CEO Strategies That Won’t Sacrifice Your Sanity With Donna Dube

Episode 72 – Transcript + Timestamps

CEO Strategies That Won’t Sacrifice Your Sanity With Donna Dube

Introduction

[00:00:00] Yvonne Heimann: Hello, and welcome back to another episode of Boss Your Business, and where we also boss our mindset. And today I have a really amazing guest in here and we are going to be talking about quite a few habits and being CEO and running your business and actually doing all the things without burning yourself out, without going all crazy.

[00:00:29] But I’ll let her introduce herself today. I have Donna with me and Donna, you are, your goal really is being a CEO without being a CEO, that’s what I call it, because when I hear CEO, I’m like work 24/7, all the things all the time, and we don’t want to do that. But before we dive deep into this, tell the audience, who are you?

[00:00:58] What do you do? And [00:01:00] how did you get here?

[00:01:01] Donna Dube: Yeah, good. Thank you. So happy to be here. So I’m Donna Dube, and I’m a certified director of operations and business growth strategist, which is a lot of words, but really means I work in the back end of people’s businesses, mostly online, but certainly, there’s a lot of businesses online nowadays and what I help business leaders do is really leverage three things, their time, their talent, and their tactics to help them grow their business to the next level without burning out, without working 24/7, without feeling like they have no time for their life, their family, their health.

[00:01:40] And, you know, how I got here was kind of interesting. It’s a long and windy path. Not straight and narrow like most of us as entrepreneurs are, right? I started my career actually in healthcare. I was an RN for a number of years in ICU. And then switched gears when we started a family and wanted to, you know, be home and the shift [00:02:00] work was getting harder on me.

[00:02:01] And so I switched into doing project management with online businesses. So I would come in, help them manage just a particular project, whether that was, you know, the launch of a new program or service, whether that was the business leader wanting to write a book and sort of help to manage that, whatever that was.

[00:02:19] But what I found when I got in there was that so many business leaders were drowning. They were working 24/7, right? And stuck in the weeds, everything came back to them. If they had a team, the team had no autonomy and they’re looking at me saying, well, I want to grow bigger. And I’m thinking, how?

[00:02:40] Yvonne Heimann: You are already suffocating.

[00:02:44] You already drowning now add more on top of this. Really?

[00:02:48] Donna Dube: Yes. Yes. And so that’s when I switched more into operations and said, no, I want to help these business leaders get out of the weeds, put some systems in place, put some process in place, get team, if we need [00:03:00] to hire team, have them accountable, have them know what the goals are and where we’re headed so that they can actually do some of that work.

[00:03:08] And then you can spend your time on vision and strategy, because like you said, at the beginning, you know, CEO sounds like a lot of work, but that’s because it’s chief everything officer. Right?

[00:03:22] Yvonne Heimann: That’s a good one.

[00:03:23] Donna Dube: Yeah. And that’s what we are when we first start our business, because we don’t have capacity or money to hire anyone.

[00:03:31] And so we are doing everything, but we fall in that trap of, as we grow, we have to step out of that role and piece by piece, we have to let it, some of it go so we can put on the CEO hat where we’re really doing the vision and the strategy.

Helping Business Leaders Focus On CEO-Level Work

[00:03:46] Yvonne Heimann: Now I’m curious with you helping people get from the chief everything to the chief vacation officer.

[00:03:53] Yes. How, how is their process from doing [00:04:00] everything to delegating to seeing systems? I’m like, we’re working in a similar area, right? So I kind of have an idea where this is going to go, which is why I’m interested.

[00:04:12] Donna Dube: Yes.

[00:04:12] Yvonne Heimann: Working with your clients to get them out of the business. What do you see them go through?

[00:04:19] Donna Dube: Well, it is definitely a journey. It’s not an overnight flip the switch and you know, I can take four weeks off vacation, right? So it is a journey and it really starts with the business leader’s mindset. And I’m not a huge mindset coach by any means, but you have to believe that things can be better than they are right now.

[00:04:40] You have to believe and you have to be able to let go and allow others to work in their zone of genius and not have everything just perfect the way you want. So for me, I like to tell my clients if you can have a team member or an automation do something for you 80 percent as good as you [00:05:00] can and you don’t have to spend your time, then let’s go for it. Because it doesn’t have to be Perfect.

[00:05:07] Yvonne Heimann: And I’m smoking over here for everybody that’s just listening and not watching. I’m smoking over here because I’m like, yeah, I’m self recovering perfectionist, right. It I’ve, I’ve been there myself. I’m like, I’m preaching it to clients. Right. And I’ve been there myself where it’s like handing things off and I’m like, Oh my God, this is not perfect.

[00:05:29] I’m like, my stuff is not perfect either. And it’s like, it, it’s like, who knows what perfect is. The public perception of what we put out is not what we perceive it to be. So that’s always an interesting struggle to, yeah, I’m like, let our baby go. A lot of entrepreneurs, we started something because we are really passionate about it.

[00:05:51] We want to change something. We want to have an impact. And suddenly you are at the point where, yeah, complete burnout 24/7 working and [00:06:00] you, you have to let this idea go of you are the only one that can do everything all the time and be able to hand it off. So.

[00:06:10] Donna Dube: Yes, yes. And there is sort of a framework that I use with the business leaders for that.

[00:06:15] And so I call it the CEO scorecard. And basically what we’re doing is throughout the week, we’re giving a score to different activities that we’ve done and based on the amount of revenue we want to achieve for the year. The higher the score we want to achieve each week, right? So if we want to make, you know, seven figures, then we’re going to have a higher CEO score, meaning we have to spend more time in the vision, in the strategy, in that CEO level work and less time in the maintenance and the day to day.

[00:06:46] And so it’s not a time tracking where we’re, you know, monitoring every minute because I know that can be very tiresome and not very many of us want to do it for very long. Right. But it’s really looking at your week and saying, well, [00:07:00] how was I spending my time? Did I have time to, you know, create new content that only I as CEO can create?

[00:07:07] Did I have time to make partnerships? JV did I have time to do networking? Did I have time to do sales calls? If that’s something that you know you do in your business. So making sure they have time set aside for those higher level tasks. And when we first start out and they’re doing their CEO score, it’s usually very low.

[00:07:25] At the beginning, right? Because we’re doing, we’re changing landing pages, we’re adjusting email sequences, we’re, we’re creating images in Canva, you know, we might be in QuickBooks a little bit, like we’re, we’re all over the place, again, doing all the things, right? Yeah. We can look at that and say, no, those things are maintenance and bit by bit, how can I, you know, release this and let it go?

[00:07:47] And again, whether that’s delegating to a human, delegating to an automation or sometimes stopping, because the truth of the matter is we pack on [00:08:00] strategy after strategy after strategy, but we sometimes don’t take the time to look and measure our return on investment. So I’m doing this thing, whatever that strategy is.

[00:08:10] It’s taking me three hours a week to put into place, but is it giving me a return on investment? And if it’s not, we got to let it go.

[00:08:21] Yvonne Heimann: And I think that’s one of the things a lot of us get caught up in where, why am I doing this? Does this actually still serve me and my company or should I let it go? I’m like, we had this conversation a lot lately with all the content we put out.

[00:08:38] What of this content actually makes sense for us to put out? And for April, we had decided, cool, we, we are putting a pause on the podcast for a month because we are launching a new offer. The offer is going to be the focus. And I simply don’t have time to put out podcasts enabled, the same with, [00:09:00] with our regular YouTube videos.

[00:09:01] It’s still doing the job. It’s still going out there. It’s still promoting. We are not completely dropping it, but because there is a new offer that I really want to focus on that. I want to turn into our main offer. It needs my attention. I need to be there. So I’m like, cool, we’re calling it. We’re taking April off from long form content.

[00:09:22] And it has given me the time to give the attention to what really is going to move the needle. And it’s not always easy because let’s be honest, my ego was like, I’m not going to put out, I’m not going to put out YouTube videos. Wait, what?

[00:09:38] Donna Dube: Right. Right. Yes. My business is going to fall apart. Right.

[00:09:42] Yvonne Heimann: And actually I’m getting more subscribers in this past right now than I have been.

[00:09:49] Yeah. It’s been, it’s been interesting. So

[00:09:52] Donna Dube: yes,

[00:09:53] Yvonne Heimann: guys, again,

[00:09:53] Donna Dube: that’s the advantage of the long form content, right? Again, we’re not here to go into the marketing situation, [00:10:00] but definitely the long form content gives you that advantage where if you do need to take a pause. Your stuff is still there. People can still find you.

[00:10:08] I can listen. I can subscribe. I can get value out of what you’ve, you’ve put out there. Right. It’s not gone in 24 hours.

CEO Power Hour: Your Weekly Review And Reflection

[00:10:14] Yvonne Heimann: So if the audience, when the audience, I’m pretty sure this is not an if this is when the audience and our listeners and viewers are ready to really take action to get out of the daily grind and all the things, how, what can they do to get into their zone of genius?

[00:10:35] Donna Dube: Hmm. Yes. So one thing I suggest is called the CEO power hour, which is really a one hour date with yourself every single week. So you pick one hour, whether it’s going to be Monday morning, Friday afternoon, Sunday evening, whatever works for you as business leader, but it’s got to be the same time. Every week, and it’s got to be non negotiable, meaning [00:11:00] you don’t move that and nothing moves that unless it’s, you know, a life crisis.

[00:11:05] Right? So that time is set. It’s just as important call as any other important calls that you have in your week. And what you do during that CEO power hour is really review and reflect where you are in your business. And so I have a download that can kind of go through some of the pieces, but we want to review some top metrics.

[00:11:26] So are we getting people into our world? Are we getting people on top of our funnel? How are we doing revenue this month? Are we promoting something this month? Or am I busy, you know, making new content? Right? And where am I in terms of my 90 day goals? So we set big goals, yearly goals. We got to break them down into 90 days and then down further into monthly goals.

[00:11:50] And where am I in that? What do I need to do this week, to get 1 step closer to my goal. And then we got to look at our calendars and our team and [00:12:00] say, do I have the support I need to be able to do that this week? And do I have the time and block off that time. Because if this is a goal, if this is a priority.

[00:12:09] Then it’s got to be on your calendar. And so by doing this every week, you get a real sense, a real pulse of where you are in your business and you’re not leaving things too long. And then the snowball grows, right? So I’m sure you’ve heard people say, Oh, I don’t know. You know, we get to June and they go, Oh, I’m nowhere near my revenue goal for the year.

[00:12:29] Yvonne Heimann: Which means you didn’t pay attention to it.

[00:12:31] Donna Dube: Yes. Yes, exactly.

[00:12:33] Yvonne Heimann: Right. Yeah, guys, I just I did just call you out guys. No, actually, I also called myself a little bit out. We’ve been so in doing that, I haven’t looked much at the numbers lately. And it’s like, okay, fine. I hear you. Yeah, that’s good.

[00:12:49] Donna Dube: Right, right. But if you know, if the numbers aren’t where we want them to be. I say great because that’s a chance now to go a little deeper and say, okay, what, what else can I do? Right? Do I [00:13:00] need to reach out to some people one on one? Do I need to do a flash sale? Is there something about the process of customer getting through, you know, sales page checkout and actually buying that’s not working?

[00:13:10] Right? What’s the data showing and where can I tweak and adjust to make things better? Right? So you have a chance to affect that outcome. You know, when you’re checking it regularly. And so that’s a big part of, of it. And if you think about really big businesses, like we think about Apple and Microsoft, we’ve got CEO and they’ve got a layer of VPs underneath them, right?

[00:13:33] Who are all reporting up to them saying, this is what’s happening in sales. This is what’s happening in marketing and operations, right? We don’t have that in our smaller businesses, but we still need to wear that CEO hat and be looking at our business from a high level view. And so this power hour really helps you set your week up for success because you know, where you are, you’ve looked at some numbers, you know, if there’s something that needs to be tweaked, who you can pass that off to, if [00:14:00] it’s, if you have someone in your team that can do that and you know what your priorities are as CEO for that week, so you can get closer to your goal.

CEO Habits To Stop Being The Chief Of Everything Officer

[00:14:09] Yvonne Heimann: Now for anybody that really wants to step into that leadership and really change. I know there’s, there’s a lot that needs to change. There is, there is habits, there is mindsets, there, there’s so much to step out of the achieve everything and, and be able to restructure how we think, how we do. And I know you talk about six CEO habits to really keep you in that zone of genius.

[00:14:43] And I would love for you to, to talk about this. What are those six habits that my audience can implement to, to stop being the chief everything officer.

[00:14:53] Donna Dube: Yes. Yeah. Good question. So number one is that power hour that we just talked about, right? Implementing that [00:15:00] in your business, not hard, set aside that hour and, and, you know, get to it.

[00:15:05] A second thing is what I call your scheduling ninja, which is really just your calendar. But I want the ninja working for me, not against me. And I’m sure our listeners want the same thing and so setting up a model calendar or an ideal calendar that works for you in this season of your life, right? So what that looks like is we start with a blank calendar and we map out the things that we need to do for our personal self and for our families.

[00:15:34] So maybe you have a morning routine that you like to do at a certain time. Block that time off. Maybe you pick kids up from school or you have a date night, or you like to have a massage every two weeks on Friday, whatever that is for you.

[00:15:46] Block off those times that you know are recurring and then are important either for your own health, for your family, for your friends, those commitments. And why I say we block those off first is because we want to build a business around our [00:16:00] life, not our life around our business, right? Many of us have done that before.

[00:16:06] I’m guilty and it doesn’t work because that’s what leads to the burnout, right? That’s what leads to, Oh, I’d really like to go to Susie’s baseball game, but I have this meeting. Oh, I’d really like to meet my friend for lunch, but I can’t.

[00:16:20] Yvonne Heimann: We didn’t start a business just to create another job.

[00:16:25] Donna Dube: Hmm. Yes. Yes, exactly.

[00:16:28] So we block off those times. Next piece is we’re going to block off the times when our business is open. Now I say that in air quotes because most people are thinking, well, I’m running an online business. It’s always open. No, no, no. Right. We want to have certain times when we’re at our laptop, when our team, our clients and our customers know we’re available, right? And we want to have other times when we’re not available. Someone can email us. Someone can slack us. That doesn’t mean we have to answer. [00:17:00]

[00:17:00] Yvonne Heimann: That’s a great one. That’s a big one because that also means us staying off the phone where it’s like, it’s 6 PM on Friday. That email is going to be there tomorrow.

[00:17:11] You don’t have to answer it. It’s interesting. We’ve been going through this with my team where it’s like, guys, just because I’m popping something in doesn’t mean you have to jump on it. If I’m in my zone right now and I’m in the flow and I’m having ideas and I have all the things and I pop things into Slack, it doesn’t mean you have to reply.

[00:17:30] It’s the damn weekend. Take the time off.

[00:17:32] Donna Dube: Yes,

[00:17:33] Yvonne Heimann: but that’s also, that comes back to us. To be like, I’m not here. I don’t have to answer it. I don’t have to serve. I don’t have to deal and being okay with it.

[00:17:46] Donna Dube: Right, right. It’s like, you know, people say setting those boundaries and I don’t know if you were the same, but I was good at setting boundaries on paper, but not good at sticking to them.

[00:17:58] So if you look, yeah, I had my [00:18:00] boundaries. All right. But I didn’t follow them. So the truth is I didn’t know

[00:18:05] Yvonne Heimann: a little bit about that.

[00:18:06] Donna Dube: Yes. Right. So yes, setting those expectations for yourself, for your team also, right? So that they know, okay, if I pop something in on a Saturday morning, you can ignore it until you’re at your desk on Monday.

[00:18:20] Don’t worry about it.

[00:18:21] Yvonne Heimann: Yeah.

[00:18:21] Donna Dube: Right. And the same with our clients. So if you’re in a business where you’re working one on one with clients, you need to set those boundaries and those expectations when you start working with them as well, right? My time to meet with you is Tuesday at 10 o’clock, that’s our hour consultation or whatever it is, right?

[00:18:39] You’re welcome to email me or slack me or whatever you have set up. I will get back to you, you know, when I can, I may or may lose convenience within so many hours, whatever those expectations are, but have that discussion because it’s so important for everyone to come into the relationship, knowing what’s expected.

[00:18:58] Yvonne Heimann: And it’s nice. [00:19:00] It’s, it’s not just even the, the setting boundaries for me, but setting expectations with clients or whoever you work with, because it makes life easier for me to knowing what those boundaries are. And I’m like, cool. Okay, dropping this in so you have the information and I know I’m going to hear back from you by Tuesday morning or something or whatever it is.

[00:19:21] There is no question open. There is no, Oh my God, I don’t even know when I don’t, what? Yeah. So boundaries and expectation goes both ways.

[00:19:32] Donna Dube: Yes, for sure. And then once we’ve got our time when we’re working and again, that doesn’t have to be 9am to 5pm. Make it fit for the life you want, make it fit for, you know, the, the, area of clients you work with.

[00:19:47] I know I had a client and she was trying to fit into nine to five, but she was taking her young kids to school and rushing home to, to be there for nine, right? And then some of her clients were not in the same time zone as her. So they [00:20:00] actually wanted evening time slot. So then she was working into the evening.

[00:20:04] I’m like, okay, then take your time in the afternoon, pick up your kids from school at two o’clock and be off until six and then do from six to eight if you want to have client calls then. Right. But really think outside the box on what that could look like, set it up in your calendar and then share it with whoever you need to share it with.

[00:20:24] So if that’s with your family, if that’s with your team, that’s, you know, part of it with your clients, but let people know this is the area. This is how I’m going to work, right? And then within that time, you want to make sure you have time blocked off each and every week to work on the major systems in your business.

[00:20:44] So, marketing, sales, delivery, those three systems have to be in place for each offer that you have in your business. Right? We need a marketing process. We need a sales process and a delivery process. And so when I say have time every week to work [00:21:00] on that, you might say, well, my process is already set up for that.

[00:21:04] Great. But there’s going to be certain pieces of that process that you are responsible for as CEO. And so you need to have time in your week for doing that. You know, this goes back to the example we were talking about earlier with, I’m going to take a pause on my podcast and my YouTube videos, right?

[00:21:21] Because as CEO, I need to focus some of my time on this new offer that I want to launch. Some of this podcast is your responsibility. Some is your team’s responsibility. Right. You sent me a nice calendar link. I booked in your calendar. We didn’t have to go back and forth about, you know, what day, what time.

[00:21:38] That was all automated. Boom. Here’s the link. If I had any questions, I could respond. Your team would answer. And here we are, we show up. Right. So you have certain responsibilities to make this happen. And so does your team. So you have to make sure that you have time in your week set aside for each of those things.

[00:21:59] Yvonne Heimann: So [00:22:00] we talked about two of your 6 CEO habits. Now, what are the other ones?

[00:22:05] Donna Dube: Yes. Okay. So the other ones is definitely self care and as women, we could go on a long, we won’t go there. But definitely just setting aside some time for yourself because you can’t pour out to others from an empty cup.

[00:22:24] Yvonne Heimann: Wait, wait to call me out that it is time to schedule my time massage.

[00:22:28] I haven’t been in two weeks.

[00:22:30] Donna Dube: Right. Right. And you know, I’m guilty too, right? I’m very good, but children need a doctor’s appointment, dentist, whatever, Oh, I’ll get in there and get that booked. But what about mine?

[00:22:42] Yvonne Heimann: Uh huh.

[00:22:43] Donna Dube: Yes. And then the other one is, yes, your CEO scorecard, which we talked a little bit about.

[00:22:49] So just really monitoring how I’m spending my time during the week. And am I allowing time for those growth level tasks?

Setting Your Team Up For Success; Proper Task Delegation

[00:22:59] And then the third [00:23:00] piece is setting myself and my team up right for delegation for success. And so really, you know, when we bring people into our business, they can’t read our minds.

[00:23:11] So. Yeah, so we have it.

[00:23:14] Yvonne Heimann: That’s a big one because it’s like, but this is how it’s yeah, it’s like great. I have had the conversation so often with like, yeah, I brought this expert in or I brought this VA in and I’m like, yeah, they might know the specifics of the job and how things are supposed to get done and what’s supposed to happen, but they don’t know your specifics.

[00:23:37] They can’t. Not yet tap into your brain and just suck the information out there. So yes, no matter, no matter how great you hire, you still need to extract what’s in your head and get it to them.

[00:23:52] Donna Dube: Yes, exactly. So you need to have some onboarding for them to get to know what your business is about, right?

[00:23:58] What’s your mission? What’s your [00:24:00] vision? And what’s their role within that? Right? How are you going to give tasks to them? Is there some sort of video or written document? SOP, we like to call it, but some sort of document to give them some guidelines on how to complete the task. Does the task have a deadline?

[00:24:19] Right? So it’s assigned to them. It has an actual deadline and you’ve shown them or given them some examples of what success would look like. Right? So imagine, for example, I say to you, okay, make me an image, so that we can, you know, share on social about this podcast episode.

[00:24:37] Yvonne Heimann: What are the specifics?

[00:24:39] Donna Dube: Okay. Yeah. I haven’t told you my brand colors.

[00:24:41] I haven’t told you what I like in an image. Right. So the person is going to use what they know and what they think. Right, and we can’t blame them for that because we haven’t given them the resources and set them up for success. So that’s another big piece of this.

[00:24:58] Yvonne Heimann: That’s and I [00:25:00] would love to build up on that.

[00:25:01] We, my team is fairly set up. We’ve been working for, for ages with each other, right? But one of the things that I also just implemented, because even I, I still fall into this habit of, Hey, I need this and not give the specifics where we implemented that it’s the team, the team’s responsibility if they’re not getting the information they need to get the job done, meaning a question is coming up, they need a specific, whatever it is, it’s going to be their responsibility to be back, like, and be like, Yvi, what, what, where, how, what?

[00:25:37] Donna Dube: Yes.

[00:25:38] Yvonne Heimann: And it has taken, it has taken a little bit just because of the personalities of my team. And it’s like, Oh, I’m supposed to know everything.

[00:25:45] And I’m supposed to, to do everything right. And I’m like, no, you’re not. Yeah. So it has taken a little bit to get into this habit, but it’s really, really fun watching now, and when Kitty come just happened, Kitty came back to me. It’s like, [00:26:00] so what specifically does that mean? Are we doing this in email? Are we doing this in social media too?

[00:26:05] Where, what, why, how, when? And I’m like, Cool. Thank you. Because yes, I try to give as much information as possible when I hand things off, but things happen this week has been crazy insane. So I didn’t give all the specifics she needed. But she took, she took ownership of it and was like, Hey, I need this, this answer, this answer, and this answer,

[00:26:30] so I can do this rather than just diving in and doing whatever she thinks is the thing.

[00:26:35] Donna Dube: Yes. Yes. And so many business owners get frustrated with that because, you know, I give them, I, I give my team a task. I didn’t give the specifics, right. They go ahead and make something. It’s not what I, how I want it doesn’t look like what I want.

[00:26:51] And I say, I’m frustrated. Okay. I’ll go and do it how I think it should be done. So now I’m using my time after paying them to do it. [00:27:00] And I haven’t shown them, I haven’t taught them, I haven’t mentored them to be able to do it correctly the next time. Right? And I say, Oh, it’s not worth having Susie Q because I have to go and do it anyways.

[00:27:13] Yvonne Heimann: Yeah, because you didn’t do your job right.

[00:27:16] Donna Dube: I didn’t do my part. Exactly. Exactly. Right. It’s a two, what’s that saying? It takes two to tango and you know, it has to work both ways. Definitely.

[00:27:27] Yvonne Heimann: Love that. Donna, where can people find you? Because I know that my audience is going to want to dig deeper, probably even download your, your playbook.

[00:27:41] So where can people find you?

[00:27:43] Donna Dube: Yes. So my website is ceoamplify.ca and on there, there’s free resources. And one of them is the CEO power hour playbook. So you can grab that and it’ll walk you through, okay, what do I do now that I have this power hour. They will walk you through the steps [00:28:00] of what to do during that time.

[00:28:02] They can also find me on LinkedIn and Facebook and, you know, the usual.

[00:28:07] Yvonne Heimann: And as always, everybody, the links are going to be in the description for you, easy to click. Yeah, we’ll make it really simple or in the blog post, wherever it’s linkable. You’re going to find the link to make it really easy for you.

[00:28:22] Thanks so much for joining and thanks so much for nerding out with me. I always love getting nerdy and into systems and I definitely have a couple of new ideas for our business too. So thanks so much Donna for joining me today.

[00:28:35] Donna Dube: Thank you. It was my pleasure.

[00:28:37] Yvonne Heimann: Bye everyone.

Timestamps

00:00 | Introduction

03:46 | Helping Business Leaders Focus On CEO-Level Work

10:14 | CEO Power Hour: Your Weekly Review And Reflection

14:09 | CEO Habits To Stop Being The Chief Of Everything Officer

22:59 | Setting Your Team Up For Success; Proper Task Delegation