• How to step out of the doing and into the leading
• Cultivating team culture
• Looking after your team members to drive better results
• The impact you have as a leader
• Creating a people strategy

About Hareta

Hareta McMullan
Hi, yes, I am good. I am so excited to be here too. I remember the first time I met you and you are just such a ray of light and warm energy. And I’m so happy to be here in your presence and have this incredible conversation.

Nicole Smith
Yeah. And that’s actually look at this stream of light coming from behind. We thank you. Appreciate that’s beautiful to hear. And I’m very excited to have you here because this actually say this every time but when I have these conversations, the universe has just brought us together at the exact right moment. Because this connection with becoming a leader versus a founder or a business owner or business human, whatever it is that you’re connecting with is really front of mind for me at the moment. It’s a transition that I’ve been going through the last few years. So I’m really excited to dive into this. But first of all, I want to hear a little bit about you and your journey. How have you arrived here today? I know obviously walking and sitting in a desk but the journey before those footsteps? Yeah, absolutely.

Hareta McMullan
So I didn’t intend on a career in HR, I actually studied business and wanted to run my own luxury boutique hotel, maybe one day we will see. And I accidentally fell into HR and loved it. I spent the majority of my decade working in HR within hotels, which was incredible. And then I switched over to the tech industry, which was even better. And that is where I really spread my wings and fell into the way that I approach HR leadership and employee experience. Now, it was on parental leave with my first child that I started dabbling in third space. And I decided not to go back to my job at the end of parental leave, and instead focus on helping people become incredible leaders and creating really empowering places to work.

Nicole Smith
It’s just a beautiful experience when as a human working in an organization or even creating the space for yourself to step into your trueness. Right. It’s just such a different experience from the typical HR. Let’s say the one that everyone I know what you mean. Yeah. Yeah, sorry. Absolutely.

Hareta McMullan
I didn’t have a horrible experience working in the corporate world, which I know many people do. And that’s the catalyst for starting their own business. I really enjoyed my career. But it got to the stage where just like you said, there was a seed and I wanted to explore where that would take me and try something different. And that has led me to where I am today.

Nicole Smith
Yeah. So when we are looking to become a leader, because we all have those potentials in ourselves, don’t we? It’s about getting that confidence and stepping into or supporting ourselves and having those humans around us to really help us, pull that out of us. So really just lean into it. What have you found that when you’ve been working with your clients and even in your corporate land that this was their kind of like a moment in time where you could see, this human is on the just on the verge of jumping into what their leaders can be?

Hareta McMullan
Absolutely, I’ve come across a few commonalities throughout my conversations and career in supporting different leaders. And it really comes down to mindset and understanding what your role and responsibility is as a leader. So the number one challenge that most people have. And so it’s very normal is to transition from that subject matter expert where you do, and you control and you really only are accountable to your own work, into the leader mindset where your job becomes less about the doing, and more about the supporting, empowering, motivating. So there is that point where you have to let go, and your job becomes overseeing everyone else’s job. It’s not actually I’ve got to do the spreadsheet, or the sales deck or that task, it’s about the conversations and how you support other people in doing those things. So that’s the number one switch. And if we dig under that a little bit deeper, that comes back to really honing in on your limiting beliefs and your values. And then once you’ve identified those reconciled anything that you need to reconcile, then that’s where things start to click into place for you. Because you really believe in your own ability to be a leader.

Nicole Smith
I resonate with all of that so much, because I in over here in The Artisans, I’m growing my team to move away from the doing not fully move away from the doing because there are some elements that I love doing. That’s why I have created the business. However, when I was on my team members there it there’s a shift there, it’s well, okay, I’ve now have this, the role in my business is to support my humans in my world to be able to be their best selves. And to be able to do that, I need to let go of some of these bits, really empower my team to step into their roles and what they love to be doing. And that means less daunting for me, which is amazing, because, you know, they turn off the chart all the time, I never certainly when I first started my business, I said I can do the doing. I’ve done the doing for years, I’m very good at doing the drawing I was that the person that everyone would come to when they would have a thing that didn’t know what to do, right? I’d be that solver. But I don’t want to do the time, I don’t want to be that..

Hareta McMullan
There’s a reason that you started your business. And this is the same for perhaps a lot of people listening. And it’s to get you want to be the visionary, you have this idea. You want to create change, and you want to make impact. And that juicy stuff that really lights you up can get lost when you’re doing the doing.

Nicole Smith
It really can. Because as a business owner, there are so many things that were responsible for. And I know for me when I have space, the creativity just flows, whatever that creativity might be aimed towards. And it’s it’s that busyness, the having to be in charge of or in control of once we let that go, and you’re right, like the feeling empowered to lean in and step into those feelings of Yes, I can. And this is where I can shine. And this is how I can support my humans. It’s a beautiful experience.

Hareta McMullan
Absolutely. And one thing that I have learned in actually being able to do that is leadership capability. I think a lot of people believe that leadership is innate. And it definitely is to a degree there are values and capabilities that we have that part of us and that really does help. But you need to also know how to have a difficult conversation and you need to know how to delegate there’s a way that you can do it that’s really going to set yourself up for success. And one challenge that I see over again, and it’s part of why I’m doing what I’m doing is that leadership is a skill that you can learn, like anything else, and so when you’re doing it for the first time, for example, let’s say delegation, you’re you go in with all of the great intentions, but you just don’t perhaps execute it to the degree that you would like. And so it doesn’t really work. And then it causes more damage than it does helpfulness, for lack of a better word. And so then it puts you off doing it again. And then you get stuck in the spiral of not delegating, because you’re like, well, it just created more work for me last time. So it obviously doesn’t work. There must be something wrong with my team member. And then that compounds, another issue, and we could go on.

Nicole Smith
Yeah, that’s why how we support our humans and our clients is so important, because delegation, part of that is about providing the right amount of information right on the hows and the expectations and what is the output going to be, I know, for me and my business, I’m at a stage now where I’m looking for people who are autonomous, to be able to take a task to run with it, to test it to do all the things like I would do it. And so I don’t have to keep being the block, because I’m the blocker at the moment of the work. And I’m in why I am. And it’s sort of a yucky feeling to be in. And we’re putting things in place to remove myself as the block. But part of that is good delegation, and communication and expectations are a big part of that. Right.

Hareta McMullan
1,000%. So on the same page.

Nicole Smith
Yeah. How much does just culture have to do with becoming a good leader or a fabulous leader, like if you’re if you’re building your business, I know for me, culture is really important. I already have a vision of how I want my business to be and the people how they feel when they’re in our spaces. Do you find that they’ve got an alignment, the culture and leadership?

Hareta McMullan
Absolutely. So when we talk about the term culture, it can seem very vague and a very fluffy term, and we talk about it a lot. But do we actually know what it means? And so for me, part of the definition of culture is how do my people feel, and you just said it, then that you’ve got an idea of how you want your people to feel. And so as a leader, if you’re creating a culture where your people feel safe, you’ve cultivated the psychological safety and the trust that you need, you invest time into them, and you empower them, you give them accountability, there’s so many things that you can do to create the culture that’s going to set you up for success and see the results that you want to create.

Nicole Smith
But I think there’s this missolution, dissolution or whatever the word is that, you know, to grow, you’ve got to bring in a team and the team are there to do the work, right there to do their work at the execution outs, da da da, right. Whereas it’s been I’ve seen it time and time again, where the leadership of the organization has been human centered. And I’m very privileged with many of my clients are human centered. And it’s such a beautiful experience when we’re developing their ways of working, because one of those key areas we’re looking at is our humans, how do our humans enjoy this process? We want their feedback, we want to be able to design it in a way that supports them. Because I know, you would know if you’re in a space that you feel uncomfortable pressured, pushed all those words that are like hard, tight holding words, we’re never going to be the most fabulous people we can be right?

Hareta McMullan
Of course not. And you hear so many narratives around people being the most valuable asset to your business yet, unfortunately, a lot of people treat their people as perhaps a bit of a nuisance. And a really common practical example of that is you may have a weekly or fortnightly meeting, just recurring. And that’s where you perhaps spend a little bit of time talking about your projects or your work in progress, but it’s really dedicated access to you so that you can coach you can mentor you can give feedback, and those conversations often get pushed. And that is a really great example of value not being placed on your people. And so the message that that employee can receive is, I’m second best or you don’t value me, and that’s really unfortunate and if that was to happen to us, you can just imagine the impacts of that. And so when I talk about that relationship, it’s really about seeing your people as truly your number one asset. I mean, it’s one of the largest costs to your business payroll. So does it not make smart strategic business sense to effectively manage one of those largest costs to your business?

Nicole Smith
And it’s really easy to be a good human.

Hareta McMullan
Oh, totally.

Nicole Smith
You know, like, we all have things that we need to do in a day. But if we lead our meetings, and I lead mine with, and I really solidified this from one of my recent client experiences, when I was working with a beautiful example of what a truly fabulous culture is, and leader driven culture, every meeting now we start with how are you? How well are you today? So how are you how well are you? Yeah. And it’s, and it’s not just like, tick the box situations, its I’m genuinely interested in what is going on in your space right now. So that we can support you with whatever you when you need, it might be this thing on my brain, and I just need to blar it out. Or it’s, I’m having this issue. And I’d really like to talk it out and talk it through result get and have been a resolution creating those containers of support are so so important. And what a fabulous experience.

Hareta McMullan
Absolutely. We’re multi-dimensional Right. And I think it’s really wonderful. I’m seeing some great examples of leadership come through just like that. And that is a really practical example of how you’re cultivating that psychological safety and that trust, and that will come back to you in a more commercial business sense.

Nicole Smith
Well, that’s right. Yeah. And you said the word trust there, I think trust is, is really key. And it’s not that I trust you to do the thing, it’s, I feel safe, I feel safe. And that safety is one of our number one. things, right, as a human, we need to feel safe.

Hareta McMullan
Totallly I often see, when we hire people, it can be easy to forget about that. Not because you don’t want to create it or you don’t value it, but because there’s a lack of time. And always a sense of urgency and pressure and trust takes intentional cultivation and time.

Nicole Smith
But it’s really interesting, you know, one of my own personal stories is an experience where it’s completely the opposite to that. And the feeling the the physical reaction that happens when you’re involved in those situations. It’s, it’s involuntary, it happens every time you see an email, or name or phone call, or whatever it is, it’s like, what’s Oh, instant? Oh, versus okay. Oh, such and such as calling. I know that whatever we’re going to have a conversation about will be human based, we’ll have you know, we’ll get to the objective that we need to at the end of the call, rather than feeling panicked and stressed. And what’s going to be expected from this phone call. I actually posted up on LinkedIn, I don’t know if you saw it, there was a TED talk on this, where you know that that culture of ripping up work in front of other employees and belittling and all of those sorts of things. It’s such a strong is clearly a very passionate point for me. I can feel it. I can feel it in my tummy. It is so easy to be a good human and to create a culture for your business and your communities that is just enjoyable and safe to be in. So let’s just do that so much.

Hareta McMullan
Aboslutely. I think you said that another great word there enjoyable. What’s the point in any of this? If it’s not fun?

Nicole Smith
That’s right. We especially if you’re a full time work, right? If you’re a business, it’s longer than nine to five on Monday to Friday. You’ve gotta enjoy it. Life is there to be enjoyed?

Hareta McMullan
It really is. And I read an interesting study recently that found 70% of employees rated their manager having more impact on their mental health then their partner. And then there was a two other professionals I think it was maybe a doctor and the therapist combined. So as a manager, we have so much impact and that’s wonderful. Think of the good and the power that comes with that there’s so much opportunity and I think it’s about coming back to looking at ourselves as leaders. It’s about understanding that I impact someone else’s life. And there’s power that comes with that. And there’s a deep sense of responsibility. But like you say, if you can nail some of these, perhaps non-negotiables, it really is not as hard as it sounds.

Nicole Smith
Yeah, I know from from my experience, a key factor that can really enhance anyone’s experience is the language that we choose to use. Language is a very powerful tool that can be used for superhero goodness, and very evil, bad guy in us as well. And it’s being intentional about how we communicate, I no again another recent experience, I received an email that Well, you could tell it was rushed. It was not thought through it was like forwarded through from a scan from little details that but the topic of the attachment was, could be very impactful, like detrimental to people’s well being right. So these types of conversations need to have a little bit more thought and effort and energy put into them. If we just are in a zone, and we’re, you know, having to talk to an employee about a certain thing, like a difficult conversation, take that moment to get yourself organized, prepared for that meeting, right? I’m guessing that’s what you help your listeners with.

Hareta McMullan
Absolutely. And that’s the same, you can apply that to your marketing. And it’s the same thing, you’re just setting yourself up for success. It’s as simple as that. And it doesn’t need to take long, but like you say, getting in the zone, having a plan of what you’re going to say sort of roughly met doubt can make all the difference.

Nicole Smith
People strategy. So as I shared, I’m scaling my business, growing my business, whatever words we want to use, and then a part of that has been thinking about with Who do I actually need in my space? Is this something that’s you think’s really important? When you’re in a business when you’re growing a business? Like how can it be like how can it really influence the success of of where you’re heading in your business,

Hareta McMullan
It can make or break it.

Nicole Smith
Just interrupting this episode for one little message, if you have been listening and love what you hear and want to come in Connect, we have a take control with Nicole’s Facebook community, right over there on Facebook that I would love to invite you to come and join us. We are a supportive community, we are looking to really take action in our businesses and change the way or evolve the way we’re working right now. So I invite you to come on over and join our community and connect with us all community is the essence of everything, your business, being able to really build those relationships that you can nurture, and grow and support and celebrate each other. Oh, how fabulous, I hope to see you over there, pop on over to Facebook, Take Control with Nicole, see you soon.

Hareta McMullan
And that is because I feel like it’s so tempting to hire someone in a rush because you there’s perhaps an area of work that you don’t know how to do or that you don’t like. And so you just want someone to do that. But there needs to be an over I’ve used the word a lot, but a little bit more intention put behind that decision because you need to think about where that’s going to go. And so when we talk about people strategy, part of that is organizational design, it’s looking at why are you hiring this person? How are they going to help me deliver on my strategy? And if that strategy is shaken up a bit because of world events or a change in direction? Is that role still solid enough that we could it malleable? Or if something happens that’s outside of my control? Will I have to make that role redundant and so of course there’s always times when you may need to make a role redundant but the more thought you put into it, and the more thought you put into the capabilities that are needed in that role, then it becomes a lot more flexible and helps you to support your growth in whatever direction you choose.

Nicole Smith
Yeah, I know that with where as I said before, you know looking for people that can really come into work alongside with me to support our clients and it’s being intentional about a first of all for me it’s are you a good cultural fit to our business like we have lots of fun over here. We you know, what we’re talking about can be some people pretty boring, but the people that I’m attracting in my business, love, love operations as much as I do. So we’re like looking out over automations. And like, have you seen that ClickUps doing lalalala, whatever it might be. And we’re just all connecting in to the point even, you know, I’ve got, I’m obviously called Nicole. My team members called Nicole, we’re both married to Simon’s who are from England, like, obviously, we’re not taking it that depth with every person that comes into The Artisans. But these are the criteria criteria. If your name is not Nicole, then oh, we’d make it really nice and simple here, you know. But yeah. It’s such a difference when you find people who, yes, fit the culture, but have that skill set that? Is that missing block to complement your skill set, as well?

Hareta McMullan
Absolutely. And the behaviors as well, different stages of business will require slightly different behaviors. And I think, when you’re scaling, one behavior that you need is a willingness or perhaps an ability to cope with change, and problem solving. For example, there’s a lot of problem solving that comes up in any business, but I think, particularly scaling a business. So there’s, when you’re looking at your organizational design, first thinking about what do you need to be able to nail this role outside of also those hard skills?

Nicole Smith
Yeah, you’ve said a very good thing. Growing up as a business owner. And every iteration, it’s, it’s a journey of things, they’re discovering, by calibrating were becoming clearer and, and as a team member, you will be exposed to all the things that are going on, you know, when when, as leaders not having the best of days, or, you know, were able to, we’re not able to focus here, but we’re moving over here, like being able to, as a leader, I guess, can communicate that as well, I’m guessing, communicate absolutely certain language. But communication is key, right?

Hareta McMullan
Absolutely key, for example, when you’re in a more established business, there’s more structure and control in place. And so as an employee, you may really resonate with that you may like working within the confines of that structure and have direction and have process. And that’s fantastic. In a startup, often, you don’t have that yet. And so what you’re looking for in an employee is the ability to create that themselves. And the resilience that is needed when, like you say, you think you’re going to show up for work and work on this today. But something has happened overnight. And now you need to focus on this.

Nicole Smith
And so creative entrepreneurial brain of our wonderful

Hareta McMullan
and be able to communicate, that as a leader is huge and be able to take your people on the journey of change is quite a skill.

Nicole Smith
Yeah, and I’m working with someone at the moment they’re in they are in the corporate world. And my role is to facilitate a change rollout of a system. And it is really focused on the people. So it’s the end users of the tech, well, how can we shape this experience, so they feel supported and comfortable and know all the things and understand why it’s important to be doing X, Y and Zed. And without that sort of communication, that change pace, you know, we may not experience the positive experience and reaching those goals that we want to achieve. Right? So

Hareta McMullan
Absolutely. And it ties back into your overall people strategy is having, even if it’s a loose based plan on how you’re going to lead your team, and what you want from your team is going to support your business and growth plans. For example, you know, six months ago, I didn’t really know what a marketing plan was, obviously, I’d heard of it. And I knew roughly but did not know how to create one and did not know the impact that it could have on me in a really profound way. And a people strategy is the same thing. It’s like we said people is one of the biggest costs to our business. And so having a plan in place to manage that is simply your people strategy. And when you create one, you’re literally putting it side by side to your business strategy and then whipping it underneath.

Nicole Smith
Yeah, I think it’s sometimes when we’re growing the focus. So most of the time seems to be the immediate need, I have a need, I need that need filled so that I can be doing la la la la, right? It might be a tech, whatever it might be, right? More clients more whatever. Sometimes the people element of the strategy is forgotten about. And so it’s really good to have this conversation because I have engaged people that I thought was what I needed at the time, because it’s like, oh, well, I need a thing. Oh, that’s a person that says they do that thing. Great. Let’s put that person in here. Oh, no, we’re not quite aligned. Great learning, because what it actually got me to investigate and explore was what I actually didn’t need. And so every stage I’ve become really clearer on what it is that I’m actually who it is I’m actually looking for.

Hareta McMullan
Absolutely. And the great thing about growing and testing is that you don’t need to bring on a permanent employee, if it’s not aligned, or if you don’t think you’re ready, or if you wanting to test the waters a little, if you will, there’s so many other options with temporary work, with contract work. And then like you say, you can learn about what you perhaps really need or just that the problem that you have now is solved. And they have helped you put perhaps processes or measures in place that will enable you to more easily manage that yourself moving forward.

Nicole Smith
Yeah, exactly. You know, it’s not always but I was having conversation mastermind on Friday, we’re talking about IT support, tech support. And he was like, we’re not at a budget yet. We don’t have financial yet to employ someone full time for IT. And I said, well, at the size of business you are right now, you don’t necessarily need a full time employee in IT here. And in your business, there are so many amazing support people out there who can come in for the moment in time, get those systems set up, get all the security setup, right, get your backup set up. And so then you have that check in point when the things happen that you’re like, I need help. Right. And that’s more cost effective as well. Right, small.

Hareta McMullan
Absolutely. And I suppose that’s one of my key points when we’re talking about people and creating a people strategy is you’re managing the cost, you’re being smart about how you spend, and that like anything with a marketing strategy, or an up strategy or tech strategy, it requires a little bit of thought.

Nicole Smith
And it’s wonderful when you actually invest that time to get it out of your noggin into into your ClickUp whiteboard or onto your document wherever you might be doing it. I know for me personally, when I have invested at time, you mentioned marketing before. Last week, I was over with my fabulous OBMs, Leanne and Chloe, and we’ve just mapped out 12 months of themes and sub themes for the podcast, which is an amazing cornerstone. And it feels at the time I was like, Ah, I love organization. So even I was like, oh, but then as the days passed, and like, this feels so much lighter. Now I’ve got the plan, I know what I’m looking for, I know what I need to do and deliver over the next 12 months, you know, it gives me the freedom to still be creative, which is exactly what you need.

Hareta McMullan
You make such a great point. It’s about how you can create and give yourself the clarity, you need to do your best work for yourself and your clients.

Nicole Smith
Exactly. Nail on the head. So tell me about your Founder to Leader program. I’d love to learn a bit more about that.

Hareta McMullan
Absolutely. It’s a 10 week experience. And we basically take you from that founder mindset that we were talking about earlier through to being a confident and capable leader. And there are 10 areas that we explore throughout the 10 weeks that I believe, based on my experience are going to help you get there.

Nicole Smith
I love that because it is really a transition. When we’re first starting and you’re in the time doing the doing is we keep you know, we’ve said a few times today during the doing and it is an important stage to go through is understanding all the elements that make up your business and that, you know transitions you through to that next iteration. But being able to have a guide through what to actually be looking for as you’re stepping into that leadership role. Fabulous.

Hareta McMullan
Absolutely. I have got a lot of help with marketing more recently and that has bought so much clarity and removed so much overwhelm and that is what I achieved through my program, it’s helping you find the clarity, remove that overwhelm, so that you’re less reactive. And you’re starting to put proactive measures in place that mean you stop having to deal with some of the more unsavory parts of people management in the first place.

Nicole Smith
Ah, singing to my ears, not yours, there is always a way. It’s about discovering how that looks like for you. And knowing where your you know, your skills lie and knowing where we can enhance those through learnings, education’s also identifying, okay, this is really not my cup of tea, but someone over there can come in and help me to refine this and support me in this way. It’s just that’s the joy of being in entrepreneurial business world, I have to say, and in the communities that we’re in. It’s just, jump in a room with it four people that you’ve never met before. And you make these connections that, you know, you’ve heard of me before. And it’s just, it’s just beautiful. So yeah, sorry, went off on a tangent there. But it’s okay.

Hareta McMullan
No, I agree. It’s all part of it. It’s all part of effective leadership is surrounding yourself with other leaders, other people who think in similar yet different ways because we don’t want to create echo chambers, but surrounding yourself with people who have perhaps been where you have been or a walking alongside, you can add different angles to the experience and provide different perspective. And that is absolutely how we grow and learn and do better.

Nicole Smith
And love, you’re using the word experience, because that is such a neat word. I love it. All of this, though, it’s really the business journey. But it’s the business experience, you know, we have this fabulous opportunity to connect with fabulous humans that are like, similar to us, as you said, but also shape your business the way that you would love it to be. There’s no cookie cutter, you know, we’ve got this beautiful opportunity to lean into these areas around people, client experience, client journey, all those things. And my dog is now tippng over the basket. Emmet has joined us for this whole episode, if you’ve heard little bits and pieces as we go through. So yeah, so thank you so much for joining me, this has been a fabulous conversation. And as I said, So relative to me right now, is there anything you’d like to leave us on? Before we jump into our three questions,

Hareta McMullan
I suppose we’ve talked a bit about delegation today. And if it’s something that if any of you listening would like to explore further, I do have a free delegation resource on my website that you’re welcome to download. And that can perhaps be a starting point in switching from that founder mindset to that leader mindset and really make your life a heck of a lot easier.

Nicole Smith
I love that we’re gonna pop the link into the show notes for that, because I think that’s a resource for wherever you are on your journey. Having that skill that to be able to delegate effectively is the earlier you can learn that….

Hareta McMullan
You realize, Oh, my God, it actually can be better. This is great.

Nicole Smith
It actually was relatively easy to you know, empower my team member to step into their own life.

Hareta McMullan
Totally, I miss delegating so much. I can’t wait till I can start to grow my team again, because it is really a good time.

Nicole Smith
It’s a beautiful experience, though, isn’t it? So pre here, you know, I had a team that would report into me and being able to actually help them to develop their own skills as well. It’s such a beautiful experience.

Hareta McMullan
It’s incredibly rewarding. I used to manage an intern, who then we hired as a permanent employee. And now it’s been even two three years later, and I privately mentor her as an up and coming young HR professional. She’s turned into a beautiful friend and to see her growth in her career is absolutely incredible.

Nicole Smith
It warms my heart is beautiful, even Emmet’s excited under the desk. We have, yeah, it’s beautiful to hear that because you know HR can sometimes have this stigma of rules rigid, policy, process documents that are way too long in Times New Roman is so hard to read that people sign them even without reading them. Like it there is such an opportunity here to change that experience for you. People, so, oh…..

Hareta McMullan
Absolutely. And that’s part of why I’m here is to shake things up. It doesn’t have to be that way. And or you should see me when I watch TV shows and movies, and there’s always that line, go to HR, or HR made me do this training session and HR. I’m like no, we’re not all like that.

Nicole Smith
Yeah, exactly. Exactly. And, you know, there’s so many tools like that can support that journey. Now, you know, like, there’s one that I’ve been working with recently Employment Hero and creating that whole experience from the start all the way through it’s and really aligning it with your brand and business experience as well. So they know from the moment they interview with you, if they’re gonna like you as well, because it’s just as much about them connecting with us as business humans as we like, even as potential business people. Oh, my gosh, we could continue to talk we just have well, so thank you so much. I’m gonna jump into our three questions. What is your go to app that creates ease in your day?

Hareta McMullan
Canva.

Nicole Smith
Yeah, good one.

Hareta McMullan
Yeah. I use it on my desktop and on my phone.

Nicole Smith
Yeah, yeah. I was at an event this morning. And she was talking about the QR feature now for QR codes.

Hareta McMullan
I love that. I discovered that a little while ago because I met someone at a networking event who pulled out this QR code. It’s obviously like a digital business card. And I thought that’s amazing. Because who carries business cards these days?

Nicole Smith
Funnily enough, I have three in my pocket right now. So organized, they’re not mine that other people’s but…

Hareta McMullan
I stand corrected.

Nicole Smith
I love the digital ones. There’s some other ones that you can just tap the back of your phone onto someone else’s phone and the details are tech is amazing. It’s so good. I love Canva. Canva’s so good. Okay, online, paper, hybrid to do lists lover, where do you sit?

Hareta McMullan
Online, I use my calendar as my, I don’t want to call it a to do list but I use it as the main tool to design my work. And I color coded things so that I can reflect and look at where I’m spending my time. And everything is movable a bit like Tetris and it seems to work for me.

Nicole Smith
Lovely. So you’re a time blocker? You love the time blocking. Yeah, fabulous. Yeah, very efficient way of working. I know my team and I are just getting me back into that pattern. I was very good at it for ages and growth. Things happen. And life happened. So yeah, I use a combination of my calendar, but also all the tasks in ClickUp. So I’m in. Yeah, yes. Okay, final question. What would you do if you created more space in your world?

Hareta McMullan
I love this question. I know exactly what I would do. I would do nothing. I think we as a society move so fast. I know I move fast as a new-ish mum and a solopreneur. Learning the world of business. I crave and want space to do nothing. And that nothing could be sleeping, reading a book, may I say go for a massage.

Nicole Smith
Yes you may. 100%

Hareta McMullan
Something that clears my head and creates space for that big picture thinking, the creative thinking, the thinking that really helps us move the needle.

Nicole Smith
Love, love, love that answer. It’s just beautiful when we actually listen to what our body needs as well. With our mind,

Hareta McMullan
That’s really interesting, because when we create space, it’s so tempting to fill it up with stuff and I can easily do that. And I’m at the point now though, that I’m intentionally trying to design my my week in my year to create space for me to simply be.

Nicole Smith
Because we are the most important humans, you know, to lead the best leaders to be the most impactful business owners. We look after ourselves. And yeah, I know yesterday afternoon yesterday I was doing some things and I was like huh not feeling quite not feeling something’s not feeling right. And so I pressed pause in my brain on the things and I got my new book. Have a with me it’s a new book that Kathy Rast recommended coding building a second brain. Tiago someone or other amazing you know, some books you get new like I can’t really read this. This one I haven’t been able to put down such a do.. book for me. But I sat on the couch for half an hour turned my phone on silent. It was a fabulous and I felt so refreshed afterwards. So being able to allow ourselves and supporting and really, you know, cheer ourselves to take that space for us is really, really important.

Hareta McMullan
Absolutely. So yeah, that’s me. Do nothing.

Nicole Smith
is so good. Thank you so much for coming on today. It’s been such a fabulous conversation I knew it would be we had a great conversation in that one roof room when we first met. So this has been just beautiful. So lovely.

Hareta McMullan
It really has it’s made me feel really liked, very happy, very motivated. And so I thank you as well for being so joyful to speak to and listen to.

Nicole Smith
Ah, gosh, I’m getting all the all the happy vibes over this side are screen today. Loving it. Thank you, you can come anytime. We want to know where where you’re hanging out, because people will have listened today. And I know this is a journey in a transition that many of business owners will be either in the middle of not quite there or transitioned already there and thinking are still not quite feeling right. So where can we find you and connect?

Hareta McMullan
Absolutely. I’m on Instagram at third underscore space. I’m on LinkedIn and Hareta slash Macmillan. And of course, my website, which I’m sure you’ll pop in the show notes as well. So definitely come and hang out with me. Send a DM. Let’s chat.

Nicole Smith
Yay. And we’re also going to put the link to your delegation download as well, because that sounds delightful, there’s lots of d’s in that word. Delegation document. Amazing. Well, thank you so much. Again, it’s been such a pleasure chatting old things with you today.

Hareta McMullan
Thank you, Nicole. I’ve really enjoyed it too.

Nicole Smith
You’re welcome. Everybody else who’s listening out there. Have a wonderful rest of your day and enjoy creating space and time freedom by now.

Well, there we go. Thank you so much for joining me today. It’s been such a pleasure having you on board. Have we connected on social jazz? If not, please come on over. Say hi, I’m on all the platforms at the artisan solutions. So I’d really look forward to seeing you over there. And if you enjoy today’s episode, don’t forget to tag me and I’d love it if you could leave a review. And of course, share this with others so others can come and join us next time. All right, then everyone have a fabulous rest of the week and until next time, see you then.