Hello and welcome to the Business of Executive Coaching Podcast. I'm your host, Ellie Scarf, a senior executive coach with over 17, even 18 years experience now coaching, which I bring now to my role as mentor and business coach to other executive coaches when it comes to coaching business. I've done it all.
I have grown coaching businesses, solo and in partnership and with teams of coaches working with me. I've been an in-house coach and I've been an associate coach, so. When I talk about selling coaching to corporate clients, you know I'm sharing from a place of experience and empathy. I work with coaches now through my group coaching program, the Corporate to Coach Accelerator, where executive and leadership coaches grow their businesses with more corporate clients.
I'm also a mom, a big reader, and an even bigger fan of my miniature schnauzer. Yoshi, keep listening for lots of practical tips, inspiring stories and prompts to help you grow your business your way. Okay, so one of my [00:01:00] favorite things to do is to walk my dog and listen to podcasts. Now, honestly, the, uh, genres I listen to are pretty variable.
They range from business topics like marketing of sales, of course, to productivity and time management. To ones that are about juggling, work and life to traveling with kids. And there are, you know, even I love personal finance podcasts and I've had a number that have infiltrated thanks to my kid.
Jumping on my podcast, listener, thinking, you know, things like frauds and scams. She loves politics and history, all of the above. But one of the, my favorite, quite niche sub genres of the podcast I listen to has become, and these are usually business ones as well as those work life juggle ones has become all of the different things you can outsource.
In business and life. And so I just wanted to share my take on how that could look in a business and leadership coaching, a business of leadership and coaching type work, that you might consider. And , some of them I have implemented, some I probably won't, but that you could,some are simple, some are more elaborate, and I wanted to just share my, just some ideas,for you and.
Although these are. Either for work or life, right? We can think about outsourcing in those two different categories. I want to be really clear that outsourcing that you do in your personal life or on the home front absolutely has a knock on effect on your business. So this operates in the sense that it gives you time back, right?
When you outsource things on the home front, of course. And that's very practical, but it also operates because I think our capacity, the right capacity as business owners who are also owners of a full and rich life, our capacity is this. A combined pool that is finite, right is a finite resource of time and energy.
When life is heavy or weighty or full of commitments, our capacity for our business is naturally less. This means that there is a limited amount of time that we have across these two pools and a limited amount of energy. And so when it comes to outsourcing, there are a few factors to consider. Firstly, being able to outsource anything requires us to.
Balance financial resources, right, with what we're trying to achieve. And so what is doable for one person is not going to be doable for another, and I really wanna acknowledge that. Any capacity to outsource probably even the capacity to be in business. Means that we are coming from a place of privilege.
So I want to acknowledge that. I want to acknowledge that this is not going to be accessible for everybody in every circumstance. And if it's not for you, then I want you to think about maybe this is something that you want to aim for, right? Maybe it's something that you can aspire to and feels motivating or exciting.
But for many of us, we do have some capacity. Now, it's not an infinite capacity, so we always talk about trade-offs because the second factor to consider is that outsourcing is almost always about balancing priorities. We are weighing up the financial cost against a. Time gains much of the time. And so the question becomes is the time that we gain back from outsourcing a particular task,or even the energy that we gain back, because I think that that is very tangible.
Is that time or energy and the use that we are going to now allocate that time and energy too, is that use of time and energy a higher priority or of higher significance? Then the financial cost, it will take to buy that back. So to be very clear, I am not recommending that you necessarily do any of these things.
I just want to get you to consider whether it is something that could stack up for you and to share some fun ideas. So the first one, I'm gonna start with the least controversial, and that is home tasks. So I think it is a fairly well worn path. It's fairly common that many of us outsource certain tasks in the home front.
So you think cleaning would be here, have to be the most common, followed by laundry or ironing. And then really, you know, , the world is your oyster from there, like once you unlock the outsourcing muscle, there is not a lot that you can't. Outsource, right? So think meal prep, think cooking. If there is anything that really takes your time or drains your energy, that is the thing to consider.
And it doesn't have to be something that someone else would outsource. For example, for me. I hate changing the sheets on the bed every week. I hate folding washing. And so we added, and this is, this is, it feels like a massive luxury to me. We added an hour to our cleaner who already comes once a week and she does those things.
They change the sheets, they fold the washing, and this has changed. My life for the better. So I highly recommend it, but you have to think about what would make sense for you. , So example, for example, I have friends who love doing the laundry, but would never outsource that, but lawn mowing, gardening, and pool maintenance are top priority.
So you have to think about what it looks like for you. And I don't think I can talk about outsourcing on the home front without a little note on guilt. And a lot of folks, and by folks I generally mean women when I'm talking about this, guilt, have inherited this guilt about outsourcing of these tasks that are traditionally considered to be women's work.
And this is usually not conscious. It's usually something that has,that we have inherited through our family, through society, through, , eons , of this being the, the way things are done. So if you're hesitant to outsource some of this type of work, , if you are hesitating, consider. Why, and if there is a should here that you wouldn't apply to a man in business or another female business owner in the same situation.
It may be that you might benefit from taking the opportunity to experiment with outsourcing something really small and seeing how it feels. And, and I would say that this is , for work and for home life tasks, but there are. Ways to build your muscle when it comes to outsourcing. It doesn't have to be that you immediately outsource an entire task, uh, and commit to that forever more.
It may work better for your brain to think of it seasonally or on a less frequent basis or for a part of a task. So for example, maybe you have someone come in and do a deep clean for you on a quarterly basis, like doing all those tricky things you don't wanna do, like skirting boards and windows and , on top of the fridge.
Oh, I don't know when I last cleaned on top of the fridge, there's, confession. , Or maybe you pay a meal prep service to freeze healthy meals for you that you can use once a week for a few months. And you use it on those nights when you tell yourself that you're gonna cook, but you always end up ordering Uber Eats.
Or maybe occasionally you might recognize that you are entering a busy season. So you buy some of those meal box services for a few weeks to take the thinking off your plate so you don't have to plan the menu, and you can shorten that prep to table timeframe as well. So those are a few of the things.
Of course, there's a lot of ways we can do that in work as well. So if we look at the second category and keep on more task focused, then we can outsource a lot of our work tasks, obviously. So when should we do this? Becomes the question and my thoughts are that we should do it when we think that doing so would unlock something important and when it wouldn't cause financial hardship.
So when I say unlock something important, I mean would taking this task off your plate open up creativity, energy, focus or motivation for you to spend on tasks that are going to get you to your goals quicker or for you to spend on your life priorities? Right. And so in terms of tasks that will get you to your goals quicker, I mean, will this allow you to spend more time on direct client generating activities?
So that's really what I'm talking about. Timeline things like, outreach, things like having more sales conversations, reaching out to your network, going to networking events, all of those sorts of things. If outsourcing a particular task would give you the mental bandwidth to do that is something that you should consider.
Obviously there are infinite ways we could do this or things that we could outsource from small to big, short to longer term. And my advice on this has changed a little over the last couple of years because outsourcing even two years ago generally meant a person. Now it could mean an AI tool or it could mean another great tech system.
There are a lot of things that come now . Into that world, and it may be that outsourcing is having someone set up a system for you rather than someone do something for you. Consistently, , in terms of the categories of the business related things you could outsource, it could involve general admin tasks.
So think about appointment scheduling, document formatting , invoicing and follow ups, reminders. Then it could grow into more specialist tasks or skill sets. Things like developing and formatting, slide decks, getting marketing assistance or getting expertise like bookkeeping and accounting. Now, I always suggest that a bookkeeper and an accountant should be among your first things that you outsource.
So if you haven't done that, that might be something that you could consider. If it's something that takes a good amount of your time. And again, what we outsource at work, we often think it's like, oh, well it's like hiring somebody. But in fact it could be that you engage people for one-offs. So things like you might have gone through your 90 day content planning process.
Some, something we do inside the accelerator. And you may have written three months of LinkedIn posts, right? And, you might be thinking then, , what is going to get in the way of me consistently? Posting these, and you might choose to engage someone to actually build graphics for 20 of those posts, right?
Graphics, whether it's a carousel or a standalone graphic, or adapting a photo or an image that you have. You might get them to do that because then it just feels like it's done. You could even get someone to schedule it for you, right? So that it is going to happen you can kind of, I mean, I still want you showing up on LinkedIn , for other things, but you could turn off your brain on content writing for 11 out of 12 weeks of the quarter.
You could also pay someone to set up a LinkedIn automation for you to add your ideal clients consistently and to invest in a system that does that. There are many automations for you here and I couldn't possibly list all of them, but I really want you to consider that as well. So the third bucket that might sound a little bit strange for a coach to outsource, but stay with me, is outsourcing things like discipline, willpower, and accountability.
So here's how it looks for me. As an example, I'm a lady of a certain vintage, okay, mid to late forties, let's just put it there. And strength training is really important for me. My husband also knows it's a priority as he does a lot of cycling and needs to stay strong. But for years, we could never really get into the swing of going to the gym because.
Our preferred exercise time is the morning, but we didn't want to both go out cause we couldn't leave our daughter home alone. We were already juggling trade-offs of that prime exercise slot for our other exercise priorities. We bought weights to use at home, but we just never did it. And so what we have outsourced that has absolutely been worth it for us is that we have a personal trainer come to our house once a week.
So it means that no matter what, we strength train at least once a week. It's at our house, so we can't bail out, we don't have to worry about where our daughter is, and we don't have to think about it because she just shows up at 5:45 AM on a Monday morning. Now, this absolutely feels like a splurge for me, but our goals are to stay strong, stay healthy as long as we can.
And so this is something that we have decided to prioritize.And it's been a priority for maybe four or five years now, and I can't see that changing , and I really like it. You might also consider outsourcing discipline, willpower, and accountability. If you are like me and you work well with external accountability, now that's not everyone.
Some people are deeply internally motivated. I go really well when I have someone that knows what I'm doing and helps me to report , right? And that is a challenge when you go into business on your own right? Because there is no one. Who is setting your KPIs? There is no one giving you a performance review.
There is no one giving you deadlines. It is just you. For me, this is why I always have a coach of my own and generally that's a business coach and that is the biggest investment I make in my business of, of any, anything is my business coach, because it removes so much of the mental load, particularly should I do this?
Should I do that? I just now, instead of ruminating, I ask a question and then I implement the plan. , And I have someone who is checking on how the plan is going. I can't tell you how transformative this one has been for me. And so obviously, I have a bit of a stake in this one because as I think many of the members of the accelerator, my program for working with executive and leadership coaches.
So many of them joined for this part, right? Because showing up weekly to our coaching calls is a helpful discipline. It helps to stay focused and answer questions.
It has built in accountability processes, and it removes the emotional labor of wondering if you are on the right track. And I would also add to this, I think that adding therapy is, in some ways, a wonderful investment in outsourcing because you're outsourcing a lot of these mental gymnastics.
It gives you a time-bounded place to work through everything that is going on rather than. Infinite time to ruminate and overthink, and that has a huge flaw in the effect on work and life. So that is definitely an investment that I've made many times over the years. The fourth category, and it's kind of related to that, is that.
You can, to some degree, outsource for speed and to expedite a learning curve. So this could be investing in a system or technology that does what you would otherwise be developing manually.It might look like buying templates or tools. An example could be.Paying for legal templates rather than trying to write one yourself.
Another example is that you can in fact buy, white label training materials like a leadership program or communication skills program that you can then brand as your own brand. And that's something I've only learned about this year. , But you can do all of those sorts of things and for someone at a certain stage of business, that could be a really good investment.
You are in the accelerator, so people who come into the accelerator, we have templates for all sorts of things. Like your coach bio, your proposal document, your quotation document, your outreach scripts,and that saves. Time saves having to develop that yourself. I've also, in the past, purchased Canva templates for all sorts of things, including graphics that I can adapt for LinkedIn.
There are so many examples of this. I also think that programs like the corporate to Coach Accelerator, which is, as I said, my program for executive coaches starting or growing their businesses with more corporate clients. It fits in this bucket because one of my big goals for my members is to help decrease the time it takes to get up and running, with a great marketing strategy and to build a pipeline of corporate clients.
And so what might take, , two to three years if you're starting from scratch, can be done much quicker. When you aren't starting from scratch, but are starting from a place of someone telling you what works and what doesn't and helping you to apply it rather than having to develop it right, from the start.
And there are plenty of other examples I'm sure you can think about in the category. The fifth one is, look, my favorite idea, because you can outsource literally anything. And so this is an example of something that I personally have not invested in. But I really love the idea of it, and that is outsourcing your mental load.
And the way I've heard it done recently and is growing in popularity is by hiring a household manager now different from a cleaner or a housekeeper. This is definitely growing in popularity, particularly with entrepreneurial women or entrepreneurial people who are. Juggling businesses and also the lion's share of the mental load at home.
And what it is hiring a person and like, it could be two hours a week, could be five days a week. Totally variable, but that person's job is to take the mental load off you on the home front. That could be, and you have to really define what that looks like for you. But that could be.
Noticing what you need to buy, right? Whether you're using toothpaste or toilet paper, it could be booking the appointments that you need. It could be meal prep or meal planning. It could be being around when tradespeople come to your house. It could be grocery shopping. It could be managing your annual maintenance schedule for your home.
It can be literally whatever scope you like and whatever scope exists in your world. Now, as I said, I haven't gone down this path, but it is something I would really consider. And I know that in the US at least, there are agencies that have been set up to help you find a person like this. , And honestly, if you have done this, can you please send me a message on LinkedIn and let me know how it has gone because I am very curious about this one, and I could imagine it being something that we invest in.
So those are just five examples of categories of things that you could think about outsourcing. I would encourage you this week, just think about one thing that you could take off your plate that would give you back time and a bit of mental energy. And I want you to think not just about how you would do that, but how you would use that time and energy and I want to say that rest.
It is a very valid way to use your time and energy, as is a personal priority, right? Could be family, could be health, could be hobbies, or it could be something that is going to be really productive in your business.Something really sales and growth oriented. So think about that. Also, remember that outsourcing could also look like delegation in the micro.
So it might be. One task we've recently, you could say outsourced , is that our daughter is now in charge of emptying the dishwasher all the time, right? So I don't empty the dishwasher anymore. She does now. She often needs reminders, so I'm trying to be realistic. She's 12 years old.
But it has taken just a little bit of the load off my shoulders and off my husband's shoulders, and that feels really good. So maybe your baby step is a chore that your kids could take on, or maybe it's a household manager, right? That you hire three days a week. Maybe it's a nanny, maybe it is a virtual assistant, whatever that looks like for you.
How will you use that time and energy? Please reach out to me on LinkedIn and let me know what you are going to do. I'm super curious. I wanna know, are you already a dedicated outsourcer or are you stuck in the shoulders and do you have a lot of guilt about outsourcing? I would love to hear from you.
If you would like to accelerate your learning curve in your business, or you'd like some support with accountability as you grow, let's have a chat. You can book in a chat with me at http://elliescarf.com/bookacall. And we can talk about whether my program, the corporate to coach accelerator, would be a good fit for you at this stage of your business.
I'll speak to you next week.
