184: How to Build a Design Business that Fits Your Strengths
Michele 00:00
Hello, my name is Michele, and you're listening to Profit is a Choice. I am so excited to have Carol Lang of Carol Lang Interiors in New Jersey on the podcast with me today. Carol is an excellent designer who has really learned to create her own path forward in this industry. We will be sharing her journey of discovery to clarify what she wants out of her business, and how that work is iterative and ongoing. I hope you enjoy.
Michele 00:33
Every day empowered entrepreneurs are taking ownership of their company financial health, and enjoying the rewards of reduced stress and more creativity. With my background as a financial software developer, owner of multiple businesses in the interior design, industry, educator, and speaker, I coach women in the interior design industry to increase their profits, regain ownership of their bottom line, and to have fun again in their business. Welcome to Profit is a Choice.
Michele 01:07
Hey, Carol, welcome to the podcast.
Carol Lang 01:09
Hi, Michele, thanks for having me.
Michele 01:11
Oh, you're welcome. And we did a lot of pre conversation. So I'm excited to bring our conversation to the crowds. And so today, we're going to start by telling a little bit about yourself, your company. And I would love to hear because you haven't been in business a super long time. And you've done some really amazing things which we're going to talk about today. But just tell us how you started your business and kind of what you even did prior to that, because I think that some of your prior work informs the way you think and the way that some of the tools, if you will and processes that you brought to your design firm.
Carol Lang 01:50
Oh, absolutely. So I started right out of college as a strategy consultant. So my brain was always tied a little bit more to the strategy side of this than maybe some designers might have been. And after a very brief stint doing that work, I decided I wanted to focus on things that were more tangible. So I went back to design school, I went to Pratt Institute in Brooklyn, and I then went from there to large commercial architecture firms. And my thinking was, if I could learn the more technical parts of the business, that would be great. I was young, I was in my early 20s, I wasn't quite yet ready to put myself in a marital dynamic and be an arbiter of taste and style and maybe some other things that came with that. And so I did that work for a long time. And where I landed, after starting to decide, as a designer, I landed as a project manager from that. And as this was all happening in my career was progressing. My family was growing too. I had gotten married, I had my first two kids. And then it got to the point where I thought, you know, this is something that I love, but it isn't working with the life that I have dreams about having for myself. I was commuting to the city I was, you know, back 'n back and forth. We had moved to New Jersey, and it just felt like too much. So I talked to my husband about it and said, hey, you know, I think I'd like to start my own business. And this was in 2013, I just found out I was pregnant with my third son. And he said, Okay, well, let's give it a shot. And you know, we kind of said like, let's have low expectations, we have tiny, tiny kids, stay in it, see if you, you know, can leverage a few relationships and maybe do a little bit of work just to learn the residential side of the business. But we kind of just started really small and had small expectations. And that was absolutely the right thing. And then, as the years have passed, and really in the last two or three years, as my kids have gotten older, and this was always the milestone was when my youngest was in full day school, I thought I'll have more capacity, and I'll have more bandwidth and why don't I then think that that's the time that I might be able to step on the gas a little bit. And I've been incredibly fortunate that the timing of my clients and some repeat business and some other relationships synched up with that. And so the last few years have been very different from those early few years. And I've been busy and growing. And that was when I decided to reach out to you. I thought this is big, and I'm doing this by myself and I could use an expert to help guide me and I think you gave the analogy said You know, it's a lot harder to turn a cruise ship than it is a little speedboat and I thought oh, I'm a speedboat. If I want to make some strategic shifts now this is a really good time to do it. And that strategic part of my brain came back on and, and so here we are.
Michele 04:44
I love that. One of the things that has, I guess maybe even like I feel connected to you and of course, strategy and a multitude of things. But you know, I built my business very similarly I came home from a corporate and more corporate environment, software development. And for me, I wanted to pursue some of the interiors. And I wanted to do it in a way that that blended with the family that I wanted to have. And you know that I think the beauty of the absolute beauty of being able to own your own company is that we get to kind of set those rules, and we get to create the constraints, or the lack of constraints or the barriers. And I, you know, I started my business mostly at night and weekends or during nap time, or during that three day preschool until it just started growing more and more and more. And then next thing you know, I'm on the road for a week, a month, and I'm out doing it, I'm owning my company, but I'm doing what I want to do around my family schedule. And one of the things I've shared in one of the podcasts was we always had a rule that when mom travels, my husband traveled when the kids were little, which was perfect. So his job required a lot of travel early on when I was here. And then now my job can create some travel, especially back in the days prior pandemic. And he was able to be home the entire time. And then what that allowed us to do was kind of shift it. But I then remember Carol, when the kids went off to college, our youngest, our baby, oh, let me go back. So one of the rules that we had was when mom traveled, I would be home by Friday at lunch, because we had Friday night football, the boys are on the field. And we had usually some type of a Saturday event, you know, connected to their high school days. So for seven years, I did everything I could to be home during football season on Friday night so that I could be in the bleachers screaming for the kids. And so that was pretty cool. And it was just one of the things that we talked about, like we can give up mom being gone for a day or two here or out busy here. But this these are non-negotiables. Right? I know that Jeremy and Chandler Quarles who were in the program, and they were on one of the podcasts, I'll put it in the show notes. Their whole reason for working together as a couple was to say, what is the lifestyle that we want to live with our family? And then now how do we create that. And so that's exactly what you did is you took a step back to say, it's costing our family even though there were some benefits to working in the city and the money and the project and the work and all of that there's some benefit, there's a huge cost to the family that you and your husband were trying to build and create and have together. And so it created a stress. And that was one of the things that we talked about was using our minds for strategy to build a business that we love that has its own intrinsic stress without creating additional stress. And so you know, one of the things that I always encourage you all to do is to write down what the life you want to have is when are you going on vacation? Where are you doing? And now put your business into it? I think I even did a podcast about that after I'll have to look it up. Right? Yeah, I did it was create your my first and then create the business to fit the life. So to talk a little bit about how you work through that process, because I think that informs a lot of the work that you and I have done together is having to really sit down with your husband and get very clear on what do we want this to look like with three kids and a life and, you know, really the other all the other stuff? Right?
Carol Lang 08:23
Yeah, yeah.
Michele 08:25
Let's talk first because I do I really think that's super important. How did you go through that? And it's not a one time process. So I mean, it's an ongoing, continually moving thing.
Carol Lang 08:37
Absolutely iterated.
Michele 08:38
Tell us about it.
Carol Lang 08:39
We had a we had a situation in our family where both my mom and Matt's dad were diagnosed with terminal diseases in, I think it was 2017. And at that point, a light bulb sort of went off in both of our heads that you know, we get one shot, we aren't guaranteed any days. And so what we wanted to do was make sure that we built a life for ourselves and for our family, that had us in the places that we wanted to be. And that made us feel like we were not leaving anything undone. We weren't going to wait to do things, I guess was kind of how the how the shift went through our minds. And so, you know, we started to think like, well, what, what do we want our family life to be? Like you said, I have three sons. They're, awesome. And they're, still little, my youngest is seven, my oldest is 12. And for us having somebody here at home when they came home from school was a priority. And you know, one of like you said, one of the privileges of being a business owner was that, you know, if that's a priority, then I want to figure out how, how we can do that. And so we sat down and we looked at our calendars and my husband, you know, during all of the COVID shutdown started working from home three days a week. So that kind of gave him some of that space to do that. For me. It was you know, seeing how I could work and one of the things that I decided was I, I want to work from home, I don't want to an office. And I think what you said before struck me. You know, there are many different ways to build a business. And there are many different sort of aspirational levels of this is what success looks like. And it took some thinking and some processing for me to realize that Success for me was not having a sign on a on a door front right now, I think that is a wonderful thing. And I think it can be amazing. But for me, that wasn't something that I felt like had to be a level that I achieved in any sort of with any sort of speed. So we've made decisions about how we are using our home to make sure that I have a library here that fits. The staffing decisions that I make are to be made that I don't need somebody sitting next to me necessarily all the time. And that if I can build a team of people, kind of anywhere on the East Coast, like that's a great thing, and why not take advantage of resources that are out there that I might not have available in my, you know, little neck of the woods here in New Jersey? So I'm not sure if I answered that. But you know, that's kind of how our thinking has been. And then, you know, we've we sit down regularly as a couple and think about what do we want this next year to look like? How much time do we want to dedicate? Because that determines how many projects I say yes to how quickly I decide to build my team, or slowly, you know what that looks like, and we let our kids in on that too. You know, I want them to feel like this is our family business. And not just, this is something that mom does. And I think the biggest shift that I've had in the last few years is taking my brain from thinking this is just something that I do that is sort of a passion project to Oh, no, this is this is my business. And this is my a big source of income and support for my family. And how do I make sure that we all understand that this is just as important as when dad goes off to his office that has, you know, his job that has an office? Me tuning in and starting to work is equally important. So we've worked through a lot of that stuff. And it's been great.
Michele 12:05
So I want to make a comment then I have a couple of questions on that. First is on the podcast that I did with John Warrillow. One of the things that was on it was built to sell, so how to create a business to sell. So even though that might not be what you're doing right now we're thinking about one of the big mind shifts that he talked about, was really making sure that we recognized ourselves as business owners, really recognizing that we are building a business and being as much in love with building the business as we are with what we do in the business. So in other words, not seeing yourself as a designer, but seeing yourself as the owner of a company that provides design services, you may then step into the role of designer, but what you do is so much more than a designer. And I think when we start to understand that that's really the gift that you're giving your children is that you are the head of a business. And this is what the business does. And that that when my kids started understanding that I mean, they're you know, of course, I started when they were so little like two and four or something. And now here we are, that they're 24. And I was 27. And they see this as a bigger thing than just me, this isn't like, in their podcast, they always talk about my mom's just playing on Facebook, my mom makes money on Facebook, you know, my mom makes money and she sews in the basement, like they didn't understand how big it was until we invited them and showed them that and show them this is where we're looking to go. And this is what we want to do and all those things. So one of my questions to you is you've talked about how you started to define success. How do you keep that decision that you and your husband collectively have made? How do you stay grounded with that? When you see the social media kind of people in there creating these other ideas of this is the way you have to do it? Or this is what it looks like we're this is what success is? How do you stay grounded in what you believe and what you want? And just you don't I mean, honestly putting on it? Well, it is putting on blinders, I have to do the same thing we all do. But putting on blinders and going that works for you. And that's awesome. And I celebrate your success. I'm not one of those women who's like Pooh poohing somebody else's success. I'm like, what you want a girl go get it, but that is not what I want. That is not what that would require of me is not what I am willing to give in this particular moment or season or in that way. How do you because I know you have to we all have to deal with this.
Carol Lang 14:49
Absolutely. And I would be lying if I said my eyes don't get distracted and I don't think that you know I don't get occasionally envious of that and that I don't think that, that looks good. I could imagine how that would feel. But then I come back and I think, who am I? What are the things that are important to me? And I think going through the exercises that you had, if you like, what is your why what are the things that drive you? What are the things that are important to you. And if I can just recenter myself and remind myself, my values are serving families that are busy and have 1000 things on their plate, and that is something I do well. And if I try to then say, oh, and I should also do, you know, affiliate marketing, and I should also be writing a book, and I should also, that's not what's important to me right now. And you know, that doesn't mean that it won't be important to me someday, it doesn't mean that I have ruled out ever having space outside of my house, I'm just hanging a shiny sign on the door. But I have to keep coming back and saying what works for me right now, in this moment. And I remember somebody saying to me once, you can't really make a strategic plan that goes past three years, because there is absolutely no way and this is, you know, top people who do this for the biggest companies in the world, you can't really know what is going to happen three years from now. And I know you and I have talked about it, none of us expected that the world would shut down in March of 2020. You know, that is just impossible to dream and imagine and certainly to tie to a timeframe. So I think reminding myself, who you who this is what this business is now, first of all, does not define me, I define I get to define me. And what this business is now is not absolute, it might scale down, it might scale up. I mean, I think you know, there are, there is no way I can know but all I can do is plan the tools to make sure that I am able to be successful and serve my clients with integrity and, and reduce the stresses of being a business owner now, so that when opportunities come along, I can evaluate them against the criteria that I have determined, and I've determined with my family and said, Does this fit where I want to go? Or does this feel like maybe this isn't right. And you know, I think one of the things that you and I have talked about is that growth is something that is important for me. And it is something you know, I love to learn, I love to grow, I love to try new things, I love to push myself, and business growth is not incompatible with me meeting the needs of my family. I just have to think about it. Like you said differently. It can't be me doing everything. And that has been a mind shift. You know, that's like, I'm not the lady in the basement sewing curtains. I am somebody who is the steward of all of this. And I you know, I think about that sometimes. And I think I will mourn the day that I don't get to do drawings for clients. Because I love it. I absolutely love doing space planning. I love solving these problems. I love figuring this out. Is that the best use of my time? Probably not. Is that something that somebody else can do? Yes. And can I let them do that? And I think that, you know, can I let them have their own joy and find this thing that has given me such joy? And bring them into it? And you know, that's a that's a hard thing. That's a very silly example, but a hard thing to let go. But it's not certainly, you know, If I can do that, then I can do more of what I love in a way that fuels me. And, you know, I'll go ahead,
Michele 18:23
no, you're fine. I was just going to say one of the things that that my mind was going to on on this is everybody knows now because you mentioned that you did strategy and have that background. I love strategy. It's one of my big, big fun points talk about how can we do this. And we do plan three and five years out. But we also know that your four and five are very muddy, and right very, very muddy, very loose, I wrote the word fluid, I think of these things as this big vision that we have. They're all fluid, they shouldn't be somewhat fluid. I would say if we have them so detailed that they're not fluid, and they're so rigid, we have a more of an opportunity for something to break or not work, the more fluid we can be with what's going on, the better. It's like the tree that bends versus the tree that breaks. And one of the things that we also did in really what you've done with your family is created a family strategic plan. Right, right. And I think one of the most clarifying moments for me came when I did the work that you've done. And I said, What do I want to do? Here are the questions that I keep saying and I've kind of rephrase them because the more I say what is your why? What is your mission? What is your vision? I mean, I've been screaming that for 10 years, but the challenge is we've almost become immune to it with the overuse of people screaming at us to do that work right it's not
Carol Lang 19:51
an Instagram mood best right? That's your why your vision and anything right.
Michele 19:55
And so of course I don't think that we throw it out. I have I still use it. I think we should use it at It's imperative. But I think sometimes if we can shift the wording a little bit, and ask ourselves this way, or at least this is opened up my mind to think about it in another way, I'll say it like that. What do I love to do right now, like I, what I love to do right now honestly is different than what I love to do 10 years ago. So to your idea about drawings, I wish I would have told you back in 2010, or 11, I would have told you, I would have never closed my directory work room, and not done that the detail going in and working in collapse, I would have told you that I would have, as a matter of fact, when all of my health issues hit, which caused us to reevaluate everything, we were thinking about expanding all of my work and bringing in people and doing all these things, when everything shifted. So I did have to give something up. But what has also been so interesting in that fluidity part, as I started asking myself in this moment, what do I most love to do? Okay, who do I love to do it for? What is it that I'm physically doing or mentally doing in that process? And what is the transformation that I want to bring about? And so you're really thinking about, what is it that you're good at and that you love to do that brings you joy? How do you best do that thing to bring the transformation. So then you're required to think about the transformation that you bring to the people that you serve? Who are the people that are best positioned to have success in this transformational period, right? Because if you can align all that that's your mission, your vision, your how your why your values all tied up, and just asking the questions in a different way. And so sometimes I know I met with another coach, last week, we had breakfast together, she's sorts of completely different industry, and executive coaching and all that sort of stuff. And we were sitting there and she was like, I've got this client who wants me to do this, and I've got this person who wants me to that I'm trying to figure out, Should I do it? And I stopped, and I said, Well, let me just ask you what this is, where do you make the biggest impact? And what is it that brings you the most joy? Well, when I do this, okay, so if this is what you love doing, and this is the biggest transformation, and this brings you joy, who are the people that that allow you to do that work? Well, this kind of person that said, Okay, so this person that you're asking about, did they fit into that? And she's like, Oh, my gosh, you just solved. Because we get stuck in our own minds, right? I think he was, but serve outside of, or our services have shifted and changed, and we've got somebody like the straggler hanging out. So then what I said to her was, instead of getting rid of that client, is there a way that you can solve a portion or have her hire somebody to solve this portion, right? So outsource this piece that you don't want to do for her? And then can you move her into the model of the transformation that you want? And she said, Actually, I can, I can go in over here. And I can suggest a consultant or contractor to do something. And then I can move her into this part of my program. And then I'm working in alignment and joy. And so I think we sometimes miss our own joy, or, or our own life, or our own family strategy for what it's going to be, you know, I've shared multiple times we do an end of year beginning of year find do with a whole family, you have to be married or engaged.
Michele 23:39
It's our sons, and then our role, our rule when I guess middle school, high school, they were like, this is such an honestly, it's such an intimate time as family, where we put things on the table for conversation that we might not always come up that way. And there's a lot of review and thinking. And so it's a very emotional, intimate family moment. So we made the decision, you have to either be married or engaged. And so we have we have a new attendance at our, at our Family Fondue. And, you know, it's it's amazing to think about because that's when we talk about what is the family, and even now they're grown, what is still the family we're trying to build with all of us and for them, and then how to our businesses and our jobs and our hobbies, how all of it fit together because we're not just here to work. We're here to build a life and what is it the life that we want to build. And how does that fit into it and especially with you know, Metrique Solutions and Scarlet Thread and all the different pieces, I've got so many pieces coming into it, but they've got their own pieces. And that's where you inviting your kids in and having the fluidity of the family strategic plan. You know, how did they get to do what they want to do? You do what you want to do. Dad does what he wants to do, but you all are collaborative and contributors to this family unit.
Carol Lang 25:00
And a lot of it is just like you said, it's communication. It's saying it out loud, like I think, you know, sometimes you just hope that somebody will notice you're doing something and both from, you know, advertising perspective for your business that doesn't make sense and work, nobody's just going to come and like, pick you out of obscurity, you have to be able to tell the story of what you want. And so I think one of the things that Matt and I are trying to do is give the kids the words to be able to say, what their needs are, what their hopes are, what their wants are. So that when they are in a position to say, Hey, I'm being offered this job, or I want to start a business or whatever, then they will have a little bit of language around that to say, Okay, well, the thing that is important to me is that I can spend some weeks every summer on Fire Island, and how do I make sure that I pick a job and a lifestyle that that is compatible with that? And, and so I think there's no, no reason not to start talking about it. You know, in second grade, I, it just, it feels natural.
Michele 26:00
So how did your family meal go?
Carol Lang 26:01
It was great. It was so good. So I had I had hyped it up. And I had said to them all, you know, New Year's Eve, we're going to have this conversation, we're going to talk about sort of whatever our goals are, what we want out of the year, everything else that they were like, Oh, you could probably see the eye roll in Georgia. But yeah, they, you could feel it, but they got their mind in
Michele 26:22
it the first year, the first year, their eyes were like, Oh, you're insane, and now telling you. They love it.
Carol Lang 26:28
They, we had such a good conversation. And I think next year, it will be something that they set on their mental calendars of this is something we are looking forward to as a family. And you know, they were vulnerable, they got to share things with us that, like you said, wouldn't have come up at a Tuesday dinner, it just wouldn't have happened. And if we hadn't asked specific questions about what they wanted to so you know, I think it serves two purposes. It gives them the power to feel like, you know, we're agents in life. And we're not just you know, the kids live in a world where we are telling them what to do all the time and setting their agenda and picking what they're eating for lunch sometimes, you know, and this was like, Oh, I have agency I can I can do it. Yeah, I think that was really huge.
Michele 27:13
I could remember one year the kids were we were asking him. Okay, so here's one of the questions we want to ask you for the new year. I think if they when they first thought that when I instituted this, they were Elementary School. And we did find do number one, because it was it felt fancy, right for them. But number two, there was an activity for them to do while we were talking. So it wasn't like we were sitting having this heavy conversation, right. So in some way, there's all kinds of stuff going on, I would get, we would usually have champagne, and I would get sparkling cider for the boys. And I would give them the champagne glasses, and we just toasted we just made it into a very fun thing. But what I remember is the one year we asked them, Okay, so Dad and I have really thought about the fact that we would love to go to some sporting events this year. And so what we would like to do is find out if you guys would like to go with us? And if so they're middle school by this point, which ones do you want to go to? And they realize that you could actually set a plan for those kinds of things, and then work to attain them and save the money to go there and put it on your calendar. Like there was such a life skill just in that, like, because now you can't go look for a basketball game if you're not in basketball season. So it may do alright, you want basketball and baseball, if you had to choose which comes first if we could only do one, how would you put them in priority order.
Carol Lang 28:37
A bigger trip, do you want to get on a plane?
Michele 28:38
Do you want those things. And so just that type of strategy in the home and in the family is the same kind of strategy that I try to bring to Scarlet Thread into the clients and to you and to people that I work with. I'm curious, so the business that when you did all of this heavy work in the business that you thought again, the fluidity of the plan, right, the business that you thought it would be, how does that compare to the business that you have today?
Carol Lang 29:06
So, you know, I think the business that I thought it would be, I think I thought I would stay kind of dabbling almost like a jab for a lot longer than I have and I don't know if that was a confidence thing or, or what it was or just kind of, uh, not figuring it out. And I think what I have realized is that staying tiny, is pretty manageable. And scaling up is pretty manageable. But this middle band is hard.
Michele 29:37
I call it the muddy middle.
Carol Lang 29:40
Yeah, absolutely. And you know, it's when, to me at least, you know, there's revenue coming in, there's projects, there's work, but it doesn't quite feel like I'm ready to hire somebody to give some of it away. And so, you know, I was head chef and dishwasher and doing it all You know, I just I feel like I was nervous all the time that I was going to drop the ball. And so the business that I have built now has more support. And I think that has been a revelation and a surprise, and I and I wasn't expecting this middle to be so tricky. And I wasn't suspecting that growing would feel easier. And so now I have a bookkeeper and a CFO remotely and an administrative assistant, and I'm in the process of getting into marketing person. And I'm in the process of getting ready to bring on design help. And that has been such a joy to see that growing the team, in fact, is reducing my stress rather than adding to it it is giving me and you know, I know everybody says like, you need to be able to have enough capacity to deal with it. And what I was doing was by holding on to everything, for maybe a little longer than I should have, I was hurting my own ability to see clearly and do the work strategically and kind of step back from it, which I know is one of my strengths, by getting kind of mired in the details, which, and the details are not my strength. So I think that's been, that's been kind of a good, a good shift.
Michele 31:06
I remember, I think it might have been trying to think of when it was we were working on your two together now. But in the first year, I can remember having a call with you. I can't remember if it was the deep dive or whatever. And we like we looked at your pricing, we looked at who you served with the number of jobs that you were working on. And I remember just really challenging you to Carol it because you kept saying I want to preserve my family like you had, you were like I got this boundary and that boundary and this boundary and really good boundaries. I love that though. I think I think that's cool. I had them too with you know, that's why my business grew, grew. And then, you know, when my youngest went off to college, I said to my husband, I said, I feel like I have been holding a horse and buggy and it has been running down the road and I am holding back on the reins. I said I'm getting ready to let him go. And we're going for a ride. And that's what we've done. But I chose to wait to really blossom, if you will into the fullness of what I wanted to do without regard for I've got to be home at four o'clock and have dinner on the table and what's in the crock pot and what's in the airfryer. And what's here and do we have vegetables and like he's an adult he can eat I can eat. It's just it was everyone can heat up a pizza. It's okay, everybody can eat a pizza. That's right. Or we can make one great big pasta dish and eat it for at least a couple of days in a few lunches. So here's what we have. But I just remember you having this shift in this aha moment of, first of all, I made you raise your rates, I didn't make you I highly suggested that it can be recommended to raise your rates like because yeah, again, you have agency in your own business, you can choose to do it or not. But yeah, in fairly not. It wasn't just a flippin it was we looked at your numbers, we looked at the area, you were invalid to the level of design that you were doing. And then we assigned a value price to what you were doing.
Carol Lang 33:01
And Acknowledge that I wasn't junior, you know that this merging a junior rate, I had the experience in the portfolio.
Michele 33:08
And that's right, you had done the work. So now let's lower the price to it. Correct. So I say that because I don't want people to think the first thing that I'm going to say is raise your rates because I don't I don't. Okay, so we looked, we looked at what you were doing, we looked at your body of work, we looked at all of it, and we assigned a rate that was appropriate for the work that you were doing. Well, when we also did that, it immediately showed that you could work less and make the same or even more, if we made sure to capture the value of all the products and services that you're offering. And when you went back and did that work, I just remember your aha of Oh, my goodness, I actually can make even more and not that you didn't know it. I'm not saying that like that, but you sell it on paper with your clients and your projects. So you saw it with your data, that with my personal data, I can see where I can make more and hire and bring on people and fractional capacities, and work less and reduce stress on my family. Right? You know,
Carol Lang 34:11
When you whiteboard it, it like it lit my brain up because I thought oh my gosh, I'm, I'm a helper by nature. It's what I want to do. I want to help people. And I said yes to everything. And it didn't matter if it was the right project or the wrong project or anything else. I just thought, oh, somebody needs me and I will go and I will meet their need. And you very simply said you could do six projects a year. And you could serve your clients so much more than what you're doing deeply. You could make sure that you really are covering everything. There aren't dropped balls there aren't there isn't that lying in bed in the middle of the night. If I have 42 things going did I drop one of them somewhere and I couldn't even parse out which one I might have. And it has been such a good shift for me to think okay, so if I want to do that, then what are my services? And how can I still create a service that serves somebody that maybe doesn't want to have that level of investment, or time with me. And so that's really where I've focused in this last year. And it has been such a joy to see everything on that whiteboard come to life, that I'm able to, you know, to execute it without really changing what I was doing. There's tweaking in terms of the design work, or there's tweaking, and you know, there will always be tweaking, but you know, okay, instead of saying yes to 200 different types of projects, we're going to say yes to full service design. And we're going to say yes to a design day. And we are going to make sure that we do those with excellent
Michele 35:39
And even more with the process of a process. And then yeah, you know, so once again, if you think about it, from the beginning of our discussion to what you just described, Carol, it is, what was the transformation you want to make you wanted the transformation in the project, and in the life of the homeowners that you serve to be a deep transformation, not, not a quick in quick out, not a half done, or it's okay, you wanted it, you also wanted to build a relationship with these people, because you're very relationship oriented. So they would come back again, and again, not that again, not that you weren't doing great work prior to that, you were just doing the work that other people wanted you to do, instead of the work that you wanted to do that brought you joy. And when it brings you joy, you know, I know. And if anybody's listening, you can do it easier, faster, quicker. And even if it's not easy, fast, quick, and it's harder, you don't mind doing it.
Carol Lang 36:35
Everybody's happier.
Michele 36:36
Yeah, it feels different when you do it that way. And I think some of it is interesting, sometimes, I think, a good portion of my coaching. And even if I go all the way back to where I started as an educator, 20 years ago, a good bit of what I do is giving other people permission to do what they love. It's like we are somehow waiting on a permission to say, I'm permitted to price it this way, or to do it this way, or to have this process or to not do that, to say no, to hit the gas to hit the brakes to do whatever that is. And I think a good portion of mine is to show you how if you own that control, that's why I always say if you own it, you can fix it, or you can change it. If I can help you understand the owning of the business, and that you're not making these decisions in a vacuum. You're making him with a plan based on what you do what your team does really well, your products and your projects could shift based on the team members that you bring on, you may find a collective joy, that takes you in a slightly different way, the fluidity of that strategic plan. But you still have litmus test all around you to check. I know another thing you mentioned in the pre conversation was, and also working to your strengths. So what I did was help you think, what is where do we use that strategy that you have? Where do we use all these things that make Carol and that bring you joy intrinsically? Because it's just what you naturally do? How do we take that and help you do that for your clients for the people that you're trying to help and serve? And that has been a big deal for you too, hasn't it?
Carol Lang 38:21
It's been huge. It's been absolutely great. And like you said, that permission has been wonderful for me to give myself I think I'm so quick to give everyone else permission. And I I'm the hardest on myself, I guess we're all the heart. I think we all are. Yeah, but yeah, it's just been, you know, transformative to think that this is something that lets me be myself more fully and lets my clients realize their dreams more fully. And that, you know, I'm giving them permission then to say, It's okay to want to live in a really wonderful space. And for me to say like, I can use my strategy, my ability to build relationship in equal proportion to design. And I think, you know, I've always had a little bit of a chip on my shoulder that I didn't start out as a designer, and that my undergrad was and in design, I wasn't the person who in third grade said, I'm going to be an interior designer when I grow up and I'm going to run my own business. It took me a while to get here. And I always sort of doubted that that was the part I could do. And I think the early part of my business, I spent it building my competence that Oh, I am good at this. I can do the design work. But I almost didn't let myself step into the business owner. That's right, until I had done until I had proven to myself that I had done the design work and you came along at just the right time and said, girlfriend, you can do the design work, but you have a brain that really likes the business owning part. So that's okay, I'm giving you permission to step into that. Just as equally as you know you've stepped into the design piece. and crazy for you thing.
Michele 40:01
Yeah, you know, I think about just some of the explorations that we've done with this either in the Inner Circle or in our deep dive calls, or whatever it's been for even at the workshop, that I think what's been so cool is that ability to give yourself permission. So it started with me kind of giving you permission, and then teaching you how to give yourself permission. Right?
Carol Lang 40:23
I look at world I'm giving myself a lot way too much. Maybe there might be people listening
Michele 40:28
There may be people listening to this that are kind of like, I don't even know, I don't get that. And that's fine. But I'll tell you, a lot of people, if you really sit back and ask yourself, why you aren't doing what you think you want to do, or know you want to do. It's because we're either afraid of the outcome or afraid of what's going to happen. So I think it's also awesome that you've given yourself permission within your own company, to shift responsibilities for things, right, that's what allowed you to bring in the bookkeeper in a fractional CFO and other operational and admin support different things. giving yourself permission to tweak a process that isn't working to you have the ability because you are strategic. You're like me, we can see a pain point that's coming. I can see it before I will tell my family sometimes I'm like, huh, if we do that, my brain is gone. 16 steps ahead. I feel like dr. strange sometimes, and he the one that could come
Carol Lang 41:25
He said, I can see the future.
Michele 41:27
So just what I'm telling you if we stay on this path, and we don't do this, right, we're going to be in trouble. Trouble ahead. Ding Ding Ding. And it's funny, because not everybody appreciates that level of insight. And I can even remember in corporate, people would say, Why are you always telling us the stuff and that was like, if you knew there was a pothole, it's kind of like Waze, right now, right? Where Waze goes, pothole ahead or accident ahead, and you're like, you're thankful. But when people in life say, you can go down that path, I'm going to tell you the potholes to avoid, some people don't want to hear it. But if we can embrace it, and ourselves and who we are, and use it as part of the plan, that was the brain that I also wanted you to bring to the design. And my goodness, the last two years, if there's ever been, I think, a skill set that has been required, I think there are two, three over the last two years that I think have been huge flexibility, communication, and critical thinking. And if you if we all can be flexible, that fluid, we know what's coming, if we can all do that, if we can communicate our wants our needs, our desires, good news, bad news, the same kind of thing. You talked about teaching your children. And then if we can think critically and somehow strategically, we can kind of avoid and move and hopefully take care of things before you get so bad. But I think those are three critical skills. And I think that's things that you are good at all of those. But you had almost separated them from the business like yeah, here's the design. And then in my other life, I'm really good at all these things. Right. I'm reading all those together. Cuz I think you can use that over here. Yes, no, like, it's kind of like InDesign. Oh, my gosh, why didn't you tell me you had that beautiful chair in this other room, and that you didn't like it in that room? It would be gorgeous in this room. Let's pull it over here.
Carol Lang 43:21
So you know, I think you're exactly right. And it's just been, it's been really fun to be able to build on all of these little pieces of my life and history and make sure that it can come together in a in a way that is unique and you know, is different than what other people are offering to and my I'm going to make mistakes and you know, my ideal client isn't going to be everybody else's ideal client. And that's another thing that I thought like, Oh, that's okay. I don't need to be the right fit for every single job. I just need to be the right fit for the jobs that are right for my business and my process are very few right I mean, I think you had said like to meet your goals if you just did I think it was six jobs a year. And I thought six jobs a year. This sounds amazing. And sure enough, like that's kind of the model that I've fallen in not fallen I've very strategically moved myself into but it's a game changer because it means that I can then feel like I'm caught up on everything and I'm not running behind consistently and constantly and it's been really pretty, pretty fun was the other good part. Not just but fun.
Michele 44:32
And I think it's been amazing how your family has seen that because they don't see the frazzled mom. You know, they're seeing a mom who actually has built something that she enjoys. Yeah. And I think we have to also be careful when we build these things that we let if we let them run us into the ground. That's what we're modeling to those that are watching and are looking,
Carol Lang 44:53
Talking to the therapist the other day and she said you know your coping mechanisms as a parent have consequences. I thought, oh, isn't that the truth? And it's the truth for your clients. And for everybody, you know, if my coping mechanism with my clients is to say, I'm just going to stick my head in the sand and avoid any bad news and not tell them, Well, that's going to be terrible for them, because then they're full of surprises down the road that are not good surprises, if my coping mechanism is instead to say, we need to just have a sit down. And we need to talk about the fact that you know, something changed, or the budgets, offer, whatever, I would rather do that now and rip that band aid off, then wait, because that's painful now, but we're just going to make it more fun down the road when everything does start coming in six months later than we thought but like starts coming in, instead of me saying, Oh, I don't even want to show up for the install, because they're going to hate me. Instead, I'm going to show up and say, Hey, we got here, and we can celebrate this instead of just like, oh, this terrible dread in the pit of my stomach.
Michele 45:55
Exactly. Exactly. Well, I, I just want you to know how much I admire the work you did, because we talked about it as Yeah, just made this decision. But it takes it takes a lot of hard work. And it takes a lot of ownership of decisions. It takes a lot of realizing in the entrepreneurial world. I'll tell you this. So you know, I have matric and working with corporate and going back and working with that I talked to another coach about it the other day, when we are in corporate and many times, we're not told to be as flexible, we're told to do what you're told to do, stay in your lane, don't move outside your lane. If you point out processes that are broken, or things that aren't working, you're now being negative, you know, I mean, it's just not as an I'm not saying every corporate environment, but I'm saying,
Carol Lang 46:46
but they have not more boundaries, because otherwise more boundaries and be making all the decisions all the time
Michele 46:52
And, and even bringing them up. And so a lot of times bringing them up gets you labeled, and so people they have, to your point earlier, they learn how to adjust to the management, the parenting, if you will, of that particular what the strategies are, will you take that mindset and move it into entrepreneurial, where you've got to be flexible, and you're going to make a mistake, and you're just going to make a mistake that because it's not built in so many has already made it there, you're going to make lots of mistakes. I now just look at them as and I had to get used to that because I am not a perfectionist, but I am a precision. That's what I like to say, I like precision. I don't care about perfection, but I care about precision. Like I don't care if you left out a comma, that spelled word, right. It's just a weirdness. But I have had to learn and flexibility, honestly, is at the very bottom of my strengths finder. Adaptability, I mean, which doesn't mean I can't adapt. Is that on the fly? No, I like it. I don't like it. I like it, I have to plan to not have a plan, right. And this year, in particular, flexibility is the word that I'm holding on to you. Because, you know, we're going through some health things over here and just life changes and all of it and you're constantly just like, Okay, I gotta flex, I gotta flex, I gotta flex. And so that's a muscle that that I'm working on. But I've watched you work on that, too, that yeah, I'm willing to flex and to move and to challenge an idea, a previously held idea. And that's a big deal. And so I just don't want to miss the fact that this is a lot of time, and quiet introspection, which a lot of us do not give ourselves the opportunity to do because we don't think it's profitable.
Carol Lang 48:37
But it is profitable and like you said, it's not the shiny Instagram part of the business. It's not the beautiful result. It's the staying up burning the candles at both ends, you know, trying to figure out, you know, well, okay, what are my financial goals? Or what is my what is my perspective for the year and you know, you and I talked about it a lot. My goal for last year was to get my process, it's tight, it was almost to be more turned in than turned out. So that this year, I could turn out but last year it was I want to make sure that I get this right for right now, again, it will all change. And that was hard sometimes because the poll is there's something shiny over there. I could do there's something shiny I could do over there. But I had to keep just telling myself if I do this now. And if I invest the time and I invest the brain space, I will be a happier person in one year. And no one will ever know I have done this work. Now that I'm talking about it. I just scale it in the capacity to scale it again. And it got to the point where you know you and I were able to have a conversation where I said, I think my goals for growing this business might be too small.
Michele 49:47
I think I need to steal the ball even now. Not like yours out but now
Carol Lang 49:52
right now. And you said you could do this. I can do this. But then I didn't need your permission in the same way. way that I needed it at the beginning. And so I think you know, and it's interesting. And then my challenge for this year is, as I grow, how do I become an employer and keep this flexibility? Grace, empathy, you know, how do I make that the thing that is who I am as a business owner, to the people who I work with, rather than I need you to come in on Tuesday and get everything done, and remember, go, go, go, go go. And you know, there's some of that that will come in. And if I think we talked, and if we talk two years from now, I would say, oh, my gosh, baby me was such an idiot. But you know, I think it's, it's going to grow and change. And I want to be sure that I am setting the culture just like you did around the dining room table on New Year's Eve, when your kids were six, I'm setting that for the people who are coming into my life to make sure that they feel that this isn't just a job. It is just a job. But it's a job that they need to be able to grow in how do I grow people? If I can grow a business?
Michele 50:59
How do I grow people, you know, when exactly and that comes back to that owning the business, not just being a designer, not as just as bad, but not being only a designer, but designing in a firm in a business that you've built. And you know, I've got a huge team at this point. And when I had to step in recently and say, Hey, I got to take a step out just to do a reset here, take care of some family needs and get again, that's when you know that you've hired the right people that you've got the right team that you have the right clients, I haven't had one client who pushed back and said, I can't believe that you're not taking my call right now. Every single one has been so gracious. My teams have been gracious, I'm introducing team members from one part of my business are another part of my business that have never spoken because I was always the middle person. And now I'm like, you know, person A, me Person B, person A, this is what you do. Person B is what you do. Here's the challenge. I'm out you. Can you guys take care of that? And everybody has just stepped up and said, what can what can we do and how. But what's interesting about that, and what my brains been thinking about lately is, those might have been things that in the past, I wouldn't have thought to handoff and with the challenge that I have now that my time is reduced for a short amount of time I you know, I've got this little season, my time is going to be reduced. It's forced me to hand off those drawings, it's forced me to hand off the things. And it actually has brought me even though those were things I enjoy doing project management strategy, somebody else is getting to do that. And happily, so yeah. But it's brought me joy and peace and ease in the moment, even though it's something I love to do, makes me feel good to be able to empower them and train them to do that. And to see their success in doing it. Because now I feel like I'm a teacher in that. But I'm also getting relief in that right?
Carol Lang 52:57
Well, you're similar to me and that you're a helper you want you want to help people. And I think, you know thinking about growth as not just, I want to make more money, or I want to get bigger or I want to have you know, a sign with my name on it. Growth is, Am I growing? My clients lives? Am I growing my family's life? Am I growing our skills? Am I growing my team's ability to do more? You know, the last thing you want to do and I want to do is be the person pushing down on somebody, we want to be the people who are, you know, trying to boost them and lift them and give them as much opportunity. And when I worked in corporate, I worked for a gentleman who was wonderful. And he said, I will give you as much leashes you want to set the only the only criteria is if something goes badly, you just have to let me know. And I thought that's kind of a nice philosophy. And you know, he was also training and helping and teaching. But I thought, oh, okay, so I'm not under somebody's thumb here. And I think that was a little bit unusual in the organization that I had that much ability, but it was wonderful. It was a gift. And it's a gift that I know you give to your team. And I'm hoping that no I can do to mine.
Michele 54:07
And you will as long as you learn to continue giving the gift to yourself. Yes. Because that right if you don't give yourself that permission, and that gift of making mistake and the leashes long, and maybe that's one of the questions we ask ourselves, suppose how long the leash if we put ourselves on, and maybe you put your own leash too tight, or maybe we put a muscle when we need to take it off, right? So when our kids see how we treat ourselves when we make a mistake, or when we're trying something new. When our team sees how we're doing it. They're going to assume that that's what we're going to model back to them. Yeah. And so you have given yourself a lot of gifts this year. So I'm going to ask you one last question, and that is, what were you expecting out of coaching when you called me I don't always ask this question. But when you called me a year and a half ago, we started working together, what were you expecting out of the coaching relationship for that year? And then I want to hear what you what you felt like you got out of it.
Carol Lang 55:09
So you may remember on our discovery call, I had sort of no idea what I wanted. You said, Well, what are your goals? And I said, I think I'd like to make more than my husband, just because that feels like a fun competition. And I think back on that, and I think I'm a complete knucklehead. the silliest thing to say, I didn't laugh at you, you didn't laugh at me, you kept a very straight face, I was impressed because
Michele 55:32
I can't say it's not something I've thought about. So
Carol Lang 55:35
exactly. And you know, who runs the business is not a little bit competitive and a little bit, right.
Michele 55:40
It's only because it's a marker that we know, if you think about it, it's not really about the person and the dynamic marriage. It's really about a marker that we know,
Carol Lang 55:49
that's a marker that we know, and I think what I came into coaching with was, I think this will make my business more successful. And that proved to be correct, but it wasn't the same path. So I thought, the way my business will be more successful is if Michele tells me what to do, and I do it. And instead, what it was, was you said, no, no, no, I will give you questions prompt, but you need to figure out what your markers are? Is it your husband's salary? Or is it your project, profit, profitability, and you have to be tracking your time, and you have to be setting up these processes so that you're not doing things harder. You know, I think, I think if I had even imagined the self awareness that I would have gotten out of it at the beginning, I would have signed up even faster. And I'm a fairly self aware person. It was revelatory to me to give, it was a gift I gave myself of the time to sit, and think and be strategic, which I love doing. And I forget sometimes that I love doing in the business of life. And I, I found myself in it in a way that I didn't expect. And that has been just beyond measure. And so when you said, you know, you could do this for another year, your business is going to go through a lot more transitions, and having this supportive environment around you. I thought, that's a no brainer. Of course, this makes all the sense in the world. The other thing that I've gotten out of it that I expressed my concern to you at the beginning, I thought group coaching, oh, I don't know, this is an investment. And I'm not sure that this is the fastest or most efficient way for me to get where I want to be as a business owner, as a designer, whatever. And you said, I promise this works, this will be better than if it's just you and me talking all the time. And the community of designers that I have found through this, you know, being a designer is a little bit lonely, especially when you're a one person shop, there isn't somebody to say, hey, how, how do you structure this? Or have you ever had this situation? What do you do? I don't have a colleague that's sitting next to me in my home office that I can turn to and ask that question. And certainly not, you know, at the level that I want to be at. So seeing designers who are a few years ahead of me and business wise or a decade ahead or two decades ahead has been amazing, to benefit from their knowledge, their insight. And it's just, you know, it's been great. You know,
Michele 58:25
it's funny, I don't even I don't even call it group coaching anymore. Because people have an idea that it's, I don't, I don't know what they think I think it's the old dry, you're on your own, you're left and I look at the coaching program that I have, it's more of a hybrid, because there is one to one opportunities built in, in a myriad of ways, one to one feedback, I do provide that, plus a group experience. So it's so much more, but you're right, that first idea is I need you and only you and I went to go. You do need me, but you need a community and a group is also going to need a family here that's going to support you through it.
Carol Lang 59:05
And I love you to pieces but you are not always the expert that I need the answers right. Sometimes it's another business, it's another designer, exactly. You aren't living this business, you are an amazing facilitator and an amazing relationship builder. And you have the business process side of it down. But there are other people that I know.
Michele 59:24
That's right. And you know, to that point, one of the things I say to everybody in my discovery call is I'm not trying to make you a better designer. I'm trying to make you a business owner and a better business owner. And the better that you are at business, the more time you have to be a better designer or to get the resources. So that's the group part is helping build the designer in you. Yeah, the coaching part is helping build the business of you. That's why we do things based on strategy, operations and finances, and the three of those together holistically make you a great business owner to pull in what you need. So that's cool. And my other big thing is to give you, I tell people, when they leave the program, I want you to be able to know how to create a strategic plan. I want you to understand your financials, and I want you to have a framework for decision making. That's it. Because if you've got that, that that self permission that How should I think about this? What is the litmus test? How do I carry this through? If you have that, you can pick it up and put it on any business, any size, business, any type of business, any family issue, you put it over anything, that it's this framework, and then you're like, Okay, take a step back. Now, what do I do even now in my own, you know, family dynamics, I'm having to take all of that same work that I teach, and move it over to family and think through that same lens, because it works. Yeah.
Carol Lang 1:00:48
And I brought that in at the end of last year, to have a strategic planning meeting for the following year. And that was really a cool thing to do, to open up my books, which he you know, can see whenever he wants, but you know, it's not his daily business. And he doesn't think that hard about it just says, Oh, this seems like it's going nicely. But to sit and say, Hey, this is what's happening. You should we should celebrate this, this is pretty cool. Like, what should our goals be? What should my business goals be? But I want you to be a lens of how do they reflect back on this life that we're creating together and with the kids, and I'm proud of you. He was he was cute, he was great. So it was really fun to, to do that, and to have a celebration that, you know, hey, this works. And the finance piece of it, you know, I have a pretty good finance brain. I didn't know how I didn't know what I didn't know. And I think that was wonderful. I thought, oh, I can do my own taxes. And I can I can do it. I can do it all and sure I could do it all. Am I doing it? Well, am I doing it correctly?
Michele 1:01:50
Maybe not so or maybe as deep right that I think that was a big piece, that deep transformation that you want to give you realize that there were areas that other people could give you that deep transformation
Carol Lang 1:02:00
I need to get off of an Excel spreadsheet and trust somebody else to do that. And it has changed the way I think about hiring consultants and other people, I don't that and I in the same way, I hired somebody to help me, you know, get my processes together over the summer. And I thought, well, this would be a fee that I would charge a client and I shouldn't feel any differently than they would feel about if I'm asking them to do this, I should be willing to pay this. And certainly I was and it was great. And it was transformative. And it saved me hours and hours and hours.
Michele 1:02:33
And you spend some of their time billing a client for something you were doing for them doing what you were doing,
Carol Lang 1:02:38
I got to do the work that I am talented at. And you know, me writing SOPs might not be my skill set. So. So that has been really fun to just think differently about resources. You know, I'm always willing to invest in my business. But it needs to, like you said it, we throw it in the framework and does it hit the does it hit the criteria? And if it does, great, if it doesn't, okay, that's an easy decision, then instead of being a agonizing decision.
Michele 1:03:04
Don't second guess it the same way. You don't worry over it the same way. It's just Yep, that worked. Nope, that didn't that's not going to fit. No, thank you. It's kind of like but not, right. It's like going into the, you know, a store and chillin on a pair of jeans and go not flattering. don't fit. Yeah, that's an easy no, like, I'm not going to buy that. Right. So easy now. So that's the goal.
Carol Lang 1:03:23
And in, you know, in a few years, if things are different, I think, you know, then the lens is different. And you reevaluate again. And oh, this thing that didn't make sense two years ago now seems like the greatest idea we've ever had. That's right. So that's right. I think like you said, that flexibility piece of it has been critical in this season, in particular, just a busy life. We all have busy life and pandemics and everything else. But it's you know, it's been really it's been a gift.
Michele 1:03:50
Well, it has been such a darn pleasure. I just can't even stress to you how fun it has been to watch you come in to say I'm not even real sure what I want. I just wanted to do more. And then go through the discovery process of what that is. And not just again, not just I want to, you know, bring in more than my husband. All right. But why does that matter? And what is that connected to? And is it really just the marker that you know? And how do you now set the next marker? Because when you hit it, how do you set the next one? And then what do I do? And what is it that's driving you? Right? I think sometimes we don't even know what drives us. And when we can figure out what drives us. It actually leads us down the path of what are yeses and what our note is a lot more easily. Like, believe it or not, I'm not driven by money even though I talk I'm driven by profitability, which is different because it's not just as I talked about time it's not just profitability of our money is profitability of company culture, is being profitable by hiring the right people. It's being profitable by communicating well, by serving well by helping well by doing well by showing grace well that that creates a profitability because people aren't afraid to show you where they made a mistake. They're not covering things up. And so when you think of profitability in a bigger way, I would rather be more profitable and all those ways and less profitable financially with just the dollars and since then to have more dollars and cents, and not have that level of enjoyment in my family in my life, there's a Bible verse that says, What does it profit a man to gain the world and lose his soul? And that's what I think about I don't want to gain all the stuff and yet be miserable. Right?
Carol Lang 1:05:35
You know, as I have to say, you know, I I reevaluated that after I had done all the financial cleanup and the planning and the thinking, and I don't want to make more than my husband, my goal changed significantly to fit what I actually valued, which was like you said, Not, you know, this competitive marker, but it was I want, you know, control over my time, I want to work with people who I adore, I don't want to say, to have to say yes to something that isn't the right fit, just to hit a number, I want to be able to be selective. And I think you know, that was like, Oh, well, then this is a much better, this is a much better brain space for me to live in, then the other one, which is just fine.
Michele 1:06:21
Because sometimes we think, again, we think that we're making a goal again, because it's the marker that we see, because it's what we think we're supposed to do, as opposed to taking the time to go. But what really do you want to do, and if you hit it, you hit it. But it's not because you were aiming for that it's because you were aiming to serve well. And if we aim to serve well, and we serve well, with processes and everything internally, as well as externally with that client, the money in the profits going to show up. It just does if we priced it well, and we're doing it well. So congratulations, I cannot wait to look at the end of this year and see where you are and I love watching because you're constantly going in I have you go in every quarter every half year and tweak that strategic plan, because you're getting closer, and you can see it. So it's just fun to watch and fantasy and you've just been a delight to play with.
Carol Lang 1:07:12
I couldn't say any differently about you. I love working with you. It's been such a pleasure and a gift to me and my whole family and to my clients whether they know it or not, you know, having your sage advice in my ear has been truly transformative to my business.
Michele 1:07:27
Wow, that is awesome. We got more to come. So hold on.
Carol Lang 1:07:30
All right. Thanks.
Michele 1:07:31
You're welcome. Take care.
Michele 1:07:33
Thank you so much, Carol, for your insight on how to create a business that can fit in with your life and family. We can all learn and take away something from this much needed conversation. Carol is a client of mine and she shared some of her hos in the program. If you're in a similar position to Carol and want to invest in yourself to grow and scale in a conscientious way I would love to assist you. You can complete a discovery forum at www.scarletthreadconsulting.com on the work with me page. Choose to define your profitable life in business because profit doesn't happen by accident. Profit is a Choice is proud to be part of the designnetwork.org where you can discover more design media reaching creative listeners. Thanks for listening, and stay creative and business minded.