0:32

Hey welcome back to

0:32

another edition of the business

0:38

owner breakthrough. And today

0:38

special episode, we have Laura

0:42

jakka mele. She is a dance

0:42

school owner just outside of

0:45

Philadelphia. She owns Libra

0:45

dance studios, and she's done so

0:49

well. She's basically 10 times

0:49

her business over the last 10

0:52

years and has 11 People working

0:52

with her. And, you know, one of

0:57

the things as business owners we

0:57

talked about is freedom. And

1:00

Laura has done a pretty good job

1:00

in getting some more freedom

1:02

over the last couple of years.

1:02

But she's looking for even more.

1:04

And that's pretty common as we

1:04

roll through our business. And

1:07

one of the things that we talked

1:07

a little bit about, was this

1:10

idea around trust. And is it the

1:10

people that we don't trust to

1:14

hand the stuff off to? Or is it

1:14

the process that we don't trust,

1:18

and it's often not the people,

1:18

it's often the process. So today

1:21

was really digging into a couple

1:21

of the process management tools

1:25

that she could take in use and

1:25

reframe, in order to hone that

1:29

process a little better, so that

1:29

everybody has proper

1:32

communication on where things

1:32

are at in her business. And

1:36

things are being done without

1:36

her managing or micromanaging

1:39

within that business. So that

1:39

it's just taken care of. So

1:43

let's dig into it with awesome

1:43

business owner, Laura

1:46

Laura Giacomelli, it is a

1:46

pleasure to have you here on the

1:46

Giacomelli. business owner breakthrough

1:54

today,

1:55

thank you for having me, I'm very excited to be here, feet,

1:58

you know, we met

1:58

through re gold and dance life

2:01

and the gold mastermind and all

2:01

of those kinds of things. And I

2:05

know you are one of the onboard

2:05

coaches there and doing some

2:08

stuff with Ray as well. He's got

2:08

such a great community of dance

2:12

school owners and wanted to

2:12

invite a couple of you on to my

2:17

podcast here, the business owner

2:17

break through and go through a

2:20

few things that we talked about

2:20

at some of the conferences and

2:23

some of the shows and some of

2:23

the different things. And when I

2:26

reached out to you, it's like,

2:26

yeah, yeah, love to come on. And

2:28

it was it was so so great. And

2:28

you know, one of the things that

2:32

we talk a lot about here on the

2:32

business owner breakthrough, the

2:35

whole podcast series is all

2:35

around communication process and

2:37

accountability, what I call the

2:37

CPA, you know, in mastering your

2:41

CPA, not your Chartered

2:41

Professional Accountancy, but

2:45

your mastery as a business owner

2:45

of communication throughout your

2:49

business, process management

2:49

throughout your business, and

2:51

accountability throughout your

2:51

business. And when we were

2:54

chatting a few minutes ago, just

2:54

before we hopped on your like, I

2:57

still want to get through some

2:57

process and accountability

2:59

stuff, because these are the

2:59

things and Laura, I know you

3:02

work with a bunch of dance

3:02

school owners as well. But these

3:05

are the things that just keep

3:05

coming back all the time, right?

3:08

We're always honing these

3:08

different pieces of our puzzles

3:11

as business owners. Well, I

3:11

think because when you realize

3:15

your business is like a living

3:15

entity, right? It's always

3:17

growing and changing, and you're

3:17

keeping up with things that are

3:20

happening in the world, and what you're going to offer your business. So like you have your

3:22

systems and processes, but what

3:26

I'm realizing is like your

3:26

systems and processes before

3:29

COVID are different during

3:29

different post COVID are

3:32

different right now are

3:32

different, like, so I feel like

3:35

the growth of it all. And the

3:35

evolution of it all is always

3:39

changing. So it's a lot to keep

3:39

up with. And it's what I'm

3:42

having my issue with is putting

3:42

the systems in place, maybe if

3:46

they're slightly changed, or a

3:46

little different from the

3:49

previous year and expectations.

3:49

And now making sure my employees

3:53

are at that expectation of

3:53

following through with the

3:56

updates, I guess I would say,

3:56

it's really interesting. One of

4:00

the lines that I've used over

4:00

the years, and I haven't said it

4:02

lately, and it just kind of came

4:02

back when you're talking about

4:04

that was there are no perfect

4:04

processes, but we're always

4:08

trying to perfect them. I think

4:08

that's exactly what it is. Yeah,

4:12

you know, it's I mean, unless

4:12

you're literally building the

4:15

same widget for 10 years in a

4:15

row and you put it in the

4:17

computer system, and the robotic

4:17

arm just drops the thing. But

4:20

for most business owners, small

4:20

business owners, because that's

4:23

our audience here today is it's

4:23

really things do revolve and you

4:28

know, whether it's your kid from

4:28

three year old that day school

4:31

to my kid at 23 year old and off

4:31

on his own, you know, things

4:35

evolve and our businesses evolve

4:35

to as leaders, what we need to

4:39

be doing is continuously

4:39

evolving these three things

4:42

communication, process

4:42

management and accountability.

4:44

And I think the big thing when

4:44

we look at the idea, because a

4:47

lot of people who are business

4:47

owners bootstrapped it, I'm

4:51

gonna start those first one to

4:51

three years. And I think a lot

4:54

of listeners here can probably

4:54

associate with this, that first

4:57

one to three years. It's like I

4:57

just got to put in my time, get

4:59

everything done, and we get

4:59

habitual alized into making all

5:03

the decisions. Right. And I

5:03

think you get into that

5:05

headspace where I have to do it

5:05

all it has to be me and I'm just

5:09

speaking as like a small

5:09

business owner. I've been open

5:11

for 13 years. And I feel like

5:11

once I got into more upper

5:17

education and putting myself in

5:17

rooms where people are already

5:21

at the spot where I wanted to be

5:21

that was when I started really

5:24

listening to the people around

5:24

me being like I shouldn't be

5:27

doing cleaning the toilets and

5:27

running payroll and teaching all

5:30

the classes and doing all the math

5:32

are getting and the media at like, you can't, the goal needs to be to

5:33

get everything out of at least

5:37

in my mind, this is what my goal

5:37

has been, I needed to get it out

5:40

of my mind, put it on paper, and

5:40

then delegate it like that. To

5:45

me, that's, that's my goal. And

5:45

I feel like that has been my

5:48

goal a lot. Since, as you

5:48

mentioned, I have a three year

5:50

old, right and I, I want to make

5:50

sure that my first baby, which

5:56

is labor dance studio, that

5:56

baby's taken care of, right. So

6:00

I can now be at home when I want

6:00

to and take care of my my new

6:04

baby, which is cold. That's

6:04

always been like my, my long

6:07

term goal with libre dance

6:07

studio is to not have to

6:10

micromanage it. But I think

6:10

you're right, I think a lot of

6:13

us get in that mindset of small

6:13

business owners, well, it's

6:15

mine, I have to do it, it's

6:15

mine, I'm going to do it better,

6:18

I'm going to do it, if my name

6:18

is on, it's going to be done the

6:21

way I want it to be done when in

6:21

reality 80%, okay, like the 8020

6:26

rule, if it's 80% done, and you

6:26

can put that other 20% on it and

6:31

buffer it up and make it really

6:31

the standard that you want it to

6:34

be, it still got 80% done

6:34

without you doing it. The end,

6:38

you know, and that's once you

6:38

kind of, in my mind, once you

6:41

switch to that mentality, I felt

6:41

less overwhelmed, I felt very

6:46

overwhelmed with my growth of

6:46

the business until I started

6:49

switching it up. I mean,

6:50

you're you're talking

6:50

my language for sure. And when

6:53

we look at these things, the

6:53

other way of looking at that is

6:55

going from detail to dashboard.

6:55

Right? So and when you start

7:00

doing that, I use a lot of

7:00

thinking tools with my coaching

7:04

Laura, and one of the one of the

7:04

thinking tools that I came up

7:07

with quite some time ago, now

7:07

it's called assign it and assign

7:10

it revolves around the four A's.

7:10

And we've had podcasts on the

7:13

four A's before but the four A's

7:13

are really this, assess it,

7:16

address it, align it and assign

7:16

it. So we're looking at taking

7:19

those things, whatever it is

7:19

cleaning the toilet use cleaning

7:23

toilets. And by the way, I had a

7:23

toilet cleaning business for 10

7:26

years, I've cleaned more toilets

7:26

than you could ever imagine. But

7:29

I didn't do it forever. Right. I

7:29

did it when I had to because I

7:33

had to fill in for somebody or

7:33

wherever the case is. But I had

7:35

a team of people out there

7:35

cleaning toilets every day, like

7:37

we service 300 restaurants and

7:37

dance studios and all sorts of

7:40

different places. Right? So you

7:40

know, when we look at this, this

7:44

philosophy of taking something,

7:44

whatever it may be, whether it's

7:47

bookkeeping, or whether it's the

7:47

next class that you don't

7:51

actually want to run yourself,

7:51

you know, it doesn't matter or

7:54

or in your industry, I know that

7:54

ordering costumes is a big

7:58

piece. And

7:59

and that's what we're in the middle of right now. It's costumes, and

8:01

now whole separate systems for

8:05

that so that I'm not drowning in

8:05

ordering eight 900 costumes on

8:11

my own. What do you do? And all

8:11

that inventory comes in? What is

8:14

that process of them getting?

8:14

You know, like having all of

8:18

that we're literally in the

8:18

thick of it right now. And yeah,

8:20

years ago was all me doing it. I

8:20

can't think back and I'm like,

8:24

What was I thinking? So thinking

8:24

doing all of

8:26

that, flip it back,

8:26

you know, I'm a shoe store

8:28

owner. So we own shoe stores?

8:28

Well, yesterday, I was buying

8:31

shoes for next fall and winter,

8:31

even though it's only November

8:33

as we're recording this. So we

8:33

have to order out a year in

8:36

advance. But this earlier this

8:36

year, I lost the person that's

8:39

been doing that for the last

8:39

five years, a key person in our

8:42

organization. And before that, I

8:42

did it but you know, I lost? His

8:47

name was Brock. And in our

8:47

accountability chart, that's a

8:50

big hole to fill. Absolutely.

8:50

Yeah. But you know what, because

8:54

we had looked at sort of this

8:54

assessment, address it alignment

8:57

and assign it, it's like, assess

8:57

it, okay, well, we need somebody

9:00

else to do this, address it,

9:00

what's involved in doing it,

9:04

align it, who else on the

9:04

accountability chart? Do we need

9:08

or some people use the word

9:08

organizational chart, but I

9:10

prefer accountability chart

9:10

because it means this person is

9:12

accountable. And then assign it,

9:12

boom, that person is there. And

9:18

so you need to have your process

9:18

in place. Because getting back

9:21

to the idea of do I need to

9:21

micromanage or whatever the case

9:24

is all this idea I've owned, she

9:24

told me since 2010. So we're

9:28

parallel there. 13 years for

9:28

this, this business. I've had

9:32

other businesses before, but you

9:32

know, how do we set this up? And

9:35

who else can manage this? And

9:35

how do I feel comfortable, but

9:39

13 years later? It's not about

9:39

do I trust my team? Because

9:44

hopefully you actually have

9:44

people working 13 years later,

9:48

you know, when we talk about

9:48

well, I don't trust them to do

9:50

it. Because this is something

9:50

that goes through owners heads a

9:53

lot, right? I don't think I

9:53

trust them enough to get this

9:56

done. That's why we feel as

9:56

though the pressure of having to

10:00

micromanage things and dig it

10:00

like what the reality is. It's

10:04

not that you don't trust the

10:04

person. It's that you really

10:08

don't trust the process.

10:10

I agree with

10:10

you. I feel like think talking

10:13

about say costumes. When I I

10:13

have a process of how I go to

10:17

costumes and to be honest, it

10:17

starts in August and I've only

10:21

been technically ordered them

10:21

until October and November. I

10:23

have two waves that I order if

10:23

the company costumes that we

10:26

order because they have to come

10:26

in earlier for competitions. And

10:30

later we have the recital and

10:30

that's not until June. So we

10:32

have a nice big buffer with

10:32

that. I never wrote anything

10:36

down or explained to my people

10:36

exactly how I did it. You know,

10:42

it's like, well, you measure

10:42

this. Yeah. Well, how do you

10:45

measure them?

10:46

Exactly? What does

10:46

that mean? Would it right? Like,

10:48

this

10:49

is how you

10:49

measure their chest, you have to

10:51

you have to keep in mind, it's

10:51

October, they need these in

10:54

June, how much are they going to

10:54

grow? Right? So what is what are

10:57

you adding? What are you

10:57

subtracting, and it's different

10:59

for each measurement their chest

10:59

or waist or hips? And so when I

11:03

would say measure, they don't

11:03

know, right? So now I, I

11:07

literally went to every single

11:07

my senior teacher. And then my

11:12

three staff members who run my

11:12

office and I said, Everyone come

11:15

here and I pull a dancer out of

11:15

the classroom, I said, this is

11:17

how you measure this. This is

11:17

how you measure this, this is

11:19

how you measure this. This is

11:19

their girth. And I said, and

11:22

when you give me measurements,

11:22

you give me their exact

11:25

measurements, because some of

11:25

them were adding, not adding.

11:28

And then I was like, costumes

11:28

were coming in. And they're

11:31

coming in wrong. Too big.

11:31

They're too small. And I think

11:35

as business owners in my mind,

11:35

I'm like, well, that's money,

11:38

because now I have to pay to

11:38

return it and exchange it. And

11:41

now we're going through all of

11:41

that. And that's just costing

11:43

the business mistakes and money

11:43

and mistakes and money. And my

11:47

original fear was like, I'll

11:47

just do it. And then I was like,

11:50

I think the more mature I got

11:50

and comfortable and confident

11:54

with owning my business, I said,

11:54

No, I'm going to take time to

11:58

train them. You have to take the

11:58

time to train them. Like, I

12:02

literally ended and it's, I did

12:02

it last year, right when we were

12:06

measuring. And I did it again

12:06

this year. I said I know you

12:08

won't know how to do this. But

12:08

here's your refresher. This is

12:11

how you do this. This is how you

12:11

do you know and it that's just

12:13

one piece of the huge pie. But

12:13

taking measuring 500 Students

12:18

alive, I don't want to be there

12:18

every single day measuring 500

12:22

students, right? Like, I need my

12:22

office staff to be able to

12:25

handle that and send it to me

12:25

via email at the end of the day.

12:28

Right. That's it. I don't need

12:28

it. I don't need to do it.

12:30

Put it in the spreadsheet and away we go. Right. Exactly,

12:34

exactly. And

12:34

not not feeling like I have to

12:37

do it. So it's going to be right

12:37

trust trusting them that they

12:39

can I gave them the training I

12:39

they have the skill, right, they

12:44

can do it. And it's interesting

12:44

once I kind of figure out what I

12:47

need to put those refreshers in.

12:47

Yeah, I literally I just had 400

12:51

costumes come in, like 450. And

12:51

they tried them on last week.

12:55

And this week, I think I have

12:55

five that I have to return.

12:58

Oh my gosh, that's,

12:58

that's awesome. Yeah, five out

13:01

of 450. I'll

13:01

take? Yeah,

13:04

for sure. Yeah,

13:04

especially when you're dealing

13:06

with kids that are growing and all that.

13:08

And knowing that they have space, and the older guys aren't gonna grow as

13:10

much, you know, like all the

13:12

little innuendos of it all. And

13:12

I'm just like, wow, like, we

13:16

actually did that. As a team,

13:16

which, and I didn't have to do

13:20

it all myself, which is the

13:20

number one thing for me, if

13:23

we look at that

13:23

process, you know, when when I

13:27

look at, you know, honing

13:27

process and process management,

13:30

stuff like that, you probably

13:30

don't know, I'm a Kobe certified

13:33

coach, as well. And Kobe is sort

13:33

of how you make decisions and

13:35

all this sort of thing and how

13:35

you see things and how you want

13:38

to communicate and people

13:38

communicate in different ways.

13:42

And so, you know, one of the

13:42

things that I would suggest that

13:45

you might do is, if you may

13:45

already are doing this, but when

13:49

you're doing your training, like

13:49

showing somebody how to measure,

13:53

make sure it's recorded, oh, set

13:53

up the tripod. And you record

13:58

yourself measuring somebody so

13:58

they can physically see you

14:01

doing and say, here's the

14:01

difference between 32 inches and

14:04

32 and a half like this is how

14:04

the tape measure wraps around,

14:07

you got to get it from this side, because that's a half a half inch difference, like show

14:08

like if you because some people

14:12

are very visual. Other people

14:12

are audio. Yeah, other people

14:16

want that. They want to read it,

14:16

right. So when you start

14:20

building your process in order

14:20

to trust your process, which is

14:23

kind of this idea before you can

14:23

assign a line and assign your

14:26

process and feel comfortable and

14:26

trusting the process so that you

14:30

can then assign it to somebody

14:30

with confidence. They need to be

14:35

able to receive it in a way that

14:35

makes sense to them. Because we

14:39

have our own ways of making

14:39

sense. But that doesn't mean it

14:42

makes sense to them.

14:43

Right? And that from a teacher's standpoint, like my mind, that

14:45

makes total sense. Because, like

14:48

if I'm teaching a kickball

14:48

change, I'm demonstrating it.

14:51

I'm also like saying it, I'm

14:51

breaking it down for them. So

14:54

like what you're saying makes

14:54

complete sense. I totally

14:57

understand that. Yeah, and so a

14:57

staff page on Facebook that it's

15:01

like a private little page and I

15:01

can just say like, here's your

15:03

neck next year. Here's the video

15:03

reminder, this is how we work it

15:07

you know, as

15:08

we're talking about

15:08

honing your process, this is

15:11

this is one of the things

15:11

because every year you're gonna

15:14

have 500 or more to measure and

15:14

you may have new people that

15:18

haven't been through it before.

15:18

So the idea here is you get a

15:21

captured on video, and I'll go

15:21

back to some history for me. I

15:25

mean, I've captured some of this

15:25

stuff years ago on video and it

15:28

has to be redone because it's

15:28

it's we've changed a little bit

15:31

right And it's old video and all

15:31

that sort of stuff. So that has

15:34

to be redone. But if all I have

15:34

to do is redo that one training

15:38

video that I don't know, 50, or

15:38

100 people have watched over the

15:42

last year or two, once every

15:42

couple of years, as opposed to

15:46

having those 50, to 100

15:46

presentations to all those

15:49

different people through

15:49

training over the course of

15:52

those last two years, I'm happy

15:52

standing in front of the camera

15:55

on a tripod and going through

15:55

that exercise once every two

15:58

years to update that video. And

15:58

that's a good use of my time.

16:02

And the other thing is that,

16:02

from a perspective of all of the

16:06

team that you are now having as

16:06

accountability partners in this

16:09

particular task, they're getting

16:09

the same message every time. The

16:14

exact same message every time,

16:14

right,

16:16

and there's no

16:16

miscommunication between whisper

16:18

down the lane, oh, my, I'll tell

16:18

the Tuesday person what the Lord

16:22

told me on Monday, it's just

16:22

seamless. So

16:25

you put it, you put

16:25

it into your rhythm of the

16:28

videos, like when it's time to

16:28

measure, they all see that video

16:31

again. And they take the 10

16:31

minutes to you know, properly

16:34

measure. And that's just part of

16:34

the rhythm of the process that

16:37

you have in making sure that you

16:37

are I mean, obviously it worked

16:41

well this time, but you did it

16:41

live this time. But if you don't

16:44

want to do it live or can't do

16:44

it live next time, who knows,

16:48

maybe you're having another baby

16:48

next time when this happens, and

16:52

you're not going to be available to do that, I

16:53

mean, on vacation pee.

16:56

And you know all of

16:56

these different things, because

16:58

life does take us away from our

16:58

business, right. And so the idea

17:02

behind communication, because

17:02

now we're communicating that

17:05

process, through video. And

17:05

here's the other beautiful thing

17:09

of all these different API's and

17:09

everything. Now you take that

17:12

video, you transcribe it in

17:12

something like otter, it becomes

17:15

a transcription, you take the

17:15

auto transcription, pop it into

17:19

something like chat GPT. And it

17:19

does the whole description for

17:22

you. And that description goes

17:22

in alongside of the video so

17:25

that the people that want to

17:25

watch it, watch it, the people

17:28

that want to listen to it can

17:28

listen to it, the people that

17:30

want to read it can read it, and

17:30

you've got it all with one video

17:34

that you have done, or whoever's

17:34

doing who's currently

17:37

accountable, so that it can be

17:37

cross trained throughout your

17:39

organization. And you can feel

17:39

comfortable about process

17:43

management within your business.

17:43

So you're trusting the process,

17:47

not having to feel as though you

17:47

have to trust the person to know

17:50

everything that's in your head.

17:51

I actually I

17:51

have another question about

17:53

that. So we're open six days a

17:53

week, we're Monday through

17:57

Saturday. I mean, we're we have

17:57

three studios in my facility. I

18:02

have hundreds of kids coming in

18:02

out of the building, I'm, we're,

18:05

we're big at this point, I'm

18:05

blessed. But now it's like, we

18:10

have people in my front office.

18:10

And one process that I'm

18:14

struggling a little bit with is

18:14

I have different people in the

18:17

office each night. You know, I'm

18:17

after school activity, and it's

18:20

an awkward time. It's like three

18:20

to nine or three to 930 supper

18:24

and all that. Yeah, exactly. So

18:24

it's not ideal for someone who

18:28

has a family. You know, it's

18:28

just it's hard. It's a hard

18:32

time. So I have an alumni who's

18:32

in college right now she has

18:36

three of the days she's

18:36

fantastic. Because she grew up,

18:39

you know, has been to my studio,

18:39

she understands when someone

18:42

says what's the recital, she,

18:42

she's lived, right? She gets it.

18:48

My mom is my Monday night

18:48

person. She's great. She's been

18:51

with me since the beginning. And

18:51

then I have another alumni who's

18:55

there on Thursday nights. And

18:55

she's been with me for years as

18:59

well. So she's graduate, she's

18:59

about 2627. But now that we have

19:03

so many people on each night,

19:03

it's the transition of the tasks

19:10

that had to be done, maybe

19:10

weren't finished, the next

19:13

person has to pick up the ball

19:13

and start running with it on

19:15

Tuesday. And I do this year, I

19:15

did like a checklist. So when

19:20

they go into the office, there's

19:20

a log, and it says here's the

19:23

things within the first 20

19:23

minutes, you need to do return

19:26

phone calls, check the

19:26

bathrooms, make sure the lobbies

19:28

you know good. Make sure the

19:28

facility basics, right, all

19:33

that. And then throughout the

19:33

night, there's like things you

19:36

need to check off. And then as

19:36

you lock up, these are the five

19:39

things you need to handle

19:39

whether it's vacuuming the

19:41

waiting room, making sure

19:41

there's no sticky stuff on the

19:44

chairs, just like you know,

19:44

things like basic maintenance.

19:48

Exactly. But then there's also

19:48

things that pop up, like

19:52

checking in the costume, which

19:52

is what we're handling. We have,

19:56

you know, 30 or 40 people we

19:56

don't even know if they're doing

19:58

recital yet because they it's

19:58

been you know, people haven't

20:02

returned phone calls, haven't

20:02

handed in paperwork, have

20:04

returned emails, you know,

20:04

normal dealing with busy

20:07

parents, right? Yes. So it's, I

20:07

have them write a log for the

20:12

next person and leave it on the

20:12

desk. But sometimes it's like

20:16

getting lost in translation

20:16

still. Well, you only got

20:19

through one through eight. I

20:19

thought you got one through one

20:22

through 10 What you like there's

20:22

just the communication between

20:26

my people isn't as clear as I

20:26

would like for it to be and it's

20:31

them Calling me Hey, Laura did

20:31

such and such get it done. I'm

20:35

like, I wasn't even in the

20:35

office on Tuesday, I don't even

20:37

I was at home doing my own stuff

20:37

when it was your day off,

20:41

whatever, you know, or whatever it

20:42

may be, I

20:42

wasn't in there. And my response

20:45

is, well, you have to call

20:45

whoever was in there and ask

20:48

them where they were at with

20:48

that project, or, you know, if

20:52

it was complete, I don't know if

20:52

there's a better way of making

20:57

of taking me out of the

20:57

occasion. So that system flows

21:02

better. I thought, I've said it

21:02

the right way. But they're still

21:05

coming to me saying, Oh, she

21:05

didn't do this, or I thought

21:08

this was done does this my

21:08

responsibility. That's where I'm

21:11

getting a little lost right now.

21:14

So there's a couple

21:14

of different ways of looking at

21:16

that. And there's some technologies there, if you choose to use it, some people

21:18

do, some people don't, it's all

21:20

good. One of the things that we

21:20

use, it's called Voxer. It's a

21:23

voice message app. It's like a

21:23

walkie talkie. And we have a

21:27

Voxer channel in amongst our

21:27

management team. And so every

21:31

day in the morning, there's the

21:31

three priorities of what you're

21:34

working on. And if there's any

21:34

sort of stuff like at night, I

21:37

would say just send a box and

21:37

say all is okay, do that kind of

21:41

thing. If you're a voice type

21:41

person, if you'd like to, if

21:44

you're a checklist person, of

21:44

course you can have you can form

21:47

up and curate your checklist a

21:47

little bit better. This is what

21:50

I consider project management

21:50

type stuff, as opposed to just

21:53

did the bathroom get cleaned

21:53

that checklist, you know, but

21:56

we're talking about the

21:56

continuing projects? Not

21:58

necessarily did I shut the

21:58

lights off? And did I you know,

22:01

put the money in the safe and

22:01

stuff? Correct? Right? Correct.

22:03

So the continuing projects, ones

22:03

should be should live on a

22:07

different sort of board than the

22:07

actual checklist. Okay, so

22:12

yes, that's my

22:12

opinion. Now it's front page and

22:14

back page. Yeah. So check it,

22:14

simplify it. But it's not

22:18

checklist. This

22:18

checklist, it's not project

22:20

management, project management

22:20

is, is Did you know, there's the

22:23

list of 12 people that need to

22:23

be contacted? How far did you

22:27

get down? That's not the daily

22:27

checklist. So the daily

22:30

checklist is the daily

22:30

checklists, we sweep up, we wipe

22:33

up, we do all these different

22:33

things and, and you know, we

22:36

lock the door, we open the door, all that kind of stuff, that's daily checklists. And you might

22:38

have a weekly checklist to where

22:40

you're walking around the

22:40

studio, checking for lights and

22:42

all the other stuff and, you

22:42

know, checklist type stuff which

22:45

are repeated, done the same way

22:45

every single time. What we're

22:47

talking about here is a little

22:47

bit more project management, and

22:50

project management of all those

22:50

independent projects that kind

22:53

of have a start and an end, can

22:53

live in a different file if

22:56

you're paper based, or we like

22:56

to use a program called Trello.

23:01

And Trello allows us to set up

23:01

columns, and everybody's

23:04

attached to the Trello board.

23:04

And each project has its own

23:07

card and the card moves across

23:07

to do doing and done. And, you

23:11

know, you you can really just

23:11

set up columns that are to do

23:15

doing and done. And then each

23:15

one has its own card and you

23:18

build your card, you could have

23:18

15 cards there that are all in

23:21

the to do list. And like if when

23:21

you get back from your

23:24

conference, and you have 52 to

23:24

do lists, then you would write

23:30

out all the 50 twos, but you

23:30

don't have they're not in

23:33

process yet. They're going to be

23:33

in process some time. But when

23:36

you pull them into process, they

23:36

become in process, and

23:39

somebody's name gets put to that

23:39

like in your case might be Laura

23:42

or in my case, you might assign

23:42

Peter to it or Well, whoever and

23:46

whoever's little head is there.

23:46

They're accountable for that

23:49

process until they've assigned

23:49

it to somebody else or moved it

23:53

to the column that says Done.

23:53

And when it's done, it's done.

23:56

Nice. So it's sort of what was

23:56

that we were doing done? program

24:00

again. Yeah, it's called Trello.

24:00

And other people will use one

24:05

called Asana. I mean, there's a

24:05

lot of different project

24:07

management type style boards,

24:07

but Trello is free for I mean,

24:11

we pay for an upgraded version,

24:11

but it's free for anybody that

24:14

wants to use it. And it's it's

24:14

nice to you can share to anybody

24:17

who's on that Trello board, and

24:17

they can see who's accountable

24:20

and where everything's out. You

24:20

can put up checklists, you can

24:22

attach it to your Google Drive

24:22

with other files and different

24:25

things like spreadsheets and

24:25

stuff like that, if you choose

24:28

to. There's a lot of different

24:28

little things that you can do

24:31

with that that will help you in

24:31

your process management.

24:33

That's

24:33

awesome. Yeah, just because that

24:35

was just that, for me is going

24:35

to be the way to take me out of

24:39

the equation like I don't want

24:39

nothing. They you can call me

24:42

with questions. You can. Sure.

24:42

But there's still the owner,

24:45

right? But the communication

24:45

between each other, I want that

24:49

to be smoother, right? It's not,

24:49

I don't want to necessarily be

24:52

the middleman in every

24:52

conversation. What did she do

24:55

yesterday? What did she not do?

24:55

What like? So having something

24:58

like that I feel like would be

24:58

yes. Or just completely upgrade

25:03

everything at the studio in the

25:03

office? Yeah.

25:05

So if you put your

25:05

lens on two different things.

25:07

The one thing is the checklist

25:07

of sort of what we do every

25:10

single day are opening

25:10

checklists, cleaning the

25:12

bathroom, all that sort of

25:12

stuff. And the other piece of

25:15

the puzzle is a project

25:15

management process board. And

25:20

that's going to be where are we

25:20

standing with all this stuff. In

25:22

the end, we talked earlier about

25:22

the term detail to dashboard.

25:26

This is where you can be on the

25:26

dashboard of this but you can

25:29

dig in if you happen to be on

25:29

Trello and you want to know

25:32

where any of these projects is

25:32

lining? You go in and you're

25:35

like, Oh, they're on step number

25:35

seven, and Judy's accountable

25:38

for that. And that's great.

25:38

Okay, so at least I know now now

25:40

I have the overall view or, as I

25:40

would put it in Dansko language,

25:44

the view from the balcony

25:44

instead of from the floor. I've

25:47

got the overall view of the

25:47

production happening here, but

25:50

I'm not necessarily on the stage

25:50

running the production.

25:54

Yeah, 100%.

25:54

And I feel like the older we

25:58

get, at least for me, although I

25:58

get as a business owner, the

26:01

less I want to be on the stage

26:01

dancing, the more I want to be

26:04

in the balcony watching, right.

26:06

And that's fair.

26:08

Yeah, I say,

26:08

like, when I talk about Libra, I

26:11

say, she's my baby, but my

26:11

baby's 13. Now, like, there's

26:15

things that a 13 year old should

26:15

be able to do by itself, right

26:18

that like, that's your, to me,

26:18

that's the goal, as a business

26:20

owner, it's like, You're certain

26:20

things that I shouldn't have to

26:23

baby her with, she should be

26:23

able to function and move

26:26

forward without me running it

26:26

every single day. And I think

26:30

down to like, the systems and

26:30

processes, I'll definitely have

26:32

to look into that program,

26:32

because that was, I was like,

26:35

that's what I need, that I need

26:35

something to just connect the

26:38

dots there, because they're

26:38

looking at me to help connect

26:40

the dots. And not that I don't

26:40

want to help them when they need

26:42

help. But I feel like that would

26:42

just take a lot off my plate.

26:46

That's the whole

26:46

point of our conversation here

26:49

today, Laura is to free you up,

26:49

right. And if something like

26:52

Trello is it's a piece that can

26:52

free you up, and then the

26:55

conversation is a good one. And

26:55

you know, a lot of this stuff

26:59

you got into business 13 years

26:59

ago, because you have dreams of

27:02

a better life. Yeah, then then

27:02

whatever it was, I didn't know

27:05

what you were doing before. But

27:05

whatever it was before, but I

27:08

can tell you, almost every

27:08

single person that gets into

27:11

business for themselves has

27:11

dreams of a better life. And if

27:14

all you're doing is head down,

27:14

working 50 6070 hours a week,

27:19

not getting home for supper,

27:19

because your business happens to

27:22

be open through supper time, not

27:22

having the opportunity to spend

27:25

Saturdays with your young child

27:25

and family and friends and

27:28

whatever the case is, or not

27:28

being able to take a little trip

27:30

away, because you want to take a trip away, because you feel that you have to stick around, then

27:32

we got work to do. Right, right.

27:36

And so the next piece of the

27:36

puzzle is once that starts

27:39

coming, it's like, oh, how much

27:39

more freedom can I get when I

27:42

start implementing some of this

27:42

stuff, because the freedom that

27:45

you get, maybe you want to open

27:45

another studio someday, maybe

27:48

you want to start an entirely

27:48

different business. Or maybe you

27:51

don't want to or maybe you want

27:51

to move to a different town, but

27:53

still have this business as a

27:53

great viable investment that you

27:57

have, that you're involved with,

27:57

as needed. There's so many

28:01

different ways of looking at

28:01

this as we get through here. And

28:04

you know, my biggest thing that

28:04

I see a lot of people when they

28:07

get overwhelmed, overworked feel

28:07

as though you know, they just

28:10

can't do it anymore. They want

28:10

to sell their business because

28:13

they just can't, then it's like,

28:13

I just don't want to do this

28:15

anymore. And it's usually not

28:15

because they don't love the

28:17

business. It's usually because

28:17

they don't love the detail. If

28:20

they could get themselves out of

28:20

the detail to the dashboard,

28:23

they probably still want to be there.

28:24

Right? And I

28:24

feel like too, I'm sure that's

28:26

probably common in our industry.

28:26

It's like people get into this

28:29

because they love working with

28:29

children. They love to teach.

28:32

But I don't think we always

28:32

understand the business side of

28:36

it, right? Like I went to

28:36

school, I have a BFA in dance.

28:39

And my biggest regret in life is

28:39

not having a business degree.

28:42

Yeah, honestly, because I always

28:42

do I want to open a studio, but

28:46

I never went for business

28:46

classes, which is why, you know,

28:48

I do continuing education and

28:48

things like that. But yeah, I

28:52

mean, I don't I feel like the

28:52

burnout comes from, I don't

28:55

think necessarily from the teaching, I think it's from running the business, because it

28:57

is a business. It's this is not,

29:00

at least for me, this is not a

29:00

hobby, this is my livelihood,

29:03

this is my career. So I very

29:03

much take it seriously in that

29:07

way. Right? I found it that way.

29:10

I'm an image guy. And

29:10

one of the cartoons that I had

29:13

drawn up a while ago was, you

29:13

know, a dance school owner

29:16

sitting at her desk with papers,

29:16

you know, all these papers and

29:20

and she's in sort of the the

29:20

admin room looking out at the

29:23

dance floor, basically saying

29:23

what do I really want to be in

29:26

here or don't want to be out

29:26

there, right. And it's kind of

29:29

like, these are the things when

29:29

you start getting your business

29:32

going and running on rails, you

29:32

should be able to choose where

29:35

you truly want to be and my

29:35

framework around that is called

29:38

Love it or leave it and, you

29:38

know, you should be able to love

29:42

what you're doing and leave some

29:42

of the other stuff. And if, for

29:45

example, bookkeeping isn't what

29:45

you want to do, then you find

29:47

somebody else to do the bookkeeping portion, right?

29:49

I just hired a

29:49

bookkeeper and I kick myself in

29:52

the butt now that I have her

29:52

like, why did it take 11 years?

29:56

Like what what was I thinking?

29:56

Not something I like doing, but

30:01

my money's going right? Like

30:01

really know where my money's

30:04

going. So it's funny because I

30:04

feel, I think, probably

30:09

listeners too. Don't be scared

30:09

to you have to spend money to

30:13

make money early on. I think I

30:13

was nervous to do that. Also,

30:16

it's like hiring people cost

30:16

right. When in my mind, I once I

30:20

really thought about it, I'm

30:20

like, Well, if I can delegate

30:22

this, then I can create

30:22

something new over here. And

30:25

there's something new over here

30:25

can generate money, right? And

30:29

maybe a portion of that can take

30:29

care of that. Right? For sure.

30:32

But that's another way to think

30:32

about it to not to be nervous

30:34

about delegating and doing

30:34

things like that. Because in the

30:37

end, it frees up your time to

30:37

either create something new or

30:40

have free time and do whatever

30:40

you want with your own family

30:42

and your own self.

30:44

I love it. I love it.

30:44

Well, I think we've had a great

30:46

conversation here today, Laura,

30:46

thanks so much for taking part

30:49

and being a part of the business

30:49

owner breakthrough. I'm so

30:52

excited to see you again at one

30:52

of the events down the road here

30:57

and look forward to chatting

30:57

with you and watching your

31:01

growth as a business owner.

31:03

Thank you so much for having me. It's been awesome. Thank you. All

31:06

right, make it a

31:06

great day. You too. Bye bye.

31:15

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