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We’re Jason and Caroline Zook, a husband and wife team running two businesses together and trying to live out our version of a good life in the process. In this business podcast, we share with you our lessons learned about how to run a calm, sustainable business—one that is predictable, profitable AND peaceful. Join us every Thursday if you’re an online creator who wants to reach your goals without sacrificing your well-being in the process.
[00:00:00] Caroline: Welcome to Growing Steady, the show where we help online creators like you build a Calm business, one that's predictable, profitable, and peaceful. We're your hosts, Jason and Caroline Zook, and we run Wandering Aimfully, an Un-Boring Business coaching program and Teachery, an online course platform for designers. Join us each week as we help you reach your business goals without sacrificing your well-being in the process. Slow and steady is the way we do things around here, baby.
[00:00:29] Jason: All right, cinnamon rollers, that's you. Let's get into the show. Hello and welcome back to our podcast. What's up? How's it going? How many times do you think I've done like a… what's that called? That is a crescendo?
[00:00:47] Caroline: Scale? Oh.
[00:00:48] Jason: Nice. We are the music podcast that you come to every week to learn about F sharps, C minuses, B pluses.
[00:00:57] Caroline: I think a marriage tip that not enough people are talking about…
[00:00:59] Jason: Yeah.
[00:01:00] Caroline: …is marry someone who has the exact right same amount of tone deafness.
[00:01:06] Jason: Yeah. You don’t want to…
[00:01:08] Caroline: Because I would be so jealous if you could really sing and I couldn't, but we…
[00:01:13] Jason: I'm not sure exactly what you're saying.
[00:01:15] Caroline: But we both can't sing.
[00:01:16] Jason: Yeah. Hey, one of our next preamble tops, you told me about this TikTok trend or whatever that was like what are the funny little silly things that we say around the house. Right now, we can't think of them on the spot because that'll be putting you in an improv state, and we all know how that goes if you've been around for a while.
[00:01:32] Caroline: So, you want to do couples dictionary, but just on the pod?
[00:01:34] Jason: I think so.
[00:01:35] Caroline: Okay.
[00:01:35] Jason: I think it'd be fun to have a couple written down we could share with everybody. So, look forward to that. Maybe next episode, if we remember to write it down. There are some absolute silly ones.
[00:01:43] Caroline: But I want to do an absolute true surprise one.
[00:01:46] Jason: Yeah.
[00:01:47] Caroline: So, maybe I should just do them all to you, because something that does bother me on the trend is when clearly, they know the answers.
[00:01:52] Jason: Oh, yeah, they just surprises. Yeah, sure.
[00:01:54] Caroline: Yeah. They should be surprises where you have to actually guess.
[00:01:55] Jason: You can quiz me. That's totally fine.
[00:01:56] Caroline: Okay, I'll quiz you.
[00:01:57] Jason: Because if I quiz you, then you'll feel bad if you don't know. And then that leads to a whole breaking of plates after the podcast is over. And then we have to go buy new plates every time. It's a joke. We don't break plates.
[00:02:06] Caroline: We don't break plates.
[00:02:07] Jason: Let's dive into it. Oh, I did want to shout out for those of you been paying attention to Carol's baking journey…
[00:02:12] Caroline: Journey.
[00:02:13] Jason: …that she has been on. She has now baked her third item.
[00:02:16] Caroline: I am a true mediocre baker.
[00:02:19] Jason: No, not really because you haven't messed up yet. So, we had a garlic…
[00:02:23] Caroline: I mean, I exploded the butter.
[00:02:24] Jason: That's true. We had a garlic pull apart roll.
[00:02:26] Caroline: Delicious.
[00:02:27] Jason: Which was fantastic. It was basically looks like a loaf of bread with, like you pull the little pieces off. We did the same exact recipe, but with cinnamon sugar and icing on top to be like a cinnamon roll esque. That one we overbaked a little bit.
[00:02:37] Caroline: That was okay. It was overbaked.
[00:02:37] Jason: That one was mediocre.
[00:02:39] Caroline: Yeah.
[00:02:40] Jason: But it was still tasty. And then this weekend, I gave you our tried-and-true gluten-free biscuit recipe and you put it together and you ended up making some parsley cheddar biscuits that were delicious.
[00:02:52] Caroline: They were so good.
[00:02:53] Jason: They were delicious. They were great.
[00:02:54] Caroline: Yeah.
[00:02:55] Jason: It is actually a very easy recipe to make.
[00:02:57] Caroline: They don't compare to regular biscuits. It's like when I say it's so delicious, you're picturing like a…
[00:03:01] Jason: Big, fluffy…
[00:03:02] Caroline: Like a Chick-fil-A biscuit, and it's not that.
[00:03:04] Jason: Well, I'm picturing like a big, fluffy biscuit. It looks like it stands on its own.
[00:03:08] Caroline: Yeah. Like an American, southern biscuit.
[00:03:09] Jason: It's like 10 feet tall and you can pull it open and live inside the nooks and crannies.
[00:03:12] Caroline: And these biscuits are not that. They are just…
[00:03:14] Jason: They're little flat, little flat boys.
[00:03:16] Caroline: They're flat and they are crumbly…
[00:03:17] Jason: But delicious.
[00:03:19] Caroline: But for us, they're delicious.
[00:03:20] Jason: Yeah. And we try, and I make a lot of things, they're gluten full, so those are easy. And also, I literally brought flour back with us the last time we came from the US.
[00:03:28] Caroline: Yeah. You packed up flour in a suitcase, which is such a baker thing to do.
[00:03:31] Jason: I did pack nine pounds of gluten-free flour because that is one thing that is very hard to find here in Portugal. Well, maybe not all of Europe, but in all the places I've looked online, it's very hard to find a good gluten-free flour blend that people say…
[00:03:44] Caroline: But I feel like that was a good choice.
[00:03:45] Jason: It was fantastic. Also, I didn't have to carry that suitcase. Just rolled it around. It's fine. All right, let's get into this episode. So, two episodes ago…
[00:03:52] Caroline: Yes.
[00:03:52] Jason: …we talked about our specific shift for us as being solo creators, but also in talking about our plans to talk to solo creators about the things that they're working on.
[00:04:04] Caroline: Yes. So, if you're curious about that a little bit, we're always telling you about what strategic shifts we're making our business. I think that's fascinating. I love listening to other people. How are they making decisions in their business?
[00:04:15] Jason: What's shifting in them right now?
[00:04:16] Caroline: What's shifting in them right now? If you're interested in that, definitely check out that episode. But it's really our attempt to continue evolving who our target audience is and being more strategic in our content and our business in general. Part of that exploration was coming to this conclusion, which is why I told Jason I wanted to do an entire podcast episode about this, that we would just like to double down and really own the fact that we are this very specific type of online entrepreneur, of a solopreneur. And I feel like that word has been around for years now, but I feel like people are really starting to understand that as more people start to try to build online businesses, there are these words that are emerging to more specifically define what type of online business owner you are. And I just first, some personal context.
[00:05:09] Jason: Okay.
[00:05:09] Caroline: Okay.
[00:05:10] Jason: Fantastic.
[00:05:10] Caroline: So, at the beginning of this year, as many of you know who have been listening for that long, this year is all about going all-in on Teachery this year.
[00:05:18] Jason: Yeah. Which we said in 2023, but that didn't end up happening, but this is the year.
[00:05:22] Caroline: No, it didn't. We really meant it this time.
[00:05:23] Jason: Yeah. What's absolutely ironic about that, just to share with everybody…
[00:05:26] Caroline: What? Please.
[00:05:26] Jason: …we are six months in, and we have literally done nothing external that anybody would know or find Teachery more from.
[00:05:34] Caroline: That's correct. However…
[00:05:34] Jason: Which is absolute hilarious, but we are on the cusp.
[00:05:37] Caroline: We're on the cusp. And you have to look back and you have to see all that we have done and have accomplished.
[00:05:40] Jason: Yeah, of course. Uncle Jerry, we had to fix all Uncle Jerry's stuff.
[00:05:43] Caroline: Exactly.
[00:05:44] Jason: For those of you who've been paying attention.
[00:05:45] Caroline: And sometimes it goes like that. Right? I think that is, listen, we should probably do an entire podcast episode that's like the six-month check in of our Teachery journey.
[00:05:52] Jason: Yeah.
[00:05:52] Caroline: And explain to people, because I feel like we really fell off there and giving updates as we shifted to WAIM. So, we'll save that for another podcast. But to go back to the story at the top of the year, I thought, okay, I was really in the SaaS world. I was in my SaaS era.
[00:06:08] Jason: Yeah. SaaS, you're being software as a service.
[00:06:09] Caroline: Software as a service. And learning a lot about what it takes to run a software company effectively and profitably. And the difference between our software business, Teachery, and our coaching business, Wandering Aimfully, is that in the software business we are not fully in control. We are sort of at the mercy of our developers that we contract out and they are the ones who are built, we're directing the software and of course doing all the marketing and stuff like that, but they are the ones who can tell us I can build this feature, I can't build this feature, or this would take nine months to build, so we can't do that. Those types of things. Right? And so, I thought to myself, especially having two businesses, in order to do the content we want to do, in order to push the product forward, in order to do customer service, that you don't have to do customer service for the rest of your life.
[00:06:58] Jason: Yeah.
[00:06:58] Caroline: I thought to myself, okay, we're probably going to have to grow a small team. It was never going to be a big team, but I was like, maybe it's like five people and we run this small team. And in my mind, that's what it would take to be a "real SaaS" company.
[00:07:12] Jason: Now, just for S's and G's, what would that team look like?
[00:07:17] Caroline: I think it definitely would have been a customer service representative.
[00:07:21] Jason: Yup. Okay.
[00:07:24] Caroline: It could have been an additional developer.
[00:07:25] Jason: Okay So, out of the five, were two of those already our developers or was this five on top of?
[00:07:32] Caroline: Sure. It could be our existing developer. So maybe the two. I would keep the two developers. I would probably hire someone just as like a general marketing hat person. They're helping come up with content. They're maybe even producing the videos, et cetera. And then, that's probably what it would have been.
[00:07:49] Jason: Yeah, yeah, I think that...
[00:07:51] Caroline: What do you think? Would you add to that? Maybe a designer? Because I just…
[00:07:53] Jason: Right. I think that's the last thing that we were discussing. So just to recap, it would have been two developers, one designer, one marketing content creation person, and then a full-time customer support person.
[00:08:03] Caroline: That's probably how it would have shaken out.
[00:08:04] Jason: And that was kind of like, as we started this year, we're not going to do all that right now. We already have the two developers, basically. So, not a lot changes there.
[00:08:12] Caroline: Yes.
[00:08:12] Jason: It's the hours probably would have gone up, but it would have been starting to add some of these other people in as we were hitting some revenue goals. Because it wasn't just going to be, let's just pile these people on now.
[00:08:21] Caroline: Yeah.
[00:08:21] Jason: Let's do it as Teachery starts to grow.
[00:08:23] Caroline: And I think the biggest thing is, because you're probably like, "Well, what's the difference between, you have two developers now? Isn't that a team?" And it's like, I think it would have been a more massive mindset shift because by the time, we have two developers right now, they're contractors. There's no like team element to it.
[00:08:38] Jason: Right.
[00:08:38] Caroline: And also, they're very happy, they're the type of people who enjoy that. They don't want the structure, they don't want the micromanagement. We don't have stand up meetings. It's very asynchronous and it's very much like a contractor thing. It's a very amicable and wonderful and friendly relationship, but it's not like I feel the need to guide this person on their career and create a facilitated team environment for them. Right?
[00:09:01] Jason: Yeah.
[00:09:01] Caroline: And nor do they want that.
[00:09:02] Jason: And just to give context, the one developer has been with us for three years now, and I think I've had four calls in three years face-to-face for less than a total of one hour of talking.
[00:09:15] Caroline: Exactly.
[00:09:15] Jason: Everything has been done through Slack messages. That is how we communicate, and we get about, I think it's 100 or 120 hours a month from that developer. And then the other developer has been around for, I think one year longer. And that developer, we've reduced hours down because they're more of a specialized developer. And I've had one call in that time with that developer. So, that just kind of tells you the state of when you think of like a team, like what that looks like, as Caroline is saying, is very contractor forward. But I think for some people, they don't necessarily know what that means. So, I'm just sharing the context with them, so.
[00:09:45] Caroline: Yes. And I'm glad you did because like I said, there's a big difference between that setup and then having a "team" where you're managing those people, you're creating an environment where you're having meetings, you're having one-on-one meetings, you're doing performance reviews, like all of these different sort of more HR.
[00:10:01] Jason: Ew. Can you imagine having to do performance reviews?
[00:10:03] Caroline: Honestly, a full body shutter in my body.
[00:10:06] Jason: Ew.
[00:10:06] Caroline: Okay, but listen.
[00:10:07] Jason: Okay.
[00:10:08] Caroline: So, at the beginning of this year, though, I thought to myself, that's what it's going to require for us to reach these goals that we have with our software business. And I was at this pivotal moment where, and I think a lot of people listening right now hopefully can relate to this, where I was like, is this like a limiting factor that I'm putting on myself where it's, I don't want to manage people? Is this something that I'm just staying in my comfort zone and so I'm therefore preventing my growth from actually reaching the goals that we have with our business? Or do I just truly not want to manage people, and that's okay.
[00:10:39] Jason: Right.
[00:10:39] Caroline: And I couldn't figure out what the answer was for there. And so, I thought to myself, well, let me just operate on the assumption that this is a new growth edge for me as a businessperson.
[00:10:49] Jason: Yeah
[00:10:49] Caroline: I was operating under the assumption that, yes, if we have these goals with Teachery, it's going to require even a small team. I'm going to have to develop all of these leadership skills. And also, by the way, I consider this being getting swept up in some of the business advice that I was seeing online as well because I was in the SaaS world and I was listening to interviews and podcasts, and all of it is about building a team and…
[00:11:11] Jason: You're not really listening to any podcasts where someone makes $2,000 a month and it's just them.
[00:11:15] Caroline: Yeah.
[00:11:15] Jason: It's always listening to the, "Oh, yeah, we make $50 to $100,000 a month or a million dollars a month. And so, we have to have a team to manage all that."
[00:11:23] Caroline: Yes. And so, I do think I was a bit clouded by, not that I wanted to make that much money, but I was clouded by the voices that were in my head about what the conventional path of a SaaS. Right? And so, I was like, okay. So, I was like, reading leadership books and I was like, that's the content that I was consuming. And I allowed myself to really go down that path. But then you and I would have meetings and we just could not bring ourselves. We'd be like, okay, definitely a customer service person first. And then we would have a meeting about what that job would entail and who we would look for and what the qualities were. And we'd be like, let's revisit it in three weeks.
[00:12:01] Jason: I like the metaphor, we've talked about this before. Credit to Liz Gilbert for the idea of a shit sandwich. So, it's just like, what shit sandwich do you want to eat to run your business? Because you're going to have to eat something. So, if that's like, "Well, I have to be on Instagram because that's where my audience lives and I've got to create content", then great. That's the shit sandwich you have to eat.
[00:12:17] Caroline: There's trade-offs with everything. That's the point.
[00:12:19] Jason: Exactly. So, in this metaphor, what I think we did is earlier this year, we made the shit sandwich. So, we got the bread, we found some dog shit outside, we put it on the sandwich, and then we looked at it and we were like…
[00:12:30] Caroline: Nope.
[00:12:31] Jason: "Are we going to eat this?"
[00:12:32] Caroline: I was like, "Nope. I will go find a different shit sandwich. This one is not it."
[00:12:34] Jason: Because we can look at it and we can see it. And I actually think that's a helpful thing for anyone listening to this who is thinking about hiring in any capacity, and we're going to talk through a lot more of how we're thinking about these things and making these decisions, but it's like I would go through the steps to see what that is going to feel like. So, start looking at writing out all the tasks you want some to do, start thinking about how much it's going to cost. Start looking at where do these people hang out that you're going to post job listings for them to apply for? And just think through and go through some of those steps and then just look at that shit sandwich on that plate and go, "Am I going to bite into that or am I not going to?"
[00:13:09] Caroline: Okay, it's getting gross, so we're going to need to divert from it because I just…
[00:13:12] Jason: Okay. Sorry. I'm so sorry.
[00:13:13] Caroline: It was a lot better when it was just words like eat a shit sandwich. But then you were like it's on the plate and it's on the bread. And I'm kind of having a visceral reaction. So, I…
[00:13:20] Jason: But I think that's a good thing because…
[00:13:21] Caroline: I don't. I don't think it is, babe. I do not think it is. And so, I apologize to anyone listening if they're grossed out like I am. We're going to find a different metaphor.
[00:13:27] Jason: Yeah.
[00:13:28] Caroline: But the point remains the same. Yes. I think that is helpful advice to really mentally visualize and walk yourself down that road so that you can feel in your body. Is this something that I want to move forward with? And for us, it became clear that we did not want to. And for a long time, I was like, again, is this just a personal growth step that I'm not willing to take? And I finally looked at it and I thought to myself, let me operate on the assumption that's on the other side of that at the beginning of the year, which is, what if I'm just a person who enjoys doing it myself?
[00:14:01] Jason: Mm-hmm.
[00:14:02] Caroline: What if I'm just a person who does not want to grow a team, who does not want to manage people? And I think if you've been around our stuff for a while, you know that one of our core beliefs as it relates to business is that your business is a tool to live a good life. And so, our primary pursuit is not the business itself, which means I'm not willing to do whatever it takes to reach my goals. That's not me. I'm not willing to do whatever it takes. I'm willing to do what it takes in alignment with what I want for my limited time here on this planet. And if managing people and those headaches is not going to, there's a difference between this is going to be a hardship that I have to endure as a business owner, and not everyone can like every part of your business, there's a difference between that and the shit sandwich that you have to eat.
[00:14:51] Jason: Sure.
[00:14:52] Caroline: And this feels incongruent with what I want out of my life.
[00:14:57] Jason: Yeah.
[00:14:57] Caroline: And I think mentally going down that road made me realize that this feels incongruent. And so, then I allowed myself to start going, what if we double down on this idea of being solopreneurs? We're still people who want to hire a freelancer here, a contractor here, but we don't want to build this team mentality, we're okay with doing, wearing all the hats. And I think that there is a very real type of person out there. You're probably listening to this right now. There's a type of entrepreneur who wants to build the empire, who wants to build the team, who wants to manage people because that feels amazing. And maybe you're a super collaborative type of person, and maybe you're a natural born leader who wants to cultivate that growth in other people, or maybe you're the type of person who just wants to create things and you don't want to spend your precious time doing all of those things I just mentioned.
[00:15:47] Jason: Yeah, exactly. Cool. All right, so let's talk about some of the benefits that we're focusing on for staying solopreneurs. Ready to do that?
[00:15:54] Caroline: Yes. So, I thought it would be fun to just talk about, like. Okay. And again, we're not trying to say that any one of these is better than the other.
[00:16:01] Jason: No. Just sharing our perspective and the choices that we're making.
[00:16:04] Caroline: Yes. Because I wish that maybe in January or February, I would have listened to a podcast like this, and it would have allowed me to give a little bit more credence to that other part in my brain that was like, but what if I just wanted to stay small?
[00:16:17] Jason: Yeah. Yeah.
[00:16:18] Caroline: So, that's why I want to share this. So, a couple of benefits, and if you're curious of why we are doubling down on being this particular brand of entrepreneur, is number one, is flexibility and control. And it's just, I think you and I have said it for years and years and years now, but we needed this experience to remind us that flexibility is our number one value.
[00:16:38] Jason: Yeah. Yeah.
[00:16:39] Caroline: It is the thing that brings us happiness.
[00:16:40] Jason: And I think one of the things that people neglect, especially if you have never hired anybody, even on a contractor basis, is you don't just hire that person and they just do all the things. You have to deal with setting the steps up for them, you have to deal with managing them, delivering things. You have to deal with what happens when things don't get delivered on time or when they need to take time off, it's like all those things that remove flexibility and control from your business, you can't even see coming. So, it's that's a really important thing to realize of, yeah, it seems like you're going to get a lot more done by hiring someone, but you actually have a lot more other work that you have to do that you've never done before.
[00:17:16] Caroline: Yeah. And for me, it's flexibility also, as it relates to agility, meaning the ability to evolve and turn on a dime. You and I love to evolve as business owners when something is no longer serving our values. This is a perfect example of that of like, "Oh, I don't want to grow a team, so I'm going to make decisions in my business that reflect that." Right? But even the little bit of hiring that I've done in the past, like I had an assistant many, many years ago who was phenomenal and wonderful, but I definitely did feel the need to, like I wanted to facilitate this team environment for her. And one part that I found that was really hard about that experience that I think is now playing into this thing of I don't want to create this for other people is I would change my mind all the time.
[00:18:00] Jason: Yeah.
[00:18:00] Caroline: And I would change my mind and I would put her on a project, and then she'd finally get to this place where she was doing it, and I'd be like, "Oh, we're not going to focus on blog posts anymore. We're going to focus on this." Right? I was constantly learning in the business and changing, and I didn't love the way that it felt to kind of set her out…
[00:18:17] Jason: To be switching it up on someone, yeah.
[00:18:17] Caroline: To be switching it up on her. And it was hard for her to constantly be rearranging her statementally to fit. And I want the ability to do that. I want the ability to change my mind and to focus on different things at different times. That's what feels good to me. That type of flexibility to meet the moment that I'm in and I don't want to do that to somebody else.
[00:18:37] Jason: Yeah. I mean, I think there's something to be said for when you're hiring someone for any capacity, freelance, full-time, whatever. You can say, like, "Hey, we're a company that believes in switching gears, changing directions."
[00:18:49] Caroline: Yes, you can set someone out for that.
[00:18:50] Jason: You can do that, but also there is just a human nature of, it can feel bad to switch it up on someone too often, and they kind of signed up for a job that does X. And even though there was a little asterisk that said, "We're going to change things", it does make you feel a little bit weird to shift things on them. Now that being said, some people do like that because some people get very bored in doing the same thing. And I think our main developer for Teachery is a great example of, he loves being thrown a task that is just wildly different than the 90% of stuff that we normally do because it gives him the opportunity to learn something new, it gives him the opportunity to explore.
[00:19:22] Caroline: But also, the difference is like in that business, we feel very confident that we're always going to need those development resources. So also in the macro, I don't want to hire this team and then go, "Oh, we're actually shifting from content marketing to ads", or whatever. Let's just hypothetically. And then you go, "Well, this highly specific content person, we're going to let them go." I don't like having my agility rely on other people's livelihoods.
[00:19:46] Jason: Yeah, exactly. Which, speaking of that, talking about the ability to keep our overhead very low, hiring people is expensive and it can be less expensive, obviously, and you can set budgets and you can have a baseline that you're willing to spend. But the other part of that is the financial pressure of paying someone and knowing that they rely on you for their income, even if it's part time income. And my quick story time with this is back when I was running my IWearYourShirt business, we eventually got up to a team of eight people and an intern, and it was $30,000 a month in expenses every single month that went out the door. And when I say that number to you, we hear of big numbers all the time in businesses, but when I tell you that we ran this out of our tiny little house, out of the upstairs bedroom, and every month that I had to literally write those checks at that time, 10 years ago, it was hard. And then we would have a month where I saw the writing on the wall that we weren't going to be able to make bills and I was going to have to pull money from somewhere else, it was so unbelievably stressful. And I don't say that to scare you and to make you feel bad about it. And I think most people listening this are probably not going to have $30,000 a month in expenses if you're a solopreneur and you're hiring a couple people. But even now, with the amount of money that we spend every single month, which is not a lot in comparison to 30,000, it still feels pressureful. It still feels like money that someone is relying on us. And that pressure is something that until you actually feel that pressure, no one can tell you what it's going to feel like. And I will say that it does. I have a little bit of post traumatic feelings about that, every single time I have to pay a freelancer every month, I'm like, "Uh-oh, is this going to be a problem in the future, and it's because I have those feelings?" And it's not. We have much better businesses that are much more profitable, much more predictable. And so, it's not a problem, but it is just something that a lot of people don't talk about the pressure of paying those people every single month and what that's like.
[00:21:41] Caroline: Exactly. And for some people, they can handle that because they just go, "Okay, as long as the economics of the business work out. I know what my profit margins are, I know that this is the amount of money that is required in order to make that revenue, and that's fine." But again, I think this is where you figure out mentally, what bucket am I in? Am I in the bucket who does want to build that… I keep calling it building empires because I think you know the type of entrepreneur I'm talking about when I say that. Some people are so, they get such a thrill out of that. And that's kind of the bucket that they want to play in. That's the game that they want to play. And again, I want to emphasize there's nothing wrong with that. It's just, I know now that I'm not that person.
[00:22:21] Jason: Yeah.
[00:22:21] Caroline: I want to be in this other bucket, which is, yeah, I don't want to carry that financial pressure on my shoulders. I do want to have maximum flexibility. I don't want to be responsible for the livelihood of other people.
[00:22:33] Jason: Yeah, yeah. I think where some people find it glamorous to say, like they're at a cocktail party, whatever, and it's like, "Oh, how many people that work for you?"
[00:22:41] Caroline: Exactly.
[00:22:41] Jason: It's like, "Oh, I have 10 or 15 or 20." It's like I feel it's much more glamorous for us to be like, "Yeah, we make multiple six figures per year, and it's basically just us and a couple freelancers that work, not full-time hours." That feels good, and that's not impressive to somebody else, but it feels great to me because there's no stress and I don't have to worry about it.
[00:22:58] Caroline: Totally.
[00:22:59] Jason: Okay, last thing, or I guess there's two more here.
[00:23:01] Caroline: Yeah. No…
[00:23:02] Jason: Benefit of not having to manage people.
[00:23:04] Caroline: Yeah, I think we already touched on that. People are great and wonderful, and we love people. We have a community of people. Managing people is hard. Human beings are very complex. They have their own desires, they have their own paths that they're walking, and you want to facilitate that. But it is very difficult to manage the various needs of multiple human beings. And again, every ounce of energy that you spend trying to do that delicate dance is time that you're not spending on creating. And when you are like Jason and I, that is the thing that is the most fulfilling, is having an idea and bringing it to life and creating things. And so, again, the older you get, the more time you spend, the more you realize what is it about this career path that lights you up and how can you maximize the amount of time you spend doing the things that light you up and minimize the amount of time that you spend of the things that drain you. And that is where managing people falls for us.
[00:24:03] Jason: Yeah. Yeah. And I think one of the biggest things for us is just the personal fulfillment side of it is that we just like doing these things ourselves.
[00:24:10] Caroline: Yeah.
[00:24:10] Jason: And it's very interesting to think about all the things that we've done in our, for me, it's almost a 20-year career now as an entrepreneur. For you, it's almost 10 years now, or more than 10 years.
[00:24:23] Caroline: More than 10, yeah.
[00:24:23] Jason: And knowing that pretty much every single thing we've done has not been because we've had this team behind us or this agency that we hired or any of these things, it's like we brought all those ideas to life. We made all those things happen. And absolutely, hiring freelancers in that time and developers and those things is a crucial part of it. But you just know that the satisfaction of the work that you're doing based on your effort, it just feels so good.
[00:24:47] Caroline: Yeah, I think we talked about this maybe on an earlier podcast episode this year, but I remember I had asked you, "Do you want to hire a SaaS consultant to help us with strategy with Teachery?" And you and I had thought about it, and again, I was asking myself the same question, which is a question I ask myself often, which is, is my hesitancy… Hesitance?
[00:25:08] Jason: Sure.
[00:25:08] Caroline: Hesitancy to hire this person, is that me limiting myself and not wanting to grow? Is it am I not being humble enough to say like, "Oh, I don't have all the answers. I want to hire somebody whose full-time job is the SaaS world." So, that was my question. Am I not being humble enough? Or is there another reason why I don't want to hire this person? And the conclusion I came to was, "Oh, I don't want to hire this person because I want to figure it out myself." Going back to what I was saying about what lights us up about this job is it's not just creating, it's about figuring shit out. I love that so much.
[00:25:44] Jason: Yeah. And I think this probably hasn't happened for many people ever, but I think you'll get the metaphor is you sit down to do a thousand-piece puzzle, and when you put that last piece in and you know you've placed every piece with you or a family member, whatever, it feels so gratifying. Now, imagine you did 50% of the puzzle and you brought someone in to do the other 50%, and they maybe put the last piece in. It would not feel that good. You'd be like, "Well, I only really did half of that." There is a whole thing, and I know that some people listening this might be like, "Yeah, but I'd rather have 100% of 50% of something because I'm not getting it."
[00:26:16] Caroline: Which is great.
[00:26:17] Jason: And I totally agree. But I think the part of this that is really important to also know or to note is, and we talked about this and we had this discussion about bringing in a SaaS consultant is, and I think you all listening to this know this in your heart as well. You already know what you need to do. We already knew what we needed to do with Teachery. We needed to create content, we needed to market the business. We need to put it out there. The product needs to be better. We need to update things. All of these things we need to do, we know what we need to do. It's just we are not carving out the time to do it. We're not prioritizing it. And for you listening to this, it's the same thing. You know you've taken enough courses, you've read enough blog posts, you've listened to a podcast, you've watched enough videos, you know exactly what you need to do. You don't need to hire a consultant for the most part. You just have to carve out the time to do the things that you know you need to do. And that's really the hard part of it.
[00:27:05] Caroline: For sure. Yeah, I totally agree. But it's like going back to what we were saying, which is I want to know that I worked through those challenges, and I figured it out myself. I mean, I hear what you're saying and sometimes you do know what you need to do, but other times there's stuff you haven't figured out yet. And the point that I was trying to make is like experimenting in order to find those things is actually what I enjoy.
[00:27:29] Jason: Yeah. And I think my point is that anybody trying to do anything in their business, especially listening to this podcast, I think they already know what they need to do. They don't need to hire a professional to come in and consult on it. So anyway, all right, so we touched on the building an empire thing, but you have a point here about MrBeast. And anytime we can bring up MrBeast and give him a little bit of a bump, it's good because the guy needs some attention.
[00:27:55] Caroline: No, I was using him as the most probably notable example. But this idea of the importance of understanding whether you are a solopreneur and you're in that bucket or you're maybe the type of small team entrepreneur or even bigger entrepreneur who wants to build this team, how it's so important to know which of those buckets you're in so that you can listen to the right sources for the advice that you're seeking. Because I, like anyone, anytime MrBeast is on a Colin and Samir episode, I'm there.
[00:28:28] Jason: Yeah, totally.
[00:28:28] Caroline: I'm watching it because almost as like a just morbid fascination, right?
[00:28:33] Jason: Absolutely.
[00:28:33] Caroline: Like what is it like? I don't understand. That is a level of building an empire that I will never know. And I get val, I can get some value out of that, but my point is everything that comes out of his mouth, I have to take with a grain of salt for myself and my business, because he is operating in a different, I mean, obviously a different game with a different playbook for different reasons. Right? That's the point I'm trying to make is when you see someone who's giving you business advice, ask yourself, are they trying to build a big team? Are they trying to maximize profit? Are they trying to become the biggest X, Y, and Z in the world? Because if the answer is yes, and you are just a mom who wants to spend more time with her kids, and you want financial freedom to be able to do that…
[00:29:21] Jason: And you love selling some Notion templates.
[00:29:23] Caroline: And you love selling some Notion templates, then take what you will from the advice of that person, but just know that everything that comes out of their mouth is advice for a game that you are not playing. You're playing a different game, one that is driven more by your own personal values and lifestyle that you want to be able to lead. And so that, I think, is the most important thing. And that is the benefit of, I guess, in my own mind, doubling down and more embracing this identity of solopreneur is like, ah, then I'm going to look for people who, like me, want to stay extremely lean, and want to maximize their efficiency so that their entire life is not spent on their work.
[00:30:04] Jason: Yeah. I mean, I've said this on many podcasts and things before, but even not just to people listening, but also to us. It's like when you get into a real stage of, I'm trying to grow my business, I'm trying to transition something, I'm really trying to focus on accomplishing X, I really think one of the most important things you can do is remove yourself from all comparison possible to people who are not perfectly suited to helping you in that moment.
[00:30:28] Caroline: Yeah.
[00:30:28] Jason: So, it's like unfollow all the experts, unsubscribe to all the emails of companies that are bigger than yours. That is not helpful. Yes, there is some inspirational benefit to it, but I think too many of us get so distracted by that. And then we compare what we're trying to do to what we're seeing and reading and consuming, that it then just deflates us and then we don't move forward.
[00:30:48] Caroline: I think you're so right. I think it's...
[00:30:50] Jason: Can you say that again into the microphone? Can we get a clean...
[00:30:53] Caroline: What was it? Oh, I lost it. It just went in one ear and the other time.
[00:30:57] Jason: Just a real clean take. Go ahead. I think you're so right. Thank you so much. We've got a clean take of that.
[00:31:01] Caroline: That's a flawless impression.
[00:31:03] Jason: Yeah, I used AI, so it's good to go. Go ahead.
[00:31:07] Caroline: I think you're so right.
[00:31:09] Jason: Nice. Nailed it. Yeah.
[00:31:10] Caroline: Thank you. No, I do think you're right. I think that you would be better served, all of us will be better served looking for either the person who is alongside us, dealing with the same challenges, or maybe the person that's one step ahead on their journey. Right.
[00:31:23] Jason: Yeah.
[00:31:24] Caroline: Because they're probably making strategic decisions with the same limitations that you are. That's not to say that kind of breaking down what these successful people are doing and trying to extract value isn't good, but so often that's what we convince ourselves that we're doing, and what we're actually doing is just comparing ourselves, and it's making us, like you said, extremely stuck. Because we go, "Well, I can't make my YouTube videos look that way." And it's like, "Yeah, because you have a full production team."
[00:31:53] Jason: Yeah, exactly.
[00:31:54] Caroline: And so, yeah, I do think that is a piece of advice, too, is once you know what bucket you're in, you can look for similar peers and even "leaders" to look up to who are maybe in that same bucket, but a little bit further ahead than you.
[00:32:08] Jason: Yeah.
[00:32:09] Caroline: And I think this also goes back to, I think I didn't realize it, but this is probably a big reason why we talk about the enough mindset so much. And that's because when you're a solopreneur, you have to make different trade-offs, because you are only one person and you're limited, or in our case, two people.
[00:32:28] Jason: Yeah.
[00:32:28] Caroline: You're limited by the constraints of your time. Right? And so, we often talk about this idea of leaving money on the table. We love to leave money on the table. And what we mean by that is we will happily make less revenue if it means that we are not making a trade-off for something that's undesirable. So, it's like, if you told me that we could make a million dollars a year running a team of 10 people versus keeping it lean and the way, basically, we have it now and making $500,000 a year, I would take $500,000 a year every single time.
[00:33:03] Jason: Totally. And I think that's people hearing that who have not gotten to, in this example, $500,000 per year, it's very easy to think, like, "Huh, nice of you to say that. I'm so far away from that." And I think the thing that what you don't understand, if you've never tried to hire people and you've never tried to grow, grow, grow, is just how hard that really is and just how painful it is to have to deal with all the things you have to deal with. And so, I think it's saying that it's just, it's trying to be a voice in this online business space where it's so easy to see so many people making seven figures and making all these things and doing all this stuff and running a team, and they make it look so easy. And the reason they make it look so easy is because they're trying to convince you to buy something from them and they want to look good doing it. And I think we are always trying to come back to this place of, like, but the reality is for most of us, it can be a lot simpler, and it doesn't have to be so big and grand and make so much money. You can live such a great life on so much less, and also working less time with less hassle.
[00:34:04] Caroline: Yeah. And now, here's the part where the caveat police comes in…
[00:34:08] Jason: Oh, nice.
[00:34:08] Caroline: …and I have to add an addendum to that, which is, I want to be really clear. This is a very nuanced conversation. That doesn't mean if you are someone who is just barely making $12,000 a year with your business, and you feel so totally swamped and overwhelmed, and you really are completely limited because you can only work three days a week, and you just know that if you had a little bit of extra help, you could really double that. Right?
[00:34:33] Jason: Yeah.
[00:34:33] Caroline: I'm not saying if you're that person, it's like, "Jason and Caroline said don't hire people." That's not what we're saying at all. What we're saying is, it's okay if you don't want to hire people, but just know in your own business, hiring a freelancer here or a contractor here or getting help, that we are not anti-support and anti-help.
[00:34:51] Jason: Yeah. Absolutely.
[00:34:52] Caroline: And we are not anti-collaboration and anti-team. That's not what any of this is. It's just like, I think it's this big macro decision to be a specific flavor of entrepreneur that says it's also okay to just want to do your own thing.
[00:35:08] Jason: Yeah. And I think making sure to be very clear about where we stand on this is our goal in the next year as we look at things is really not to grow our "team" at all. Team, I put in quotes.
[00:35:20] Caroline: Yeah.
[00:35:21] Jason: Our goal is to stay with the two developers that we have. One is very part-time, one is a more full-time developer. We have a transcriptionist who we pay to do some work. And then every once in a while, we have a designer that we bring in for small projects with Teachery, but we haven't used that designer in over a year. That's it. "That's really our team." We have a bookkeeper, and we have an accountant in that. But that, it don't really count because that's not really helping grow the business. That's just like admin stuff behind the scenes. But I will say that I think we've gotten to this place, and I think you would agree, and I do manage the people, so I see more of the people side of it, but it feels very streamlined. It doesn't feel we're constantly scrambling. And I think we've felt this way before to find work for someone to do and to make sure that they're delivering on that and all that. And I think that that's the place where we really want to avoid. And if we do add a customer support person for Teachery, I think that's a very easy job to be able to give someone where we don't have to feel like we have to give them a lot of tasks.
[00:36:18] Caroline: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
[00:36:18] Jason: It's like monitor this inbox, do a great job of being kind to people, and then everything else, we'll just figure out and do. And listen, this might change. I think the other part of this as well is just being honest where a year from now, we might have a different perspective on this.
[00:36:31] Caroline: Totally.
[00:36:31] Jason: And we might hire someone to do things, and I think that's a thing as a business owner, you got to be prepared for. And I think we've been saying that more in the past couple episodes of the game of business that you opt in for is a constant game of change.
[00:36:43] Caroline: Yup.
[00:36:43] Jason: And that has never been more true in 2024, and 20 years ago, there was not as much change because there was not as much going on. And 20 years before that, there was even less change because there was even less going on. 20 years from now, who knows what business is going to look like? It's going to be wild.
[00:36:56] Caroline: Who knows? Yeah. And what we want to be is a voice here for you to go through it with you and say that can be really overwhelming sometimes, but to make it okay and remind you it's okay when the ground is shifting underneath your feet, this is the fun of business. This is the puzzle that we're trying to solve constantly. And unlike Jason's metaphor earlier, you actually never do put that final puzzle piece in the puzzle because three seconds later, I mean, you might, but then three seconds later, the whole table…
[00:37:27] Jason: Your toddler flipped the table over. Yeah.
[00:37:28] Caroline: That your toddler flipped the table over. That is business. And that if you can embrace the fun of that. So, for right now, we are in a season of owning our solopreneurship. Now, again, the other caveat I want to say here is we know good and well that we're two people. So, I know it's a little bit weird when I say solopreneur, but we still consider ourselves solopreneurs. Also, if you think about it, we run two businesses, so two divided by two is one. Okay. It's math.
[00:37:51] Jason: Oh, nice. Okay, math, I'm getting it, I'm getting it. Nice.
[00:37:52] Caroline: It's girl math. It's entrepreneur math. It's solopreneur math.
[00:37:54] Jason: Fantastic.
[00:37:55] Caroline: But we very much, I think it's more of the mentality of wanting to do things yourself, wanting to stay small, wanting to optimize for a good life and using business as a tool to do that. But the one thing I would say is because we're two people, I often forget that if you are truly a solo creator, please do yourself a favor and find ways to seek out community, because it can be a very isolating thing when you're traversing all of these challenges and you are dealing with change all the time and you don't have someone to bounce ideas off of and talk you off the ledge. And Jason and I are that for each other. And so, I just want to make sure that that doesn't go unsaid, that I know that if you are truly a solopreneur, that it can be lonely sometimes.
[00:38:40] Jason: Yeah. And an anecdote here that I think is really at least helpful because when we stopped working together after my IWearYourShirt business, I was, as much as I would think a solo creator, because you were working on your stuff, I was working on my stuff. There really wasn't much overlap at all. Of course, we were talking every day, and we were business buddies, but it was very much separated at that time. And this is when I found Paul Jarvis. And so, I read a book by Paul Jarvis, I think is how I found out, or maybe you sent me an article, but I cold emailed Paul and said, "Hey, I really enjoyed this book. I feel like we could be friends. This is very weird, but would you ever want to just hop on a Skype call?" That tells you how long ago it was. And just like chat. And…
[00:39:22] Caroline: I still remember where we were when you had that first friend chat. And afterwards, I was like, "How did it go?" And you're like, "I think we're going to be friends."
[00:39:28] Jason: Yeah. And I don't think that's going to work for everybody listening to this, like reading a book by somebody and then reaching out to them. Now, granted, Paul at the time was very indie and not a lot of people knew about him, so it was easier. I'm not reaching out to Cal Newport or anybody who's written bestselling… Not to say Paul hasn't written bestselling books because he had, but at the time he hadn't. My point is I think some people listening to this will say, "Oh, well, I don't know anybody around me, or I live in a very isolated place. There's not a lot of community. I don't even know online communities." And I think part of that is like…
[00:39:58] Caroline: Put yourself out there.
[00:39:58] Jason: Yeah. Getting yourself in front of some people and being willing to reach out to some folks who you do find interesting. And you do see that they're not so busy or so popular or so glamorized that, yeah, they don't really have the time because they're too busy. So, it's about finding people that are very like-minded. And also, finding communities. And this is not a plug for WAIM Unlimited, but I do think we have cultivated a great community of people who then start to foster relationships. And one of my favorite things is every couple months, we'll get a selfie posted of two people who met up. They live in completely opposite parts of the world, but they ended up being in the same place, and so they got together. And that stuff is amazing because you start to build lifelong relationships. And I think finding those communities can be a little bit difficult when you stay in your own bubbles. So, it's about just maybe trying to get out of your bubble, go experience some different subreddits, Facebook groups, all these places you might not want to spend time fully, but invest a short amount of time to find somebody to then be able to create a good relationship.
[00:40:52] Caroline: Definitely. So, hope that was interesting. I know there's not a ton of takeaways, but this was the episode that I wish that I had listened to at the top of this year, where I was sort of trying to figure out which of these buckets do I see myself in? And as we already discussed, that can change. It's not like you're just one thing, but if you are someone who was thinking to yourself, "I'm not a real entrepreneur if I don't grow a team." Yes, you are.
[00:41:15] Jason: Yeah.
[00:41:16] Caroline: Yes, you are.
[00:41:16] Jason: Can I give two tips here before we go on getting help?
[00:41:20] Caroline: Well, you can give some tips.
[00:41:20] Jason: One thing I was thinking about when you were saying if you're a solopreneur and you're trying to do everything yourself, I think one really good thing you can do is to outsource a certain task that is repeatable, that's very easy, that doesn't require a full-time person. So, my example would be podcast production. There are now so many podcast production companies that it's pretty affordable, and you can find a company within your budget where they can even help you produce episodes. I think that type of thing in your business is a great one to try and outsource. And so, it may not be a freelancer, it may be a company that you pay. And again, I know not everybody listening is going to be able to afford something like that, but I think if you can find the things in your business that are leverageable through external work that help you get more done in less time that you can afford in your budget, it's a great example.
[00:42:08] Caroline: Definitely.
[00:42:08] Jason: The second thing I want to say, and this is what we've done for a long time in finding freelancers, is using Upwork. And what I love about Upwork, as it's different from Fiverr, is you can set a budget for a project. So, I can say, "I want to spend $100 a month on my podcast production just to keep that going." But what I love to do anytime we post one of these jobs is to have one little action step when someone applies for it, that doesn't mean they have to do work, but in the most recent one that we posted, I recorded a two-minute Loom video, and I wrote in the description, "Please watch the video, and then just let me know that you understood the system that I showed you in Notion, and it worked for you." 75% of the applicants that applied didn't mention that thing at all.
[00:42:49] Caroline: Yeah.
[00:42:49] Jason: And it was so easy for me to be like, "Great. No, no, no." And they're just spraying and praying that someone's going to pick up their application and pay them. And that's what I love about being a little bit smart and strategic, where you can set the budget on Upwork, you can create a little action step for people and find out if you're going to find someone who actually wants to do the work. And so, I think those are two things where I would say staying solo can mean doing those things and giving you a lot of leverage for time.
[00:43:12] Caroline: Great. Fantastic. Hot tip.
[00:43:14] Jason: Cool. All right. Next year, and we have a team of 30 and a monthly expense of 1.2 million.
[00:43:20] Caroline: Oh, my God. Can you imagine?
[00:43:20] Jason: We'll record an episode about how that happened. Just kidding. That will not happen.
[00:43:24] Caroline: No.
[00:43:24] Jason: But, yeah, I think we're very happy to be staying small right now. I hope that was helpful for anybody listening this who might be on the cusp of, "I feel like I have too much to do, and I need to try and find someone to help." Maybe this gave you some ideas or permission to go, maybe I need to make that shit sandwich. Or maybe I'm not going to make that shit sandwich…
[00:43:41] Caroline: You had to bring it back, didn't you?
[00:43:42] Jason: Well, I just wanted one more reminder of that.
[00:43:45] Caroline: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
[00:43:46] Jason: Okay, that's it.
[00:43:46] Caroline: That's it. Thanks for listening, and we'll see you next week.
[00:43:49] Jason: Bye.