type one. He's five. So I don't know if that has anything to do with it too. But I do think for us, there are some major differences just in the ways that we operate. And he is more of an artist. So that's a little bit different too. Like he's selling his work and his
00:27:16
Speaker
self a little bit more. And so that's why we're transitioning a little bit and having him offer more service-based options to expand a little bit. Now that my daughter's in kindergarten, we have this ability now to try a few different things and see what happens, but there's for sure a difference in the ways that we operate. I'm very driven and
00:27:40
Speaker
checklist, project management software, things like that. He's not that way so much. And he's getting into that a little bit more now that we're having these discussions about other businesses, but it is different. It's very different. And like I said, I don't know if that's gender or if it's personality type. Gotcha. No, that makes sense. That makes sense. I feel like Mallory's going to want to know about your systems.
00:28:04
Speaker
You know my ears perked up when she had a project management system. You can elaborate if you'd like. What kind of things do you love using? I don't do anything super sophisticated, but I have something called to do, but it's spelled like T-E-U-X, D-E-U-X or something like that. And it's a very basic daily, you get to X things off. And it's just very simple. It's just literally like a to-do list on your screen, but you can go back and see if you've done things. So I use that.
00:28:32
Speaker
I use just a Google calendar for my projects so I know the timeline of things and I know how much I can take on at once. And then with some of the agencies I work with, they use different chat applications and project management software. But for myself, those kinds of things, I don't really need as much. What do you do for invoicing, things like that?
00:28:51
Speaker
I have a very old self-hosted software called Pancake App. You just paid a flat fee at the time and then it's just hosted on my website. And so like on the backend and I just invoice from there. And then I use Tobble to track. So they're not connected, but it's simple enough. Interesting. I've never heard of that.
00:29:13
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. So it's kind of nice cause I'm not paying a monthly fee for it. Right. So posted, but it's pretty basic, but it's been working for now. You can get into not so low risk when you have so much subscription fees, so many subscription fees, really. So I don't, I never preach to people to have more systems than you need more often than not. People don't have enough.
00:29:37
Speaker
or they're not using anything and not saved or organized and whatnot. But you certainly, yeah, I think that helps you keep your costs of your business down because you're not paying an exorbitant.
00:29:53
Speaker
I can't even say that word because you're not paying a huge amount in systems fees. For sure. Yeah, for sure. Yeah. Yeah. And I have some other things like pandadoc for like signing documents, a few things like that, you know, and I have all my decided software. There's things that I'm as far as.
00:30:11
Speaker
business systems go, it's pretty basic and low. But I mean, when I first started, I was just doing invoices and InDesign and like exporting your PDF. Like that was like a very very thick system. So you have to start somewhere. Well, in fairness, systems have gotten more sophisticated, so there's more available. But also, you know, I like that point of saying, don't let that stop you from getting started because you don't have a plan for how people are going to sign your contracts.
00:30:38
Speaker
started. And we work with so many entrepreneurs who are many years in. Ideally, it's great to get things set up in the beginning, but sometimes you don't know what you need. And so you can't always do that. So then you can come back and you can tweak how your systems are set up or how your processes run and make it more efficient.
00:30:55
Speaker
Yeah, totally fine. So when you were back in the beginning, we've mentioned, you know, you've just figured out a way to do your systems, even though you didn't have it in place, but how was your mental mind? How was your mindset around doing the actual work? Was there any.
00:31:11
Speaker
fear or lack of confidence there about, can I actually execute on this? Can I deliver on what I've said I can deliver on? Yeah, there for sure was. There was a lot of that imposter syndrome, especially early on, because I don't even know how my first paid client that wasn't family or friend bound me to this day. And I'm like, okay, I'm going to do this. And then I started to get referrals and it was super intimidating at the time. And I had my fair share. I did a little contract day early on and that was
00:31:41
Speaker
It's really scary and hard and I stopped to drink that a little bit because it's hard to trust people and that's actually one thing that's been a huge lesson that I've learned over time in business and in like homeownership. It's probably not the best, but it's like if you want to get things done, you have to do it yourself.
00:32:01
Speaker
So I'm a little bit in that mentality, which probably isn't the most healthy, but I really do feel like I know I'm going to get this done right. Like I couldn't design and then hire someone else to build the cycle. I just had to do it all or I didn't know how I could end up or if it was going to get done on time. So those were mostly what the feeders surrounded with in those early days, I think.
00:32:24
Speaker
Yeah, that makes sense. I think we all get that, especially, so we talk about this in one of our courses, about the Recruit Your Rockstar course, so about hiring. One of the big holdups and the fears is losing some of that control, right? Yeah, for sure. And letting everybody else do the work.
00:32:43
Speaker
And in some instances it can be, I'm a big advocate for it, but it has to be the right tasks and the right things. And sometimes you might fail and it might be a learning experience because it's not the right fit. But I think that's a really common thing that a lot of people are feeling. Like I don't want to hire somebody and bring on support because I just don't know if I can trust them to deliver. I don't think you're alone in that.
00:33:08
Speaker
Yeah, totally. And I should say there was a time a few years later where I did find someone that was more of a referral that I found to lean on to help me build some sites at the time before. Things have shifted a lot in web design lately where I don't need to do that anywhere, but I did find someone for a little bit where if I needed the help, I could, and I could rely on her. And that's not to say I totally wrote it off. I might need to tell my kids.
00:33:33
Speaker
But they're for sure are people. And I think for me, referrals have been the biggest if I do need that support. Same. And the people are out there, and the things you want to look for are reliability and clear communication. Yeah, that's probably number one. And I think I've even found that just in small businesses that have hired me and agencies that have hired me. It's kind of crazy where they're like, oh, this person just wasn't reliable. I was like, what?
00:33:59
Speaker
succeeding themselves. It's a pretty lame answer if they're not doing their work or responding to emails. Like, I don't get it that apparently that's a thing, you know? And so people love working with me for that reason because they can count on me. I'm there, you know? Aside from my work, just that's what I can do.
00:34:17
Speaker
Yes, meet your own deadlines. Yeah. That's rocket science for that for sure. You're like, is that not a thing we've all been doing? I thought we were all doing that. Yeah, exactly. That's been for sure something just coming to an understanding of in adulthood, I think was that, oh, not everybody is what you think they would be, which is...
00:34:39
Speaker
Just responsible. Which is just responsible, exactly. I had some of the same fears of hiring help, though I've never had an employee. I've always only had, you know, contract folks and some of them are long-term though, like Mallory. It's something where now I've switched a little bit to knowing not everybody's going to be the right fit. It's going to really suck when it's not. However,
00:35:05
Speaker
The fear of, will someone do this as well as I can do it myself? When you find the right person, you become the weak lick, right? Now I'm like, I can't do what Mallory does for me as well as she does it, right? Yes, I used to do it, but I didn't do it as well as she does it. And when you find that, that to me at least is what makes the hiring really easy as a decision.
00:35:32
Speaker
to be like, you know what, I thought I couldn't give this up, but this person just does it better than I do. And so that just alleviates that whole piece of worry of is this going to get done? Is it going to get done? It's actually going to get done way better than if I did it. Well, and that goes back to a previous conversation we've had in a past episode, but Nicole and I have talked about, and you've said this yourself, Sarah, like referral. So getting somebody that's either referred to you or you know them or you know their work,
00:36:00
Speaker
from something else or past relationships. So Nicole hires people she knows and it's worked out really well for her. And so if people are wondering like, oh, that sounds amazing, but how do I find that unicorn if we're saying it so hard, lean on your network first and ask around and have those referrals come in and then have the conversations with them. And I think you might be successful that way.
00:36:23
Speaker
Yeah, totally, totally. And it's the best way for finding work too. I'm not even having to actively ask clients, but most of my work and usually the good work and the best fits are referrals, not just a Google search. I'm a web designer and I don't even prioritize SEO. It doesn't matter to me because I want work through my network. It's the best work for me.
00:36:47
Speaker
Yep, agreed. So I'm curious, since we've talked a little bit about how you don't necessarily want to grow your business in a traditional sense.
Balancing Work and Personal Time
00:36:57
Speaker
You don't want to have a bunch of team members that you're responsible for. I think that means that when you're doing most of everything yourself, you've got to have some boundaries in place, some structure.
00:37:07
Speaker
and with your daughter going off to school for the first time that stuff involves overtime so how have you set up your ideal date you have. Kind of a model calendar concept of when you want to be working versus doing other things and how is that changed over the life of your business.
00:37:25
Speaker
Yeah. That's interesting. I mean, I think my day to day, usually it's eight to three. That's when I work. Um, now that she's in school, it's harder for me to be like, okay, I'm going to take a lunch break. Whereas before it was very dedicated. It's like noon to one. I don't work.
00:37:40
Speaker
You know, I'm with her and we eat lunch together, but now that she's in school, it's harder to set those boundaries here. So I'd be like, Oh, let's bring this to my desk and eat and get more done. Right. And especially with the weather getting colder. So I'm just going to be inside where it's before I was started. The square is like, Hey, I'm going to go outside, eat my lunch.
00:37:56
Speaker
make a phone call to a friend or a family member, catch up, really take that hour for myself to rejuvenate before I get back to work. And I do think those things are important and I have to be a constant reminder even for myself that it's like, okay, just let's go for a walk or let's do 20 minutes of yoga and eat your lunch, not in your office.
00:38:16
Speaker
Even if it's just watching a show where Leslie drove pockets, just take a brain break. I think that it's really important. Even if there's work to be done. I don't know. I just think that's huge. Yes. You're more effective, actually, if you come back. So yes. Yeah. Back to our brain boost course. Yes. Yes. It's all about this. Yes.
00:38:35
Speaker
So those things and then yeah, just in the day-to-day, I don't really have a set. I do admin work this time of day. Usually I kind of just jump into some emails, maybe a little admin stuff the first hour and then try to get into billable client work from there. I'm always checking email. I probably get a little bit more distracted than I should. Sometimes I feel like I need to get back to people.
00:39:00
Speaker
I try to be focused and get stuff done and not get undistracted. I will say recently I, I'm on a Mac and I disabled the little red notification. Oh yeah, good. Yes. Because yeah, they were driving me crazy because I have my Gmail and my work email. I just had to like check them and I was like, I need to turn those off.
00:39:23
Speaker
Good. And then I just set it up where I made a few clients VIPs. So then a little notification shows up in the corner of the screen. So I can at least see a little intro of their email if I need to get to it or see who's emailing me. But then I don't have that little annoying red thing. I also took that off my text the long time. Yes. Same to me. So I will say like, it's kind of funny, little things that can really interrupt you or give you anxiety that you need to get back to somebody and disabling a few of those things has
00:39:52
Speaker
really helped me in my workflow and my brain space. Mallory's heard me speak exhaustively about inbox pause, unpause, and I use that constantly. Every night when I go to bed, I pause that inbox and I don't unpause it the next morning until I am emotionally ready to see what is there. Is that a real app? That's a real app.
00:40:16
Speaker
So it is Boomerang for Gmail or for Outlook, Boomerang. And we can link to it in the show notes. And there is a free version that works for most people. And then there is a paid version if you want more functionality. We also have a demo of it in our basics.
00:40:35
Speaker
No, actually I think it's in our time course, but I don't use it as much. I mean, I use Boomerang for some other things, but Nicole swears by it. And I think that's what it is. Those little tips and tricks seem so obvious, but when someone points them out, if you don't know about them, they can really help you or some might not, but you take it or leave it and you'll get some that do and some that don't and that's fine. Whatever works for you.
00:40:58
Speaker
Yeah. But yeah, those little things have really helped and even just, I don't really answer my phone, even though I don't answer my phone unless it's like a scheduled call, that sort of thing. Like it's just too interruptive and rarely is anything so pressing that I need to talk to them. And if I'm already in the zone of something else, it's really hard to shift and then find everything that I need to pull up and talk to them about being prepared for it. Exactly. Studying those boundaries really has helped me for sure.
00:41:26
Speaker
Yeah, it's one of the things that I think we don't spend enough time on is really figuring out what we want our days to look like. It sounds like you did from the start. That was something I really focused on, which is amazing at 21, but for the rest of us at 41.
00:41:42
Speaker
We are getting more specific about what we want those days to look like and how we want them to run and do we want calls to be part of them? Do we want to accept clients who say, hey, can you be on this chat app for all day when you're working for us? The answer may be no. And that's okay. You have to decide what's going to work for you. And if it's something that interrupts the deep work that you're doing, the answer may be no.
00:42:06
Speaker
Yeah. And I will say, you know, even going back to when my daughter was at home with us, it's funny because I have just French doors with windows. Like I can hear and see and everything that's going on. Whereas my husband's office, he has an office in our garage actually. So he was very set off. He hasn't even really noticed her being at school because he's used to the quiet.
00:42:24
Speaker
I'm used to them being around and in the house and so it's been a big shift for me not just hearing her little voice and everything but I liked having them in the background and I didn't mind if she would come visit me and say hi or something from time to time but I will say the trickiest situations were ones where there was like a meltdown or some things that go wrong he doesn't know what to do and like she kind of runs in or he comes in he's like I don't know what to do and I'm just
00:42:48
Speaker
Oh, I don't know how to do either on in the middle of this. And I, how do I like shift gears here? That was tricky, but I feel for the most part, there wasn't a lot of that. And who knows? You always look at things through a different lens now that most of that is in the past. We will have summers that are going to get back to our old routine, you know? And so we'll be right back there and it'll probably be a big transition of getting into that again. But I think for the most part, it worked for us and I liked how you were.
00:43:16
Speaker
in the background. So I'm curious if a big part of your why for running this business the way you have was to be home with your daughter and to be able to have those everyday interactions.
Evolving Motivations for Business
00:43:26
Speaker
Now that she's off at school, has that changed any of the why behind your business now? Do you think that going forward, anything will change in that respect?
00:43:38
Speaker
Yeah, I do think things have already changed a little bit because it's funny, since I was in that Feaster fan-in mode, I'll be totally honest. I was not only sending cool emails, I applied to a few jobs to just to see, like, we'll just throw it out there. And half the time I was like, are you open to contract? Do you open the, you know, I'm like,
00:43:55
Speaker
the romanet all out there and I had an offer that I was considering and it was it was going to be a full-time 32-hour position and just the more and more I thought about it the more I realized how my identity really is an entrepreneur a small business owner doing my own thing setting my own schedule so I have realized even my daughter aside that
00:44:20
Speaker
I really like running my own business. I actually enjoy writing invoices and doing that admin tasks and just seeing everything out there. It's kind of like when you're a little kid and you play cashier, I feel like I'm doing that as an adult and it's fun and I do enjoy that. So I think my why will always be for sure for her, but it's also, I am an entrepreneur. I have an entrepreneurial spirit. I always have ideas. I have other ideas for other business.
00:44:49
Speaker
businesses and who knows maybe they'll come to fruition one day but if they don't like I always have this that I've established almost 15 years in and I want to give that up. What I really like actually is that you're saying okay you were nervous about the money so you did explore the opportunity to go back to a more traditional work environment.
00:45:15
Speaker
But then your why brought you back because even in the hearts, even in the famines, even when your daughter's having the hard meltdown and you can hear her and she's home, it's still, the entrepreneurship is still better than going back. So all those whys are still way more important than the lows. And that's what keeps you motivated. I think we can all use that as a reminder.
00:45:40
Speaker
I think just knowing how far I've come, I did this from the beginning. It's been 13 years. I can't throw that away. That would be heartbreaking almost. Even if I don't have a physical business or employees that I'm supporting, it's still so much a part of me and a part of what I've created and established and the relationships that I have. It has to stay with me. It is another baby.
00:46:07
Speaker
Okay, so we're going to ask one more question. Okay. This one's a little bit more fun. But let's say you got handed $3,000. What would you spend it on in your business? That's a good question. I might spend it on
00:46:24
Speaker
just probably some continuing education because I feel if it also allowed me with the time to do it because it's you can't you're not paying yourself when you're doing that and so I don't have the opportunity to explore some new you know website platforms that I want to or a course that I want to take in user experience designer just some of those other areas that I think would make me
00:46:50
Speaker
more well-rounded designer and business owner and that sort of thing, I think would be nice because I think it is really a challenge as a small business owner to keep evolving in those ways. Nobody's paying you to do that continuing education. So I think whether I'm paying myself, I meant doing YouTube videos without money or whether I'm paying for an actual course.
00:47:13
Speaker
Yeah. But then I wonder then if you invest in that course, are you investing in more revenue down the line because you know, you have more services to offer. Yeah. If you should invest the time now to be able to have more offerings in the future, but it's a fine balance for sure.
00:47:31
Speaker
Well, I think that has been a wonderful conversation, an example of what I call life comes first, and you've been doing it since you were 21, which is amazing.
Reflection on Entrepreneurship Journey
00:47:43
Speaker
And I really enjoyed this conversation because of your
00:47:47
Speaker
Honesty around how you intentionally set up your business, intentionally set up your life and how you emotionally weather the ups and the downs, which come to everybody. That doesn't mean that you've done anything wrong. It doesn't mean that you're not good at running a business. It just means that this is what happens in life. So thank you so much, Sarah, for joining us today and just sharing your story and being so honest and authentic about your experience as an entrepreneur.
00:48:15
Speaker
Thank you guys. It was a pleasure. Thanks for being here, Sarah. All right. With that, we will wrap it up and we will see you all for the next episode. See you next time. 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'd like the podcast, please subscribe, leave us an Apple review, and share your favorite episodes with other women entrepreneurs. Talk to you soon.