About four or five years ago things were going very smoothly here at Heart of Business. I had a virtual assistant, Susan, the same one we have today. I had a full client load, our courses were full, I wasn’t working too hard. The easy life, if I may say so.

Then, I had a clear message, one I tried to ignore, but couldn’t really. “You need to learn about teamwork, leadership and collaboration.” Really? “You need to learn about teamwork, leadership and collaboration.”

Oy gevult. Okay. I can do that.

It meant turning Heart of Business into a company instead of just a solo practice. So I started to do a few different things:

• Brought on more help, including a full-time administrative/operations person.
• Ran a beta practitioner training program, and brought on practitioners to work with clients. (Look for a full blown practitioner training program in the second half of 2012.)
• Start to think, or try to think, strategically in creating more long-term plans.

I learned a few things along the way. I learned I am not the most gifted team leader. I learned that I’m far more visionary than I thought I was. I learned that you can easily weigh down a small business with too much overhead.

In fact, it may not have been very noticeable from the outside, but we had a bit of a squeaker at the end of 2010 cash-flow-wise. The company was working, things were in flow, but we had over-invested in team, and the expenses were catching up with us.

It was an expensive mistake, and one many small businesses make, miserable, miserable.

If you were around Heart of Business the end of last year, you know that one of our team members resigned, which was sad, but also permitted us, especially me, to regroup and reorient.

After a few months with a skeletal crew we were blessed to have a new person show up, Christiane Holbrook, who has made a huge difference to the way we are developing, and who has introduced me to something I never really understood before.

Introducing Project Management. Huh?

Project management is a particularly dull topic for your typical visionary business owner. But let me tell you something: once your business gets beyond a certain level of complexity, project management is where it’s at.

The recent relaunch of our website took a little over six weeks from the first team meeting (me, Christiane, Tzaddi, and Meris), to the launch. I can’t tell you how many website launches I’ve seen stretch out to four, six or even twelve months.

The difference is that someone (Christiane) was watching what we got done, and how we got it done.

There’s Project Management and Then There’s Process Management

Project Management can sometimes look like baby sitting, where someone is checking daily on different team members to make sure that tasks are getting checked off, and there is flow between everyone. This can be incredibly wonderful, except that we want to build a team of self-accountability here.

Christiane made a distinction between project management and process management. Process management is different in that you identify and outline a process whereby things get done. It involves taking a list of tasks and turning them into a system that can be repeated, perhaps with some variation, next time you do something similar.

Instead of daily project management, we’re working towards weekly, monthly and quarterly process management. It’s incredibly freeing.

I don’t yet have the definitive answer to all of this, because we’re in the middle of it, but so far it’s been a beautiful, errrr, process.

When Is It Time for Some Process Management?

Except perhaps in the earliest stages of business building, which I call “Creation” when it’s all about play and exploration, you can always use some thought given to creating better systems and support structures for how you do things.

But to have a true process/project manager, I think you need to reach at least one of these three benchmarks. If you have no mind/talent at all for basic project management, you may need it earlier. If you’re good at it, you still may need it earlier to free you up to be the visionary of your business.

1. You are finding yourself overwhelmed with repetitive tasks.

You have things that need to be done on a regular, or semi-regular basis. It’s one thing to create a checklist and make it a “system.” It’s another to take the time to rethink the entire process and how it could be done easier.

And even another thing to think about how to create it as a project that someone else could do.

2. You are finding yourself overwhelmed managing any help you have.

You may have already hired an assistant of some kind, and they may be helping you tremendously. However, you realize that you are feeling heavy, burdened, or otherwise even annoyed when they come to you asking for questions or input.

There is some way you are creating yourself as a bottleneck. The solution requires both letting go of control, meaning giving the person doing the work the power and responsibility to make decisions, as well as getting more clear on the process itself.

3. You have more than one team member.

You may not have any employees, or anyone even close to full time. But if you’ve grown to the point that you have a team, you are probably really feeling the overwhelm from number two above.

Unless you are an experienced team leader or manager, you may not know how to run a team effectively. In which case you need help sorting out the process of running the team.

Finding a Process Manager

It’s not as easy as finding an administrative assistant. Plenty of people can get things done, but many of them don’t think in terms of systems or processes. You have to keep your eyes open to make sure the person you engage can help re-organize your processes from scratch and bring them into a high pitch of efficiency and ease.

Since we’re embarking on this, I’m still learning myself. I’m curious if you’ve had experience with the difference between project management and process management? What are your best tips or questions?

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The Short Story Version

Kate resigned. We went into emotional turmoil. Big insights and learnings. We’re reconfiguring Opening the Moneyflow slightly, including beefing up the DIY program. I’ve also pushed the early-bird deadline to next Monday to allow for the emotional reality of being feeling disoriented and emotionally “all circuits busy” for a full week.

And I’m asking for a do-over of the November 18 call on You’ve Got Six Months: Go! I was way gummed up emotionally, and it wasn’t my most inspired call. So I’m adding content and redoing it this Thursday.

What Really Happened

Monday, November 15 was one of Heart of Business’ quarterly full-day strategic review meetings, where we look at everything, question what we’re doing and connect in with guidance about moving forward.

One of the big realities we were facing is that despite our growth and development, Heart of Business isn’t large or complex enough to warrant a full-time operations person plus a part-time virtual assistant. Although for the past two years we’ve had record revenue and many big months in a row, we haven’t had record profitability. In fact, we’ve had some interesting cash flow situations because we did that thing growing companies do–grow our costs along with our revenue.

The operations position, a role Kate Williams has filled the last two and half years, has been an incredible boon on many levels, implementing systems and oversight and consciousness at levels of the business we hadn’t looked at before. It’s been amazing. And with her help we’ve broken through revenue ceilings, and implemented all kinds of things I never did on my own, such as adding practitioners, bringing in legal help to clarify our relationships with people, and many other critical things to running a more complex business.

And, with all of that in place, it was now time to shift our attention elsewhere. We asked Kate to shift half of her hours from operations to running a new project we want to dig into.

And she resigned.

Not Exactly Like That

It was a long meeting. We talked about many things. The resignation came late in the day in a surprise announcement. Even Kate was surprised, saying she did not come to the meeting with any intention of resigning. (Although my wife Holly admitted to a quiet intuition over the last two days, “Kate is leaving. Huh?”)

Her announcement came in a moment when Presence filled the room and she just felt she had to speak the truth as it came to her. As she said what she had to say, there was the shock of the announcement, coupled with a big exhaled breath from all of us as the truth was recognized.

It was a courageous thing for her to speak her truth, and courageous for us all to accept it.

It wasn’t totally out of the blue. There had been a thread over the last two years of Kate questioning whether this was really her work, as she had spent previous years in various positions supporting other people. She is such a tremendous facilitator, teacher, coach and councilor, that she really needs to be doing her work, and not just supporting someone else, like yours truly, in doing their work.

Also, I’ve had a steep learning curve as a team leader over the last three years, and I’ve made plenty of mistakes. I’ve noticed that my key weakness in leadership is my desire for harmony and to be liked over truth and productive conflict. So my desire to be liked by Kate, and others on the team, as well as my desire to have everyone “taken care of” had me miss several key decision points and instead just “going with the flow.”

Through my work in my masters program I’ve been reclaiming my sovereignty in this new environment, as has Kate in her own heart-work, and truth just becomes much easier to see when everyone is committed to seeing it.

Oh My God–The Emotional Storm

As you might imagine there has been a rollercoaster of different emotions for all of us. I’ll talk about mine, since that’s who I am.

I told Kate that the first feeling was one of relief, of a truth recognized. There was also the relief of recognizing all the ways I had given myself away, a feeling of freedom regained. It’s not an entirely fair way to describe it, because no one took my freedom away, but I had abandoned it in my desire to copy some unknown ideal of how I should be as a leader.

Then came the sadness and grief, of course. Kate and I have a daily relationship of working collaboration. That’s going to stop suddenly in about two weeks. It’s like a relationship break-up, especially since we continue to be on such good terms with each other. It’s not like anyone did anyone else wrong. Just the truth emerged, it’s time for her to go and it’s very sad.

Anger. You can’t have the grief process without anger, and it’s definitely my least favorite emotion to express. But, yes, anger. “You’re quitting at the end of the year, in the middle of enrolling our six-month course, and we have to spend all this time and energy on the transition? And you didn’t do it before now, so I could’ve reconfigured Opening the Moneyflow to account for the reality of our team now?” (I did make changes–I detail them below.)

Ahh… anger… By definition it’s not rational. Now was the perfect timing, and it’s what had to happen. And anger came up. It doesn’t stay for very long, but little bits of it waft around. Fun.

Withdrawal. Although it’s not an emotion, I notice that I’m preparing for the transition and have withdrawn some. I’ve been consulting with Kate much less about the business.

I’m withdrawing partly out of respect for her and not wanting to involve her with something she’s not going to be around for. It’s also partly for me an exercise in regaining my own sovereignty.

One thing that happens as a business gets more complex is that decisions become harder to make, because there is so much more information and so many more people to consider.

In my attempts to be a collaborative, open-door leader, I notice that there are many places where I’ve abdicated my responsibility to make decisions. I’m taking that back, and the result is spending less time in meetings and discussions.

Don’t get me wrong. I will continue to collaborate with Jason, Yollana, Susan and other team members of Heart of Business. I love the working relationship that Kate and I developed. And I notice the difference between that and just avoiding decisions.

The best way for me to do that right now is to reduce how many things I bring to consult with Kate or anyone else.

The Lightning of the Business

Another piece of relief was related to the lightness of the business. As I said, we’ve had ten straight years of growth, and we busted through some big revenue ceilings this year. But the business had come to feel heavy, and I believe it’s because we took on an infrastructure model for a business that is much larger than ours, and doesn’t fit what we’re doing.

We needed to focus on infrastructure and systems for a time, and Kate did an amazing job with it, but to create a permanent position focused entirely on that called “operations” means that we missed the timing to change focus to other strategic areas. A permanent titled operations position means I went on autopilot and stopped asking when the time was to shift.

My friend, the best-selling author of Predictable Success and consultant Les McKeown, who has personally been involved in 42 different startups, nailed it perfectly in the chapter on Whitewater. He specifically warns against creating an “operations” position separate from everything else at the stage of business growth we’re in. Although I had read the chapter, it didn’t sink in. I re-read that chapter last week, all the while slapping myself in the forehead repeatedly.

To be kind, Les did say that often businesses have to make that mistake for the founders/leaders to develop the muscle and skills to lead a more sustainable organization later. And that’s evidently what I did. Check out these bulging leadership muscles.

What Happens Now?

Kate is staying with us through the middle of December to support the current Opening the Moneyflow course with which she has been so intimately involved, as well as to help set up next year’s Moneyflow. And, of course, to help effectively transfer all of what she does.

Of course a tremendous boon is that Kate is superb at creating systems and training people on them, so we’re in a great position. Susan is going to easily and without any bumps pick up the majority of what Kate was doing, and I have just a few additional bits and bobs for other people to pick up, and even one or two that I really need to pick up myself.

We are not going to rehire for her position, so please don’t send us resumes. We have all the team members we need in place right now.

Do-Over? Changes to Opening the Moneyflow 2011

With Kate no longer with us for next year, I want to make some changes to the Moneyflow program starting in January. These are not major changes, except for the DIY program (which is getting beefed up), but have more to do with how to handle capacity so we can take care of everyone really well.

First, I want to re-do the You’ve Got Six Months: Go! call I held November 18. Although I covered the material I wanted to, it was one of my least inspired teaching moments in a long time. I held the class just a few days after Kate announced her resignation, and I was gummed up with all kinds of emotions. Because I wasn’t in the position to make a public announcement–all three of us were still reeling and trying to figure out the details of what it really meant–I couldn’t talk about it with you.

This meant I wasn’t really that was present. I got off the call and said to Holly, my wife, “Well, I botched that one.”

You deserve better than that. So I’m going to re-do the call, but change the content. Not entirely, but there are some teachings I want to share from my learnings these past three years that have to do with teams, leadership, and developing a truly sustainable business at a higher-level. By a higher level, I mean one that brings five figures a month in consistently for years on end.

Click here to join us for the call. If you registered for the previous call, you’re still registered. You probably already have the new call-in information, time and date to you in the “already registered” email.

Other Changes to Moneyflow

There will be no changes to the Core program with Jason and Yollana, since all the structures and support remain in place for them to hold the groups they have. Their groups continue to fill up.

The Premium program is changing simply in terms of numbers. I’m limiting the number of participants to an absolute maximum of five, and I might cut it off at four, rather than eight. Which means there’s really only one spot left (maybe two, if you really are the right person for it and I can’t say no.)

The DIY program has the most substantial changes to it. First of all, I want to acknowledge the term “Do It Yourself” can sound inspiring to some, and daunting to others. Because of that, we’re actually adding more support to the DIY level, without changing the price.

Three changes to the DIY:

1. We’re accepting no more than 20 people into the program, instead of thirty-six. I know the team we have can support that many people.
2. The DIY participants will have a chance to write a check-in each month, and get a written response from us here at Heart of Business. You will report on your progress with your personal business development plan, challenges you are facing, successes you’re having, things you want feedback on and other questions you have.While the program is such that we can’t give in-depth line-editing or feedback on writing, what we will be able to do is review things like websites and sales copy and give you our impressions of what’s working, and our top 1-3 recommendations of what you can do to improve it.
3. The check-ins will be scheduled to be due before the monthly DIY Q&A call. This is so you can write your check-in, get written feedback, and then ask follow-up questions on the call for clarity.

Because of all this, we’re pushing the early-bird deadline back. It was supposed to be today, but oh boy way too much was going on emotionally. So I’m pushing it back to December 6, a week from today.

Get your applications in, and we’ll get you moving in the new year.

What’s Next?

Through the grief of losing an amazing team member, I’m feeling re-inspired. I’m excited by all the possibilities that are coming up.

I do know some projects that I’m very inspired about: a year-long Remembrance Challenge, including virtual retreats. The Paradox class, that’s been itching to be born. A redesign of our look.

I’m also feeling vulnerable. I know there are a lot of learnings and realizations that will be bubbling up. I’m going to be showing you behind the curtain as much as possible.

Normally Kate and I don’t get into knock-down drag-outs, but this was early in her time of coming to work for Heart of Business. I had asked her to handle something, I can’t remember what exactly, and it doesn’t matter. Probably something to do with our autoresponder that sends emails out, or our shopping cart, or the website.

Anyway, she was asking me this question, and it was the fifth time (or maybe only the second) she came asking, and Ugh! I’ve got other things to do. Can’t she just handle it?

Not a very enlightened or heart-centered response. I calmed my voice, but there was still an edge of impatience.

“Mark, I hate this. I’m not stupid, I just need help with this. Stop treating me like I’m incompetent.”

If you’ve spent any time working with Kate, you know she’s not incompetent. The provost of the naturopathic college she’d formerly worked for said she was the best person he ever had working with him and that we were lucky to have her. And we are, because Kate rocks the house.

The dust-up we were having was because of one little thing no one ever tells you when you start to pay other people to help you in your business, whether employees, contractors, or a service provider.

Before I tell you that secret, let me explain something about us business owners.

You Like To Get Things Done

If you’re running your own business, I’m going to guess you just like to get things done.

It may not always be what you think you should get done. And I’m not saying you or I don’t procrastinate, lose focus, or do whatever other human thing we do. But the truth is, it feels good to get something done—for a client, for the website, for whatever.

I’m also going to guess that you have FAR TOO MUCH to get done, and that weighs on you. At times that might feel panic-inducing. If you don’t get it all done, and done like, already, you might just blow a valve.

I’m just guessing, but if you’re like many of the thousands of people we’ve worked with, this is your situation. Did I guess right?

The Two Hiring-Help Freak Outs

It seems that everyone extols the virtue of hiring help and outsourcing what you’re not good at. Except here’s what actually happens.

First Freak Out

You’ve gone and hired someone and asked them to do something for you. And then they come back with questions. And more questions. And more questions.

Holy Albuquerque! Can’t they just get it done? No, they can’t. Not in a way that will make you happy.

When you first hire, you will be less efficient than if you just did it yourself, assuming it’s something that you have some skill at. Web design doesn’t count, because of the hundreds of hours of training and experience to make a good website.

For normal tasks transferring the information, your style, and the overall “feel” of the project will take far more time than if you just did it yourself. It’s just the way it is, folks.

A very experienced admin person can make that time more efficient by knowing what questions to ask. But still.

You are going to feel as if you’re wasting time. You just are. But that’s kinda sorta okay because you’re getting them up to speed, right? Then along comes Number Two.

Freak Out Number Two

Even after someone is up to speed, which could be a month or more, it will still take time to transfer information and perspective to them. They’ll still come back with questions.

Bottom line: just because someone else is handling a project for you it doesn’t mean that you get to go to lala land. You will still be spending at least some time on that project, which is where the second freak out comes from.

When you’re a do-it-yourselfer, the time feels different. Spending ten hours working on an issue with your email feels totally productive and engaged for you because, by God, you’re getting it done.

Spending thirty minutes fully explaining the problem to your support person, and then spending an additional hour or two helping them test it and work through additional questions feels like wasting time because you’re not actually doing the work.

Never mind that you gained about eight hours, a full day, of productive time. It’s a funny thing, but that’s often how it feels until you get the larger perspective.

What To Do With the Freak Outs

It’s been quite awhile since that conversation Kate and I had where we wanted to pull my hair out, and in that time, there have been a few insights that have helped me tremendously.

• Own Your Project

When handing off a project there can be a tendency to “dump and run.” Meaning that mentally you’ve swept the project under the rug, and are hoping that magically it will get taken care of.

Instead, own the project. Someone may be handling the majority of the work for you, but it’s still yours. Give the project space in your heart, don’t abandon it.

• Open Your Heart to Your Helpers

Similarly, find the space in your heart for your helpers. Everyone has a deep need to contribute, and if someone is willing to help out, even if they are being paid, they still care about it being done well.

Honor their heart, their caring, and their contribution by having whoever is helping you in your heart. This may help you remember, when they come to you with questions, that they aren’t bothering you, they are trying to help you in a way that works for you.

• Helpers Need Attention

When you put someone on a project, immediately schedule time not just to transfer the details of the project to them, but also make sure you have some space in your schedule to answer questions.

You might need to schedule a 15-45 minute initial meeting, and then reserve one to two hours in the next week or two for this project and your helper.

If they don’t need the time, hallelujah, go to your favorite cafe and people watch. But if they do, you won’t be blindsided and need to steal that time from other commitments.

• Project Transfer Checklist

When you transfer a project to someone, here are a few details to always remember to tell them:

• How urgent is this? What’s the deadline?
• What information do you have that they need?
• What’s your picture of how it looks when it’s done?
• What systems, information, or accounts do they need access to in order to get the work done. Give them a list of URLs, usernames and passwords.

If there are any costs involved, things they need to purchase, how do you want to handle the money? Reimbursements? Company credit card?

In the end, I very much recommend that you get help when you need it. Even very small solo businesses often have more things to do than you can easily get done yourself. Even if you’re handling it kinda sorta okay right now, you may recognize that it’s not going to be sustainable for the long term.

I want to riff off of the post I put up the end of April, How Productivity Contributes to Global Warming and Debt. The issue, as I was talking about then, was capacity. And yet, there’s an awful lot of things to get done in business.

There’s a breakneck pace that many new solo business owners assume. With an infinite number of things to do, and about a dozen hats to wear, it gets overwhelming, fast.

And, that’s nothing compared to what happens once the business actually has some momentum under it. That’s why one of my clients with a brand-new business was asking me: “Mark, how do you get it all done? Your business has about 100 times more going on in it than mine does, and I’m overwhelmed just with what I’m trying to get done.”

Here’s my answer: “I don’t get it all done.”

Which strikes at the heart of the most dangerous myth in business: the bootstrap myth, known in this particular instance as the myth of the successful solopreneur.

Why this myth is so dangerous.

The myth says that you can do it on your own, you can bootstrap your way to success, and that when you go solo, you don’t need anyone else. That’s the whole point of being self-employed, or running a personal-sized business, right?

This rugged homage to individualism isn’t just in the U.S., as some have claimed. I have seen this myth in action across the globe: Canada, the UK, mainland Europe, Asia, Australia and Africa.

It seems as if it’s just hard to get it: we can’t do it ourselves.

The physical reality.

When you’re an employee at a company, you get to do your job. And, unless you think upon it, you might not realize how much other people do just so you can do your job.

Who prints and signs your check? Who makes sure the office building gets cleaned? Who stocks the office supplies closet, or goes out and sells to clients so there is revenue to pay you?

It’s humbling, but when you become self-employed, all of those functions fall into your lap. And it is impossible, literally impossible, to do them all. If you’re overwhelmed trying to make your business work on your own, there is good reason for it.

Frustrating- but don’t despair. It may help to understand why it is this way.

The spiritual reality.

As my Sufi teacher tells me, “Be the earth for your brothers and sisters. If you don’t carry them, who will?… When you look into another’s eyes, see the reflection of God looking at you.”

The depth of this teaching really struck home when I realized that he wasn’t talking to me personally- this teaching was for everyone. We’re all asked to carry each other. Which means that we also need to allow ourselves to be carried.

When someone offers help, do you say: “Yes!” or do you say: “Nah, I can get it.” If the bootstrap myth is operating in your business, there may be a hundred subtle and not-so-subtle ways that you avoid or turn away from help.

Lord knows I do.

And yet we are meant to both help and be helped by each other. This is one of the ways that we experience the Divine in our lives, is through the actions, support and love of others.

Yes, I mean you. You are supposed to receive the Divine through the actions, support and love of others. You can’t do everything yourself. And that’s as it was designed to be.

Watch the wing-stretching and contortions you go through as you learn to receive more help. It will do much more than help your business, it will be a real experience of healing and growth for you as well.

Who can afford to hire an entire company of help?

Of course, not all of the help you get will be free, and there’s so much of it to get. And you can’t hire it all, especially early in your business. So what do you do?

After going through some big transitions ourselves, having grown up in a small retail business, and having worked with hundreds of clients, let me share some insights into how to prioritize.

Keys to Being a Successful Pseudo-Solo.

First, invest in information and learning.

I know, I know- it seems like a lot needs to get done, right now. Remember- millions of people have already done what you’ve tried to do. So, the best thing to do is to learn from some of them.

Get books from the library, or buy them. Take classes, free or otherwise. Find people you admire who have successfully navigated what you’re trying to do and take them to tea or lunch and ask them questions.

Make sure the information resonates with you. As just one example, marketing professionals out there are all saying more or less the same thing, so you can find one that your heart really resonates with and is speaking your language.

Second, get help with the numbers.

I’ll say this once: if you’re running your own business, you shouldn’t be doing your own taxes. There are too many deductions and pitfalls and details. You want to hire it out, even if you think you can’t afford it.

Related to that, as soon as you can, hire a bookkeeper to keep your accounting clean from month to month. Not only will it help you at tax time (imagine filing your taxes in the beginning of February!), but it will also help you understand your business better, simply knowing how money flows in and out.

Third, experiment with a virtual assistant.

You may not be able or ready to hire out help. You also may have no idea how or where to start. I suggest finding a virtual assistant you like, who has strengths in areas that you get overwhelmed by easily, and hiring them for a very small project, maybe an hour or two. Then repeat in a month or so.

Over some months, as you both get to know each other, you’ll get more comfortable with asking for help, and receiving it. Your business may need to develop before you hire a significant amount of help, but if you start small, it will be a much easier transition. And you’ll get there much more quickly.

Getting help in your business is a huge topic. The trick is to face the simple truth that you can’t do it all yourself, and that spiritually it’s enormously beneficial to receive help.

Then, first get help by learning through books, classes, and other resources, second get help with the numbers with an accountant then a bookkeeper, and finally practice outsourcing to a virtual assistant in small, do-able, bites.

And watch how much more successful you can be as a ‘pseudo’ solo business owner.

What’s your heart telling you? Are you flying solo too much for your own good? What do you need to break your solo-ness?