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Work Less, Earn More is the podcast that explores how to get the most out of every hour you work. Gillian Perkins brings more than a decade of experience as an entrepreneur and educator to help you design a business that's not only flexible and fulfilling, but highly profitable. She shares strategies that are working in her own business to save time and maximize profits. She also features interviews with successful business owners on how they’re achieving big things in their businesses with crazy-little time investment. Share Work Less, Earn More with an overworked entrepreneur you know who could use a change of pace!
Gillian:
[0:00] Hi, friends. Welcome back to Work Less, Earn More. In today's episode, I'm talking to Sarah Noked, who is the CEO of OBM School. And Sarah Noked has been in the online business space for over a decade now. She is just a veteran of this space. And she started out as an online business manager herself. And then she grew an agency of online business managers. And today she teaches people how to become online business managers. And she also helps to matchmake them with clients. So she helps clients find online business managers and online business managers find clients. And in this episode, we're going to be talking all about how to grow your team successfully. So whether that is hiring an online business manager or hiring somebody else, you know, maybe you aren't ready for an online business manager yet, but you are ready to hire a virtual assistant, or maybe you need to hire a customer service person or a video editor? How do you decide who is the right person to hire at this point in your business? And when is the right time to hire an online business manager, if ever? So just so you know what to expect in this episode, we spend the first half or so of the episode talking specifically about hiring online business managers,
[1:14] What hiring an online business manager looks like, why you might want to hire one, and when is the right time to do that. And then in the second half of the episode, we get into if it's not yet the right time to hire an online business manager. Well, what should you do then? Who should you be looking to hire? And how can you find the right person for the job and just really get the most
[1:36] out of hiring people and growing your team? So whether you already have a small team or you are looking to make your first hire, I know that you'll get a lot of good information in this episode about how to make your next hire and continue to grow your team strategically.
[intro bumper]
We became entrepreneurs because more than anything, we want freedom. We want to be in control of our own schedule, income, and life. But unfortunately, that isn't always the reality of being a business owner. I'm Gillian Perkins, and I'm on a mission to take back entrepreneurship for what it's supposed to be.
In every episode, I'll share with you how to get the most out of every hour you work so that you can work less and earn more. Let's get to it.
[/intro bumper]
Gillian:
[2:28] Hi there, Sarah. Welcome to Work Lesser and More. It's good to have you here with me.
Sarah:
[2:31] I'm excited to be here. Thanks for having me.
Gillian:
[2:33] Yeah, it's been a little while. We do this, I think, a couple times a year, it seems like, but it's always nice to see your face.
Sarah:
[2:39] Yes, you as well.
Gillian:
[2:41] So starting out, could you give the listeners just a little bit of context? Tell them what your business does, basically?
Sarah:
[2:47] Yeah, absolutely. So I started off as an online business manager back in 2009. So many, many moons ago, and I have steadily scaled my own business as well as my agency. And we are still, we love working with clients that are scaling multi-six-figure and seven-figure businesses. And on the other side of things, I have OBM School, which really focuses on training online business managers and accrediting and certifying online business managers. So we also have our digital school that's been running for the last five years. So together, it's a very nice ecosystem system of really helping entrepreneurs scale service-based businesses, mostly digital agencies, all of that stuff.
Gillian:
[3:32] Yeah. You talked about two different parts. And the second part is where you train people to be online business managers, right? So that's online. That's right. And what's that called? OBM school. Is that right?
Sarah:
[3:41] Yes, that's right.
Gillian:
[3:42] Yeah. What is the, I didn't quite understand the first part you were talking about. I didn't realize your business had two different parts.
Sarah:
[3:50] Yeah, yeah. So part of my why for, and you're not to be cheesy, but I really think there's something to be said about helping our students find clients and I am somebody who has been an online business manager for a quadrillion years. And we've got a lot of SEO, a lot of traffic, you know, you know, after years how to get those clients. So I have been successfully matching online business managers with their ideal clients for the last two or three years. So my agency as an online business manager started years ago. But in the last few years, alongside OBM School, we've just really been focused on matching.
Gillian:
[4:30] I see. Okay.
Sarah:
[4:31] And that's been amazing. So that's really how our agency runs. We find really great clients, really great OBMs. And then I do a little bit of a match. And I started to like think of myself as like a matchmaker. Yes, I'm a matchmaker. So it's been really great. It's been a lot of fun. Because as someone who's been an OBM for a while, I'm like, off to the races, you two. Oh, you're such a beautiful match. Now you go and work together forever. And it's just it's a really nice full circle thing for me.
Gillian:
[4:58] So one thing I wanted to talk to you about today is how to grow a team because, you know, in this business of helping people become online business managers and then find clients. So what if I am a business owner, like hypothetically, I'm a business owner, I'm considering hiring an online business manager. I know I need some management help, right? Like I need some help running this ship. A lot of the time, if you are thinking about hiring an online business manager, of course, you're like more of a visionary type leader, but running the day-to-day operations can be tough. So what would you say like are some of the most important things for someone to consider or criteria for someone to consider if they're considering hiring an OBM, but they're not quite sure if they're ready yet?
Sarah:
[5:40] Yes. You hit the nail on the head when you said visionary. And I think one of the things that I've really come to understand about true CEOs and true visionaries is that it's very difficult for them to delegate to a team. It's very boring to manage and organize things. And what I realized about myself many years ago, and a lot of the women and men that I work with in the program is that we love organizing. We love being on the back end of things and just cleaning things up and creating projects and sort of like, you know, on and on and on with that. But over the years, I've realized that there are four key characteristics that a client needs to have to successfully work with an online business manager. And the first one is their revenue. So fortunately slash unfortunately, I get a lot of people contacting me wanting to work with an online business manager, and they're very much in the startup phases of their business. And I lovingly tell them that at this stage in the game, you have to bootstrap.
Sarah:
[6:42] And you're only ready for an online business manager when there's something to manage in the business, meaning you have clients, you have revenue coming in to the tune of at least six figures in gross annual revenue. So that's something like $10,000, $12,000 US dollars a month in revenue and up. So revenue is a really key thing. Actually, the sweet spot, I would even say, is probably between $20,000 to $40,000 a month in gross revenue.
Sarah:
[7:10] So the first thing are the financials being very blunt, being very honest here. Unfortunately, I turn away a lot of people who are making $3,000 a month. I'm like, well, you're at that phase where you probably need to hire a virtual assistant. And we can definitely talk about what that first hire looks like. But back to the OBM hire. So the first thing is revenue. The second thing is that you have to find an OBM that really aligns with your values. one of the most important magical pieces of the OBM role is partnering with a client. So if the OBM and the client likewise are not speaking the same language or on the same page, that's going to cause some conflict. Now, the third thing, and this is funny enough, a lot of the times it's a deal breaker, is that delegation mindset.
Sarah:
[7:57] So I find that a lot of the times they feel as if they are the only ones in their business who can do the things they do. And believe me, I understand that. But a lot of the times you have to remember that, you know, you're not the best and that everything that recurs in your business is really delegatable. You know, it all really takes practice. So the revenue piece is there. The business model piece is there. The partnership piece is there. And I think just really having that scalability in mind, right, that mindset to scale your business, the mindset of understanding that it's difficult to hire a team. Like, it's not an easy thing to do. And you got to kiss a lot of frogs before you find your prince, you know, lovingly joking there. And that's why I love my matchmaking, because it allows me to find the perfect OBM and match that with the perfect client. So that's really how I feel about what it takes to really know what you need
Sarah:
[8:54] before you're ready to hire an OBM. It takes time to bring somebody in a management level into the folds of your business, behind the scenes. It can feel sometimes very vulnerable for people. So I try to really facilitate an easy handover when I do my matches with clients.
Gillian:
[9:12] Yeah. I remember the first time I heard about the concept of an online business manager, I was very confused. So somebody who I like, a business mentor of mine who had a pretty good sized audience, she was talking about how she had brought on an online business manager. And I just scratched my head and I was like, it's your business. Wouldn't you be managing it? Like, why would you hand over the reins to somebody else? I don't understand this at all.
Sarah:
[9:42] Yes. Well, I mean, the truth of it is, and you probably, I know you know this well, because I know a lot of the OBMs on your team, but you get to that point where it's like that glass ceiling in your business where there's just not enough time in the day and you're doing all the things. And you know that if you just had 5, 10, 20 more hours in your month, you could write the book, right? Start the podcast, start the YouTube channel, whatever those big vision goals you have for your business that you just don't have the bandwidth or the time for. So I'm using myself as an example, as a service support professional as an OBM. I remember in my own business.
Sarah:
[10:22] That same disconnect, Gillian, that you were talking about, because I was like,
Sarah:
[10:26] I don't understand why clients need me. Like, it's so easy to project manage. I love putting the tasks in the project management tool. Like, this is the best part of the business. But as I worked with more visionary entrepreneurs, me being not so visionary myself, I really realized that there is this CEO personality that is so visionary, that is so, you know, off the wall for me, so different from how I am. And that's why I really like to look at the OBM as almost a container that the client can pour all of their everything goes into that container and we help to sort of sort the things that need to get done so what I ultimately realized was that they don't have any more time in the day and if they delegate some of that managerial pieces off their plate that they really don't love doing anyways that they'll have more time to focus on the things that only they can do in their business. And that was a real moment for me where I finally understood. I think it took me getting almost to the breaking point in my own business to really understand what that feels like and to know and to really have perspective on what is important to delegate.
Gillian:
[11:31] Yeah, for me, what finally made it click and like just helped me to figure out why in the world somebody would hand over the reins of their business to somebody else was when I read, I think, Gina Wickman's book, rocket fuel and I won't get into all of it but basically it's just about like the two different types of leaders in a business the visionary leader and the integrator and kind of the different strengths of those two different leaders and their roles and whatnot and And what stood out to me about that was that I saw myself in the visionary leader. I realized, oh, I'm good at those things. And I suck at all those other things, right? That's what's wrong with my business. And I just realized, like, I saw a blind spot in myself that I had never noticed before. Prior to that, I think I just thought I need more time. So I've been hiring like virtual assistants to help me out with those little tasks and stuff was still so messy. And just like really a hot mess. And so when I recognized that I was the visionary and I didn't so much recognize it as like, oh, wow, I have these strengths. It was more like, oh, wow, I have these weaknesses. Like it's not the weaknesses of the visionary more than anything. I really need someone to like be the other half of this puzzle piece, right? And to fill this, all these areas of weakness of mine. And so that was when I hired my first and only OBM.
Gillian:
[12:56] She's been with me ever since. And it did exactly what Gina Wickman promised. Like suddenly my business was a smoothly running machine. And not to say there's not, you know, hiccups and challenges all the time. But now we actually have like both sides of it covered. Whereas before I was just like neglecting half of my business essentially.
Sarah:
[13:20] Yeah, I think neglecting is a harsh word, Gillian, if I think it's very accurate. But, you know, in your defense, I get it. And I always, you know, I always because we're really talking about team here. I always encourage entrepreneurs to bring on virtual assistants. I think they are the most important first hire. It makes the most sense on paper. However, if you are truly visionary, and I know you are, it is difficult to manage virtual assistants because it requires, to quote Gino, that integrator role, which is, you know, synonymous with being an OBM, somebody who can just bring all of the pieces together. And so when I talk to people about team growth, I really emphasize that one of the most important things that you can do to set yourself up for success is by starting to screencast and record.
Sarah:
[14:16] And document how you do things in your business. Because truthfully, I talk to entrepreneurs daily, I love it. And they tell me sometimes, you know, I don't really have systems in my business. And I like literally have to spit my coffee out at my Zoom screen because I'm like, of course you have systems in your business. They may not be streamlined. They might not be optimized. They might fully be managed by you, but you absolutely have systems for everything in your business. So I really encourage them to document it, even if it's just screencasting and starting to create a library of random recurring things that you do, and then having somebody come in that can document that. Now, that's typically an OBM role, somebody that would come in and start to, you know, piece those systems together and then ultimately be managing that VA. So it's pretty crazy because on one hand, it's great if you can hire a VA and manage that VA. But I find that a lot of the times when I am speaking to entrepreneurs who will come to me and are ready to hire an OBM, a lot of them don't have a VA on their team. Or a lot of them have let their VA go because they either didn't know what they were doing, weren't getting the right results, like whatever thing you want to put in there. And then I ask them, I'm like, well, is anything documented?
Sarah:
[15:33] Is there a project management tool in place? And the answer is nine times out of 10, no. And so that I can automatically assume that for sure the VA didn't even know what that measure of success was for them in that role or really what they needed to be doing on a day to day. And that's usually the case. So for those truly visionary entrepreneurs, it's best to hire an OBM first, then the OBM can hire the VA for the more implementation type tasks.
Sarah:
[16:01] And they can manage, you know, and make sure that everything is being done to a standardized way. And really taking that piece off of the client's plate, so that they can, again, focus on only the things that they can do in their business. Like, it's usually sales and marketing. Those are the last two things that usually come off of someone's plate with regard to delegation. You know, operations, delivery of things, making sure that emails are going out, that stuff is all fair game.
Gillian:
[16:30] Yeah, for sure. Well, you're describing me to a T, Sarah. That was exactly what happened with me. I hired a couple different, not just a couple, a handful of different VAs trying to push some things off my plate, trying to delegate some things. And it just kept not working out. And it was because of, like I said, like I had like some significant weaknesses in that integrator side of things, you know, the management side of things, where I just was not capable of. It's funny because something I've talked about with my OBM is how while in my business, I am very much the visionary. And for some reason, I'm totally handicapped and cannot, you know, manage anything, especially related to like keeping things organized or delegating tasks to people or things like that. But in my personal life, I am totally the integrator. I'm the online business manager of my house. That's so funny. You know, my husband is the visionary and I'm the person who keeps all the systems running, who keeps everything organized, who files everything away.
Sarah:
[17:25] It's so ironic.
Gillian:
[17:26] Yeah, yeah. And I still want to say that those things are like, well, like that I'm as good at those things as some people are. Like my file system for my household is kind of like strangely organized, I would say. You know, there are systems that could be improved and whatnot, but I very much fill that role there. But then I step into my business and I think I'm just so focused on like the vision that those things take all of my attention and my energy. And so there's like no energy left for paying attention to the management side of things. So I had hired a few different virtual assistants and let them go because I wasn't able to communicate to them what I really needed them to do. I wasn't able to effectively delegate to them. And managing them took more time than actually doing the tasks myself. Not because management has to take that much time, but because I was being such an ineffective communicator, right?
Sarah:
[18:17] Yeah, it's so common. Yeah, I think, you know, I think it's wonderful to be, you know, sometimes I wish I could be more visionary in my own business because I'm not like very much like, just let me let me play in my CRM. Let me like create some automations. Let me just do things behind it. Like I want to just project manage. I don't I feel you on the opposite side of things like I will default. To just managing my team or even kind of stepping on my OBM's toes, because I have an OBM now on my team, because it's just my default. And I really love it. And it gives me some sense of control. But then I'm sort of putting off, you know, this, like I put off my podcast for three years, I'm still putting off this book that I want to write. Like there's so many things that are visionary for me that I'm like, I don't know, will it be perfect? I'm going to just like backburn that for a while. So I know how that feels from the opposite end. But I think it's so wonderful because there are so many people that are drawn to the OBM role that a lot of the individuals in OBM school have very strong corporate backgrounds. They've been in corporate for 20 years. They've had enough. They want to take their skill set and create their own business. So the good news is for those visionary listeners here, there are a lot of OBMs that will complement your personality. And Gillian, I think it's so important what you said about just kind of recognizing that in yourself, because there was that moment, too, where I was like, oh, I'm not visionary at all.
Sarah:
[19:45] I'm the integrator. I'm the OBM.
Gillian:
[19:47] You know, I really wish that these two different roles had different names than they do, because I feel like visionary is so complimentary sounding like it. So it sounds like exciting and like,
Sarah:
[19:59] I don't know, sexy in a way. Yeah, I hear you.
Gillian:
[20:03] These other terms that we use for the other role, integrator, OBM, they're not sexy. Yeah, yeah. They're robotic. Yeah.
Sarah:
[20:10] It's like sexy and robotic. Yes.
Gillian:
[20:11] Which I think that maybe there's like a little bit of intelligent connotation there. Like it does make a tiny bit of sense for the integrator role to maybe have a slightly robotic sounding name. Like you're dealing with the systems and the management. But still, I wish it had a more like compelling, I don't know, interesting sounding name or something. Because when I describe myself as a visionary, I kind of feel like I'm complimenting myself or like I sound like I'm bragging like, oh, I'm a visionary. And I do in my business I do not feel like that at all like I said I mostly see it as the weaknesses that I have as I can only do the visionary things and I'm sure I can set up a system but I will not maintain it that's the biggest thing I will not maintain it and so I really have to have somebody it's like I got this handicap and I've got to have someone who's like you know my guide dog you know who's my assistant who is like helping me because I'm disabled that's how I feel in my business yeah it's like somebody hold my hand please I need help yeah that's really funny and so I really feel like the integrator role is the person who is the stronger person a lot of the time really so like they're the person who's like keeping everything stable and
Sarah:
[21:24] Managing the fort yeah yeah well those entrepreneurs go off and I'm.
Gillian:
[21:30] Going off and exploring the wilderness and And then I come back and I'm like, I hope that somebody like, you know, did the farming and and stored the grain.
Sarah:
[21:39] And everything is sorted and it's sorted in a way that, oh, my God, is better than how I would have imagined doing something. I think that's like the most beautiful thing when. The OBM on your team is just doing things in a way that is above and beyond what you could have ever imagined for yourself with regard to systems and keeping track of things. And it really is such a pleasure. But again, it really is only at a certain point in your business where you can justify bringing on an OBM. Now, I want to just go back to the revenue point that I mentioned and speak a little bit as to why that's so important, because it's not just like, oh, you need to be in a certain revenue. You need to have consistent revenue. But you also have to really like have the need to bring on an OBM revenue wise, but also just recognizing that you can really blow the top off your earnings in that case. When you bring on somebody on your team that can take on some of the managing, you amplify yourself. It's really a return on investment time and time over that. But it's really, really important to have those visions and those big goals for yourself and to know exactly where you need to be in your business. So when you brought on your OBM, I mean, aside from doing the YouTube videos and all of the courses and stuff like that, was there a goal or something that you had for yourself to work on? Or is it more just like getting the operations in order?
Gillian:
[22:59] Yeah. So, first of all, speaking to that revenue piece, for me, when I had hired virtual assistants prior to that, hiring them and having them on staff was very much an expense. Yeah. It wasn't really adding anything to my top line, to my revenue, to have them. It was more just like giving me back a little bit more of my time. But, you know, at the cost of paying their wages, of course. Whereas when I brought on an OBM, it freed so much of like my mental energy up. And it helped the business run so much more smoothly that we were able to really accelerate the revenue from there. And so we had that positive ROI. and that meant that while technically it is an expense she was much more than paying for
Sarah:
[23:45] Herself yeah it's way more of an investment because you're investing in getting back the only thing you can't get the only commodity you can't get more of which is time so even for an entrepreneur I think even getting back five to ten hours a month of like uninterrupted concentration time because somebody's managing your launch somebody's managing your client care somebody's in the operation. Like everything is spoken for so that you can literally have peace of mind. And just back to the revenue thing, you know, when you bring on like an OBM on your team, a management role, it takes a good three months for things to sort of pan out and smooth out. And I think that's why it's really important that the revenue is coming in so that you can have the OBM on your team for enough time to put semblance, to put order in place. And then it just rolls. It just rocks and rolls in a magical way.
Gillian:
[24:35] Yeah, and for me, so much actually more powerful or more significant than just getting some time back. Because, in fact, I don't even know how much time it really did get me back because she mostly took on things that I just wasn't doing. So it's just that now the business was doing, you know, these things that it needed to be doing that I had been, like I said, totally neglecting. So I didn't necessarily have more time, but now the business was running much more smoothly. And what it did give me was it freed up my like mental energy. Because I had been so constantly distracted by things breaking because of that lack of like foundation, that lack of those systems in the background.
Sarah:
[25:14] Reactionary mode. Yeah, being reactionary to all the things instead of, yes, that's the other piece is getting you back into a proactive sense of, and it's, you know, there's something to be said for having control over your business as an entrepreneur, you know? And I think having somebody that can be proactive and has really truly got your back and is really truly invested in the goals and the dream and the vision of your business, it's amazing. It's just a recipe for success, as you know. Yeah, sure.
Gillian:
[25:45] You asked like, what, I don't know what the question was exactly, but like, what was I looking for the OBM to do or something like that, you know? Yeah, yes. And for me, or like what triggered, you know, me needing the OBM. And specifically for me, it was that I had started Startup Society, a membership program. And so prior to that, I'd been like creating a course and launching it and creating a YouTube video and launching it. And each thing was kind of like, I did a thing, I'd launched into the world and then I could move on to the next thing. But when I created the membership, now I had something that had continuity. Something that needed management and ongoing maintenance, right? Yes. And so it was either going to be startup society is my job now, and that's pretty much all I can do. I don't really have time or energy to be doing those one-off projects anymore. Or I can neglect startup society and probably, you know, won't go on to thrive at all and just, you know, move on to the next project, essentially. But startup society was a big success right from day one. And when we did our first launch, we had over 300 people sign or actually exactly 300 people sign up. It was so funny the way the numbers worked out for that. We had done like a pre-launch where we were promoting a waitlist. So exactly 300 people got on that waitlist. Then we did the launch and exactly 300 people signed up. It was crazy. Like I've never had a launch like that since.
Sarah:
[27:05] That's bizarre. It's like, what are those numbers? Is that your lucky number? Do you see those numbers everywhere?
Gillian:
[27:10] No, no. And you know what? The price was $33 a month. So it worked out to almost exactly $10,000 a month. It was such nice, tidy numbers. I'm like, this is so weird.
Sarah:
[27:20] Anyway, and so weird, it's because you've had time to really be clear on what you're manifesting. That's what that is.
Gillian:
[27:28] Could be. So anyway, so I knew that like this is something I have to protect, you know, like suddenly I had this goose that was laying golden eggs, you know, like this membership that was producing a very significant stream of income month after month. I was like, okay, we got to do something to like take care of this. We don't want to just like let it die.
Sarah:
[27:45] Yeah, we don't want to churn. We want a good churn. Not a good churn. We want to keep people in.
Gillian:
[27:50] Yeah, a good churn in the sense of a very low churn, yes. Yeah, a low churn. Yes. And, but at the same time, I knew that I did have all these, you know, visionary type projects, these one-off things that I wanted to create and launch into the world still. And so I didn't want to just be tied down and like have to do Startup Society as the only thing that I did. That would not be being true to myself or really to the business at all. Like, yeah, I think I would have almost resented Startup Society if I had done that. As it is, like, I've gotten to continue to love and enjoy Startup Society for years and hours.
Sarah:
[28:24] Years and years. For years, yeah. Yeah, like, how many years has it been?
Gillian:
[28:28] Six, seven? I think seven years. Yeah, I launched it in 2018. So... And that was exactly what bringing the OBM into my business really did was she was able to shape up everything in my business, but also make sure that we were doing all the maintenance things we needed to maintain the program.
Sarah:
[28:43] Yeah, and the delivery was on par with your level of delivery inside of that.
Gillian:
[28:49] Yeah, I don't know about you, but I've bought a lot of things online, especially like courses and programs and things like that, and been very underwhelmed by the delivery of it. You know, things being broken, getting into, you know, dashboards where like buttons weren't working and just, I don't know, all sorts of different things.
Sarah:
[29:09] Yeah, that makes me crazy as well.
Gillian:
[29:11] Mm-hmm.
Sarah:
[29:11] They need an OBM.
Gillian:
[29:13] And I was like, I'm not okay with that being my reputation. You know, like I want things to work. When people buy products for my business, I want them to work and work well. And for people to get the right emails at the right times and, you know, all those sorts of things.
Sarah:
[29:28] And also to like knock their socks off with the delivery and the experience of being on the inside. Because, you know, it's a membership. Yeah, for sure. Yeah, I feel like that as well.
[mid-roll ad] [29:37]
Okay, I'm going to interrupt myself for just a moment to tell you about another podcast that I have. So recently, I recorded a 10 episode podcast, just a limited podcast series called the 100k method. In this podcast series, I break down well, exactly that the 100k method, which is my automated sales funnel strategy. So basically, this is the strategy that I use to generate passive income in my business to the tune of hundreds of 1000s of dollars per year. And I want to teach you how to implement this strategy in your business. So I went through, I recorded 10 episodes all about the 100K method,
[30:16] Breaking down for you exactly how it works, every step of the process from the webinars that I use to the emails that I send, how to promote your business without using social media, but instead switch to more passive strategies so that you can fuel your 100K funnel with what I call ready to buy leads and how you can implement this whole system into your business. Basically, I'm teaching you my whole system for free in this new limited podcast series. To get access to the 100k method and binge the whole thing, all you need to do is type in the 100k method into whatever podcast app you are listening to this podcast on. Or you can just search for my name, Gillian Perkins, and it should pop up. I'm also going to include a link to the 100k method podcast series in the show notes for this episode so that you can easily find it there as well. I hope you really enjoy listening to this new podcast series from me. Make sure that you leave a review. Let me know what you think and share it with anyone else who you think could benefit from a 100k funnel in their business. Okay, now let's get back to today's episode.
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Gillian:
[31:26] So anyway, lots about OBMs. We could go on, but I want to get a little bit past just talking about OBMs today. Because like you said, Sarah, you have to be at a certain like revenue point for it to make sense, for it to be sustainable at all.
Gillian:
[31:40] And you to really be able to get the effects, the results from hiring an OBM. So let's talk now to the people who aren't quite at that point yet. So they're not up to $10,000 a month yet. They know they would maybe like to hire an OBM, but you're saying they should wait. Who should or could they hire sooner? And how can they decide what the right role to hire is that will give them back some time and will help them to get closer to being ready to bring on an OBM in the future?
Sarah:
[32:12] Amen. This is my favorite question because it is where all of our OBMs start with their clients. And I think that this is something that anybody who is, you know, with their eye on the price to scale should consider. And that is just doing an audit of how they are spending their time. Nothing crazy. You know, you can take a sheet of paper next to your desk for the week and just keep an honest record of what you're doing in your business that recurs.
Sarah:
[32:40] Anything that recurs is fair game for delegation, in my opinion. So once you've got, so let's say you spend the week and you're like answering client care emails, scheduling my emails, going into the Facebook group and answering questions, like all the regular rigor and mole that happens in your business. Now, if you are a professional, maybe you are a lawyer, an accountant, maybe you are doing your bookkeeping or you are still emailing out clients. Maybe you also run ads or have social media. So you're just keeping a running tally of all of these tasks and all of the time it takes you to complete those tasks. If you're really savvy, you can even use a time tracking tool like Chrome plugins, depending on how tech savvy you are. So now you've got your page of all your recurring tasks. Then I want you to circle the things that take you the most amount of time.
Sarah:
[33:32] And from those time-consuming recurring tasks, be honest with yourself about the ones that really do need to be on your plate still. Because naturally, there are very specific tasks that only you can do in your business. You know, it might be like showing up for my hot seat coaching call once a month on Tuesdays or whatever that looks like. So all of those get circled. And then from the rest that are remaining, that those to me are the really, truly delegatable tasks that recur. And from that list, you can identify one to five of those tasks that you are comfortable delegating. And once you are clear on that, and I think for a lot of people, this is surprising because it's always very rudimentary, simple things in the business, like they're expecting it to be all something that it's not. But once you're clear on what you can delegate, you got to start.
Sarah:
[34:29] Screencasting what you're doing and documenting what you're doing so that when you're ready to hire somebody, it's very clear to them what they need to be doing in your business. Now, when you hire and then getting to who you should hire first, definitely a VA, definitely a virtual assistant. There are many, many talented virtual assistants. You need somebody who can do the implementation in your business. So the virtual assistant is not going to be somebody that takes the big rocks off of your plate, but they are going to take some of those smaller, you know, recurring things, you know, low risk things off your plate that might free up a little bit of your time. And then once you are comfortable and feeling good, because, you know, the truth is, is that you got to be your own OBM. You got to be your own OBM at first. And for a lot of us, it's painful. But yes, you have to start documenting systems. You have to start screencasting things and you have to start being very honest.
Sarah:
[35:29] Then, so once you have this beautiful recurring list and things you're ready to delegate, then you need to really centralize things. So the other recommendation that I tell anybody that will listen to me before they hire a team is you really need a project management tool. It doesn't have to be fancy. It doesn't even have to be a paid tool.
Sarah:
[35:52] You know, like I've been using Teamwork PM for the last, I want to say 15 years. No joke. and I know they have a free tier up to three projects that you can, you know, you just need like one operations project where you start to put those recurring tasks in, you link it to the screencast or a standard operating procedure and you are off to the races. So then you can use that project management tool as a dashboard to manage that virtual assistant.
Sarah:
[36:17] And then once your revenue is a little bit higher, then you look at bringing that OBM to come in and manage the VA. And that I made it sound very simple it never goes smoothly like we were saying before you know yet not everybody's going to be a great fit I'm very very big on dating projects so anybody that I bring on to my team and anybody who will listen to me speak to this it's very important to qualify who you're hiring especially in these days of AI you know like you can very easily fudge things you know I used to love to give people the test for you know social media manager write me a few posts for the Facebook group. And now I know that some of these roles are becoming obsolete. Some of these test projects are really relevant. So you want to also find a project that is going to qualify this person. So if I'm getting somebody to reply to my client care inbox, I might ask them to draft a response to this particular email or something along that nature just to kind of get a feel for how they communicate, how they show up.
Sarah:
[37:24] And then I love to put things into application forms that have to really do with pointing out attention to detail. So if I have a job posting that I'm doing on behalf of a client, I will put something on the end of like, send me an email with this subject line right at the end of the job posting with a cover letter on why you want to work for the company. And I know that people who are just going through things are not going to look at that. They're not going to pay attention to that. And I know that one of the most important qualities of an OBM is attention to detail, aside from organization.
Sarah:
[37:57] So I think it's really just getting some systems in place, centralizing your tools, you know, getting clear on your team audit. That's going to really make for a very nice onboarding experience for a virtual assistant. And then with any team member that you hire, recognizing that it does take time from you if you don't have an OBM, if you're onboarding this person on your own, it can feel sometimes burdensome. And I know that most entrepreneurs are stretched thin as it is. So I say that because I want you guys to be able to have a successful relationship with a team member. So you do have to sort of block some time for nurturing. The other thing I love about OBMs in general is that we're great at company culture. I find a lot of the clients I work with, you know, they neglect their company culture. But when an OBM comes on and you have the VAs and the team members and maybe a graphic designer or video editors and all the team is coming together. It's a beautiful company culture that can be created because OBMs really do care about that whole dynamic because we don't you know we don't want high teen turnover yeah.
Gillian:
[39:03] You talked about one of the important things to do when you're bringing somebody on to have a project management software set. And I hadn't even thought about that with my experience. I didn't have one when I had those virtual assistants before I successfully hired my OBM. It was when Courtney, my OBM, came on that she was like, you need a project management system. And so she set up a sauna for me and then we've been using it ever since. And it's been so helpful. I couldn't live without it for sure. Before that, I just had this very complicated to-do list, you know. Yeah. It was literally on paper. Yeah. Because I needed to have a physical reminder almost, you know, of what I needed to do to keep everything, to make sure nothing slipped through the cracks.
Sarah:
[39:47] Yeah.
Gillian:
[39:47] But so she set up Asana. But when I had those virtual systems before that, I didn't have any sort of project management system. And I wonder if that was a big part of why I had such a hard time managing them and why it was so time consuming to manage them. Yeah.
Sarah:
[40:00] Yeah, I think that probably was a big piece of it. Because you need you need a dashboard. You know, if you're a visionary entrepreneur, and you're at a stage in your business where you are still the manager, then you really do need to have a dashboard where you can oversee things. And it's, it is, you know, it's just is what it is. Most visionary individuals don't want to be tied down to a project management tool. I would say nine times out of 10 of the businesses that I get into as an OBM, they do not have a project management tool. and they could be making $40,000, $60,000, $80,000 a month in revenue. And I'm like, for real? Like, how do you sleep at nighttime? How do you sleep at nighttime with all these balls in the air and, you know, quite complex projects or a launch? You know, your OBM is managing a launch and, you know, or you've been managing launches all up until now without a project management tool. I just, I personally would not be able to sleep at nighttime. I would have such a high level of anxiety. So I see this with a lot of clients that I work with, that I match OBMs with. And it's just amazing for them when they can relinquish that control and successfully delegate it to somebody because it's just it's not in their zone of genius.
Gillian:
[41:09] Yeah, and my revenue was at a much, much lower point than that. And so I think that there was an argument to be made for me being fine without a project management system, but it didn't work to hire people without it.
Sarah:
[41:20] Right, right, right, right, right. So to clarify, yes, you should have a project management tool from the get go. I don't think it's contingent on revenue in any way. I think even small, like, you know, I train a lot of OBMs who don't even have any clients yet. And I'm obviously encouraging them to lead by example, use your own project management tool, even if it's just invoicing and checking in with clients and checking project management tools. It doesn't it doesn't need to be complicated or puffed out, but it does need to help you get peace of mind and sleep well at nighttime. Yeah, yeah. Because I'm like, I'd be going through my head. Oh, my God, did that go out? Did that like crazy town?
Gillian:
[41:59] Yeah, I mean, if for nothing else, just so that you can start clicking that, you know, make this task recurring button on a bunch of tasks. And then I don't think you need to start with a lot of infrastructure in the project management system. If you are starting on your own or you only have like one person who's working for you or something like that, I think you really can start with it just basically being a to-do list. Exactly. And then you can start making some things recur and you can start sorting some things into other projects, you know, as you need to.
Sarah:
[42:27] Maybe you want to template that client onboarding process because you've had it so nicely. You know, you put the tasks in and now you can just click a button and you got a template so that the next time you onboard a client, you're not reinventing the wheel every time.
Gillian:
[42:41] Yeah. So for me, you know, when I hired those virtual assistants initially, one thing that I have noticed in retrospect is that whenever you try to delegate things or you try to automate something or even sometimes systematize something, you get more of the same results. Like you're able to multiply your results, but you know, you're just multiplying the same result that you had. And so for me, you know, I was trying to hire people, but my business wasn't making very much money yet. You know, a couple thousand dollars, a few thousand dollars in that kind of that time period a month. And so it was like kind of freeing me up to do more of the same sorts of work that I was doing. And the virtual assistants were doing things I had been doing. So it wasn't growing the revenue. Does that make sense? Because we are just now more people were doing the same things that were producing those results. And so what we really had to do was, and this is why I'm glad that it kind of didn't work out with the virtual assistants, was because it forced me to figure out how to do things differently and how to develop things that could scale more effectively. So, for example, you know, I was creating and launching these courses that was only getting us to a couple thousand dollars a month. What I had to do was I needed to create a membership. You know, I needed to create something. And I'm not saying everybody needs to create a membership, not by any means, but I needed to do something that was going to create some recurring revenue for my business. And so it wasn't until I did that I had the revenue to bring on an online business manager.
Gillian:
[44:06] But if I had made it work with the virtual assistant, I don't know if I ever would have kind of like gotten over that hump and figured out I needed to do things differently or systematize things.
Sarah:
[44:16] That is so insightful, honestly, because I think a lot of people are in that exact same position of just sort of almost chasing their tail with virtual assistants because they're still in the management role and they still don't have the bandwidth to be in the visionary big picture part of their business. And it also, I think, really highlights this notion of growing pains and also why you and I both know that it's very difficult to scale a business. You know, it's not for the faint of heart. I mean, I could, you know, we could say all these things, but we know the hustle and the grind that goes into that. And part of those very, I think, primary relationships with OBMs as you scale and as you build are pivotal for helping you get the clarity to move on. So yes, growing pains hurt, but it was like a natural progression.
Gillian:
[45:13] Yeah, it's kind of that like failing forward concept, right? Like, you kind of have to just try things and they fail, but then you learn things from the process.
Sarah:
[45:21] That's why I was saying, like, the kissing a lot of frogs at the beginning. Because, you know, it's like, not every VA is going to be your cup of tea. Not everybody has the best intentions online. And, you know, sometimes when you hire that first person, like, I know... When I was initially scaling my agency back in 2011, I actually had employees in my agency.
Sarah:
[45:40] And I made tons of mistakes with those employees. There are even some things that I think about that literally make me want to vomit from how I would talk to them or the fights that we would have that were like so unprofessional and so, I think, reminiscent of like little me trying to do my big thing. So I think it's a rite of passage, I think, is what I'm trying to say. And everybody goes through it. Everybody has to have those team members that don't turn out so well in order to be the team. Like it's part of that leadership flex, right, that we all have to develop, whether we have the soft skill or not, whether we see it or not, it does develop. So, I mean, I think it's important to be in that uncomfortable space. You know, like maybe you're listening to this podcast and you're like, oh, I'm under 10K. I really do need to hire my own VAs. I'm going to take Sarah's advice. I'm going to take what Gillian said about her experience. And yes, I'm going to audit my task, put some SOPs in place and hire that first VA and try to do all the things that I can do to make it work. But it doesn't always. It doesn't always work out. And usually it doesn't. And it's part of the... Very, very, I think, uncomfortable journey of being an entrepreneur, CEO in your business.
Gillian:
[46:55] Yeah, for sure. You're talking about like the challenges of learning to be a good leader. And I think that that's something more people should talk about because most of us don't go to leadership school, right?
Sarah:
[47:05] And so we're just a hustle and grind. Like, you know, I can put in 18 hour days. I'm a great CEO. Like, that's what it was for me at the beginning. And then I got old and tired. Then I turned 40 and I'm like oh no more of that 18 hour days those are gone.
Gillian:
[47:20] I never had that in me so kudos to you yeah I mean I've got 18 hours in me to work on 10 different projects do you know what I mean like I've kind of got that ADHD sort of focus going on yeah but so I'll work hard on things in my home and things out of my home and things in my business and the YouTube you know what I mean?
Sarah:
[47:41] Like, yeah, everything and everything in tandem so that nothing really gets done at the top. It's all just working in tandem.
Gillian:
[47:48] Yeah. But I, you know, I've shared very publicly about how I normally work 20 hours a week in my business. Yes. And people are like, oh, wow, you know, you've got such good boundaries. And it's like, no, I just can only focus for four hours a day. I can only focus for four hours a day. You know, four times five, that's 20. That's how many hours I work in my business. Like beyond that, I just like stare at my computer and I can't do anything. yeah
Sarah:
[48:11] You meet your quota and it's done.
Gillian:
[48:13] Yeah my brain is like okay we need to go do something else change of pace yeah
Sarah:
[48:18] Time for yoga.
Gillian:
[48:20] So yeah, becoming a leader, you know, like that is really challenging there. I think that good leaders make it look so easy that we think it's just one of those natural skills, like essentially like a soft skill that everybody would have unless they are just like a bad person. Therefore, they're a bad leader. But that's not how it works. You know, like you can be a perfectly good person, you know, with a lot of other talents. But if you haven't learned to be a leader, then it will be challenging right yeah and because most of us don't go to leadership school we just learn by doing and it can be quite a learning process like you were talking about you used to have employees I used to have employees too with a local business that I ran and there was you know you're talking about some situations that when you think back on them make you feel like vomiting right yeah I have the same thing yeah yeah
Sarah:
[49:11] I believe I did that or I behaved like that it's like.
Gillian:
[49:13] Yeah, but you didn't know. And so for me, like the experience was mostly, you know, me thinking, OK, I think the company would be better if we did this, you know, where I think that this is what the people should, you know, the employees should do or whatnot. And then I would declare to them, OK, this is what we're going to do. And then you see the reaction of them. You know, sometimes you do things that they love and sometimes you do things that makes a revolt happen.
Sarah:
[49:34] Yeah. Yeah.
Gillian:
[49:35] And so that's what I'm talking about, like the learning by doing it's a painful process. But you don't know how different leadership moves that you make are going to go down, the effects that they're going to have, how people are going to react more than anything. And so since we didn't get that training, like, just like listen or know that if you're trying to hire people and it's being bumpy, like that's very normal.
Sarah:
[49:57] It's very normal. I think it's just I think it's part and parcel, the package and... You just have to embrace it. And then for some of us who might be able to, you know, afford bringing on an OBM for, you know, because OBMs do do project-based work as well. So it's not unlikely for an OBM to help a client for a short three-month period, maybe to bring on a VA, to help them get sorted with some SOPs before they take the next level. I mean, anything is possible, you know. But again, I only really recommend that for people who are, either they don't have any time. You know, I've had people who have professional businesses like a real estate agent, and now she's, you know, creating this online course.
Sarah:
[50:37] So she's funding this other business with this stream of revenue. You know, so there's always ways of making it work. But as entrepreneurs, especially online entrepreneurs, there's a lot of bootstrapping happening.
Gillian:
[50:49] For sure. Yeah. I think that's how 90 plus percent of us get started. Probably 99% of us.
Sarah:
[50:55] 99.99999.
Gillian:
[50:58] So if that's you, you're not alone. No. Well, Sarah, this has been a really good conversation. Yes. Before we wrap it up, do you have any last words to the audience, you know, as they're thinking about maybe hiring their first person or starting to grow their team?
Sarah:
[51:12] Yeah. I mean, I think just you got to just bear it. You know, it's not a pretty thing. I feel like everything in business is just solutions to problems. And when we accept that and we try to stop making it look perfect...
Sarah:
[51:25] Or try to subscribe to somebody's way of doing things. Like, you know, obviously I'm a big advocate for OBMs, but, you know, my way is not the only way of doing things. So finding your own way and also just being able to set some real goals for yourself around team. So my best friend is actually in a position now in her own business. She's been running this business for four years. She's a career coach. She's now getting to the point, you know, she's had her VA.
Sarah:
[51:52] I've coached her along all these things. She's getting ready to hire an OBM. And so I get to really see it in the flesh. And it is, it's almost an outer body experience for her, even with me. And I'm like, I'm like, you know, the queen of the OBMs, if I do say so myself. I'm like, I've been, I've got so much information and intel on team and still my very best friend in the whole wide world. I see her struggle. It breaks my heart, but it's just something that we all have to go through. So I think what I would say is that team growth is not a pretty thing, but it is definitely an investment and it is very, very worthwhile because once you have an OBM that comes in three months, six months, it's just smooth sailing after that. And then you have somebody in your business that you can trust because, you know, the OBMs that I train are contractors. This is their career. They are making this and they are not fly by night, you know, going away. Most of the OBMs I train have been OBMs for many, many years. I've had the same client for many, many, many years. It's really very much a partnership. So know that you're not alone.
Sarah:
[52:55] When it comes to team, you can always reach out to me and I'll answer any of your questions as well.
Gillian:
[53:01] For sure. And then Sarah, I think you have a tool that could help the audience with this process. You want to tell them about that?
Sarah:
[53:07] That's right. So we've created a very, very special SOP kit for those of you who are scaling teams. It's over at obmschool.com forward slash W-L-E-M dash SOP. So it includes our standard operating procedure template. It includes an example SOP. And it's just more of me sharing my tools and tricks for successful team growth. As somebody who's always wanted to give my kids the stay-at-home reality in a world that doesn't really support that anymore. I think that bringing on team and having a lot of these tools at your fingertips, like standard operating procedures, centralizing your tools, like how to do that is really going to set you up for success as you take these next steps to delegate and be that leader in your business that I know that you can be.
Gillian:
[54:02] Awesome. Okay, well, make sure that we get that link included to the SOP kit in the show notes.
Gillian:
[54:07] So listeners, you can go down there and look for that to get that downloaded. I know there's a lot of great tools in there that are going to really help you out as you are bringing people on your business so that you are not just kind of flying by the seat of your pants, but you can take some of Sarah's systems and procedures, you know, that you've already set up. Templates. That's really the word I was looking for. Some templates from Sarah.
Sarah:
[54:28] Some templates, yes.
Gillian:
[54:29] And plug them into your business to save you some time. All right, Sarah, thank you so much. This has been awesome.
Sarah:
[54:34] Thanks for having me.
[/outro bumper] [54:36]
Thank you so much for listening to this episode of Work Last, Earn More. Now, if you want even more where this came from, then I want to tell you about my brand new podcast series called The 100K Method. So this is just a 10-episode limited podcast series where I break down the entire 100K Method, which is my automated sales funnel strategy that I use for all of the automated sales systems in my business and the sales system that I teach to all my top level clients. So all you need to do to listen to this series and to learn all about the 100K method, how it works and how to install it in your business so you can start earning a passive income each and every month is search for the 100K method in your favorite podcast app. Probably the one you have open right now. Again, just search for the 100K method. Or alternatively, just search for my name, Gillian Perkins in your podcast app and it should pop up that way too. I'm also going to include a link to it in the show notes for this episode so you can find it easily that way as well. Like I said, the 100K Method is just a 10-episode podcast so you can easily listen to the entire thing. You'll know exactly which episode to start with, episode one, and you can binge listen all the way through to learn everything you need to know about how the 100K Method works and how it can enable you to earn a whole lot more passive income in your business.
[56:03] I hope you really enjoy it. And if you do, be sure to leave it a review to help more people find it.
[56:10] All right, well, that's all for this episode. Thank you so much for listening. I'll be back again next week with another one. Until then, stay focused and keep taking action.
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