Do Your Clients Take Up All Of Your Time?

Hey everybody, it's Tara Bryan. And you are listening to the course building secrets podcast. Whether you're a coach or a CEO, the success of your team and clients is based on your ability to deliver a consistent experience and guide them on the fastest path to results. This podcast will give you practical real life tips that you can use today to build your online experiences that get results and create raving fans. Why? So you can monetize your expertise and serve more people without adding more time or team to your business. If you're looking to uncover your million dollar framework, package it and use it to scale you're in the right place. Let's dive in.

Hey, everybody, welcome to today's episode, I am so happy that you are here, whether you're listening in the morning, or in the afternoon, and whatever you're doing, thanks for showing up. So in today's episode, I want to talk about who owns your time. If you are like so many people who are working either, you know in a job or you own your own business, but you happen to be doing one on one services with your clients, or you're a freelancer or contractor coach. So often, what happens is, your time gets controlled by the people who are paying you, right, so your clients, it's so so often when I'm working with people, this is one of the biggest challenges they have in terms of growing and scaling their agency or their business is that they just don't have any more time I don't have time to work on this, I don't have time to do something different, I don't have time to spend the time that I want to with my friends and my family because the business is just sucking up all of my time. So I want to talk today about how you can take control of your time and take control of what you're doing with your time. Because ultimately, the end of the day time is our most valuable resource, right? It's the thing that we cannot get back money replenishes itself, right, so. So that's not necessarily a limited resource, but your time is a limited resource. Because, you know, as you continue to go, you know, year after year, doing different things time is the only thing that you cannot get back. So it's very, very valuable. So I want to talk today about how you can look at your time how you can look at sort of taking back control of your time, I was just recently triggered by this again. So I spent for those of you don't know my story, I spent many years in corporate working as an employee, and went the very traditional route. This was, you know, the, the, what I was told to do, and all that I really knew how to do was to, you know, do a really good job in, you know, my education, and then you know, get a good job and go to my job everyday, right. And my job was dictated by the amount of time I spent there. And, you know, like every type a go getter personality in my early and mid 20s. It was all about how early Can I show up? How long can I stay? And how can I make myself more valuable, which all of those things, of course, take time. And so that's where I sort of learned this is how you help people, this is how you show up and you'll help them by giving of your time, then I want to transition to owning an agency, the very first thing that I did actually was to have kind of a six month contracting gig where I was going out on my own, I had my own sort of way that I wanted to do things, but I took a six month project with a with a client. And again, the the value that that was that I provided that they wanted me to provide was to sit in their office. And so that meant really going in and sitting there five days a week. And I'll never forget the time where I went in and they weren't quite ready for me to start the project. But we had agreed on the start date. And so they're like great, you know what we want you to come in, we don't really have anything for you to do yet, but why don't you go ahead and set yourself up at this desk. And you know, maybe next week we'll have something for you to start on. And in the meantime, you know just go ahead and you can I don't even know it was like making making copies or something I don't know something really ridiculous but they needed to have me do some things are like you know, just sit in this cube and you know, you can do whatever you want to do and then here's some you know papers to copy or organize or whatever. And so I just

kept thinking you know, I went out on my own to provide more value to I show up as a leader in the eLearning space to really help companies make a difference in their elearning. And here I am sitting at this desk doing nothing. They don't even have a computer ready, they don't have anything, right. So, so it's just like, wait a minute, what am I, what am I doing, I just left my, my job, where, you know, I was I was successful, I was doing some great projects, enterprise level projects, and here, I'm doing nothing, and they're paying me my billable rate, to sit here and do nothing. So I was like, well, there's got to be a better use of my time, then this. And, and so of course, you know, when the project actually started, it was fine. And, but at that moment, I said, You know what, like, I help people create courses create elearning, and that they can use to deliver training virtually, or through technology, I don't really actually need to be sort of rewarded or paid based on how long my butt is in their chairs. And so that was the first and very last time that when I was working on a client project, I agreed to stay on site, on at the client site, because that was totally not necessary. But one of the things that started to drive, my decision making around how I was helping my clients was that I needed to own my process, I needed to own how I was showing up and helping my clients. So that took me down a path of, okay, so if I don't want them to control my time, how do I show up, offer a, you know, an awesome service and way of doing business, but also own my time. And so the very first step with that was really to create my framework like this is how we're going to work together and really helping to lead that process to own it and lead it and say, This is the process that we use to work with you, this is how we show up, this is what we provide to you, this is when things are going to happen. This is the level of quality we're going to give you. So the expectations were set by us, not by the client. So I have colleagues and friends who you know, so I've been in sort of the agency space for the last 20 years. And I have friends and colleagues who still haven't gotten to the point where they are able to show up and own their process. So what that looks like is that the the client just says, Okay, well, this is how we do things. And we're gonna put you in this, this position. And, you know, we need you to show up here, here, here and here. And most often, what that looks like is that, you know, you're a part of somebody else's process, which means that they're controlling your time, they're controlling your energy, they're controlling when and how, and to what extent you show up, which is a really limiting place to be, because that's where you get into the situation where you let your client or your your set of clients really dictate how things are going to happen. So instead of that, the very first thing to do, as I mentioned, is to really set up how you want to work on the relationship, how do you want the project to go? And how can you help lead them to a result faster, or easier, or less expensively than they can do on their own? Right, and so if you can take control of that, the relationship, the how it's going to happen, and, and then walk them through the process, then they are, you know, treating you like your time is valuable, and they're treating you like you're the expert, and you have the answers to help them be successful, which is a totally different place to be in then showing up and just billing hourly for the work that they want you to do. So if you're in that position, really think about how can you take control of your time and your process to not only help your clients be more successful, but also for you to be able to control your time and the the work in which you do. So again, I just was saying I was triggered by this the other day where I'm working on a project that's, that's a little bit more of a traditional project, I'd

say it's it's one that usually my staff takes care of. But I decided that I was interested in kind of stepping into it a little bit because I'm I'm actually working on a process to help people in the position that I'm doing right now be more successful. So for me, there's a you know, there's some some various reasons why I'm doing it. But it's fascinating to step back into a place where I'm working under someone else's process. And and what that looks like and how How they are sort of running through their process. And, and in so, you know, fast forward a couple of weeks and, and, you know, I've got some other things going on I'm going out of town, I've got, you know, various commitments that are that, that really our priorities over my time. And so it's just funny because I'm, there was just that moment that I went back to oh, well, I need to be available for them whenever they want to schedule something. And it was such an interesting trigger, because that's how I used to think all the time. And, and haven't thought that way in a very, very long time. And so I thought, Oh, well, that's super interesting. Why am I thinking that way? And, and, and part of it was that I was sort of partnering with people who had a different process, so I was going to go kind of with their process. And I thought, Oh, that's interesting. So how can I step into that process and add value in a way that also supports my time and my expertise, and, and doesn't make it that I'm sort of at the mercy of whatever it is that they schedule. And so so it just brings me back to that moment of really thinking about when and how do you control your time, and how how very, very important that is, as you are transitioning. So whether you're, you know, doing contracting or freelancing, you're doing one on one services, you are, you know, showing up for your clients in whatever way it is that you're doing projects or, or, you know, various services for them. It's really reminding yourself or creating, if you don't have one yet, that you have a proprietary process, you have a way a path to get people from where they are today to where they want to go. And to get to that sort of other side or whatever the outcome is that you are a part of. And that as an expert, your job is really to define that path and help lead people through that path, regardless of who they are. It could be a huge company, a little company, an individual, or you know somebody else. And in at the end of the day, they're hiring you to solve a particular problem. And so you want to step into that. And then And then, of course, the step after that, once you start to take back your time want to look at how to control your time. And when things will happen, then you can start blocking time, you can start, you know, putting some parameters around the time that you are spending through, you know, controlling different parts of the process, right. So if your job is to write this one piece, then you have your writing time that's blocked, and you can tell somebody, it will be done on this date. And they can look for it. And really, you know, starting by just owning that. And then of course, the next step is really to take it to that next level, which is how do you look at the work that you're doing, be it consulting, or project based work, or you know, any kind of deliverable and look at how you can make that a repeatable process or product without so much of your time and energy included in that. Because again, people pay for results, they pay for value. They pay for you to give them what they're looking for, versus paying you for the time, as I said, when I first started this, this podcast paying you for your but being in their seat, right? Like that's not where the value comes from. The value comes from what you're delivering what you're creating. So how do you own and leverage what you're doing through controlling your time through having a process through creating tools, or templates, or various sort of automated pieces that can help streamline and leverage your time around the process that

you've created? So my course buildings secret tip for the day is really start looking at how can you own your own time? How can you really look at not only what kind of time you want to have in your day, but how do you structure what you're doing does still provide awesome value, but own the process. So somebody is not leading you around, dictating all of your time and energy and when things are going to happen. And so if you are finding that this is showing up in your practice, in your life, that you're just you one don't have any time and too, you are sort of at the mercy of when your clients want to meet. It's time to take control. It's time to set your process on the process and show up differently in your business. So you can really decide, you know, when you're doing things and and how often and, and set, set your boundaries for that. So hopefully this episode serves you today. If this is one of the challenges that you're having, this is really what we help our customers focus on is how do you package How do you create process? How do you create systems and automation that saves you a heck of a lot of time, so you can go out and do the things that you love to do on your own schedule. All right, there you go. Hopefully you get one or two little tricks and tips out of this, this podcast, and we'll talk soon.