E36 Project planning: The Art of breaking things down

Leanne Woff: Hello, hello, hello, lovely. How are you today? Okay, today we are [00:01:00] getting stuck into project planning, the art of breaking things down. I know having spoken to many in OBM, an ops manager, a project manager, that one of the trickiest parts of managing projects and businesses successfully is getting started.

How do I get all my pieces on the board? I’m great at following a project plan. I can smash through making sure things are done and done on time. But when I’m staring at that blank canvas, somebody help me. So today I am going to give you a really easy way to put the core components on your board to get started with a successful project plan.

 The first thing is set your end goal. So when we [00:02:00] are doing any project, we need to keep in mind what we want to achieve with this project. Why are we even doing this? What impact does it have on the business? What do we want it to look like at the very end? Why does this project even exist? What is our aim here?

Try and get as much detail around that as you can. Because the clearer that vision is, the easier it will be for you to identify what’s needed to achieve it. When there’s all these grey areas and all this fuzz, it gets really hard for you to know, are we looking at apples or oranges? Do I need seven people or four?

Is this, a big, big beast, bigger than Ben Hur? Or is this just something small that we want to implement and do because it’s fun? We need to know what the end goal is. We need to be able to think and feel [00:03:00] and see what that looks like. And if you don’t know, ask. Sit down with your client and say, all right, I’m going to map all of this out, but I have some questions for you and ask them specific questions.

Give them if else’s. Okay, so do you mean you want to create a whole new membership with its own brand, its own messaging for a different audience or do you mean you want to create another option within your current membership that people can opt in for? Give them scenarios so that you can get the understanding you need to make sure this is successful.

And sometimes this can be a 15 minute conversation. It doesn’t have to be a big, massive one. Or sometimes it needs to be, an hour long planning session. For you to really flesh out with your client what we’re doing, you lead that, that’s what you’re [00:04:00] there for. Once you’ve got your end goal, once you know what you’re trying to achieve, then we can chunk it.

And if that’s what I’m trying to achieve, a new membership, what are the main things that become part of this? And this is where you brain dump a little bit because a lot of the time we will get stuck trying to categorize things before they’re even in front of us. Well, hang on. Is that a person? Is that a financial consideration?

Is it a task that will need to get done? And we hold ourselves back. So the first thing that you can do is brainstorm all those main components. Okay, we’re gonna need designer. These are the kinds of things we’re gonna need to design. We’re going to need sales pages, gonna need a web dev. We’re gonna need the technology that the web dev will use.

Let your brain popcorn around a bit[00:05:00]  because that way you are going to cover all the bases. Once you’ve let your brain do that, stop, take a break, come back and start to group things together. So what are the main components that are going to need to happen here? What is it can you do it in phases?

All right. I’ve identified the processes. The way that everybody does this is different and that is okay. Some people will list out all the tasks, some people will list out all the processes, some people will list out all the different pieces of impact, some people will think about it in a start to finish order and put in random bits.

So it’s more the phase that they can group into however you want to do it. It’s fine. The biggest thing is getting it out. So all the things that need to happen, then let’s chunk them into little [00:06:00] groups, whatever makes sense for what you’ve got. So whether that is phase one, phase two, phase three, whether that is the technical components, okay. Website, emails, social media, marketing. Whether it’s department, accounting, customer service, operations, whatever it is, start to group them. Then once you’ve got your main components, we can start to pull that out a little bit. For these components, what are the people that are needed?

So let’s start looking at some resources, yeah. What are the people that are going to be able to execute this stuff? Do we have the people? Do we need other people? What are the options we have? Map that out for each of your components. What is the the finances? So is there a financial component or a budget we need to consider?

Looking at our components, our [00:07:00] big chunky bits, Are we going to have to get a new person in? How much is that going to cost? Are we going to have to buy a new tool? How much is that going to cost? Let’s start putting some of these pieces in place. Making our project nice and full. And then, we want to start looking at the timeline.

Once we know what we have to work with, once we can see the things that actually have to get done, then, and only then, do we move toward timeline. And we start to plot things out. Because then, you can layer things over the top and you can move things easier because it becomes almost like a fill in the blank.

 You’re taking pieces from one bucket and putting them in another. And so every time you take something from your main component list and you put it on that timeline, you have one thing less in your component bucket, one more thing on your timeline.[00:08:00] What you’re doing here is making sure you’re not going to miss anything.

And you’re checking that it makes sense as you’re doing it. If you’re putting something on your timeline and you’re going, hang on a second, this isn’t actually going to work because I know for this component, that’s going to take weeks. It’s not going to take a day. Maybe I need to wiggle the timeline and then you deal with that before you go and add another component onto your timeline.

And so you’re doing some rational thinking and some logical steps as you’re building it, which is going to make your project run smoother until you’ve got all those main components out of your bucket and onto your timeline. Now you’ve got a really solid timeline starting place. You’ve got all your milestones there.

The big blocks for this. Now, I want you to start thinking about the validity [00:09:00] of this project. So what can I do to achieve my end goal with the least friction? And the first thing is that we want to think about What are the possible hurdles that we might come across when we’re trying to deliver that? So if we’ve got all our components, we know what our end goal is, we know where we’re trying to head, we’re looking at our timeline where we’ve put everything together, what are the things that might go wrong here?

Okay, I know that in part C of my timeline, there’s a lot in there. It is going to mean really tight turnarounds, and I need my team working together so that it can have that quick hot potato impact. I need you to be on time so that the next person can so the next person can, because that is going to be a critical point. So, looking at the information you [00:10:00] have, what are the hurdles? What if we can’t find a specific tool that’s going to do this thing we need it to do? Pre-plan as much of this as you can. Look at it and think, what would actually shift the ability for us to complete this project? List them all down. And then, put your solutions cap on.

Look at that list and go, is this something that is likely to occur? Is this something that will really derail this project if it does occur? And that’s how you weigh up whether it’s worth pre-planning a solution or not. If it’s highly likely to occur, yes, we want a solution. If it’s, not really likely that it’ll occur and if it does occur, is it something that we’re going to be able to fix on the fly or do we need a solution now?

Like weighing all these things up. If it is something that is going to have a really big impact, and stop the [00:11:00] project in its tracks. You want a solution for that first so that then when we get there, we’re not panicking and we’re not making decisions that aren’t quite logical because we’re stressed and under pressure.

We want to make clear, consistent decisions. Having possible solutions up front will give us that, it will give us our stability because we’ve already thought about it. We’ve got a backup plan. We just switch gears. And then the last thing that I want you to do is to think about that end goal again. And then I want you to look at all of your components and think about what are the essentials here.

If this is our end goal. What are the things that absolutely must happen that this project will be a failure without that? They become your priority. That is your baseline. That’s what you’re trying to achieve. If you complete this project and those things have all been [00:12:00] ticked off and exist, well done.

Are there things in this plan that are nice-to-haves? That are bonuses? Hey, it would be really cool if we had this. But will the project objective not be met without it? Because when we’re planning things, especially if it’s new and we’re working with visionaries, we get excited and we have all these ideas.

And we want it all now because it’s exciting and it will make it better. But sometimes things have to happen in iterations. As much as we will always try to include the nice-to-haves, we need to know, what is actually the breaking point here for something that is achievable to get created, versus something that is way too big and really will never exist because we’re trying to achieve too much.

This also [00:13:00] gives the ability that when you are moving through your project, seeing how it rolls out. And what in reality gets created, if you need to drop some stuff out of the project or move it to phase two, you’ve already got a list of nice-to-haves. You already know which of the bits to pull versus leaving everything in and then not completing this project at all.

And so your success rate project management and project completion will go way up because you’ve got a really solid idea of what you’re aiming for. And then you’ve already set up phase two of your project. You already know the bits that are going to have to be done. You’ve already seen the kinds of hurdles that you’ve had to face and got solutions for them.

And it rolls on and it becomes easier and easier. So I hope that that gives you a really simple framework that you can follow so that next [00:14:00] time you’re sitting in front of that blank screen and you’re thinking, there’s so many different ways I could do this. What’s the right way? What’s the best way?

How do I even get started? But now you can just move through these simple steps and you’ll have something you’re looking at quite quickly that you can play with and move around. Let me know if this was helpful, please leave me a comment, send me a DM, say hello. And if you found this helpful, please leave me a five star review about what you loved most.

See you next week, guys. [00:15:00] 

E34 How to educate clients on what an OBM is

Leanne Woff: ​ [00:00:00] 

Hey, hey, hey, lovely, let’s chat about how to educate our clients on what an [00:01:00] OBM is. Today’s podcast episode topic actually came from one of our listeners and they sent me a message and they were saying to me, could you do an episode on how we can better educate our clients on what it is an OBM does and how we do it?

Because a lot of them don’t seem to understand. And can I tell you, she is 100 percent right. A lot of them do not understand. And it’s something that, as an industry, we need to get better at communicating, and we need to get our stories straight. Today I’m going to cover some things I think that we can all do that will help our audience as a whole grasp the idea better.

All right, so the first thing is, you need to understand it first. Now, you might be sitting there thinking of course I understand what it is, I do it every day. But, do you [00:02:00] really understand what it is? Because I’ve heard so many different variations. And yeah, everyone has a little bit of a difference in their opinion, and there are slight variations, but I’ve seen big variations.

I’ve also seen people who just tack OBM on to the end of their title so that they can charge more money. And that makes it harder for everybody because it hasn’t got to do with what the role is. So it like dissolves that meaning and it makes it a little murkier. So what is an OBM? If you’re an OBM, the easiest way to explain this, is that you are a specialist in the virtual assistant industry, someone who specializes in project management, operations management, business management, and usually is [00:03:00] digital marketing savvy and has good tech skills.

So the things that you really need at that foundation of running a business, and then you do it online. Hence the virtual part. You might also be thinking, Leanne, I’m not a VA. I’m an OBM. This is the whole issue. You are a VA. And this is what I meant when I said you need to understand it first. When you’re explaining this, you need to explain it from an industry standpoint.

Virtual Assistant is an industry as a whole. It’s everyone in it. You can have general admin VAs, which is what we commonly will say, Oh, I need a VA. That’s what people are talking about. When you say, I’m not a VA, that’s what you’re talking about. You’re actually talking about an admin VA, an admin all rounder.

You’re an OBM, which sits [00:04:00] within that industry as a whole. You can also have social media VAs. You can also have Bookkeeping VAs. You can also have lawyers who are VAs because what is a VA? A VA is somebody who works in a business and provides a business-to-business service in an online capacity. You work remotely. In its simplest form, that’s what it is. And so now you can see how being an OBM still means you’re a VA. It’s a niche within that industry. This is how you explain it to your clients and you explain it in a way where it’s like, if you were to look at your whole support team, takes a lot of support to run a business. Takes someone supporting with finance, takes someone supporting with marketing, takes someone supporting with answering the phones, takes someone[00:05:00] managing a team, there’s all these different qualities that you need and an OBM is the one that is in the middle, helping run it all. So in the same way, in an office, you would have a business manager, you’re an online business manager and you’re not online because you only work with online businesses. So let’s say like e commerce stores, you only work with e commerce stores and they only sell online.

That’s not true. It’s just that you work in an online manner.

Now, how do we further educate our clients once we have the definition and the concept down pat for ourselves? How do we pass that knowledge on in a way that’s easy to understand?

The thing that you need to grasp to do this and to do it well is there is no way to explain it all in one foul swoop. If you really want your [00:06:00] clients to understand what an OBM is, you need to do it ongoing and throughout your client journey. What that means is your education starts at marketing. So before they’re even one of your clients, you need to start talking about on your website, in your socials, if you have a podcast, on your podcast, however you do your marketing in your networking conversations. That’s where your education starts and that’s where you start explaining what an OBM is and what an OBM does. So that before people even come to you, you’ve already started building that foundation of knowledge.

Are people going to always remember what you said? No. But you’ve planted that seed, you’ve given them that foundation. Your audience will start to get it. And the more that we all do this, the easier it will be for them to grasp. [00:07:00] So marketing first. The second place that you want to cover what an OBM is, is on your services page. I am not saying, let’s go write a blog post on our services page. What I’m saying is that your services should reflect what an OBM is. If your services look exactly the same as an admin VA services page, if you offer the exact same things, then, lovely one, you are an admin VA.

Either that, or they’re an OBM and they don’t realise it. Understand the services you deliver and where they sit within the industry. Your aim here is not to create all different packages or have all different skills and offer hundreds and hundreds of them just to suit every client. What you want to show on your services page is that you operate at a higher level.

And on your services page, you might have,[00:08:00] project management, or you might have your operations manager, or your team whisperer. There’s all different ways you can go about it, but it’s very different to just saying it’ll cost you $100 for me to do a newsletter. It’ll cost you $100 for me to set up an email automation.

It’ll cost you $50 an hour for every team meeting that I have, and they will go from 30 minutes to 2 hours every week. See how it’s very different? We want to operate at a higher level, so we need to start presenting at a higher level. In no way am I meaning, don’t give clarity. Make sure it’s clear what you’re doing.

But it’s not this segmented task list of, I could do this for you, or I could do this for you, or I could do this for you. No. You want to paint the picture of, hey, when you work with me, this is what you’re gonna get. I’m in your corner. I’m gonna be doing this on a regular basis. You [00:09:00] also want to talk about the process.

A large part of what an OBM does is give space and peace of mind. And as such, how do we sell that? It’s hard, isn’t it? Because it’s not tangible. The way that we can explain it, though, is through the process. And you explain it in everything, in your marketing, on your website. And it’s when you work with me, this is what it looks like.

This is how you’ll feel. This is the space you’ll have. You’ll have clarity. You’ll have the ability to go out and to spend more time doing what you love. You’ll have the ability to really hunker down, and plan what’s next for your business without worrying that your business operations are going to fall over in the process.

You’ll have a sounding board. The way that we give you those things are, we’ll have a weekly check in call, you’ll have [00:10:00] Voxus support, I’ll come to your office and do a quarterly planning meeting. However it is that you do it, you want to explain it and you want to explain why it matters. We do this so you can……

This is how we show them what an OBM does. This is how we sell that intangible piece. Because there is no hard put a dollar in, put a dollar out. That’s not the outcome of working with an OBM and it doesn’t need to be. But we do need to work out a way to explain it and through that is the process.

The other thing that you can do if you’re having conversations with leads and you’re thinking okay, what they sound like is that they think I’m just going to be an admin VA and I’m just going to do all the little bits and that’s not really what I want to do even though I can do that. Start talking about the ROI.

Absolutely. I could do all of that stuff, [00:11:00] but that’s not the best use of my time. Like really you want to bring in an admin VA or someone better suited to those skills, pay them at their rate and pay me at my rate to manage them. And then that way we’re getting more done. We’re being financially clever.

And we’re using everyone to the best of their ability. And then explain the things that you could do. Here’s where I would be best placed. I’d really like to be involved in your business planning. Let me look at your strategy. Let me see where we’re going. Let’s look at those goals and how we’re tracking them.

Let’s have a look if there’s another team member we need to free some of your time up to do what you do better. Use me for all the skills that I have. For the level of knowledge I have rather than paying me for that level of knowledge, but not getting it. And so you can explain things like [00:12:00] that too.

And it helps give your client’s perspective.

The next thing that you can do is talk about the maths. A lot of people struggle with the money factor, but it’s because they haven’t done the math. They haven’t actually thought about, okay, if I was to bring you in and it gave me an extra two hours a week, what could I do with that 2 hours? I charge myself at $350 an hour.

I could be making $700 in 2 hours. Or I could create a new $97 masterclass in 2 hours and sell that. And maybe sell one a week for a year. What’s 97 times 52? Start thinking about the actual dollar figures. Compared to how much you would charge to be involved every week and start talking about those things.

Also, start talking about the level of ownership and [00:13:00] responsibility an OBM has. It’s very different to an administration VA. And I am not saying in any way that Admin VAs aren’t dedicated, committed, uninvested. They 100 percent are. I’ve seen so many great ones and some not so great ones. Same as people who specialize in online business management.

But as an online business manager, you are in all of those kind of strategic level things. You’re in that how we’re keeping everything on track. So there is that level of responsibility on you. There is that level of ownership of supporting everyone in a team, not just one person, so start talking about those things.

The next thing you can do is take the reins, and what I mean by that is start talking about how you work with your client’s teams. The best way to set that picture of here’s where I operate and here’s how everyone else within the business would [00:14:00] operate and here’s how I would coordinate them is to tell them exactly that.

Give them that visual picture of – there’s me and then there’s all these other pieces and I’m going to help you pull everything together. So everyone’s working towards the same goal.

Tell them how you will work with their different support team members, their admin VA, their marketing VA. It’s showing them what you do. It’s helping them understand that difference. And then the final thing is to tell stories. People find it so much easier to understand what is occurring if it’s in story form.

People find it easier to remember something if it’s in story form. People get attached to emotion and when there is an emotion, it triggers a different part of our memory and we remember easier. Tell stories. Talk about things that you’ve done with other clients. Talk about scenarios that you’ve managed.

Talk [00:15:00] about big wins. Talk about things that have been hard. Start telling stories. Use case studies. Put case studies up. These are the kinds of people I’ve worked with. This is what they came to me for. This is how I went about solving that. This was the outcome. How cool is that? Give people the input they need to really grasp what you’re talking about to fully understand what your capability and what your purpose is.

Yeah, so that’s it. That’s as simple as it can be. But really, it is just reiterating the same thing over and over. You can do it. And it might sound like you’ve said it, and you’ve said it before, and you’ve said it before, but no one is listening just to you. Everybody is coming from their own perspective with all different pieces of information getting thrown at them.

You saying it 500 times, probably going to hear it twice. And don’t not say it for fear of you’re [00:16:00] going to sound like a broken record because the consequence of that is that a lot of people don’t hear it at all and it just makes our job even harder and they’re still seeking this information.

They just weren’t in the right place at the right time to hear it. I hope that helps. I hope it’s giving you multiple different avenues to make it a little bit easier. Maybe you’re already doing some of these things. Maybe you’re not doing some of them. Maybe it’s giving you one thing. If you walk away and implement one thing I’ve talked about, you’re already ahead.

I hope you find that helpful. If you have any recommendations on what you’d like to hear on this podcast, please, please send me a DM at leannewolf pretty much anywhere because I’ll cover it. I want this to be a two way conversation. And. If you love listening to this podcast, please leave me a five star review because that’s how the Magical Podcast Apps know that this is a quality podcast [00:17:00] and shows it to more virtual assistants, including OBMs.

Bye guys. Have a great week. I’ll see you next week.

​ 

E33 Introvert, Extrovert or Ambivert: People are still your secret weapon to business success

Leanne Woff: ​ [00:00:00] 

Hey, hey, hey there. Welcome to today’s episode of the Audacious OBM. Today we’re [00:01:00] going to talk about introvert, extrovert, or ambivert. People are still your secret weapon to business success. Now you might be thinking, Leanne, where the heck did you pull this from? But this actually came from, I was thinking about it a couple of weeks ago.

And in this process, I was talking to some members in OBM Academy and Audacious OBMs and giving them advice about different things and how they can approach different situations. And I just like the little community that we’ve really built there. And I thought if you isolate yourself in any way, you would miss that and you’re missing some big resources.

And I think sometimes we go into a little box where we go, Oh I’m an extrovert, so I find this easy. I’m an ambivert, so I can do [00:02:00] both. Or I’m an introvert, so I find it way too hard. But connecting with people happens in all different ways and you can do it in ways that suits you. So you can still get the support that you need in your business.

And so that’s what I want to talk about today. Now specifically on the Introvert level, there is an amazing human. Her name is Hayley Maxwell and she’s the unstoppable introvert. She’s incredible. If you’re an introvert, look her up. She gives you all different tactics on how to do business as an introvert in a way that’s not going to push you out of your comfort zone too much, or try and be someone you’re not so awesome resource if you need that, but getting back to the point of this episode.

It is , don’t be arrogant. You don’t know everything. And [00:03:00] business, just like life, is totally unpredictable. And so when we recognize those things, I don’t know everything. And something that I don’t expect will happen. We can start putting in place the things that we need to be able to manage these things.

How do I get the knowledge? What do I do when the unpredictable thing happens? If you don’t have a pre plan, it makes it a lot harder. And that’s when we spiral. So I’m going to talk about the nine different things. Nine different kinds of help people can give you in your OBM or Virtual Assistant business.

Okay, so the first one is the Small Business Coaster Help. So if you’ve been running a small business, you know it goes up and it goes down. And sometimes you need a person or a group of people where you can say, Hey, this is going on. [00:04:00] I’m panicking. I feel stuck. Or I feel like something bad just happened and I feel really quite sad or like I’m failing or this really awesome thing happened.

And then this really bad thing happened and now my head is just spinning. Small Business Coaster Help is all about having the people that you can go to who can go, nah, it’s okay. It’s just the up and down. Or, yeah, I’m actually seeing that everywhere in the market right now. So it’s not just you. And that gives you the ability to go, Oh, all right, cool.

Little bit of perspective. I’m not rowing this boat on my own. The second one is expert knowledge help. I have different people who I’ve got quite strong relationships with. And even students in my academy. I know that if I have a Dubsado question. I’m going to go and talk to Sophie Carr. I’m going to talk to Robin.

Because they know Dubsado so much [00:05:00] better than me. And that’s amazing. But I have connections with different people so that if I’m in a situation where it’s like, I really need the answer to this question, or I need someone I can refer to for this because it’s out of what I know right now, these are the people I will go to.

And so that’s the expert knowledge help. Having the people you can reach out to based on different things. And people who are quite happy for you to check in and do that. You don’t have to have a 45 minute leading conversation. They’re people who are in your community. So they’re quite happy to get the, Hey, can you just let me know blah, blah, blah.

And it goes both ways. They’re Celebration Help. We’re in small business and a lot of the time we have little wins and we have big wins and we have no one to look over at and go, Hey, this happened, or nobody else to see what’s happened and go, Hey, do you know that that’s actually awesome? So that you can appreciate the work that you’ve put in. A [00:06:00] lot of the time we need the Celebration Help. We need a person or a few people who can go, Hey, this is amazing. This is actually happening. Look at what’s been going on for you. And then there is In Case Of Emergency Help. So if something big happens, if something breaks that you built and you’re panicking, you don’t know what to do, you need to have some people you can go to and go, help, I don’t know what’s going on.

This thing’s broken. I don’t know what to do about it. Or, hey I’ve gotta rush my dog to the vet and that’s gonna sound really silly to some people. And I have these jobs I need to do. I need somebody who can help me and have your core people who will jump in and go, yeah, cool, we’ve got this.

You go and we will, keep the ship floating. So you need, In Case Of Emergency Help, these are all the things that keep small business doable.

Then there’s Imposter Extraction Help. So we [00:07:00] all face imposter syndrome. We all struggle with the, uh, I’m not good enough, or. Maybe I don’t know enough or I’m not doing it right or, I should be further along than I am. I’m not getting any clients. Is that because of me and maybe I should just give up?

All of that is imposter syndrome and sometimes all we need is somebody else to look at us and go, No, none of that is true and pull out the imposter and extract them from our thinking. So that we can see clearly and we can move forward and we can keep building. Then there’s laughing and perspective help.

Sometimes, terrible things happen and we get quite stressed or someone says something nasty or someone reacts to a situation in one way and you think, Did I handle this completely wrong? Or, what is going on here? You start to feel really uncomfortable and worried and you don’t realise until you have someone else to tell, and then [00:08:00] their reaction says it all.

They’ll start laughing and go, that person is hilarious. I cannot believe they’re behaving that way. Or to give perspective to what is happening. And it changes your whole view on the situation. And sometimes we need that. Sometimes we need the ability to offload the worry and the panic so that we can see clearly and move on as professionals.

Competition Help. You can be in competition or you can be in community. And I know some of my competitors are my best friends in business. We do very similar things. We help each other. And we choose to be community. There is enough work that goes around. And sometimes we sit there and we worry about people who could be our competition.

And sometimes we need the people who are in our corner to go, Well, are they your competition though? Do they really talk to the same people that you do? Do they speak the same way you do? Have they [00:09:00] experienced the same things you have? Because if not, they’re not really your competition and it’s okay. And then again, we can walk through lighter.

Then, second last one is Accountability Help. We live in shiny object syndrome land. That is our world now. You walk into a supermarket and there’s all different things flashing at you saying, buy me, buy me, do this, do that. And sometimes we need help to focus. And we need that in a safe space. That is what people give us.

Sharing where you want to go and how you plan to get there with somebody else. And so then they can come back and go, Hey, how’d you go with this thing? So that you can keep following to get the results that you’re after. And then the final one is the I’m Scared Of Driving Help. Now, this is very specific to me.

A few years ago, I met in person someone I’d been talking to online and was in online communities. [00:10:00] And we live close to each other. And we both wanted to go to events that were in the city. Which is, a solid hour drive from us and it’s city driving. So it’s different to suburb driving. And we were both like, Oh, yeah, I ain’t driving like that.

It’s so much pressure. And then we worked that out. And so it was like, okay, so now I have a driving buddy. And now every time it’s like, I want to go here. Do you want to come so that we’ve got this driving buddy. And then one of us will drive and the other will sit there and it becomes fun and it becomes a lot easier and there’s somebody else to help us navigate the scary driving in the city.

But you won’t ever get that if you don’t talk to people and you don’t build real relationships. And so that is the whole point of this episode. It’s that, find your people, people who do what you do similar to what you do, in a way that you do it, in an online land, however it works. Because no matter the kind of [00:11:00] person you are, the people are the secret weapon to building business success.

I do not doubt that for a second. And so I hope that that helps you and gives you a new perspective. I would love to have you in my community. We’ve got lots of free resources. We’ve got a thriving OBM challenge. We’ve got a six figure OBM roadmap you can grab. We’ve got OBM Academy where you can learn to be a wildly profitable OBM.

There’s this podcast, leave a comment, leave a review if you’re liking what you’re hearing and DM me. I would love, love, love to hear from you. I’m Leanne Woff. I’ll see you, I’ll see you next week, guys. Bye!

​ [00:12:00] 

E32 Do you trust me?

Leanne Woff: ​ [00:00:00] Do you trust me? Welcome to today’s episode of The Audacious OBM. I’m Leanne [00:01:00] Woff and today we’re talking about all things trust. One of our wonderful listeners said to me, I was on your website and there’s nothing about trust. Can you do an episode on trust? Sure thing, I said. Now, trust is fundamental to every OBM Visionary, Client relationship.

Why is that? I find when you’re working closely with somebody, if there is no trust, things take a lot longer. And we start to have all of these emotions. Why don’t you trust me? Why can’t you just let me do my job? Why do you have to check everything? If I said I’m going to do it, then that means I’m going to do it.

If I’m saying this is a better way to do it, maybe it actually is. Do you not understand that I am an expert in everything that I do? I know what I’m doing. Why do you keep getting in the way? And then on the client side We [00:02:00] have, what are they doing? Have I given them enough information? Do they need my input?

Maybe I need to help them. Maybe I’ve given them too many things. Maybe I’ll just answer this email because then it’ll take another thing off their plate. Oh, I know they’ve probably done it, but what if they haven’t done it? And maybe I should just check and it goes on and on and on. we want things to be smooth sailing, we need to invest in our level of trust and building that foundation of trust. And that goes both ways. So I’m going to start with an example, a little story. You might be aware that I am an avid Disney fan. I love it. I grew up with it. It makes my heart happy. And one of my favorite Disney movies is Aladdin. Now, if you’ve seen Aladdin, there is a scene at the very beginning and [00:03:00] Aladdin is running through this crazy market in Agrabah and he’s towing along this servant girl.

She’d taken something and the guards were chasing her down. So now they’re chasing Aladdin and her and it’s getting very, very close and They’ve almost gotten caught and then it will be off to the dungeon for you. So Aladdin does this crazy jump. He says, do you trust me?

And jumps really far. Now, Jasmine, who unbeknownst to Aladdin is actually a princess, is standing there with this complete stranger, asking her to do this crazy jump. And all he has said is, do you trust me? And in that moment, she has two options. One, to trust him and trust him fast to make the [00:04:00] jump, or to hesitate.

And then, not trust him, which would end in her getting arrested by the guards, found out that she’s really the princess, and all the chaos that that would create. She decides to trust him, and makes the jump, and they get off. They run away, they don’t get caught, and it’s amazing. Then, we fast forward some scenes, and again, Jasmine is standing on her balcony.

Now, everybody knows that she’s the princess, and Aladdin appears, just next to the balcony. And he holds out his hand again. And he says, Do you trust me? And that’s the only thing he says. And again, she’s faced with a choice. Either I take his hand and agree, or I don’t and I stay exactly where I am. The difference between the two [00:05:00] scenarios this time is there’s no big pressure push here.

We’re not running away from anything. Now, Aladdin is offering her an opportunity. And she doesn’t know if it’s a good one or a bad one. She’s got no information other than Do you trust me? She can stay safe where she is, or she can take a risk. And she takes the risk. She grabs his hand, and he pulls her onto his magic carpet.

And then they fly. In the night sky. All across Agrabah. And she sees things that she would never have been able to see before. But if she had have said no, she would have missed that. So why am I telling you these two things? Because they tell us a little bit about the factors in trust. So the first one is, when we hesitate to trust, the consequence is pain.[00:06:00] 

And it doesn’t have to be physical pain, but there is usually a negative consequence to not trusting. Now, whether that’s big or little, it can be either. It might be as simple as, because I don’t trust you yet, I’m going to have to check all your work. And then that is going to take me far more time. I’m actually not getting as much benefit as I could from working with you because I don’t trust you.

And I still feel the need to check everything. So now the pain here is that extra time I’m spending. And then the other factor, When we do trust, we are opening ourselves to opportunities that would never have existed before. And we might not know exactly what they are yet. That’s the whole point of trusting.

What we can see is that when we give our trust to somebody, it exposes all of our vulnerabilities. What is going to happen if I say [00:07:00] yes, if I hand over control, if I put myself in this position? And I was wrong?

 We can also see on the flip side that lack of trust, it causes us as OBMs to become defensive and protective. Because I haven’t done anything to you to prove that I’m untrustworthy. So for the client, it’s not about you, it’s about them. And for you It’s not about the client, it’s about you. So how do we reconcile this gap?

How do we bridge it so that nobody is in this place of being fearful or being defensive? We manage the emotion. So a big part of the issue with trust and the reason that we struggle so much with it is because it brings up all kinds of emotions. And if we take a step back and we look at all the pieces on the playing field, not just what we see, [00:08:00] we can start to put together a practical plan.

But I’m going to tell you the way I have managed trust in the past, the way I’ve created trust with clients, where my boundaries are, and the way I’ve felt when I’ve been trusted or not trusted. Ultimately, a lack of trust comes from fear. And when we are dealing with any kind of fear, it can take a long time to work through and to work it out until you get a good result.

Now, you can do this with clients if they’re untrusting or they’re nervous or they’re hesitating. You can totally walk alongside them and get them comfy with trusting you. But it’s also important to know that you get to decide as well. You can walk alongside and take the journey or you can choose not to.

If you [00:09:00] do not have the patience or do not have high enough self esteem or confidence in your own self and skill, you might go, you know what, I don’t have the capacity right now to deal with your trust issues, or to be able to give you everything you need for this to be amazing. And it’s not a reflection on them and it’s not a reflection on you.

It’s just the reality. So I want to lead with that. I want you to know that you have choice, which brings me to knowing your boundary. For a long time, I would help my clients through the trust process. And sometimes it would take years. Sometimes it would be really quick. And after a while, I then decided, you know what, I have been doing this for a long time.

I have a reputation. I [00:10:00] have case studies. I have testimonials. I have clients you can go and speak to. And if that does not speak to the quality of person that I am and my ability to do my job and communicate clearly, then I’m not really doing the right thing, am I? It should be enough. So I came to the choice.

That my boundary would be, trust me first. This is how I operate with all of my suppliers. I trust them first. They’ve not given me any reason not to trust them. I can have all my own fear, all my own hang ups. I can wonder if they’re gonna do the right thing or the wrong thing.

But at the end of the day, it doesn’t get anyone anywhere. I decided, I want people to trust me based on what I say up front. To trust me with their business. To trust me with the decisions that I make and discuss with them. Because, [00:11:00] lack of trust makes everything a lot slower. The scale that I want to work at and the things that I want to tackle, I can’t really do that if there’s big hesitation, so then that became my boundary. Trust me first. If I prove you wrong, if I do something to break that trust and it wasn’t unintentional and I haven’t been able to fix it, then don’t work with me anymore, or let me go, or say it was the worst decision you ever made.

But don’t make that your starting point. Don’t make me prove myself before I even get in the door. Trust me first and I’ll trust you first. And so that’s what I talk about.

And you should know your boundary too. What legacy are you willing to go to, to establish the trust? And it is not a bad thing to try and support the journey of trust with your clients. There’s things that you can do. And there are things that [00:12:00] I still do to help this trusting relationship grow and evolve.

But I also know where my lines are

 in what is part of this journey. Part of this journey is. It’s establishing the foundation of trust right from the very beginning. And that means that when I have conversations with leads, I talk about trust, I talk about the different people that I’ve worked with. I think about the things that are going to give my potential clients, the confidence that I am who I say I am, that I can do what I say I can do.

And then I carry that with me throughout my whole onboarding process. And I reiterate the same things over and over. The things that will instill more trust. These are the results that I’ve been given. This is what clients have told me before. This is what you might be feeling right now and I get it. And all of those things [00:13:00] add to that solid foundation and I’m happy to do that.

I’ve done this lots of times. My clients might not have. And it also gives me the ability to start these relationships as partnerships. I’ll trust you. And you trust me, let’s do this together. The second thing that you can do when trying to establish trust is highlight the perks. Why should they trust you?

What’s in it for them? It’s interesting when you think of it, right? Now, I remember when a client said to me, Oh, I don’t know how I ever lived without you. And she trusted me before I’d even signed the contract. She, from the very beginning, was, I’m in are you in, let’s go. And from that minute [00:14:00] onwards, she trusted me first.

And it changed my view on a lot of things. Because, all of a sudden, what I said, it wasn’t questioned, it didn’t have fear around it. Whereas sometimes, even with ourselves, we’re thinking, I’m saying this, is that right? Is that wrong? Is that something silly to say? Whereas with this client, everything was a discussion, and everything was a conversation between partners.

And that trust issue wasn’t there. If I said I was going to do it, she trusted that I was going to do it. Did we have checks and balances? Absolutely yes. You need that. So were there Asana tasks that she could see got ticked off? Yes. Did she then go and look for evidence when I ticked an Asana task off to see that I’d actually done the thing?

No. She would talk about the relief that she felt. She knew that by behaving in this manner, she didn’t have to worry. [00:15:00] She actually didn’t have to think about any of the things or question the what ifs because she trusted me to do the thing. And if those what ifs were going to happen, they were going to happen anyway.

So it just gave her freedom. And so that’s one of the perks. There are many, there’s efficiency, there’s joy. There’s all kinds of perks that come with having a trusting relationship. And so talk about them, because otherwise, why should someone risk anything if there’s nothing in it for them? The next one is to share your insight.

Something I know about human beings is that we are creatures of habit. The more familiar we are with something, the more we see it over and over, the more we hear it over and over, the less fearful we are. How can we use that to help our clients trust us? We start small. And from the very beginning, [00:16:00] I’m conscious that what I say and what I do are the same.

And if I’m talking to somebody and I’m saying to them, Hey, this is what I want to do. Here’s why I want to do that. I share that little piece of me and I keep the theme consistent. So I’m sharing my knowledge, which shows them, okay, she’s really thought about this and she’s invested. She’s not just taking me for a ride.

She has understanding around this and that makes me feel safe and secure. You’re saying things that resonate with me. I’m worried about this and you’ve said it before I’ve even mentioned it. And that makes me feel safe and secure because it’s familiar, right? There’s a connection there. And then the next bit, Is the repeating the things that we say we’re going to do.[00:17:00] 

I’m going to go and do this and it can be a little thing. Hey, you’ll get an email from me in a few days, and then I’ll tell you the next steps. In a few days, make sure you send the email. Hey, let’s jump on a Zoom call. And then we’re going to talk about these four things. And by the end of it, we’ll know this is going to be the result of this activity.

And so then, follow what you’ve said. And it seems small, but particularly at the start, it’s that consistency that eliminates the fear and builds the trust. Because what they’re seeing is that repeated, Ah, she says she’s going to do it, so it means she will. She says it’s going to be this way, so it will. I don’t need to worry about it.

And so we’re calming all the nerves all around. And it’s not a hard thing to do. It’s a little thing, but it goes a long way.

Now, the other thing is to [00:18:00] eliminate the unknowns. So a big part of fear is wondering about the future, is wondering what’s going to happen. Is the good thing going to happen? Is the bad thing going to happen? Is something that I don’t even know about going to happen? The more we can eliminate that fear of the unknown, the easier it will be for your clients to trust you because they can see the step by step plan.

They have something that feels tangible to hold on to. And so that ties in with the doing what we say we’re going to do and giving them the knowledge and understanding of what they can expect next.

The next thing is to repeat the facts. Hey! I’ve spent four hours doing this task. It’s done now, and here is the outcome of it. But, if I [00:19:00] was able to see the analytics, I would be able to tell you how we can do this in two hours. Or I would be able to tell you what the ROI is on this activity and how we can alter it to get a better result.

But I need you to let me see the analytics. I need you to give me a little bit more information. I need you to trust me a little bit more. And in this situation, we’re giving them the facts of what is right now, here is what’s happening, but here’s what could happen if you would trust me. And it’s constantly reiterating that.

Because then it’s their choice. It’s their choice whether they get the opportunity or they miss out because they’re too scared.

The next thing is to ask the question. So many times I’ve [00:20:00] been in a conversation with a client and I’ve had conversations with OBMs telling me about their conversations with clients, and we’re trying to work out what the hesitation is. Why is this person doing this? Or why won’t they just say yes? And sometimes we forget to just ask, How do you feel about this?

Hey, tell me your thought process here. What are you worried about? Are you worried about giving me more access? Are you worried about sharing your password with me? Because do you know that you can use LastPass? And then you can revoke the access the second that you’re ready. Whatever it might be, our default is to brainstorm and assume and troubleshoot before there’s an issue, when sometimes all that’s needed is to have a genuine conversation and go, Hey, [00:21:00] this is restricting me from doing my best work. This is making my job harder and I don’t want that for me or you. I want you to get the best ROI. So can you let me know what I can do to help you here? What is it that you’re worried about? And have the conversation. You’ll be surprised at what comes out of it.

Next thing is to explain the consequences. What I found really effective is when something’s happening over and over again, and I feel unheard, is to repeat the facts. Hey, I’ve done this and it’s taken me three times as long because you won’t give me the script that you use. Hey, I’ve done this. It’s taken me 40 times as long because I’ve had to check every single team member’s work, even though Asana shows it all.

It’s [00:22:00] explaining the consequences of something. Hey, yes, I can manually go and check that every email has been entered, or we can trust that the automation did its job. And I can just check a few, and then that way we know we’ve got an error, or not. And then explaining what the follow on consequence is.

Okay, I’m going to have more time. If I had more time, then I could actually be creating more email content to nurture those people. But I can’t do it if I’m spending all my time just checking that the emails went in. And then that’s not actually getting us anywhere. So it’s explaining. So sticking to the facts of this is the reality.

And here’s the possibility. This is what could be going on if you were happy to work with me a little bit more. Take my hand. Do you trust me? And sometimes that’s all they need. They need to know someone is with them and that you’re [00:23:00] a person and that you are trustworthy.

The second last thing I want to talk to you about is about keeping your eyes open. As people, there’s only so much we can deal with. Let’s be honest, and sometimes other people’s brokenness is just that, it’s their brokenness, not yours. And what your job is, is to evaluate how much you’re willing to push.

How long are you willing to stand on the magic carpet with your hand out and say, do you trust me? Do you trust me?

And the last thing is to evaluate how you feel along the way. Because if you can look at the feelings you have inside, feel like I’m being micromanaged. I feel like [00:24:00] the work I do isn’t good enough. I feel like the bar is too high and I’m set up to fail. What are all the things you’re thinking and feeling that are coming back down to you don’t feel like someone is trusting you?

Believe it or not, some of these things are just stories. My work isn’t good enough and that’s why this person has to check everything I do. When the reality might be, your work is amazing and they’re blown away and they’re so grateful that every time they check your work it’s perfect, they’re checking it because the last person that they worked with got everything wrong and they trusted first and they got really badly burnt.

Again. Not your problem, and it’s your choice how far you walk next to this person on this journey. But none of it was because your work wasn’t good either. We really need to be [00:25:00] evaluating what our thought process is and the assumptions that we’re making based on what we’re seeing and then explaining that.

And these are the big hard conversations and they’re uncomfortable, let’s be honest. It’s not fun. It’s not all smiles and rainbows, but if you can get through that little bit, the relationship you end up with is amazing. And then you have this mutually beneficial, enjoyable, working relationship where all of these trust things are diminished to the point where your clients are willing to risk more because the advice has come from you.

I trust her. So if she’s saying, Hey, maybe we should do this. There’s probably merit to it. And even if it goes badly, she’ll help me fix it. And that’s okay. So I hope that that has given you a lot of insight [00:26:00] and a lot of tactics you can use into building trust with clients and giving you a little bit of the confidence that you need to make the choices on who you work with and how far you support people in this journey.

I’d love to know what you think. Please leave me a comment. If you enjoyed this episode, leave me a five star review. And if you have questions, at Leanne Woff, DM me on Instagram. I want to talk to you. I want to hear your voice. This doesn’t have to be a one way conversation. I’ll see you next week.

​ [00:27:00] 

E31 Why I stopped offering strategy sessions as an OBM

Leanne Woff: ​  Hey, hey, hey, everybody. Welcome to today’s episode of the Audacious OBM. I’m [00:01:00] your host, Leanne Woff, and today I want to talk to you about why I stopped offering strategy sessions as an OBM. Now you might think, hmm, this is a little bit curious, Leanne. How do you run other people’s businesses without a strategy?

I am not saying I operate without a strategy. I’m saying if you’re asking the question, do OBMs need to offer strategy sessions, the answer is no. OBMs don’t need to offer strategy sessions.

And I will explain why. What happens in a strategy session is it’s a chance to workshop with the client. It is a chance to sit down, talk about their big goals or their goals for a project and get the ins and outs of how to achieve those goals, [00:02:00] understand the roadblocks and the hurdles to then be able to come up with a high level strategy to reach the goal and then to be able to then take that strategy and break it down into an actionable plan. In a strategy session, you spend lots of time with the clients trying to get all the information that you need, the full understanding and that includes the understanding of what’s on the playing field.

So what are the different things that we need to consider to pull into this? And, it also, there’s a greater amount of time that gets invested into understanding what the end goal is, and if what the client thinks is the goal is actually the goal. Because sometimes our clients come to us and they say, Hey, I really want to launch this new program.

That’s the goal. So then you talk to them. And then what you find out [00:03:00] is that they don’t really want to launch a new program. They want to have an evergreen funnel, or they want to increase their revenue. And that changes how we’re going to get there. It’s like launching a new program might contribute to that goal, but the goal is actually how do we make more money.

And then the strategy would need to change. So you can see there’s a lot of time and effort that goes into here and there’s a really tight knit relationship that forms.

I stopped offering strategy sessions because I hated having to spend all of this time and getting really invested in this strategy and then having to hand it over and not be part of the execution. I find that if I do that, [00:04:00] my clients are happy, they’ve got this awesome strategy, they go away. And then they try to implement it and they can’t because they’re not ready for the variables of what might happen next.

The other thing that they might do is take the strategy and get someone else to implement it. And then that service provider has to take the interpretation and try and implement it. And they might not have the skills to do that. I hated doing all the upfront investment and then not actually getting to see the thing come to life.

And this, usually when I would do a strategy session, I would do the session and I would do a plan that went with it. Because there is a difference between a strategy and a plan. A strategy is where you take all of the information available [00:05:00] to you. You take your usual process or the way that you would normally approach something.

And you mix them together to come up with a unique strategy to achieve what your client is trying to achieve. So it’s taking all of your knowledge and all of the things you know about the client and how to get there and coming up with something really unique. We’re going to do this. Here’s the big way we’re going to do it.

What we’re trying to achieve. And because you’re in this space, these are the things we’re going to use to do that. These are the tactics we’re going to try. This is the market we’re going to approach. All different things. So all of the information you know, and going, okay, I know available to me to achieve this type of objective, I can do it these seven ways.

For this client, we’re going to do it, number [00:06:00] three. Because that’s what makes sense for where they are and the different things they’re battling with. That’s a strategy. The plan is where you take that strategy and you break it down into actionable, implementable steps. Right? So, OBMs 100 percent need to be able to strategize.

OBMs need to develop strategies. But they do not need to just offer strategy sessions. They don’t need to say, Hey, come to me. I’ll do this strategy session with you. I’ll charge you $2,000 and then you can go and roll it out. You can. And if you like doing this, like hats off to you, go for your life. I did them for a long time.

It’s a great model, [00:07:00] but I found that the level of investment I would put in in brainpower and in creativity, brainstorming, in looking at my different options, in then reporting it or pulling it together, presenting it, then doing the plan for it, the emotional costs because I would get invested, like I’m excited.

All of that adds up and so the investment for me wasn’t worth how much I could charge for that kind of session or how much I felt I could charge. I could put a price of whatever I wanted, but the reality of that being something that is a consistent business model, doesn’t really make sense.

And part of the reason is because I know how invested I get with my clients and I know I want to see the impact. I don’t ever want to do something [00:08:00] for nothing. I want to see the thing play out and I want to see my clients get the results. And so there was always this kind of tension for me internally.

If I just do that front bit. I don’t actually get to be involved anymore and I’m such a people person and I’m so big on connection that it’s hey, I want to be in your corner for the whole time. So that’s when I flipped and I started offering strategy sessions, but only for ongoing clients or set project clients.

So it’s like, come and work with me for 90 days and I’ll do a strategy with you. That’s the first step. But I’m not going to just put in all of that work up front to give you the plan for you to take it away and then for you to either roll with it and it goes amazing or for you to try and implement it [00:09:00] but go, this is a bit hard for me, this is not what I do every day and then not get the result for you to take the strategy and give it to another service provider, a VA, another OBM who isn’t the one that created it, who then tries to implement it and can’t.

And then that is a reflection on my reputation. I don’t want the responsibility of developing this thing. And then someone actually doesn’t get the result from it because I wasn’t involved in it, or they didn’t have the understanding and there’s a disconnect. I don’t like it. It makes me feel icky.

So I thought if I have this ongoing tension, I can either, one, resolve the friction within myself and let go of all my emotional attachment. I tend to be very money and very black and white. Or, [00:10:00] I can change the way I do it. And that’s what I chose to do. I made the decision that feels good for me in the way I operate my business.

And that is okay. Plus, the final reason I stopped offering isolated strategy sessions was for the curiosity factor? I am a curious creature. I love to learn and I want to see how these things play out. And I want to be able to be in the middle and make adjustments, if needed, to be able to make sure our strategy is successful.

I’m excited about this. So that’s why I stopped offering strategy sessions as an OBM. I used to do it as a once off thing. I don’t really do that anymore. Sometimes I might do it in very special circumstances, or if [00:11:00] it is someone that I work really closely with and, for one of my business besties, I’ll do things like that, but not as a business model anymore.

And what I want you to walk away with is the understanding that it is okay. Number one, if you don’t want to offer strategy sessions, even though everybody else tells you to. Number two, it’s okay if you do want to do that, it’s totally fine. And number three, it’s okay to make decisions in your business that aren’t just about money. It’s okay to make decisions that change the way you feel about your business, or keep you feeling excited and happy. And what you’re doing is having an impact. That’s a good thing. So I really hope that that gives you some food for thought. Gives you a little bit [00:12:00] of insight into my brain and the way that I see things and approach things.

If you’re listening to this episode and you’re thinking, yeah, Leanne, this is great. Thanks for sharing. Please leave me a five star review. That’s how other OBMs find out about this podcast. It’s how I know what I’m talking about is making an impact and what to talk about more, or send me a DM. Find me on Instagram at leannewoff and say, Hey, I listened to this episode.

I wanted to drop in and say, hi. I love connecting with my listeners. I love knowing what’s going on in your world. So please, DM me. Talk to you next week. Bye!​ [00:13:00]