Service Based Business Society Podcast

Season: 1
Episode: 9
Title: 100% Mom + 100% CEO- But Not At The Same Time

Hello and welcome to the service based business society podcast. I'm your host Tiffany-Ann Bottcher. out our wee
Tiffany:
Well, thank you so much for being here and sharing your story and and these valuable tips. I mean, anyone, moms, dads, anyone who have kids and this new work from home, even people who don't have their own businesses, lots of people are working from home and I think these tips are all still so relevant. It's this if you're juggling responsibilities with yes work of some kind there is this you know, double obligation and and it's it can be it can be challenging.

Amanda:
Yes. Thank you so much for having me. This was so fun.

Tiffany:
Well, we are all out of time for today. If you guys have not joined the service based business society Facebook community, make sure you head on over to Facebook and we can continue the conversation. Be sure to also follow the show by going to any podcast app and searching surface based business society. Click subscribe, click the fifth star and leave us a written review. Have a great week and we will see you soonkly episodes, we will dig into everything you need to know about scaling your service based business without losing sleep. With my experience in creating over seven figures per month, and a passion for marketing, finance and automation, this show will provide tangible tips and techniques for scaling your business. Let's get started.

Tiffany:
Hello, everyone, welcome back. This week we have a guest that is so relevant to our time. We actually shuffled some things around to get this episode on the air this week. So this week, we have Amanda Clarke, who is a business mom, multitasking expert. So Amanda was a 19 year old teen pregnancy statistic who lost herself in being a mom and wife for years. She thought that she had to put her dreams and desires on the backburner so she could care for everyone else. One day, she decided that there had to be more to life and she drew the line in the sand and began on her personal development journey. Over the last 12 years, she has built a photography business from scratch, but found herself burnt out when she realized how to stop spinning her wheels. She learned from her mistakes, grew her business to profit over the next two years and deciding to help other moms to do the same. In 2021, after gaining momentum coaching other moms as she pivoted wholeheartedly into helping them realize they can be 100% Mom, and 100% CEO, but not both at the same time.

Now she has her own podcast called braving the mountain, which empowers moms to live lives they're obsessed with while raising inspired kids through her coaching business. She has big dreams and wants to help you achieve yours as well. Because when we fill our cup first, we then have something to pour into others. Now this episode, I I reluctantly share not because Amanda isn't fantastic, but because honestly, this is an area that I have struggled with a little. And so in this episode, I am probably a little more honest and vulnerable than I necessarily would intend to be parenting while running a business is no joke. And often there is this multitasking piece. And when we combine that with the boundaries that are required in you know, functioning at a high performance level and a busy calendar and whatnot, it can be a bit, it can be a bit of a challenge. And to be honest, sometimes I find it more than a bit of a challenge.

So in this episode, I definitely get a little more honest and vulnerable than I intended to. But in the name of, you know, sharing my authentic journey. I'm getting this episode out and on the air sooner than planned, because we really also talk about the challenges that come with the kids leaving school for the summer. So if you are a parent, and you are juggling, you know the end of school kids getting out for summer and realizing you still have some big plans in your business. This episode is for you. So without further ado, let's get started. I am ended. Thanks so much for joining us.

Amanda:
Yes, thank you so much for having me.

Tiffany:
So I feel like today's episode is just so in line with really the day of the week. It's a week, I think, week I've been having. And so when I saw our session on the calendar, I kind of had to laugh a little bit. So why don't you tell the audience who you are, And Kate.

Amnda:
so I am Amanda. I was a 19 year old teen pregnancy statistic and I simply decided to stop being a victim to my circumstance. I found myself on the living room floor one day I had two babies in my lap. And I just remember crying thinking, this cannot be all there is to life. I was miserable. We were broke. We had checked off all the boxes, we have the house we had the babies like all the things and it was just I wasn't happy. So I drew the line. I jumped in, started a photography business, ran that for five and a half years and was still spinning my wheels guessing, trying to figure out what I was doing, not getting anywhere that I wanted to go and I hired my first business coach and that is when things took off was for the next few years. And so after that experience, I pivoted into coaching other moms and that is currently what I do I coach moms to be 100% Mom 100% CEO, but not both at the same time and build a business with kids in tow. Raise your kids to be inspired. Let them see your dream big. Let them see you sit with fear. and do the damn thing anyways. So that is where I'm at right now. And that's totally the short answer. I know, we'll probably fill in some gaps in here.

Tiffany:
Absolutely. So as a mom myself, who has had the kids in tow for a long time, I can say that it is definitely a challenge, but super rewarding. My middle son wants to be an entrepreneur slash YouTuber. He when I when I started my YouTube channel, he was like, well, when did we get the merch? I'm like, merch, she's like, you have a channel you need March. I'm like, Oh, I don't know if it's that kind of channel. So yes, the kids can really add this extra element. So you have how many kids now?

Amanda:
I have four. Four kids

Tiffany:
Okay.
Amanda:
Yep.
Tiffany:
And what are the age ranges?

Amanda:
14 and my baby is six. So I've got the I've got a wide range there.

Tiffany:
Absolutely. Yes. My oldest is nine at the end of the month. Oh, I don't know where the time goes. Really all of a sudden, like more mature. She's quite tiny. She hasn't really I always say she has only grown very much. But she's more mature like her interests are more mature and and my youngest just turned three. So we're still in the you know, he's he's still fairly dependent, if you will. So yeah, definitely some challenges there. i When I moved away from corporate that was one of my I had never worked from home, I'd always worked even through the kids. And so it was being home at the start of COVID. And then thinking I don't actually want to go back it was one of my determining factors.

So when you when you talk about you know, doing it with the kids in tow and whatnot, although it adds that extra challenge, they really are a part of what's going on and that inspiring and, and seeing the winds and the the challenges for sure.

Amanda:
Oh, completely. They are, they are along for the ride. They see mom cry, they see mom talk about how scared she is about something. And now like my six year old, she's one giving me the pep talks. She's like, Mom, I'll be like telling her I have a call today. And I'm a little scared of for it like little nervous. And she's like Mom, remember that one time when I was scared to go to kindergarten. And it's just so funny how much they pick up on when we don't think that they're listening. Or we think we need to be the one to give them the pep talk. And suddenly, our six year olds are giving us the pep talk. And we're like, Well, okay, you are listening. You are paying attention. It's just interesting.

Tiffany:
Yes, they truly are listening all the time. It's funny what they pick up work and repeat back later that you're like, I didn't realize you were listening to that.

Amanda:
Right? Yep.

Tiffany:
So one of the things that you you said when we when you were kind of explaining who you are, as well, as I seen your content is this 100% Mom, 100% CEO, just not at the same time. And I love this this statement. So he told me a little more about kind of where that comes from and what's behind it.

Amanda:
Yeah, so I think a lot of times we start our business, we think, Oh, this is just a cute little side hustle, we just want to make you know, 50 extra dollars a month or 500 extra dollars a month to pay for Susie's dance lessons, or whatever that may be. And what we don't realize in the beginning is how much work actually goes into building a business. And also stepping into not like when we first begin, we don't really take ourselves seriously, right? We just want to make 500 extra dollars, it's gonna be this cute little side gig. And, you know, and so we don't set these clear expectations, these clear boundaries for ourselves. And suddenly we find ourselves overwhelmed overthinking it all. And when we're trying to play with our kids, we're feeling guilty about what we're not doing in the business. And we're thinking about that mile long to do list. And it's time to separate both.

And I like to flip it on its head, I'm like, I want to make my life fit into my business, my business or my business fit into my life, not my life, but into my business. And so we really have to sit down and say, Okay, what do I want my life to look like this year? What do I want it to feel like? And then we plan that out right? Now we got put our CEO hat on and say how much time do I have to put into my business to complete the tasks that I need to that are going to lead me to hitting my goals. And so now we can separate those out. And now we've built a business that fits into our life that fits into those, like gaps of time that we may have during that day are those boundaries that we set for ourselves so that we can accomplish what we need to in that time. So now when we spend that time with our kids, we're not thinking about that my alarm to do this So we're actually feeling really good about what we've got done. Because we were able to put on our CEO hat during her work hours. So now it's time to put out our mom hat and be 100%. Mom, be present with your kids enjoy those moments, and have just this overall feeling of, I got everything done that I needed to today, I can be with my kids wholeheartedly, and I'm not stressing about the business because everything's fine.

It's just separating both and stop trying to cram them into one another. And, you know, you're don't have clear work hours, you're just trying to grab 10 minutes here and there, and your kids are constantly interrupting you, and then you're overwhelmed and frustrated, and we have to stop that. Put a CEO hat on, take yourself seriously, and enjoy motherhood while you're doing it.

Tiffany:
Yeah. So I would say I'm not i If I could confess, I'm not that good at this. I have a confession. This is not my strong. I, I'm listening to you talk. I'm like, Oh, no. Oh, no. Yes. This is just, you know, it's not that I don't take myself seriously. I do. I just really it's that cramming. That was 10 minutes. And one of our first episodes of the podcast, I think it's episode number four, we had a boundaries coach on and as you're talking about, you know, setting these boundaries in your time. I remember when she was talking, it was that same feeling of Lego. But you're like crap, I just got called out. I totally did. You know, I, when I was working in corporate, and so and I refer to it kind of where he is corporate because it's although it started as a small business, I was a partner there. And it grew and scaled into this. It was it was very large, by the time I left, and there was lots going on, and lots of moving pieces. And I would say it was much easier for me to I would drop the kids off at school on the way into the office. And then we had a nanny at home. And I knew that she if there was an emergency, she would call me. But otherwise I could trust that things were okay, I would drop the kids off. And that time between school drop off and actually getting to the office was like my my moment to kind of switch gears and kind of refocus. And I could 100% Get out at the office in like mom are not in mom mode, but in like CEO. And so now because I work from home, which is great. But we don't have a nanny, which was I really wanted to make that transition when I left my job. And I wanted to be more present with my little one. And so, and he goes to preschool in September, so we kind of are in that last little push before. He's not around as much. And so it's great. But I don't ever really make that transition out of mom mode, because he's always here. And so you know, he needs this or, you know, let's do that activity. And it's, it feels like that constant juggling and multitasking. And I know it's inefficient. So I often that's, you know, people said, Why do you work late at night? And I'm like, well, because I don't think my kids are sleeping. And that is more and more, you know, quiet, focused time and less, the less juggling for sure.

Amanda:
Yes. And I think you get to decide that too. Because I feel like for me a lot of my beginning journey was I just stayed stuck. So I created like a new circumstance for myself to stay stuck in, right. I can't afford that or my businesses making no money. I'm going to tell you, the day that I hired a sitter to come in one day a week for four hours is magic. Game Changer. Yes. Because it's very inefficient when you're trying to cram things in 10 minutes here, 10 minutes there, hoping for nap time praying for because my baby goes to all day school this year. And I'm like, What am I gonna do with myself like, This is amazing. But you also don't want to wish their childhood away. But again, it goes to you know that mom guilt creeps in real hot when you're planting your child in front of a TV. And so for me, I just flipped that switch. And I'm like I would rather than be making a connection with a human even. And that's the thing I think people get hung up on to is, well, I can't afford to sit or thinking that they need to hire somebody to come in for 20 hours a week. Make it work for you.

So for me it was four hours a week. And she would come in one day she would pick my little girl up from preschool like once she started going to preschool she would pick her up from preschool, bring her back here, play with her. And now my kid is getting attention from somebody that loves on them. She's connecting with another human. I'm not stressing like one you're listening, right? Is she climbing the pantry shelves again? Is she into something she shouldn't be? You just gotta relax and be with your business and get what you need to done. And again, it comes to discipline piece. How disciplined Are you? And I'm going to say I was not perfect at this, I had a scrolling problem. So you'd get on to post on Instagram and you'd be 20 minutes later, you're like, well, crap, I just wasted about 20 minutes of workout work time doing something that's definitely not going to move the needle. So it's just, it's all your mindset, right? Just deciding how you want your business to look and feel. And if that's bringing in a sitter, to make things easier for you, so that you don't have to constantly have that one ear listening to what's going on in the house, or what might be getting trashed. Do it. And if not, if your kid is really good at sitting in front of a screen, do it. But don't judge yourself for whatever decision you make, just know that it's a season and let that be okay. And don't stress about another, like a judgment that somebody else might place on you, you get to run your life.

Tiffany:
Right? I think it's, it's more juggling than I mean, I for sure, thought, you know, it's, our life had kind of gone one way for so long that we did have that, you know, we had full time nanny, and I worked so much my husband works lots and you know, she was fantastic. But it was a real, you know, like, I remember talking to my husband, when I was had made the decision to leave, I said, Oh, it'd be so nice that I can cook dinner all the time, and spend so much more time with the kids. And we were talking about it. He's like, I feel like you were ambitious, in your all of these things you could get done. I was like, it might have been a little ambitious. Because I still am, it's a bit of a struggle to fit it all in. And I mean, my business, my all of these different things that we do is we automate things to save time and whatnot. But when it comes to setting those boundaries, I often don't fill that time with, I fill it with more work things I take on another client or we take on another opportunity. And so that comes back to that boundaries piece and really setting that line and saying, hey, you know, I need to hold this time, and I don't need to fill the calendar with all these different things. Totally. Well, I mean, I feel like I've been called out this morning. You're welcome.

Amanda:
That wasn't even intentional, either. So it's always funny how we learned something about ourselves that we're like, okay, yep. She totally just caught that one.

Tiffany:
Yeah, it's, you know, I feel like there's this interesting balance with having a business in the online space where, you know, for so long it was, let's have everything kind of have that perfect outlook. And I would say, you know, now there is this be a little more vulnerable, be a little more honest. And it's tougher, it's tough for me, it's not my natural thing to go to. But I feel like it would be dishonest to sit here and say, oh, yeah, I do all those things. So, you know, in the, in the mission, to be honest, and you know, be a little vulnerable, even though it's uncomfortable, I would say it's definitely something that I, as a business owner continue to work on, and setting those boundaries and and not just not even just for the kids, but also for my own personal time. It's the stuff that you've committed to only yourself. That's the easiest to take off the list. Oh, yeah. You know, yeah,

Amanda:
it's Oh, my gosh, yeah. It's so easy. And that's me. I'm like, I don't ever preach on anything that I've never learned the hard way. Because all of this I have learned the hard way. I've wasted work hours doing things that don't matter. I've you know, but I think it's something that's a constant. We constantly have to remind ourselves, and we have to lean into, like when you get in tune with yourself, and you're doing something and you're like, how is this feeling right now? And suddenly that feeling of like, oh, this doesn't feel good comes up. Get curious, like, dive into yourself and find out why is it because you're not holding that boundary with yourself? Is it because you know, just like, there's a lot of stuff that I try to take a little bit of me time every single day, like even if it's 10 minutes, sitting outside, away from the kids and just having that time. I noticed when I don't do that for a few days. So don't think that there's ever this perfect balance of it all. Because this is all something that I feel like we all work on, no matter how good we feel like we're getting at it. And I feel like I've even had to sit down with myself as the kids finished school for the year and they're off for the summer.

I'm like, Oh my gosh, it doesn't feel like a workday because they're home. And so it's been a whole new this last two weeks. I've really had to like dive in and decide what are going to be my boundaries for summer. What is my work going to look like for summer How do I want it all to feel? And it is it's just like a constant job almost to keep deciding. But that's the magic of it all is do you get to decide what that looks like. And you get to decide now, how you want it all to feel. So when it's not feeling that way, you can ask yourself what's happening right now? Why is this not feeling good?

Tiffany:
Yes, one of the things that I talk about in my navigator program, so this is kind of a Business Mastermind group that we have, it goes all the year. And so we were talking about it just just this last week, we were talking about non negotiables. And although we have kind of these long list of things, I mean, there's always as a business owner, especially if you're really focusing on growing and scaling and doing these things, if you're out of things to do, then you're not looking hard enough, there's always things to do. But it comes down to, you know, what are those non negotiables and really decided how you're going to fit those in, as opposed to, you know, fitting everything, especially as kids are coming, you know, off of school, ours, were in Canada. So we still go till the end of June. But I know that a lot of people are talking about you know, their kids being out.

So do you have some tips for you know, those who have kids who are getting out onto summer break and, and some suggestions on how they can balance that change in schedule.

Amanda:
Yeah. So I think right now, it would be sit down and map out your schedule for the summer. So map out family vacations that are coming up, anything for the kids or their summer camps, coming up, anything like that, have that on your calendar, and then decide what you want your work hours to be and get those on the calendar. And then you get to decide, do I need to hire a nanny or a sitter to come in and help or something that I have found very helpful is a little swimming pool out back letting them run through the sprinklers. And I mean, my oldest is now 14. And then I have a 12 year old and an eight year old and a six year old. So we I have those ages that they kind of can watch themselves, especially with my 14 year old and my 12 year old being out there. But something my kids love is just running through the sprinkler or filling up the pool and hanging out out back. And so you can either go take the laptop out, hanging out with them in the chair, and do what you need to do, and make it work for you. If they're out there sometimes. So my office faces our backyard, so I can peek out and just see and make sure that they're okay.

There still is a little bit of that listening ear. But just deciding what's going to work for you if you're gonna let them have movie morning. Like we went through a phase of that to where they could just binge watch whatever. While I sat in my office and worked for a few hours, then that was great. And then after I cut it off at like three hours, I was like, okay, you know, go play, go do something else. Board games have been great. My six year old loves when I print off coloring pages or her like I don't know why that's the coolest thing, but she loves it. So she'll come in. Yeah, she'll go and I'll let her pick a picture. And I'll print it off and she'll go color that forever playdough I mean, just just lower your standards at how clean your house might be at the end of your work time. Or the table is going to be destroyed with playdough everywhere but just know that it's fine and it's a season and it's gonna pass and don't judge yourself for over it looks I feel like that's the biggest thing is sometimes we get so hung up in the mom guilt or thinking you know, as we talked to a friend and we're like oh yeah, like my kids watch movies in the morning or whatever and we think that they're gonna judge us and we get all up in our heads and we call us all the mind drama. Just be okay with it.

Be okay with however it looks and based on your kids ages, some of mine I've given them a to do list and I was like once you have this to do list on like, then you can do whatever you know. And that would keep them busy for about an hour. So it's just deciding where your kids are at and what works for you. But schedule fun, schedule fun in, take your kids out and do fun things so that when you are working and your kids are trying to entertain themselves or do whatever you're not feeling guilty because they're still getting your time and it's not our job as moms I don't feel like it is to entertain them every second of every day. I don't think that that needs to be our job as a mom they need to learn independent play they need to learn to play together and let go of everything else just make it work for you.

Tiffany:
Yeah, one of the things we did last summer was set up my office outside in the back that you know the laptop is portable i i took enjoy working off my laptop as much as you know I like the keyboard and mountain the screen I just don't feel as efficient. But it was absolutely lovely. I had the best tan I had ever had. Because I always you know when you're Working in the office, it's like air conditioning blasting, I always wear like sweaters or suffer gold in the office. And so I just it was so nice to spend some time outside. And you know, they're jumping on the trampoline and doing all sorts of fun things. And be you know, that being doing both and able to get some stuff done. This summer, my plan of attack is to check in at the end of the summer, my plan is just to start a little earlier, I don't have to do school drop off and those kinds of things. So my plan is just start a little earlier, get through some stuff in the morning while they can, you know, get some of those chores and tasks and kind of you know, that lazy summer morning and then and then we'll plan to do some more outings and fun things in the afternoon.

Amanda:
Yeah, I love that. I love that so much. The early mornings the best, especially when your kids are still sleeping. That's my favorite when everybody's still sleeping. There's just something about the energy in the house that just calming and relaxing. And that's when I do my journaling and my workout. And I love that.

Tiffany:
Yes, there's something I think it just comes down to the quiet time you have also, you know, as as business owners, we are always have something on the go. And so it's that time to just thing. And even if you're not actually thinking about so it's amazing what comes to you. You know, creative thoughts, ideas, solutions to problems you've been working on for a while when you just have that little bit of just quiet, just peace. It's amazing how many that how productive that time can truly be?

Amanda:
Oh, yeah. Yeah, it's amazing. So amazing.

Tiffany:
many of life's problems have been solved with just a little quiet.

Amanda:
Right? Yeah, a walk by yourself. Five or 10 minutes in the backyard by yourself. Yeah, I totally agree with that.

Tiffany:
Yes, I used to have a long a really long commute a couple of times a month. And at first I really thought you know, off this time, it's going to be so unproductive, gosh, why can't you know self driving cars be ready by now and I could work and, and but in the end, I actually found this time to be incredibly productive, because I was just doing you know, it's it was quiet, you're driving, but you're thinking and I used to just record voice memos. Because originally I'd be like, Oh, my goodness, I'm gonna forget all of these things, right? And so I would just record like a couple of like, hey, this gate, you know, came up or, and so I wouldn't forget all of these amazing ideas I was coming up with. And in the end, it was significantly more productive than I

Amanda:
Yeah and I think that's something that we as moms and business owners, don't take the time. And I probably wouldn't have jumped into taking that time had my coach not been like, No, you will take at least 10 minutes a day to just be you know, podcasts in your ears. No kids running and screaming. You just have to be and yeah, you accomplish so much more. And a lot of people don't believe it, there's a lot of resistance to that. And I just want to challenge you all listening to just test it out, test it out for yourself, just go sit for five minutes. In the quiet. Something I like to do is ponder a question. Like, think about something that you've been trying to solve, like you said, like solutions to problems you've been dwelling on for a while. Just think about don't think about the negative, like what's wrong with me? Why is this not working? Think about the pot? Like how can I make this work? Get your brain to start seeking those answers? How can I get this to work? How can I solve this problem? How can I increase my revenue here? Whatever it is ponder on like a how to question so that your brain start searching for those answers. Because if you ask it What's wrong with you? Blame me, it's gonna give you all the evidence. So flip that a little bit. And let's search for ways to get out of that negativity and out of that mindset and into actually a solutions oriented question.

Tiffany:
Yes, there's, there's this shift that occurs when we think less about what what went wrong. And you know, all of these negative pieces and we just focus on the solution. And, you know, I've often heard you know, the pushback there has been well, but like if we don't, you know, we need to focus on what went wrong so we can prevent it from happening again. And in some situations, that's important. But in most situations, really need to first focus on the solution. Get the problem solved, get you know if something is down Add a backup if there's a you know, unhappy client or child like it doesn't matter who it is or what it is, but get it solved, get things back on track, and focus on that solution first, and then go down the rabbit hole of okay, how do we prevent that situation from happening again? But step one, get it solved. Yeah.

Amanda:
And I feel like there's always a reflection, right. So like, after a launch, of course, we're going to reflect like, what could have gone better? What could we have done differently? How could we have gotten more feet in the door? And so I do, I definitely feel like there's that time of reflection. And then yeah, and you're solving for that. That's essentially what you're solving for. So if it didn't go as planned, you're like, how can we make the next one go better? While looking at what didn't we do as good as we could have? What can we improve next time and totally going to the solution there.

Tiffany:
Now, one of the things that we always do here on the podcast is do a tangible tip that someone can implement today that would make a difference in their life tomorrow. Now we talked on, you know, the 10 minutes. And I think that that is super, super valuable. And I encourage everyone to do it. Is there any other tips that you have that someone should implement today, that they'll see that benefit right away,

Amanda:
make your decisions ahead of time. So decide how your day is going to go ahead of time. So when you wake up in the morning, just decide, if Johnny interrupts me during work today, I'm going to allow that to be okay. I'm going to jump in, redirect him. And I'm going to dive back in, I'm not going to get overwhelmed, I'm not going to get flustered, just kind of make the decisions of how you want your day to go. And I just like saying this now because we're in summer, right? So we all know that our kids are going to be home. So just make those decisions ahead of time.

How do I want today to go and decide how you're going to respond? When interruptions come up, when Johnny is screaming and beating down your door while you're trying to record a podcast or do a coaching call or record a live or whatever, I think we've all had at least one of those moments, it's probably never happened again, because we've like basically told our kids like if you ever do or we just solve for the problem, right? And we're like, Okay, we're gonna do four lives today, we're gonna bring an out yet or something. But anyways, but just deciding how you're going to respond ahead of time instead of trying to respond to those situations in the moment because that's where we tend to react.

So whenever you're listening to this tomorrow, I want you to wake up, and I want you to decide how your day is going to go, and how you're going to respond when things come up when life throws a curveball at you and stick with it. Don't decide in the heat of the moment.