Healthy Boundaries In Your Business

[00:00:00] Emily Thompson: Welcome to Being Boss, a podcast for creatives, business owners and entrepreneurs who want to take control of their work and live life on their own terms. I'm your host, Emily Thompson. And in this episode, I'm joined again by Corey from the Being Boss team for the second part of a two part series on boundaries.

[00:00:19] If you miss the first part, head back to episode number 307 and begin your boundaries journey there. Second half we're settling into two categories of boundaries for business owners, identifying lots of boundaries to serve you on your journey and breaking down a little process for creating boundaries in your work and life.

[00:00:39] You can find all the tools, books, and links. We reference on the show notes at www.beingboss.club. And if you like this episode, be sure to subscribe to this show and share us with a friend.

[00:00:52] All right, bosses. It's time for another podcast recommendation. And this one is a deep dive into all the unsexy industries that are often overlooked. The podcast is Unsexy hosted by Elaine Zelby brought to you by the HubSpot podcast network. In each episode of unsexy, Elaine explores industries, such as campsite booking in outdoor, travel, agriculture, chemical industry, and more, and sure she claims they're unsexy, but many of the episodes are exactly the kinds of businesses that I would love to know more about

[00:01:23] and I feel like many of you will too. Learn more and listen to unsexy wherever you get your podcasts.

[00:01:34] All right. Corey, you ready to wrap this one up?

[00:01:37] Corey Winter: Yes, because I'm realizing that my boundaries are awesome. So now I'm excited to keep this going.

[00:01:42] Emily Thompson: Oh, my over the course of one episode, Corey goes from, I have no boundaries to the all the boundaries that I do have are awesome.

[00:01:51] Corey Winter: I might have better boundaries than you.

[00:01:55] Emily Thompson: Maybe.

[00:01:56] So you don't have a kid[00:02:00]

[00:02:00] Oh, I love it. Good. Well, I hope other people who listen to that first episode. Maybe have come out on the other side, feeling the exact same as you for sure. And anyone who has not come out on the other side feeling that way. That is what this part of, of this sort of two part episode series is about

[00:02:20] it's getting you in a place where you can feel good about your boundaries. We're gonna talk about some boundaries that you, that I believe you need to have as a business owner. If you want the CEO ones that was referenced in the last episode, and then talk about what it looks like to build a new boundary.

[00:02:40] I don't know, go from there. I'm excited to see what comes out of this one.

[00:02:44] Corey Winter: Okay. So let's get started. What are some must have boundaries for bosses? I thought you would have the answer prepared already.

[00:02:55] Emily Thompson: I did just, I, I think I just lost myself. I not recording after lunch because I'm too hungry. Cause I had a meeting.

[00:03:05] Then let it anyway. It's fine. It's fine.

[00:03:08] Corey Winter: You have to have, so you don't have boundaries around food?

[00:03:10] Emily Thompson: No, I should have put food in here. I should have put food. Okay. So must have boundaries for bosses. I like to categorize them. I'm not gonna give you individual ones. We will get into that. What I wanna look at is sort of two sides of this, and I want, I want everyone to think about their boundaries as

[00:03:28] bosses. Yes. But think specifically business owners, I could talk about life work, blend boundaries all day long. I guess it is a little bit of what we're talking about. I could, it doesn't matter. I need date. need to go have lunch soon. So two kinds of boundaries, boundaries that protect you in your business and then boundaries that protect you from

[00:03:53] your business. These are two sets of boundaries, I think are incredibly important because for the first ones pertaining you in your business is all about making sure that whenever you are sitting down to work, you are here doing the work that is most important for you to do for this organization that you've built.

[00:04:15] And that is true. Whether you are a solo entrepreneur or whether you have a boss or you are a boss of a team of 50. You need to protect yourself in your business. You need to protect yourself from sort of wily clients from fires that need to be put out from distractions, from, you know, things that don't need your time, that you don't feel that you feel may be important, whatever it may be, protect yourself in your business.

[00:04:42] And then as the awesome business owner that you are, God bless us for choosing these paths for ourselves. You had to protect yourself from your business, right. To keep your business from encroaching into your life too much. I feel like both of these are the kinds of things that contribute to, or a lack of these things are the things that contribute to burnout.

[00:05:12] To, you know, having, what's the word I'm looking for? Not regret. There's a word, resentful. That's the word I'm resentful for your choices to start a business for your clients for, you know, Every decision you've ever made in your life that has gotten you to this point, whatever it may be, having strong boundaries in these places allows you to show up and be your best self when you are here working, which allows you to more concisely and efficiently create the impact that you're here to make.

[00:05:51] So boundaries in your business, boundaries from your business. One of the things that I'm really excited about doing. I move into, actually, I guess, as of recording this, I'm doing it, which I'm very excited about, but like behind the scenes, as of recording this in May, 2022, we have launched a beta run beta, beta group I guess is what we call it of a group coaching.

[00:06:20] Yeah. Right. Something like that. of a group coaching program that the team and I have been working on behind the scenes for, I mean, let's be real seven years.

[00:06:32] Corey Winter: But more practically like, three, four months.

[00:06:36] Emily Thompson: Four, maybe five, something like that a while. We are currently launching it to just the community, which is another reason why you guys should be a part of the community.

[00:06:46] We do stuff like this in that space to our nearest and dearest. So we've currently launched it at the time of publishing this episode, I will be in it doing the group coaching with this small beta group. And one of the things that we're gonna be doing is this defining some hardcore, very defined boundaries

[00:07:07] for you to be producted both in and from your business. This is such an important thing. And, and honestly, I find that because in the last episode, we talked about this idea that you can put policies in place, right. That help support you when it comes to talking to clients, to your customers or how it is that you wanna move throughout your team, whatever it may be.

[00:07:29] These boundaries, I think are some of the easiest ones to put in place. Which once you get to practicing putting these boundaries in place, upholding them, communicating them, all of those things. It's so much easier for you to take these skill sets outside of your business so that you can have better relationships with your friends and your family.

[00:07:49] And you can, you know, Just better prioritize all things. So we're gonna be doing some coaching around this, in our beta group. I'm doing it right now as of the time of this thing coming out, and then we'll be launching it again in later summer, openly to everyone. So if this, as we're going through this, if you're like, I don't even know how to, where to start or I need help.

[00:08:08] You need the accountability to. Hold yourself, responsible to your boundaries, then know that our group coaching program is coming soon to an email near you.

[00:08:22] Corey Winter: Or better yet join the community, you will get notifications when it goes.

[00:08:26] Emily Thompson: Indeed. So indeed.

[00:08:28] Corey Winter: All right, so let's, let's move on. Let's actually talk about you're starting with in your business boundaries.

[00:08:34] So what important boundaries. Can you set up to protect you in your business?

[00:08:39] Emily Thompson: Mm, good question, Corey. Thank you for asking. okay. So in your business, so again, the purpose of this little subset of boundaries for bosses or business owners is about protecting you in your business so that you can show up to do the work that you are most aligned to do.[00:09:00]

[00:09:00] One thing that you can do is define access to you. So maybe this is store hours. Maybe this is email hours or like slack hours or otherwise communication hours. Maybe this is how it is that you communicate. One of the things. I've always, or I was always extremely adamant about back when I was doing client work is I would not give my clients my cell phone number.

[00:09:24] And that's something I see people doing all the time and it never ends well , I've heard so many bosses come and talk to me or talk to other bosses or bring that to the groups, whatever it may be about, you know? So I have a client who won't stop taxing me. Well, Problem number one is that you gave them your cell phone number.

[00:09:43] That is a boundary that I don't think that many bosses should cross. So how you communicate is really important, you can also think about just sort of gave a very client side example. Also think about your team as well. Even the Being Boss team, we're not texting each other. If we need to talk, we're on slack.

[00:10:02] I will occasionally, Meri and I have a, have a relationship where occasionally we will do a little bit of Marco polo, but we try to keep it personal only. Or if we're traveling and cannot text, we will Marco polo if needed, but those are very small windows of time. We are communicating very clearly.

[00:10:21] For the next two days I might mark polo you. Is that okay? And it's a very well communicated boundary that we are loosening, that we are opening up a little bit, so that we can communicate as needed before we close it back down and get right back to communicating how it is that we communicate. So access to you, I think is incredibly important for you to define in any and every way that you need to.

[00:10:45] Corey, I'm wondering from you. When have you seen this work really well? Or when have you seen this be a shit show?

[00:10:56] Corey Winter: Well, I'm thinking back to Indie Shopography. So we had the clients and we offered email support. So if they ever had a problem, they could email us, but we had email hours and in the footer, like our signature of all of our email accounts, we said email support is available.

[00:11:14] I think it was just, you know, typical eight to eight to five, Monday through Friday. If you email us on the weekends, you'll get a response on Monday. And for the most part, clients respected that because we set that boundary. We set that expectation when it has not worked well, actually goes back to that,

[00:11:32] cell phone thing. The very first client I ever had is fact before I really had a business. And the only way I could talk to them was on my personal phone. Cause I didn't have a business phone or anything like that. So they obviously had my phone number and they were older and man, they just blew up. My, it was an older person that knew how to text , which made it worse.

[00:11:54] Oh gosh, he did not leave me alone. Yeah, it did not. It did not go. I learned my lesson but yeah. Yeah. So ever and, and you can get free business phone numbers. I think Google offers business phone numbers. So like there's ways around that. If you don't have an actual business phone, you can get virtual phone numbers.

[00:12:15] If you want to have a business phone number for your clients.

[00:12:18] Emily Thompson: Yeah. I mean, I remember back in those days I had a Skype phone number, right? Yeah. They were calling a phone, but it was just ringing on my Skype. And so I was never giving my cell phone number. There's definitely ways that you can do that. Hold on.

[00:12:30] I feel like you pinpointed something else there. I wanted to highlight X. Oh, so around emails. Another thing that you can do is create separate email accounts for things like support mm-hmm or customer service or whatever it may be, so that you're creating a boundary between your email and the sort of

[00:12:49] support or customer service email. Another way that you can protect yourself in your business. Whenever you're getting into your email to, you know, answer your business besty and reply to, you know, a new client inquiry or whatever it may be, you don't also wanna be bombarded with all the support that you may need to also be giving, setting up things like that also helps you think further down the road to what it would be like to have someone come in to manage support.

[00:13:13] You're not having to get this stuff out of your inbox. From the very beginning, created a boundary that makes it really easy for you to bring someone else in to manage that support, email address or whatever it may be. For a while you can have that forwarded to your personal if you want that to happen.

[00:13:29] But you can also just create it as a completely separate situation. Also things like, you know, putting no DMS in, you know, in your Instagram. Bio or whatever, like creating boundaries around access to you and then upholding them for sure, because if you define hardcore email hours and then you are emailing outside of them, guess what your clients are gonna expect you to.

[00:13:53] Corey Winter: Yeah, you they're gonna follow your didn't not let us, you did not let us email after hours.

[00:13:58] Mm-hmm . Like you, you, I think you actually got mad if we did.

[00:14:01] Emily Thompson: I probably did because then they start expecting it. And then I'm, you know, on a Friday night and having someone yelling at me because they emailed after five and I didn't reply to them. It, there is, they will respect your boundaries as long as you do, and they will follow your lead a hundred percent.

[00:14:19] So define boundaries for how it is that you want people to access. You. And then absolutely uphold them yourself. And in for the most part, people are fine with that. I will often talk to bosses who are like, well, I'm afraid that my clients will get mad or like, you know, not respect my boundaries and everyone who's ever instituted

[00:14:37] this has always been surprised to come back to see that no one cares . No one cares and if there's not.

[00:14:43] Corey Winter: And if they do care, yeah. They're not your dream customer.

[00:14:47] Emily Thompson: No, they need to go and they need to learn some manners a hundred percent.

[00:14:53] Corey Winter: Also if you work with a team, do not disturb. Oh, that functionality is fantastic.

[00:15:01] Yeah. Yep. On slack, on just your computer in general, you can settle it all. Do not disturb time. Yeah. So after hours you will not get notifications.

[00:15:10] Emily Thompson: Yep. For sure. I don't even do that if I am, if I am not slacking, if I'm doing something where like, I need to be focused and I don't even care what y'all are down there, like talking about whatever it may be.

[00:15:22] I will just close the app and. I do not have slack notifications on my phone.

[00:15:30] Corey Winter: See, I just can't imagine that life.

[00:15:32] Emily Thompson: Yeah, no, like I same, my email notifications are not on my phone. Like those are boundaries that I have created where if I ever look at my phone, I can see what phase the moon is in. Or if the moon moved into another sign or if someone Marco polled me and that's about it.

[00:15:48] That's about it. So boundaries to protect you in your business so that you can focus on what it is that you wanna focus on. So many ways that you can define that for yourself. [00:16:00]

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[00:16:43] Corey Winter: So that was, that was access to you, boundaries. What, what other kind of boundaries can you do in your.

[00:16:53] Emily Thompson: I think lots of standard business policies. I mean, this is where a little bit of research comes in. Things like returns or refunds returns or re returns or refunds re returns or refunds.

[00:17:12] that's hard to say but I did it, things like late payments. Ugh, bosses all the time are coming in. Like clients have disrespected their payment boundaries then create one more. That has them paying you for late payments or having some sort of action that happens. If someone is paying you late. What happens if someone disrespects your boundaries and cancels an hour before a meeting or before a session or whatever it may be.

[00:17:41] Creating policies around those kinds of things to protect you in your business. So that someone, if someone is wasting your time, money or energy, you get compensated in some way, or at least they know what happens because sometimes simply stating the policies of like, if you pay me late, then will have them make sure that they

[00:18:02] never disrespect that boundary because they understand that it's important enough for, to you that you would do something about it if it happened. So all kinds of policies like that, depending on your business, you'll have different kinds of policies that you need to have in place, but absolutely put them.

[00:18:19] And here's my things with policies and, you know, create them as a boundary or whatever it may be as you can break them. But you first have to make them what . So, you know, if something like returns, not returns, but returns, you know, you can create. As strict of a policy as you want, but still kind of go at it as unlike case by case basis.

[00:18:48] Mm-hmm if you want to or whatever it may be, you don't have to be, you know, totally dogmatic about your own policies, unless you want to. The point is that you are communicating where you want those boundaries to lie, and then you can J them around as needed as needed another one of my very favorite ones for protecting you in your business.

[00:19:13] Is to actually create some physical boundaries. This looks different for all kinds of boss businesses, but think about, you know, having your creative studio. That is a boundary that you are creating to protect you in the creative part of your business. Having a door policy, anyone who is working from home, especially if you have kids or a partner who just likes to come in and chit chat.

[00:19:38] Because you're working from home. What could you be doing? You know, you know, David right. Having a closed door policy so that if my door is closed, you're not allowed to come in. Like don't even knock, don't even check and see if I want, you know, more coffee or whatever. It may be having that policy and holding it and not getting mad when they didn't come ask you if you wanted more coffee because your door was closed.

[00:20:01] Right. Then, creating physical boundaries like that are really important. We talked a minute ago about having that, like having the headphones boundary, with my kid of like, if I have my headphones in, do not come talk to me. I have another one cuz I don't really use headphones very much these days, except for when I'm recording is if my fingers are moving on, the keyboard do not speak to me.

[00:20:25] Because I'm usually in the middle of like typing a sentence. And if you say something to me, you're gonna totally screw up. My y'all you'all know what, how my brain works. It's not the most effective sometimes. and whenever I'm in the middle of typing something, if you come in and ask me a question, I lost it.

[00:20:39] I gotta rewrite that whole email. I don't even know where I was. So that's another one of my little physical boundaries of like, do not speak to me if you see my fingers moving on the keyboard. So everyone has, I think, some sort of iteration of what this looks like. Even, you know, I've heard of bosses who are working from the kitchen table, they will.

[00:21:01] Take their stuff off, like put it on the table at the beginning of the day and take it off of the table. They're creating that line between life and work so that whenever they are working at the kitchen table, it is a desk. And when they are not working at the kitchen table, it is their kitchen table. So creating some sort of physical boundary for you to protect yourself is incredibly important as well.

[00:21:21] One of the great things that I did too. Just before the pandemic hit. And then honestly ended up being a saving grace throughout the pandemic was going and getting it out of the house office, creating a hardcore boundary between my life and work so that whenever I'm at work, I'm at work. I'm not thinking about the laundry or the dishes, or, you know, the dog barking next door is, are they gonna let him in.

[00:21:46] Because then that I've lost my train of thought again. I can just be here working and that's another really great physical boundary I'm here. I'm incredibly productive. I leave. And I don't think about all of these things.

[00:21:58] Corey Winter: So it's, that's kind of transitioning us into protecting you from your business cuz those physical boundaries do.

[00:22:04] Emily Thompson: Oh yeah.

[00:22:05] Yeah. So they work the other way too. Hold on before we go into that, I wanna know what, how, what you do to pro protect you in your business. Or maybe just like in your work, however you wanna think about it, but like, what do you do to like get in the zone and protect yourself? your face right now though?

[00:22:23] You don't even know okay's got some improvement.

[00:22:29] Corey Winter: Hmm.

[00:22:31] Emily Thompson: I mean you're in an office,

[00:22:32] Corey Winter: right? Well, I guess I do have the whole access to me thing is I do have pretty set boundaries around that nowadays. Like no one has my phone number. Good. They know I'm pretty slow to reply to emails, so they don't expect anything right away.

[00:22:46] Yep. Then I do have an office, so if I'm in my office, I'm obviously working. If I'm not in my office, I'm not working.

[00:22:54] Emily Thompson: Cool beans. Cool beans. Oh, I do access. I wanna go, there's one more thing I wanna do there. And that is my no meeting days. I do wanna bring that one up again, pretty pointedly, because that one is really important for me, especially as I'm, you know, juggling lots of projects and literally so many meetings and recordings and just all of the things is one day a week where I can just work and sometimes work looks like.

[00:23:23] I just need to go, like write some notes at a coffee shop or like, whatever, like just sort of get out of my bubble and not have to be like, not have to be so present in terms of like, I'm just looking at that zoom camera again. Or that I can sit down and like work on a project for three or four hours.

[00:23:45] That for me is like, That is basically unheard of these days. So like whenever I do get the opportunities to do that, I wanna protect that. So hardcore and having that boundary on my calendar of no meetings on Thursdays, though, as we have recently learned, unless you were just like trying to catch up on all the things, having that, no meeting Thursday really allows me to have the time I need to, similar to what we said previously.

[00:24:13] Like just. Get out of this, what I need. And that is some flexibility in my schedule. That's some freedom. That's the ability to sit down and do creative projects. It is something I need to make it all do. Now we can talk about protecting from your business. Are you ready?

[00:24:30] Corey Winter: I mean, a lot of that, a lot of that was protecting you from your business.

[00:24:33] Cause we talked about physical boundaries, which, you know, in my case, if I'm in my office, that means I'm working. If not my office, I'm not working. So I, if I'm outside of my office, that is protect me from my business I'm not working.

[00:24:45] Emily Thompson: So it's so funny. Is that, that door, that door to your office? Yeah.

[00:24:48] Literally serves two purposes. If it is closed is, and you are inside of your, the room you are being protected in your business. If you, it is closed and you're on the other side of it, it is protecting you from your business.

[00:25:01] Corey Winter: You know, last year, my brother and my nephews lived with me. So I did not have an office anymore, cuz they were using my old office as bedrooms.

[00:25:09] And so my office was in my bedroom. And so like I didn't have that physical boundary cuz I was in my workspace, but also in my personal space and I didn't have that boundary. And so having that physical office now where it's just my office, that, that it's a huge boundary for protecting me from my business.

[00:25:29] Emily Thompson: How. How did you feel about that transition? Like working in your bedroom to working in a designated office?

[00:25:38] Corey Winter: As soon as they moved out, setting up this office was literally the, like, I'm pretty sure the day they moved out, I started setting up my office cuz it was that huge of a, of a thing. Yeah. And yeah, it has been life changing.

[00:25:53] Yeah. I don't, I don't wanna go cuddle with my dog. That's sleeping in my bed right behind my computer every day. Now I can, I can actually just focus on work.

[00:26:03] Emily Thompson: Love that poor Danny though. Poor Danny. Yeah. I will say, you know, anyone, anyone listening to this who do, who do not who wow. Who does not have a designated workspace for working

[00:26:18] in your business, on your business, that is one of the biggest things that you can do for yourself. And again, it can be a corner in your bedroom or the dining room table, but somehow create some sort of boundary that designates that as workspace and as work time, so that you can focus and do what you need to do.

[00:26:40] Okay, protecting you from your business. So yes, lots of those things do that, but there's also some other things that you can do as well. One of the things that I think most bosses, and I think there are some exceptions to this rule because creatives are all very different, obvious. You're all beautiful unicorns and I love you for it.

[00:26:57] But most bosses need to define for themselves how many hours a week they need to work and actually hold themselves to it. Yeah, because the kinds of work that we do, we could just go all day, all day, every day and not even feel bad about it until we do. And then it's a little too late. So one of the things that, and this is definitely reflective of how it is that I need to work or yeah.

[00:27:20] How I need to, how I have to is I have to have a, like a goal post that's not at all the right word for this, but like, I need a wall. I need a wall, not a goal post a wall that I will not allow myself to go beyond. Hmm. Like I'm gonna walk up to it and I'm gonna stop. Try not to slam my face again. Again it, wow.

[00:27:43] Corey Winter: you need a, you need a limit. You cannot go PA you can work less than the limit. Yes. But you cannot go past the limit.

[00:27:50] Emily Thompson: Indeed. I need that because if not, I will work 50, 60 hours a week without even realizing it. So. For me, I have to define how many hours a week I wanna work for someone else. And maybe the exact opposite in that you need, you need the goalpost, right?

[00:28:04] You need to like, say, I need to at least make it to this and beyond, because maybe you are side hustling and you're really trying to get up to like having 12 hours a week to work on your business. Or you are an amazing procrastinator and you just need to like really gain the discipline of sitting down and working on your business, whatever it may be.

[00:28:25] That's more of like protecting you in your business, but on the other side of that door is protecting.

[00:28:29] Corey Winter: I mean, I think it's important to say there's a lot of overlap.

[00:28:32] Emily Thompson: Lot for sure. I mean, it's the same door. same door. But how many hours you want to work so that your business is not encroaching on. Your life, because time is the one thing that we cannot make more of.

[00:28:47] Right? Your kids, aren't gonna be young forever. Your friends aren't gonna wait around forever. Literally climate change is changing the environment on a daily basis like that forest isn't always gonna be there. so go enjoy your life. And so draw some boundaries around, around your business so that you are here working, and then you are out there living for sure.

[00:29:11] Corey Winter: And track your time.

[00:29:13] Emily Thompson: And track your time.

[00:29:15] Corey Winter: Don't just look at the clock at eight o'clock and say, oh, I'm gonna work eight hours. And you know, maybe you take a couple of hours in the middle of the day to take a break, but then you come back and if you're not actually tracking your time, it's hard to actually know how much you're working.

[00:29:28] Emily Thompson: Yeah. It stretches. Stretches for sure. You can think that you just took a 30 minute work or lunch break, but you actually took two hours or you could think you took two hours, but really it was like 30 minutes and you needed more that's me today. Whatever it may be definitely track your time. We do have some time tracking training, which actually is significantly more robust than just tracking your time to make sure you're working enough every week.

[00:29:51] If you would like to check that out beingboss.club/time, it's there. And I use that process literally every single week.[00:30:00]

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[00:30:43] Another one. And we actually talked about this a little bit for working in your business, this idea of working or protecting you from your business and your communication channels. Not having notifications. On your phone, not giving your clients your cell phone number. So they can't call you in the middle of the night or whatever it may be.

[00:31:02] Those sorts of things are super important to protect you from your business so that whenever you are not working, you're not having to deal with work stuff. Don't take your laptop on vacation with you. step away. We're not doing brain surgery here. And that's actually, that is something that I say to the team of both my businesses all the time, because we do work in an environment where, you know, stay on it, stay connected, you know, you're working remotely, or we all have phones in our pockets.

[00:31:37] Blah, blah, blah. We're. Saving lives here. We're selling rocks and recording podcasts. So you don't need to have notifications on your phone. You do not need to reply to that email right now. You do not need to, take your laptop on vacation.

[00:31:59] Corey Winter: Okay, fine.[00:32:00]

[00:32:03] but it is literally on record, on a podcast, like you told me not to bring my laptop. So if something blows up while I'm gone, indeed,

[00:32:10] Emily Thompson: it's your fault. It's fine. Just it's even a holiday weekend. So what we'll fix it on Tuesday. We'll fix it on Tuesday. I mean, this is even me owner of two businesses. I never take my laptop on vacation.

[00:32:25] Hmm. Ever. Like even when I'm traveling for work with a very few exceptions, unless it's going to be kind of a working sort of work vacation where like, I'm going, I'm gonna be at a hotel. I need to do some, like, it's on my schedule that I want to do some things while I'm there. But even like, if I'm doing a speaking gig or for the most part going to a conference or any of those things, like I'm still not taking my laptop boundaries, boundaries.

[00:32:53] Okay. Another one from working or protecting you from your business? Well, I put no meaning days on this one. That’s funny. You play that's in your business, but kind of from your business. I mean, ed yeah.

[00:33:03] Corey Winter: It's from your business.

[00:33:04] Emily Thompson: Yeah, like I guess so I guess so, like I said, there's a lot of overlap indeed.

[00:33:10] Basically your business is a monster that will like try to encroach on every single bit of your life. If you let it only, if you let it, you were the key there, you have the ability. A hundred percent, it's your business. Is it not to create any and every boundary that you need to allow you to separate from your business

[00:33:33] whenever you want to. And if you have some like angry clients or like, no, you, you let them hire you. You're keeping them on. You've let them believe that this is acceptable behavior until now, because I'm literally hearing multiple people in my ear being like, but, but, but, but, but, but right. Or, you know, your team can't do it without you, whatever it may be.

[00:33:56] You did this, you can fix it and you can have the relationship with your business that you most want. And also, literally that is also just the whole premise of the entire coaching, the group coaching program. I was not planning on plugging this again, but as I'm saying it, I literally just wrote the sales page of, of you get to define your relationship with your business.

[00:34:17] And we're talking boundaries here. We're also talking mindset, we're talking habits and routines. We're talking all of the things. That is the premise of the group coaching that we are currently beta testing with a small group in the community. And I'm super excited to be launching later this summer.

[00:34:31] So if this gets you excited, you wanna hear how it is that I wrangle literally two businesses and have immaculate boundaries. Even though in the last episode of this, I talked about how they really suck at the moment. . Simply in a winter, simply in a winter of my, this cycle of creation. That is what the whole group coaching is about.

[00:34:51] Corey Winter: We have talked about what some boundaries are, but how do you actually build a new boundary?

[00:34:57] Emily Thompson: Mm, this is the question. Isn't it?

[00:35:01] Corey Winter: You're, you're starting from scratch.

[00:35:03] Emily Thompson: Yeah. New situation.

[00:35:05] Corey Winter: How, how do you do it?

[00:35:07] Emily Thompson: Oh, it's easy enough. It's actually a replicable process, which we love here in business. Do we not? First thing you have to do is identify where it is that you need it.

[00:35:19] Right. Where, where do you need the boundary? And like we said, I think in the last first part of this, this two-parter is where is there friction, like where is there an issue? Where is someone bumping up against your values or how it is that you want to go through your worker life? And, you know, has a client said something to you about something that's rubbed you the wrong way?

[00:35:40] Are they texting you? Is your, you know, Friend, not respecting, you know, how you want to show up to dinner parties. I don't know. That's a very lame example.

[00:35:52] Corey Winter: Or, I mean, going back to the calendar example, if you open your calendar and just see too much and it's overwhelming. There's a, yeah, there's a red flag right there.

[00:36:00] Emily Thompson: Yeah. What'd you do to yourself? yeah. You said yes to wait too many things. Maybe it's just something within your business. Maybe, maybe you're working too much. Maybe you're not getting paid enough. Maybe you're doing work that does not fulfill you. I don't know so many things. So I identify where you need it by thinking about where it is that there is friction and I encourage you to get incredibly specific like this client did this.

[00:36:27] My calendar looks like this because I did this. Whenever it may be, get really specific with where it is that friction is happening with, with where it is that you need a boundary, once you've identified, it define a way to remove that friction. Maybe it's something like I will not give my clients myself a number in the future, or I will close my door when I'm at work or.

[00:36:55] You know, whenever I have my headphones in, no one will speak to me, whatever it may be define a way that, that, that friction is removed from that situation. And then actually do it and doing it is a multi-phase process, right. Where like you actually have to perform the action. But you also have to communicate it to someone.

[00:37:17] So it's, you know, telling a client maybe like retroactively, I'm actually not. Taking phone requests anymore. If you wanna communicate with me here is my new policy or AKA your new boundary for how it is that you will communicate. And then never give your cell phone number out again because it is against your policy, AKA boundary to do so.

[00:37:42] Communicating to your kid when my door's closed, don't come in and hold everyone responsible and don't get too been out of shape. If it takes them a minute to adopt your new boundary. I think that's a huge one, too. A lot of people think that, oh, like, they'll just, I'm gonna say it once and they'll remember.

[00:37:59] No, they won't. no, they will not. Sometimes it takes a couple of times to remind people and that's fine. And then I think the most important part of this, because as I mentioned in the previous part of this two parter is that it is, it's a work in progress. So you have to consistently test and change, right?

[00:38:21] Maybe you do the he phone things. And it works well enough, except for like, what if you're not listening to something, but you're typing something on your keyboard. Right? And so then you need to change it of like, if I have my headphones in, or if you see my fingers moving on the keyboard, please do not speak to me.

[00:38:37] and then you are, you are evolving that boundary to better suit your needs. Or, you know, my case where I feel like most, so many of my boundaries have dissolved. I have to re I have to do them from scratch.

[00:38:52] Corey Winter: So step one, identify. Yep. Step two is define step three is do it. Yeah. And step four is test and change.

[00:39:01] That sounds way too easy.

[00:39:02] Emily Thompson: You'd think, right, because it is, it is y'all in, in practice. It is easy enough. The problem is there's like parts that come before this things like. Knowing yourself. right. The awesome hardcore self-awareness, identifying what it is that you need. Something that's come in the middle.

[00:39:23] Like the communicating part is incredibly difficult. Showing up for yourself and gaining the discipline. You need to keep your boundaries in place. Incredibly difficult. And then like the follow through and the evolving people don't like to change. Like once you get a boundary in place that just works, like it works.

[00:39:41] Let's keep going, but situations change, your boundaries need to change. So in practice, it is relatively easy. It doesn't take a whole lot, but a lot of things do have to go into it to make it really work. The thing that I love about boundaries is it is a skill set that you learn and you practice and it becomes easier and easier every time that you do it, it becomes easier and easier to, to pinpoint where it is that you need them to have the conversations with the people.

[00:40:11] You need to have the conversations with to actually make it work when and where you need it to work. And to evolve them. I will say evolving them in my current situation and say is maybe the hardest , but that's just because literally where I currently am, but it is what it is. It doesn't have to be, it's not impossible for sure.

[00:40:34] It doesn't have to be hard. You just gotta do it. And then you practice it over and over again. I will say there is like a piece of boundaries. Especially, I gonna bring up like work life boundaries here. That's really important to consider. And actually this is a pretty blanket statement I think for boundaries.

[00:40:54] Is that just like, it's really hard to expect people to just accept your boundaries the first time you tell them, because maybe not maliciously, not respecting them, but literally forgetting them. Yeah. Or whatever it may be is that boundaries are not. They don't just fall into place immediately and work for you immediately.

[00:41:16] Right? They're not like a, you know, I'm gonna do it and it's just there forever and it totally works. I've learned to expect a sort of learning curve for both yourself and the people around you. And for like once the actions actually start happening for the results to start coming to fruition. So for me, for example, like, especially after recording these two episodes, I feel newly empowered to like, let's figure this shit out.

[00:41:44] I do need some better boundaries. Let's put this shit in place. I love this for myself. I'm here to do it. I know I'm great at it. I just gotta do. For where I like newly am in life and work. I'm not going to expect it to be done tomorrow. By any means. I will probably look at my calendar, choose, you know, a couple of weeks ahead, two, three weeks and say, okay, you know, I'm gonna be defining, I'm gonna be communicating.

[00:42:08] I'm gonna be figuring out this out for the next couple of weeks, because in a couple of weeks, then I want to be where it is that I'm going. It's not gonna happen tomorrow. It's not gonna happen next week. It is gonna take a minute and I'm totally fine with that. So is it easy? Absolutely. Yes, it is also.

[00:42:26] If it were that easy, everyone would just have immaculate boundaries everywhere in their life right now.

[00:42:31] Corey Winter: well, I think the, I think the real first step is listening to these episodes.

[00:42:36] Emily Thompson: Oh my God, indeed. It's that easy? indeed. It is that easy, more or less, and just know yourself know what's important to, you know, what your values are, right.

[00:42:47] That's really, I believe where this begins is your values sort of like overarching sort of life values. And then your priorities for right now and in the relatively near enough future, what are you trying to accomplish? What is important to you right now? And building boundaries so that they wrap around those things.

[00:43:07] So they're protecting them and, and supporting you and accomplishing what it is that you wanna accomplish. Boundaries, I think. Really good aligned boundaries will help you feel more like yourself and help you feel supported in yourself. More than anything else I think. And from that place of boundaries, you're able to build good habits and routines and build amazing relationships with people and show up for your work and all of these things.

[00:43:35] And for anyone who gives a shit about ROI and shouldn't we all , they literally give you back time, money, and energy. Right. You will have more time to do more of what you want. You will have more money to do more of what you want. You'll have more energy to do more of what you want, with good boundaries that are protecting, what is, you know, just sort of being spent all willy-nilly in places.

[00:44:00] It doesn't need to go. You will have that back to do more of what you want with it.

[00:44:05] Corey Winter: So after talking about boundaries for the past two episodes. And you admitting that your boundaries are not the best right now. What's the next boundary you're you're gonna work to set.

[00:44:16] Emily Thompson: Oh, I'm probably gonna cancel that Thursday meeting that I have in two weeks.

[00:44:20] nice. I'm just gonna go it's an internal team situation. I can't remember exactly why I put it in place. Oh, no, it's not. It's a business bestie. It's still fine. I'm still gonna change it. I do not need Thursday meetings at all. I gotta get that shit off my calendar. What was I thinking? What was I thinking?

[00:44:38] Best number one is like reinstating completely upholding my no Thursday meetings. That's the easiest one for me to do. And it's one that like I've already totally set all of the expectations for around the board. Just need to make a little shift. And then beyond that, I think I need to like get back in line with how many hours a week I want to work.

[00:45:00] Yeah, because that, over the past probably month or two, I've been judging around because I've been trying to accomplish what I need to accomplish. See episode what number three. Oh. Mm. Let me see. Feel free to see episode number 3 0 6 for how we just opened a new retail business for Almanac. But I think those two in particular are very easy for me to put back into place.

[00:45:24] Not even necessarily redefined, just sort of like reinforcing boundaries that still serve me. What about you?

[00:45:34] Corey Winter: None I'm perfect. My boundaries are imaculate no, I think, I, it's gonna be a simple one. Just setting, setting, maybe a timer every night to actually go to bed at a specific time. Oh yeah.

[00:45:47] So that I'm actually waking up at a proper hour, so I can actually start working on time so I can end my day on time and actually have time at the end of the day to do fun activities.

[00:45:57] Emily Thompson: I love that for you. Love that though. I do have a question. What is, why do you say proper time to wake up? Whose definition of proper is that?

[00:46:08] Corey Winter: Mine.

[00:46:10] Emily Thompson: So yeah, that was that feel like more of a question. This statement.

[00:46:15] Corey Winter: I was actually gonna say Danny it's

[00:46:17] Emily Thompson: it's dogs. Yeah. Okay. if your priority being a good dog, dad, Corey. Yeah. I love that. I have mad respect for that.

[00:46:28] Corey Winter: No, I was gonna, I mean like a proper time to like, get a good solid day's work in.

[00:46:33] So like if I start eight, then work eight hours then end the day at four, whatever. Yeah.

[00:46:39] Emily Thompson: Yeah. Love that for you. Perfect. Well, hopefully that also inspired everyone to see that your first boundaries do not have to be big ones. Yeah. They can be super simple. And I think that's even like a, just give yourself an easy.

[00:46:53] And that's another good way to get a good boundary ball. Rolling is do something easy that, you know, will be, you know, easy for you to fulfill an easy boundary for you to respect for others, to respect, and then just go from there and otherwise set up boundaries so that you are protected in all the ways that you need to be.

[00:47:11] That includes me and my Thursdays, you and your dog and everyone else in whatever way they need.

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[00:48:03] Now until next time, do the work, be boss.