The Structure & Policies That Support Your Team with Kate Tyson

[00:00:00] Susan Boles: Imagine your key employee needs to suddenly take extended leave. Is your business financially and structurally prepared to be able to handle that without a hitch? I'm Susan Bowles, and this is Beyond Margins where we dive deep into creating businesses that not only survive. But thrive through unexpected challenges.

 

We're wrapping up our series on sabbaticals, leaves and breaks with a critical look at the structures that support these absences, finances, and human resources from personal stories to operational strategies. This series has covered the spectrum. So if you miss the first three episodes in the series, I encourage you to go have a listen before you listen to this one.

 

Today we focus on what underpins it, all the policies and financial planning necessary to support your team effectively, especially when it comes to planning for you or a team member to be out for an extended time. Kate Tyson is the owner and director of Wander Wealth, a consulting and bookkeeping practices that grows thriving small businesses while investigating new models for being in business.

 

Kate leads with the belief that businesses can help create a more just world that centers people, communities, and the environment. She's also my personal go-to when it comes to alternative business models and building equitable teams structures. And Kate has recently been through the process of planning for paid parental leave for one of her team members, and she's planning sabbatical for herself later on this year.

 

So how does a small business with limited resources manage to offer comprehensive benefits like paid parental leave? That's what Kate and I are geeking out on today.

 

Hey Kate, how are you? Hey Susan. It's good to see you. I am so excited to have you back on the show. So we have been talking about leaves, um, kind of parental leaves, sabbaticals topics around how do we actually figure out how to make that happen? And you have a company that, at least for me, is one of those where you're kind of my, my go-to on.

 

Creating a more inclusive, equitable kind of business model. And so I kind of wanted to start with the idea that your company does offer paid parental leave, which is pretty unusual for a smaller company. So talk to me a little bit about how you decided to implement that policy, why it was so important to you, and kind of how it came about.

 

Yeah.

 

[00:02:41] Kate Tyson: I think it's important to restate what you just said actually, which is it's not. Unusual for a smaller company. It's unusual for any company in the United States that is

 

[00:02:51] Susan Boles: fair,

 

[00:02:52] Kate Tyson: like even amongst huge companies. I think it's fewer than one in four private sector workers have any access to any form of paid leave.

 

[00:03:01] Susan Boles: That's a pretty depressing statistic. So

 

[00:03:04] Kate Tyson: yes. So not just smaller companies, uh, larger companies. Well, I mean the, the immediate context, and I actually, I wish I had a different answer at this point, but it was really just out of necessity. Um, we had a team member who. I was having a baby. So, you know, I was like, okay.

 

And that hadn't, that for some reason hadn't happened before. And so it hadn't come up. So then I started to go into this deep dive of like, okay, like what does that look like? And then I also went through a research deep dive on like, why is the United States so. Abysmally shitty about how we care or how we don't care for humans.

 

Um, so a lot of it was just driven by, you know, we hadn't had any kind of extended family or medical leave prior to this. Um, there's some circumstances where it might've, actually, I wish we had had it. I'm not sure it would've changed things, but I have, uh, had to exit a couple of employees historically by their own choice who had serious medical diagnoses.

 

Mm-Hmm. And needed to take, you know, leave work to, um. Receive medical care. So, you know, this is like, all right, great. This is an opportunity to kind of like rethink things. But you know, once I started to get into it, I definitely have had this like, oh my God, we should have done this years ago. I can't believe we didn't have something like this.

 

It's

 

[00:04:33] Susan Boles: really important. It's so important. And you're right, it is so. It is very unusual for it to exist at all. Talk to me a little bit about, um, both the size of your team to kind of just give our listeners a little bit of a context to your, how many people you're trying to balance this at, and then talk to me a little bit about what you ended up deciding to have as your actual leave policy.

 

[00:05:01] Kate Tyson: So when we're in its current form is just three. People, including myself. Um, we're all client facing and revenue generating. We all have, I guess, books of clients ourselves who do different things. Um, the other two folks besides myself are, uh, do accounting work and bookkeeping. So that's, it's very important to say that is recursive.

 

It is there all

 

[00:05:26] Susan Boles: the time. Always never goes away.

 

[00:05:29] Kate Tyson: It's, you know, it's cyclical and so that's a really important context. Um, you know, the other big part of this, and this is a really important sort of to, and we can get back into the nitty gritty, is that a lot of how you think about and design this will depend on what states you have employees in.

 

Mm-Hmm. Because it's, since we have no national anything bigger companies are subject to FMLA. The Family Medical Leave Act. So, but that doesn't apply for smaller than 50 employees, and that doesn't provide any paid leave. It just means you can't fire people if they're pregnant. Basically, there's some states that now they're about thir, I think it's 13 states and some of those are still.

 

You know, we'll turn on in 2025, so we're not even there yet, that have policies where they have created some form of paid leave requirements, disability insurance, different, and they look different. They all have a little bit of a different policy and things like that. A lot of it for us was designing is we have wander roll, uh, moved from Philadelphia to Vermont in the last couple years.

 

So you know, we're, the business is officially in Vermont. I'm the only person there. Vermont has some fuzzy stuff and it wouldn't really cover me anyway, so it doesn't matter. And then this, the employer that's taking leave is in Washington State, which ended up being extraordinarily fortuitous because they have one of the best, most generous, uh, social policies, meaning the state actually funds and supports.

 

Somebody taking time off. So a lot of it, you know, I was designing with this particular team member in mind, but also trying to make sense of like, well, what is our actual policy gonna be moving forward? And looking at, you know, like this person, it's very planned. Uh, that's like the nice thing about parental leave.

 

Parental leave

 

[00:07:25] Susan Boles: you. You normally know about nine or so months.

 

[00:07:29] Kate Tyson: Most people don't have surprise babies. Although, unless you're adopting, maybe it is a surprise. But, you know, we had some time and so I was designing it based on her circumstances. But I know I, you know, with looking at things, we ended up going with a broader set of circumstances.

 

So the policy itself is a family and medical leave policy. So it covers like. All sorts of rea ways that you might welcome a new human into the world. It also covers caring for yourself, like needing to take time off for your own extended for the medical sick leave. Yep. Part. Okay. Um, like something that would be covered by a short-term disability sort of situation.

 

Um, and then also caring for family members who got sick. Um, 'cause that's also come up, you know, that's come up with So common business all the time. Common, yeah. Yes. Humans have bodies, uh, and families. They have family members and so like these things come up. That's sort of all the context. What's tricky about this, and I've worked with a couple clients since about like building out their policies.

 

When you have multi-state employees, it gets very complicated because you have to kind of look at what states. Have different rules and who funds things? Does anybody else fund it? Can you have somebody else fund it? And that's all gonna be driven by the state. So I had to kind of weigh Washington's a bit of an outlier in that um, their funded paid leave policy will cover up to 16 weeks of salary for somebody.

 

His, so

 

[00:09:03] Susan Boles: like, that's not. Uh, bananas for the world, but man, is that really generous? Yeah. For I know. Anywhere in the us. I know,

 

[00:09:14] Kate Tyson: I know. Yeah. I mean, the, the world's average is six months.

 

[00:09:18] Susan Boles: Yeah.

 

[00:09:20] Kate Tyson: This like, sounds crazy here, but it's like. Really not. Um, so they'll cover up to 90%, which is also a lot. That's a lot.

 

Yeah. I mean, there's almost nothing that we'll cover. I think I'm comfortable saying there's nothing that will cover a hundred percent. Um. That feels fair. Feels fair. But uh, but Washington covers up to 90%. So, but 16 weeks is an outlier. So I ended up setting our policy at 12 weeks. 'cause that was sort of the standard.

 

That seems to be a little

 

[00:09:49] Susan Boles: bit more common.

 

[00:09:50] Kate Tyson: Yeah, I mean it made it match like where the other places where we've had employees and would employ people. Um, so this employee's taking six weeks, 16 weeks, the. Four additional wander rolls. Not paying anything about it, it's, it's officially unpaid. Except she'll be paid by Washington States.

 

She'll paid by the state. Yes. Right. Yes. Okay. But there's some stuff like that that you have to kind of balance out, which is like, I. I would love for people to be able to take that much or six, six months even. But that's not really feasible in terms of like equitable treatment of different employees under different circumstances.

 

And that's one of the weirder part and like complicated parts of figuring this out out. Well,

 

[00:10:35] Susan Boles: yeah. And especially if they're in different states that have different benefits. If you just happen to be lucky enough to live in a state. You can extend, you're right, not equitable, but you might as well take advantage of the fact that you happen to live in that state.

 

Right, right. So when you were thinking about like 12 weeks, 16 weeks, looking at the different states, when you were setting 12 weeks, did you set the 12 weeks on the assumption that your company would end up, like, were you planning on. The company funding that leave with potentially other people funding if they happen to live in a, in a state that has benefits.

 

[00:11:15] Kate Tyson: Yeah. So the way I worded it, and you can steal this if you're listening 'cause it works well wonder well will fund up to 40% difference between any third party benefit. So that could be like Washington State has a social funded thing. It basically works like unemployment insurance. New York State where we also have an employee, they have also have a mandated paid leave.

 

Yeah,

 

[00:11:41] Susan Boles: they have like a pay you pay in like it's unemployment insurance, sort of. You

 

[00:11:45] Kate Tyson: pay it? Well, you actually obtain disability insurance for New York State. Okay. So it's like you pay in similar, it's like another payroll deduction thing, but it's disability insurance, so it has a sort of narrower scope.

 

Okay. Like Washington's. Stuff will cover a broader range of circumstances. So again, this is like where it gets really weird. So it gets really

 

[00:12:07] Susan Boles: weird. And you know, most of our, most of the people I work with, I'm sure a lot of the people you work with, like we have multi-state employees. That's very, very, it's very common.

 

Common now. Yep. Yeah. Um, and it does make. HR and benefits and all of that. So much more complicated than it needs to be. Yes.

 

[00:12:24] Kate Tyson: That's

 

[00:12:24] Susan Boles: a

 

[00:12:24] Kate Tyson: whole ramp for another day. Yeah, totally. So, so I plan to sort of figure out like, well, what gap. Do I feel comfortable committing to in the future? Like it's not gonna be a hundred percent, like I just, with knowing that we'd have to hire coverage and stuff like that, that would mean floating a whole ex extra payroll.

 

The whole person? Yeah, for a whole person. Basically. A whole free person. That seemed too much. So set it 40%. Under a lot of circumstances, that means that somebody will end up getting a hundred percent of their salary for that 12 weeks between like under the circumstances of like who's employed at Wonder, well, what states we have right now.

 

That covers a lot. Now there's still stuff it doesn't cover. Like somebody in New York State wanting to adopt a child and take time off, like wouldn't cover that. Okay.

 

[00:13:19] Susan Boles: They would get something. Yes. Versus at a lot of companies, they would get. Nothing. Sorry. Too bad. So sad. Hope you can figure out how to survive this or come back to work immediately after you've had a kid.

 

Yeah. Yep, yep. Okay. So you have one of your team members who's out right now on that parental leave for 16 weeks and. As you mentioned, there's three of you and you're not doing project based work. It's not like you could just be like, okay, great, we're just gonna pause all the projects that that person is gonna work on.

 

Um, so that's a really big lift for two other people to take on a whole person's job. So tell me a little bit about how you approached actually planning for this person to be away for, you know, a good portion of the year actually.

 

[00:14:07] Kate Tyson: You know, there's a couple chunks about it. I think. Um, it's nice with babies that you have a bunch of time.

 

There are certainly circumstances in the realm of what we're talking about where somebody could need to leave with very little notice.

 

[00:14:26] Susan Boles: Yeah. For medical stuff, for sure. Medical

 

[00:14:28] Kate Tyson: stuff or illness, whatever. And that would be like a whole different. Sort of triage situation, um, in terms of like the coverage and stuff like that.

 

The timing worked out impeccably in terms of the, like the realm in which we're talking about because this person's due date was like end of February, beginning of March, which puts us just on the other side of bookkeeping. Busy, Susan. That's

 

[00:14:55] Susan Boles: why I'm like, that's, that's such perfect timing. 'cause you've finished all the year end stuff.

 

I know. That's so like if, like it would've been

 

[00:15:01] Kate Tyson: a January. Second baby. That would've been really difficult. That would've been really hard. Um, so we, so we looked up in that way and that we could plan to kind of close out the year with everybody and then sort of turn February turn to like, okay, operation transition.

 

So some of it was figuring out like, okay, what coverage do we need? Like where can we move work around? I ended up having some personnel changes happening like in the fall, winter, and really got lucky 'cause a former employee ended up coming back and been like, can I come work? Can I come back? So rehired her.

 

So didn't ha you know, she was familiar with some of the clients and training and stuff like that. Training. All the systems helped. Yes. I knew this like from the fall, you know. The, I knew that what, like all of the timing and all of these circumstances. Uh, at some point in the fall, I don't remember exactly, so I had, you know, at least a quarter of kind of planning time ahead.

 

So even I think three months out I talked to. A freelancer that we use sometimes in project work and got her committed and looped in, started to sort of figure out like our communication plan, how much overlap we would wanna have. Mm-Hmm. Um, like especially with like the kind of work we do, somebody can't just pick it up day one without any prep and know exactly what to do.

 

Right. Um, so we ended up planning for about three weeks of overlap for everybody. Okay. Um, to do a bunch of planning. So that was like freelancer came on, uh, started to shift stuff onto other team members' plate and like do some, like a bunch of training on specific clients and like their particularities, uh, during that part.

 

So by the time, uh. Employee was going on leave, they, we'd already had about two and a half weeks, baby ended up coming. She ended up having to leave early, which I also sort of anticipated. I was like, we're gonna front load this. We're not in control here, so we're gonna try, we use that third week as like buffer of like, let's pretend like you're gonna have most of everything kind of wrapped.

 

Yep. You know, and in this case it's. We have a defined number of clients, so we know who they are, we know what they that takes, looks like and stuff like that. So we could kind of figure out the plan of who got what, what that coverage was gonna look like and that plan. So that, that's sort of one big chunk of it.

 

Mm-Hmm. The other big part is just around systems, like, and documentation and all of those things. Uh, I hadn't even thought about this as an issue because we have so much of that, right?

 

[00:17:52] Susan Boles: I mean, and bookkeeping and finance work lends itself well because it's very, it does. Repetitive and you're doing mostly the same thing, and a lot of it crosses from client to client.

 

Tell me more about what you ended up feeling like you needed.

 

[00:18:06] Kate Tyson: So we had, you know, we have a, a lot, we have extensive checklists and templates and blah, blah, blah, blah. But at the same time, every, every client is unique and has their own quirks. And particularities and journal entries and sales tax and blah, blah, blah, blah.

 

So, so there was stuff to like plug in. We have processed documentation for every client already. Okay. And those are the kinda things that like. In an idealized world would get updated all the time. And reality of course, don't because that's just not how people work. Uh, so some of it was like just identifying like what details did we need to update?

 

Were there like loom videos on particular like complex accounting practices that are particular to a certain client that would be helpful as reference? So there's some kind of like reference materials that got built out Mm-Hmm. That were particular to like. This one thing is kind of a 12 step nightmare, so I'm gonna loom video it for you and then like, you know, so I would say largely this is like one of those good stress tests.

 

Uh, yeah, for sure. Just imagining trying to do this for a client will show you where your holes are. Um, and this was one where I was like, oh no, we got, actually, this is like the least of it.

 

[00:19:28] Susan Boles: So let's talk about, uh, the financial aspect. So as you know, as we were talking, you're now paying 40% of somebody's salary that they're, I'm not, well, you're not,

 

[00:19:40] Kate Tyson: you're Washington State is very helpfully paying.

 

Pretty much all of it. Most of it, Washington state's paying 90%. They also have a grant for small business owners if you have to hire temp coverage.

 

[00:19:54] Susan Boles: Man, I'm moving to Washington.

 

[00:19:55] Kate Tyson: I know, I mean, it was a, it was such a pain in the ass to set up employment stuff there. I was grumbling for months about it, but now I'm like, no, nevermind.

 

I love Washington. This is great. Um, no, I think pretty much most of it's covered. There's like a little bit of extra payroll. We had a little bit of up, you know, at the beginning and at the end. Mm-Hmm. 'cause there'll be some transition stuff. So that part, like, you know, we got really lucky. I will say though, the other big part about this, and this is like the prep and the financial part, is while you know our work is recursive, we would normally open up new client spots if we had them in February, March.

 

Right. I. So in this case, I actually have, I've like had this wait list sitting for far longer than we would normally do, and we're not gonna open up any of those spots till, uh, we have full team back until the team comes

 

[00:20:50] Susan Boles: back. That makes sense. There's a combination of like, planning the level of work and also making sure that you're working at a capacity that is manageable for the existing team.

 

Yeah, yeah,

 

[00:21:02] Kate Tyson: yeah. Like not. We're less profitable than we normally would be, and there's like a little bit of shift in sort of how the financials would normally flow. The really important part about all of this though, is that even if somebody needed to go off today and have that 40% covered, I'm That's fine.

 

Like we have planned for profit savings to care for the team. Like that is one of the fundamental purposes of that.

 

[00:21:30] Susan Boles: And was that something that you. Created in conjunction with this policy knowing that somebody might use it, or you're like, do you have a separate reserve that you've set up as part, like, you know, allocated for this kind of container?

 

Or it's just you make sure that the level of your reserve is adequate to cover this if it needs, if it comes up,

 

[00:21:53] Kate Tyson: I just make sure that we have an adequate reserve at all times, like. Profit's, not just my personal business owner slash fund. The entire team generated that value and like we all get to use it to take care of ourselves.

 

Like that's why it's there. All of that. So doing really dumb things like. Over expending at the end of the year for tax purposes. Like I don't do that. I tell everybody not to do that. Yeah. You know, like it's a bad idea, you know? So some of it's just, and I would say since the pandemic, I've been more conservative about what I want our reserves to be like.

 

[00:22:31] Susan Boles: Likewise, like back before Covid, I think, uh, most of us financial professionals were like, ah, well you should have like, you know, three to six months, but like, don't, it's not like a big deal 'cause nothing's gonna completely stop you. Like you'll have some really, really, and yeah. Now that we know that like things can completely stop for like a year, um, I think everybody has gotten a lot more.

 

Um, conservative in terms of making sure that their reserves are really adequately funded. Talk to me a little bit about how it's gone, you know, as this is the first time where somebody's like really gone for an extended period of time. Yeah. Like has there been anything that you didn't anticipate or wished that you had prepared or just you, you did a good job of preparing and.

 

Things have been running pretty smoothly.

 

[00:23:23] Kate Tyson: We did a really good job of preparing. The team, did a fantastic job of preparing, um. I think there were also things that we prepared clients for and we kind of over-communicated. And even still, I think there was one client that was like, oh, I didn't read any of your emails.

 

I had no idea who she was called. And so it's like, you can't, you know, you can, you can't communicate this stuff enough. Um, but we did let people know in advance, like expect stuff to be non on schedule. Like the

 

[00:23:53] Susan Boles: month of March stuff will probably be late. Talk to me a little bit about your approach in terms of communicating that to clients.

 

Was it just an email? Did you do phone? Like how did you actually approach letting clients know that this change was coming and how to prepare for that? Yeah,

 

[00:24:10] Kate Tyson: I just, we just sent mass emails. Uh, I think the individual team members followed it up, like where, as needed, sort of with the transition and just like letting folks know what was going on.

 

Phone calls would be overkill. Almost like I am making a bigger deal about it than it needs to be. And sort of, you know, like I feel like sometimes people want to like over reassure clients and that's about their own anxiety about it more than what clients need. I mean, we let people know sort of that it was coming, they were gonna get shuffled around with who their, uh, manager of their accounts was.

 

Then we let them know who they were gonna get and also let them know like, Hey, there's some things you should expect. We're gonna be like doing this big changeover stuff will probably be off, you know, could possibly be off schedule from what you're normally used to. And also let people know, like if you have any, if there's any sort of deadline pressure, let us know.

 

'cause we'll figure that out.

 

[00:25:06] Susan Boles: How far in advance did you start letting clients know?

 

[00:25:11] Kate Tyson: Not that far. I think we let them know first thing, like in January before a sort of end of end of February, so maybe six weeks out. Okay. Two months out. We knew a lot longer than before we started telling clients about it because they don't need to know.

 

It's like,

 

[00:25:25] Susan Boles: well, no, and it's gonna make them more anxious. Like I was curious as a. If you, uh, went with the, Hey, this is happening next week, don't freak out about it. Or a, a longer term. 'cause you know, different clients get anxious about different stuff. Yeah. So yeah. Further out then you might have like unnecessary.

 

[00:25:44] Kate Tyson: No, we didn't. We gave them, yeah, probably about six weeks max or something like that. The only things that we received as communication back were like, effusive, excitement, and congratulations. So,

 

[00:25:57] Susan Boles: but I think that also speaks to the kinds of clients that you work with. You know, a lot of us that have businesses that we're trying to be more equitable or calmer or more.

 

Really just kinder businesses tend to, we get to work with really cool clients that the reaction to, Hey, I can't do this thing is, that's great. Take the time. Take care of yourself. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Um, and so I think that that speaks to the kinds of clients that you work with as well. We have a zero

 

[00:26:25] Kate Tyson: tolerance for assholes policy.

 

So

 

[00:26:27] Susan Boles: save. How did you kind of manage that? Conundrum. As you were thinking about offering the benefits or the leave policy, how did you balance the desire to make sure that everybody on your team is adequately taken care of and knowing that there really aren't? I mean, Washington apparently. Cares, but most of the other states don't.

 

Um, and they don't follow Colorado programs. Colorado doesn't care. That's, I'm like, Colorado, Arkansas cares even less. But like how did you balance that, knowing that in a lot of places, potentially, that you might be hiring team members there, there isn't a system at all. So you decided that, you know, 40% was the right.

 

Number for you, but can you talk a little bit about how you navigated kind of that dichotomy that. That tension?

 

[00:27:27] Kate Tyson: Yeah, I mean, I think some of it, it's, it's just the work of leadership all the time, which is balancing the immediate needs and circumstances with the longer term. Mm-Hmm. So, you know, like wanting to overcommit resources in the short term to care is neglecting the longer term project.

 

You and I probably see this all the time with, uh, like payroll. I love helping people figure out how to pay their people more. But you also can't over commit that 'cause it'll kill your business at the end of the day. Yes, it will. I think some of it is just being really, like for me it's just being, I think continuing to be clear about the, the longer term sustainability and stewardship and like what I felt like we can commit to within.

 

You know, the constraints of like, I still want people to have jobs in five years, so, right. Yeah. Like, you know, I'm not, I'm not gonna, as much as it would be cool to like fund more of that, um, if it's gonna ultimately harm the business, that end ends up harming all of the individuals in the business.

 

[00:28:36] Susan Boles: Yeah.

 

So as you were thinking about your. Reserves. I think a lot of the time when we think about planning for a leave or a break or a sabbatical, um, some of those are planned and some of them are unplanned. Is your level of reserves set, so like one member of the team could be gone at a time or did you consider or address the possibility, like what happens if there are overlapping?

 

Issues, not necessarily likely in a team of three, but, um, I think, um,

 

[00:29:10] Kate Tyson: you know, I haven't thought about that too much. I feel like that level of. Worry and planning is probably more than my, I'm like ever gonna,

 

[00:29:19] Susan Boles: is is my level of anxiety, not your level of anxiety. That's, that might be another way to, but what if the worst happens?

 

[00:29:28] Kate Tyson: Yeah. I mean, I think the other part is like my personal life is also secure and abundant and so like I'm well resourced individually, the business is well resourced. Mm-hmm. If something catastrophic happens, like I could absorb some of that risk personally too. Okay. So there's, which is another way of saying that like there, there's a lot of choice.

 

It's not like I'm leaving money in the business at my personal expense, which I think is important to say, like it's, it's balanced. Another way of saying is like, this is just, I'm ensuring I have choices, which is, which is a good lesson to have like come out of the pandemic if you can. Create it. Like that's, that's the point of having profit and resources is like caretaking, future opening up choices.

 

So I think that's, that's sort of the, like, maybe the extent to which I, I, I don't, I don't think about maybe as much as you have.

 

[00:30:28] Susan Boles: Are there other ways that you have built in outside of maybe financial resources or HR R policies, like a leave policy? Are there other ways that you think about that or build that in to support your team, your clients, your community? I.

 

[00:30:44] Kate Tyson: Probably honestly at every level of work all the time, like the, I think that for me, that's sort of the DNA of MM-Hmm.

 

How decisions are made. So this larger policy that we've been talking about, it's in alignment with a larger system of support already. You know, it's always evolving depending on like who's in the business, what we all need. But you know, one of the baselines is just like my team is a pr, we're at the pretty far end of autonomy and freedom of work in that like people can set their hours whenever they want.

 

It's really driven by like. Productivity, not hours. The way that I structure pay and things like that is not about time at all. Like we've pretty much taken time out of the equation altogether.

 

[00:31:31] Susan Boles: Say a little bit more about that, because I think that's something that a lot of people think about when they are pricing the services to outside clients, but not necessarily when it comes to working with their own team members.

 

[00:31:47] Kate Tyson: I mean, one of the things about like accounting and bookkeeping work is when you've, you know, there's a heavy lift with new clients. Mm-Hmm. And then there's certain inflection points in like the work we do. There's a lot of problem solving in it and a lot of like paying attention to systems and sort of what's happening in business.

 

Right. But the baseline work of it gets more efficient over time. Yes. And so like if you pay folks, like there's a lot of norms around paying people in those positions. Hourly.

 

[00:32:17] Susan Boles: Hourly, yeah. That's, that's kind of the industry standard.

 

[00:32:20] Kate Tyson: Yes, and it's a very dysfunctional framework because it means that the best employees will be undercutting themselves.

 

Because they will get faster and like more efficient and so we'll, they can deliver

 

[00:32:32] Susan Boles: a lot more value to the business in an hour than a new employee or an inexperienced employee or somebody who's unfamiliar with the client. So how did you, I. How did you shift that?

 

[00:32:45] Kate Tyson: Really? And there's certain circumstances where folks going get paid hourly for a little bit at the beginning or whatever, but ultimately I put everybody's on a salary and it's benchmarked both like within our, our like framework of sort of level of skill and Mm-hmm.

 

Um, expertise, but also based on kind of level of client work. So it's really, at the end of the day, for me, it's tied to revenue. You have more revenue on your plate, you're just gonna make a certain threshold of that. Like, I've had situations with full, like full-time employees that work 20, 25 hours a week and make a full-time salary and that's fine.

 

[00:33:24] Susan Boles: Yeah. 'cause they're producing a full-time amount of Mm-Hmm. Work and they're just really efficient about it. Yes. I, I love that.

 

[00:33:31] Kate Tyson: You know, there's already a sort of like baseline of folks working around their full lives and their other stuff going on, and like, whatever. And you know, the supports of sabbatical too, in a way.

 

Like, I don't talk to my team very much. Mm-Hmm. Uh, we don't talk daily. Generally, like there's a lot of space around sort of, I think we're more oriented towards focused independent work and then, you know, we communicate when we need to and Right. There's way of meetings and stuff like that. But

 

[00:34:01] Susan Boles: when I think that kind of work culture where it's, you know, defaulting to asynchronous work or defaulting to more autonomous work, I think it's.

 

Hard sometimes for business owners to get to that point. Uh, like it's hard for them to let go of the. Feeling like you need to control and you need to know exactly what everybody's doing at every single moment of the day. But ultimately, when you design your business to allow your employees to be very autonomous, to have a lot of control over how and when, and the kinds of work that they're doing, ultimately, you're right.

 

It allows you to then kind of lift out without disrupting anybody where if you are, quote unquote in control or you're in. Micromanaging everybody. It's so much harder for you to leave because you've basically made all of the people who work for you completely helpless to be able to do anything without you constantly being there.

 

And that makes it so much harder to actually take any kind of break, whether that's a week off or a day off, or you know, a month long sabbatical or whatever. Shifting focus a little bit, but sort of in the same realm. You mentioned that you're planning a sabbatical for yourself for later on in this year, so I would love to hear about like how you're thinking about approaching that, being that like some of the stuff crosses over, but it doesn't all cross over.

 

So, yeah. You know, how are you thinking about planning for that now?

 

[00:35:31] Kate Tyson: There's a lot of details I haven't worked out yet, 'cause I'm not, this is something that's gonna be end of this year. But I've been thinking about it for a while, and so I know that I'm gonna take at least six weeks off.

 

[00:35:43] Susan Boles: Are you gonna do it all in one chunk?

 

[00:35:45] Kate Tyson: Yeah, I'm gonna take like consecutive, at least six weeks off. A consecutive,

 

[00:35:49] Susan Boles: six weeks off? Yeah. Okay.

 

[00:35:51] Kate Tyson: I'm gonna be in India, so I'm gonna be rather unreachable for a lot of it. So, um, there's some crossover, but I would actually say I. This is sort of a radically different project in a lot

 

[00:36:08] Susan Boles: of ways. Yeah. I mean, it's a lot harder for the founder and main Yeah.

 

Person to leave than somebody who has a defined specific role

 

[00:36:18] Kate Tyson: that's part of it. Um, sabbaticals are obviously different. There's nothing else to fund them other than to self-fund it. They're about reset deep time off, other interests, all of those things. It's not always true that founders aren't replaceable and you can't have people step in pertinent to this.

 

There's a client I stepped in to do sort of racal business management during one of the partners, uh. Parental leaves, uh, and it's great. I got to do a bunch of like home renovation of the business while they were out. And so there's some circumstances where you could have somebody else step in if you needed to.

 

Uh, with the kind of work I do, I'm definitely not replaceable. Right? So we'll be working around sort of that with the timing of it. I actually don't know that it ma like. Really is gonna impact much of anything. I usually have two to three weeks off of work around that time of year anyway. So some of it will be like, you know, we close for winter break, everybody's off.

 

I take a bunch of time around that year for sort of reflection and planning. I don't talk, I usually don't talk to clients till after MLK day in January. Mm-Hmm. So there's sort of a lot of space already built in. I think the other part, and this is sort of like a secret of my business, is that bookkeeping is January, is bookkeeping busy season, like December and Jan, February 15th.

 

It's like full on. But nobody needs me there. Like I, my job is just to, again, get out of everybody's way. I don't work in that part of the business in that capacity. So it's also like a good time to sort of be out of everybody's way and gone. 'cause the team generally needs me the least then 'cause they're so busy.

 

Um, because they're just doing year end closeout and 10 90 nines and stuff like that. So that's sort of like what some of the stuff I know. I think they'll probably be some. Not taking new clients on for a bunch of period around that and like just being conscious of sort of what I'm starting up, new cycles of work with folks or things like that.

 

I have a bunch of long-term advisory clients, like we'll probably just schedule around this and things like that.

 

[00:38:32] Susan Boles: So I'm curious, when you were thinking about taking a sabbatical and planning for it, did you intentionally plan the timing for this specific time of year? That is slightly easier. You know, a lot of people don't work for a lot of December and the beginning of January it was pretty common.

 

Was that intentional or just coincidentally happened?

 

[00:38:54] Kate Tyson: A little bit of both. So I knew like part of going to India is for an intentional. Trip and that will happen at this time of year. So I knew, you know, like that commitment was gonna happen. And then at some point I was like, I lived in India for a couple years in, uh, in my, in my younger days.

 

And it's been hard for me to fathom even wanting to go back for like a vacation length of time because I've only really spent six months at a time there. Right. And it's. A big, complicated country to travel in and do anything in. Tyler was like, I know I wanna go back. There's like this thing I wanna go back for.

 

And I really can't fathom flying all the way across the country for like two weeks. That seems bonkers. So, you know, and I had this brief moment of like, maybe I could work with a 12 hour time zone prince. And I was like, no, I'm just gonna take this time off. Like,

 

[00:39:46] Susan Boles: that's like, it's, it's a really hard time difference too.

 

[00:39:50] Kate Tyson: And I was like, you know what? I've been doing this a long time. I think it's time to have, have a, have a break.

 

[00:39:57] Susan Boles: Yeah. Have you taken any extended breaks before from the business? I

 

[00:40:03] Kate Tyson: mean, I take a couple of two week vacations a year and. I have a pretty chill schedule these days, but I don't think I've taken like off email offline, like I'm not gonna talk to anybody for longer than two weeks.

 

[00:40:21] Susan Boles: So what part of the planning I. I guess are you most excited about and what part is the most nerve wracking?

 

[00:40:31] Kate Tyson: I mean, the trip itself is the most exciting part of it to me of like figuring out where to go. And, and I, and I think for a lot of it's for me is that like I, um, you know, I've had an unusual life path and career path and I spent most of my twenties wandering.

 

I lived in India. I traveled a lot. I, you know, I've done a lot of things and I think that that spaciousness and freedom has always been a touchstone for me in, in my life, period. Mm-Hmm. I think some of this is wanting to sort of go back and like touch that spaciousness again. I don't know if there's any of it that's making me nervous really.

 

[00:41:12] Susan Boles: Yeah, I mean, it sounds like you have a lot, I mean, one, you have this kind of test case of somebody being out for a while, whether that's you or, but having any member out of a small team is really impactful. Yeah. But also having the financial reserves already ready and prepared and saved to be able to, um, dip into that.

 

That's. That's the point of, of having them. Yeah. Um, so I mean, it sounds like you're, you're well prepared and it can just be something fun.

 

[00:41:44] Kate Tyson: I think just trying to decide whether I'm like really going to be unreachable for the whole period or whether there's certain things that I might need to, like I. If payroll doesn't happen for some weird thing because like some glitch happened in the universe, like right, will they be able to reach me and make sure their paychecks could happen?

 

[00:42:02] Susan Boles: Like that is one of the real challenges with being a founder in a business where there isn't an extensive team. The team is just a few other people. Um, and you know, whether it's an access issue or a knowledge issue, you know, a lot of the times when. A key team member, whether that's the founder or other leadership at a company is completely unreachable.

 

Yeah. Things can go wrong and there might be, you might be the only person that actually has access to do this thing that you don't realize that they don't have access until you test it and you're like, oh, oh crap.

 

[00:42:41] Kate Tyson: I've had a bigger team and I actually, this is, this is gonna be easier than,

 

[00:42:46] Susan Boles: uh,

 

[00:42:46] Kate Tyson: with a larger team.

 

[00:42:48] Susan Boles: Well, and I think also, you know, the way in which you design your business and your service and the way that you kind of approach delivering your services can have a big impact on Yeah. What the definitely end result of that is. Is there anything that you think we should talk about that we haven't touched on yet?

 

[00:43:06] Kate Tyson: You know, I think the biggest thing. The I run into is often people having to confront the limits of what's possible because we don't take care of people in this country.

 

[00:43:20] Susan Boles: Hmm.

 

[00:43:21] Kate Tyson: Say more. So, I think it's imperative to design our businesses as systems of caretaking. Agreed. And at the same time, we can't replace.

 

The lack of social safety nets and the amount of risk that the government, this country private, like large, private sector, has decided to foist onto individuals. Mm-Hmm. Like small businesses are not equipped resource wise to shoulder that. Gap,

 

[00:43:51] Susan Boles: especially not without extensive ability to plan way, way ahead of time and like you have a, having a reserve already funded, knowing that there isn't a social safety net, knowing that likely there aren't other resources to care for your team members having to take on that burden yourself and also having that level of reserves needing to be significantly higher than if there were other.

 

Social services to be able to take on some of that burden.

 

[00:44:21] Kate Tyson: Exactly, exactly. Some businesses are better equipped for that than others. A lot of my brick and mortar folks, they can't do what I'm doing.

 

[00:44:31] Susan Boles: Well, no. 'cause the profit margins are so small to be able to, like they're already scraping it out as best as they can, just day to day.

 

Much less trying to build anything in reserve 'cause. Yeah, those styles of business, the margins are so teeny tiny.

 

[00:44:48] Kate Tyson: I always wanna remind people that it's not a moral failing to have a system that doesn't support what you wish you could do in the world. Mm. And it also doesn't let you off the hook. You know?

 

There's like that tension that we always have to hold between. The types of care that we wish we could support and create in the world, and the ways that, like the larger system fails that. But I think it's also an opportunity to like think about alternatives to like, how do you actually support this?

 

Because at the end of the day, it can't just be your own individual little business. There has to be a larger system. If we're going to. Get to six months of paid time off to care for a new baby.

 

[00:45:37] Susan Boles: As we close out our series on planning for sabbaticals, leaves and breaks, it's clear that taking time away from your business doesn't just happen. It requires intention, preparation, and a supportive framework. Over the past four episodes, we've explored everything from personal experiences and operational strategies.

 

Two, the crucial role of finances and human resources in supporting these absences. Today's conversation with Kate really highlighted a critical aspect of this process, financial and structural readiness. Kate's approach at Wonder Well offers a really powerful model for small businesses who are aiming to provide substantial benefits like financial, paid parental leave, even within the constraints of really limited resources.

 

So if you're thinking about planning a leave for yourself or one of your team members. Here are some strategies to think about incorporating first start planning as early as you can. Having a clear detailed plan for what to do can really make a difference. You can even create a plan for what to do for unexpected or unplanned leaves.

 

You can take advantage of things like lazy training, or you can do a fire drill test like we discussed in the last episode with Layla Pomper. Second, make sure you're building robust cash reserves when you can. Maintaining an account specifically to cover things like leaves ensures that your business can support both expected and unexpected absences financially.

 

And you don't have to build this all at once, either a little bit at a time, can still over time build up a decent cash cushion. Third, make sure you communicate clearly and effectively. Whether you're letting clients know about temporary changes in your team or you're discussing leave plans with your employees.

 

Clear communication helps manage expectations. It helps maintain trust, and it makes sure that nothing gets missed while somebody is away. And last. Consider the policies that you have in place in your business right now. Think about where you can create policies that specify how leave happens, how it gets paid for or otherwise supports you and your team members when you're thinking about all the different leave scenarios you need to plan for effective and well-written policies might be kind of boring, but they actually create a plan for what should happen in both unplanned and planned leave situations.

 

When they're used properly, they can make sure that everyone on your team can take the breaks they need and can care for both themselves and their communities. So as we wrap up this series, think about the structures within your own business. Are they resilient enough to handle a key team member's absence?

 

What steps can you take today to begin crafting a more supportive and sustainable environment for everyone involved? Pick just one thing that you could start working towards today. It doesn't have to be as big as a whole leave policy, but maybe it's documenting one procedure or picking one person to get trained in a new part of the business.

 

Tiny actions can make a really big difference.

 

Now, looking ahead. Our next series is gonna dive into the different types of capital and funding options for service-based businesses. Specifically, we'll explore both traditional and innovative financing options. We'll uncover some strategies for managing your cash flow, and we'll discuss how to align your funding choices with your business' values.

 

So if you've ever wondered about the best ways to fund growth or to manage your financial resources. You won't wanna miss this. And if this series has given you new insights or helped you think differently about planning for leaves or sabbaticals, please consider leaving a review on Apple Podcasts or Spotify.

 

Sharing your thoughts not only supports our show, but it helps other business owners find us, and I really appreciate it.