Ep 28. Biggest Mistakes Preventing Entrepreneurs From Building A Sustainable Business

In this episode, host Phylicia shares two of the biggest mistakes that entrepreneurs make that prevent them from building sustainable businesses. She highlights the importance of having aligned strategies and operating the business with systems.

About Phylicia

Phylicia Pough, MBA is a wife, mom of 1 daughter and an entrepreneur. For over 10 years, Phylicia has been behind the scenes of businesses and ministries, keeping things organized. Her journey started in Administration and developed into Systems & Automation Consulting/Strategy. 

Her latest venture is The Mom CEO Suite which is a community for the modern day mom in business that curates experiences and safe spaces for mompreneurs. The Mom CEO Suite also automates business and podcasting processes for mompreneur service providers.

Connect with Phylicia

Facebook: Phylicia Pough

Instagram: @PhyliciaPough

LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/phyliciapough/

Connect with The Mom CEO Suite

Website: themomceosuite.com

Instagram: @themomceosuite

Join The Mom CEO Suite Facebook Group

Links & Mentions

Get info & join the 2 Day SOP Sprint!

Transcript
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You are now tuned in to the Mom c e O Suite

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Podcast. I'm your host, Felicia wife,

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mom, and entrepreneur. In this podcast, I'll be sharing my

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mompreneur journey along with strategies that will help you build your

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online business operations in a sustainable way.

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The goal is to help you build a business that fits into your lifestyle as

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a mom who values putting family first. We will also hear the

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experiences and expertise of other moms with

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service-based businesses. You'll get a peek into our journeys, so

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you'll know that you are alone. Motherhood gets hard,

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entrepreneurship gets hard, but together we can

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do hard things. Welcome to this.

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Hey friend, welcome to another episode today. We're talking about.

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The biggest mistakes. That are preventing

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entrepreneurs from building a sustainable business. So I really

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have two major things that I want to share on this topic, but I'm going

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to break each of them down before I do that. I want

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to explain what I mean when I say a

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sustainable business. One thing that you guys

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can expect from me is that I'm going to give you a definition. I'm going

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to break something down, just so we all can have the same understanding. When I'm

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talking about a topic. When it comes to

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sustainable, what does that really mean? Literally, if you

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look it up, it means able to be upheld or able to

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maintain. So when it comes to your

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business, And we talk about building a sustainable

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business. It's building it in a way that you, as the business owner

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can upkeep that you can maintain. So do you

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have marketing strategies? They are sustainable for

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you. And this can look different from person to person and business

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to business. What may be sustainable for one person may

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not be sustainable for the next. There's a lot of

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different factors, but think about you, your

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personality. Your capacity. Your

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desires, your lifestyle. And really

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dig deep and explore what is

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sustainable for you and your business.

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Okay. Now, why is this topic important?

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It's because if you do not build your business in a

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sustainable way, you are going to experience burnout.

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You're not going to be experiencing the freedom. That you truly

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desire in business and you're going to struggle with showing

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up. Showing up consistently And showing up in a

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way that brings joy to not only yourself. But

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also to the people that you are serving. And when we think about moms

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in business, All of these things, burnout and struggling to

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show up. Not experiencing freedom.

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There's a little bit more at stake for moms in business, because

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if we are burnt out because of our business, then that is going to translate

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into our home lives and how we interact in care.

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For our children. As well.

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So let's get into these two things. These two

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mistakes that I have seen that are preventing entrepreneurs from building a

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sustainable business. Number one.

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Is implementing strategies that are

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not in alignment. With your personal values,

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desires, and lifestyle. Okay. What

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does this look like? In real life in real time.

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So it may be that you are implementing strategies that

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drain you. Right. Again, this

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goes back to what is sustainable for you?

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The internet is very noisy. And

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everybody is going to have a different strategy and they're

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going to promise that their strategy is it.

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If you do this, you'll get that. Now just because

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something worked for someone, it does not necessarily

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mean that it will work for you. And the exact

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same way. You have to take into

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consideration. Your capacity. Your

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personality. Your lifestyle. Your

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desires. What brings you joy? You have to consider

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all of those things when you are implementing strategies and your

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business. And if you're implementing something that drains you.

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That is going to, again, prevent you from. And

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building something that is really sustainable and that you are going to be able

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to upkeep. Now for me personally, I'll give an

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example. Instagram. Had been draining for me.

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I just did not like showing up on Instagram. I

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love Instagram stories. But posting. On

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Instagram and doing reels, it was draining for me. And so

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that really prevented me from being able to show up.

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consistently or even at all on that platform.

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And so what I am actually in the process now of doing. Is

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transitioning my profile. To a nine

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grid profile. So instead of posting every

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day, multiple times of day, My profile will be

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static. And you'll be able to get information about me

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and my business just from the nine posts. That are on my

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profile. For me that is

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sustainable. I cannot keep that. I can maintain

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that. And it does not drain me.

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Okay. What's another example.

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Right. So the mistake is implementing strategies that are not in alignment with your

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personal values Desires and lifestyles. Another

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example of this is receiving coaching from someone who

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was not in the same season of life issue. And

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this is something that I have. Just recently

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recognized the need for. And it's come up in a

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couple of conversations that I've had, we're all moms here.

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Right? And many of us, we have younger children.

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Someone who was in a different season of motherhood. They may have more

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time. Or it could even be that you are a work from

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home mom. And someone else may send their child

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to daycare or. Their child may be

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in school. So they may have a little bit more time where they just don't

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have. the same level of responsibilities

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throughout the day as it relates to home life.

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And so it can be very challenging when you are receiving

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coaching from someone. Who was not in the same

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season of life is you.

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Because they may be giving you strategies again, not saying that their

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strategies don't work. But it can create

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some friction for you. Because you may get into this space where

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you feel like. You're not able to keep up.

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Or. They just don't understand where you are in

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life. Having someone who understands where

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you are. Who is just slightly

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removed from where you are or. It's in the

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same season as you. It can really help you And

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knowing that they get it and it helps you just to be

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more comfortable. And. Relatable to the

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person that you are receiving coaching from, and you don't feel

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like you're falling behind or they, you don't have the

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capacity, which then can create those feelings

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of. Feeling like you're not doing enough.

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Or feeling like a failure. Or just all of these other things.

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That stem from receiving coaching from someone who is

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not in the same season of life, life issue. Now, I'm not

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saying there aren't times where you shouldn't or you

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can't, just take the information, there's a saying.

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Take the meat spit out the bones, right? I'm not saying that you can't.

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But I do believe that it can create a challenge.

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When you're trying to keep up with someone. Who is not in the same season

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of life issue. And

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so again, all of these are just examples of mistakes.

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Entrepreneurs make. Related to implementing

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strategies that are not in alignment with their personal values,

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desires, and lifestyle. Now, the next

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mistake that I have seen is that entrepreneurs are operating their

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businesses without systems.

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Systems are so important to the sustainability

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of your business. Now. This is how I

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personally define the system. Think he T

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P processes. Tools. And

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people. All right. So your processes are literally the

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step-by-step for how you do anything in your business. You

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can think of this in terms of SLPs or standard operating

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procedures. And then once you have your processes in

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place, You can consider different tools that you can

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use. Where you can implement automation

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to. Assist with these processes. And then you

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can also consider the people who are going to help you

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implement these processes. Okay. So your system is

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your processes, plus your tools. Kolas your people.

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When you think about a system, your system really supports the life of

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freedom that you desire. Where I would talk about

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having freedom a lot here on the podcast. Your system

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supports that. In the book. The E-Myth

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by Michael Gerber. It's a great book.

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Every entrepreneurship re it's literally my favorite business book.

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But he says in the book, he says that. Your systems run the

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business and then people run the systems. So your

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system is literally just the blueprint. For how your

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business operates. And systems give you

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space to be creative. As the visionary

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as the owner of the business, you want to be able to be creative.

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You want to be able to stay in your zone of genius and your

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systems. Give you the space to do that

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because you are freeing up your brain capacity, right? So

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you're not holding all of this information. In your

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head. So how you send emails

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or your process for your sales?

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Or your process for how you onboard our client? Anything that you

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do in your business? There should be some documented process for it.

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And if it's documented, that means you no longer have to store it in your

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brain. And now. You have freed up basing your

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brain to be creative, to come up with new ideas.

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Four programs and services or new

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ideas for connecting with your ideal client

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or new ideas for collaborations. You are not stuck

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working in the business. You are able to work on the business.

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Okay. And the foundation of that are

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your processes. Are your SLPs.

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This is the documentation. That allows

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your business to operate. Without you. So God

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forbid you got sick. Or let's just say you want it to go on

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vacation for two weeks. Where's your business. Be able to continue to

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operate without you. If you had SLPs.

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Yes, it would. Because a stranger. The com.

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I was going to say, come off the street, but we don't want strangers coming

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off the street into our businesses. But somebody could

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come in, look at your SLPs. See how you

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do X, Y, and Z in your business and keep things going.

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If that's all in your head. If you are storing all of that

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information in your brain. It is weighing you

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down. Your business can't operate

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without you. And you will not experience

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the freedom that you desire. Because everything is

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reliant on you. And so what is the action step for today?

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The first thing that I want you to do is think about all of the

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strategies that you are implementing in your business. Marketing

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sales client experience. Anything that you're

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doing in your business and really consider and think

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is this sustainable for me, according to my

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personal values, my desires and my lifestyle. That's

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the first thing. And then secondly, If you do not

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have your processes documented, if you do not

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have SLPs, I want you to

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start thinking about. The different

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processes in your business. And how you can begin to

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document them. If you're needing support in this area, I look forward to

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seeing you in our upcoming SOP sprint. Or

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you can always email to find out what are the next best

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steps for you? But hope this was helpful. See you in the

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next episode. Thank you for listening to the Mom C e O

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Suite Podcast. If you enjoyed this episode, can you do us a

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favor? Leave a review on iTunes and share with other

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moms in business like you. Help us spread our message and empower

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others who are at this intersection of motherhood and

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