• Mindset challenges
• Finding an accountability and connection
• Giving yourself a short amount of time so there’s less procrastination
• Rewarding yourself after getting a task done that you don’t want to do
• Taking care of goals and following through

Nicole Smith
Welcome to Take Control with Nicole. As business owners we experience first hand the fine line between our personal and business lives. During our conversations, we will look at simple hints and tips to create time, reduce overwhelm, and help you to navigate through your journey to where you want to be. If you’re looking for smarter ways to work, and create space and time freedom in your day, then you’re in the right place. All right, let’s go.

Nicole Smith
Hello, and welcome back to Take Control with Nicole. Today I’m speaking with the wonderful Leanne Webber all about how to combat loneliness as a founder. Leanne is the CEO of the founders team, which exists to make business life less lonely and 76,321 times more fun. Right across Australia growth minded emerging and established business owners join the founders team for community, accountability, support and inspiration. Right across Australia growth minded scaling business owners join the Founders Team for connection, accountability, support and inspiration. Were a place to Mindstorm about your business without Arnie Marge piping up that maybe you should get a real job when times are tough. When Leanne isn’t supporting wonderful members and her team, she spends time with her high school sweetheart turned husband and 12 year old Labrador. She loves to create moments of calm amongst the chaos, and she is an advocate for creating change and spreading awareness about Endometriosis, a chronic illness she suffers from herself. Well, hello, Leanne, how are you, thanks for joining me. I’m really excited about this conversation.

Leanne Webber
Thank you so much for having me. I’m excited to be here on this Friday afternoon, end of the week.

Nicole Smith
Yay! Love it. What a wonderful way to end the week having just a fun, easy flowing words are definitely going to work conversation.

Leanne Webber
That’s it, we’re ready.

Nicole Smith
We’re ready. We’re ready to rock and roll. Well, I love to start with you telling us about you, your business, your journey and how you arrived here today.

Leanne Webber
Okay, so when was it? When was it, 2016? How long ago was that? Six years ago, I started a business with my husband, we sat down and we were like, okay, are we going to have a baby now? Or are we going to start a business first, we decided to start a business first. And we started a software development company, which is called Webinet. And that’s still running, Jake still runs that himself and I help out in that business sometimes. But I think it was about two years into that business. I was really lonely. I had no business friends, I had no friends that own their own business, no one to talk to about business. When I tried to talk about the business, it kind of just went over their heads a little bit. And they just didn’t really understand why we were putting ourselves through it. You know, if you don’t own a business, it’s hard to understand why you would go through all this stress. But yeah, so I didn’t have any business friends. And I thought, okay, how can I how can I meet some people? And how, who can I talk to about the challenges that we’re having? Because we were having some team challenges, we’re really struggling to find team members. And we were having like cashflow challenges, you know, like we weren’t really making much profit for the amount of revenue we’re bringing in back then. So I reached out to a few people on Instagram, people I didn’t know as well as a couple that I did and asked if they would be keen to catch up and do a mastermind. And so I organised one just with a few people that I reached out to on Instagram. And when I put a photo of that catchup up on my Instagram, which only had about 600 followers back then I was inundated with messages asking to join and to come along to the next one. And I was like, oh, we already had 10 people in that group. We already went for like, I think we’re talking for about three hours. And so I kind of pondered on it a little bit. And then about a month later, I was like, you know what, I’m going to try and turn this into a business. And back then Facebook groups were really beneficial. And I just posted in some Facebook groups, if anyone was interested. And then yeah, two months later, we had 30 members.

Nicole Smith
Amazing.

Leanne Webber
So that was in 2018. I was only charging $35 a person as we do in the beginning, and it grew really organically. I’ve never used paid advertising. It’s really grown through word of mouth. And, you know, obviously loneliness as a founder is a real thing. And it’s really important to surround yourself with people that understand the journey that you’re on. So yeah, it grew really organically. We’ve gone through a few iterations and made some big changes recently as well. And now we are just doing one mastermind, I’ve been spreading myself too thin. So we’re going back to what it was originally one mastermind, so we can really focus and provide a really good service as well.

Nicole Smith
That’s really exciting. I love the iteration of business though. I’ve only sort of been two and a half years, but already, I’ve seen so many different, you know, things I’ve tried or evolutions of services I’ve offered or things like that. And it’s, I guess that’s one thing about of owning your own businesses that you can quickly make, well, maybe not quickly, maybe there’s a whole process of thoughts behind the changes, but you’re able to make those little shifts when you when you own your own business. I love that how fabulous though, that it’s just grown organically and you’re right, I think that when you are starting your own business, you think you’re the only one going through all the things and then you actually talk to people and you’re like, ah, okay, it’s not just me.

Leanne Webber
You know what I used to get really bad comparisonitis. And because I facilitated now, last time I counted, which I think was about three, six months ago, I had facilitated over 300 masterminds. And so that’s, that’s listening to a lot of challenges and a lot of problems. And so it’s really helped with my comparisonitis because even the people that you see on Instagram whose businesses, they are thriving, their businesses are thriving, they still have challenges, they still doubt themselves, they still, you know, take on clients that they had a gut feeling about and knew that wasn’t the right fit, but they still took it on and knew they shouldn’t know, you know, everyone still goes through all of those things, no matter how long you’ve been in business and how successful your business is, as well.

Nicole Smith
Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, we always think the grass is greener on the side. But you do realise that we’re all just travelling the journey, someone’s just maybe 10, 20 steps ahead of you. But they’re still going through the motions and the feels and the exploration and all of those things. So when you’re like in those groups with your crew, do you find that that accountability of getting sk, I was going to say, there’s a word that I wouldn’t say here, but stuff done? Is that a common theme like, especially as your own boss, that you want to start a business? It’s like, for instance, mine, I want to create a business that gives me freedom and choice, right? But to do that, you still need to make the dollars, right? You need to get to grow the business and work with the clients. So is that something that you find is a common theme, becoming accountable and actually doing the work?

Leanne Webber
Yeah, it’s challenging, especially if you’ve got some like mindset blocks around fear and success and things. It’s really easy to procrastinate, because no one is saying to you, hey, Leanne, you said, you’re gonna do this. You haven’t done it, maybe your clients, but when working on your own business, it’s really easy to put that on the backburner. We have some members that don’t really need it. They’re just naturally don’t struggle with that. And then we have other members that love that we set goals every month, and they’re deadline driven. And so they wake up at 4am on the day of their mastermind, the mastermind is happening at nine and get their goals done. And they absolutely love it. And that is one of the reasons I started it as well. Because, you know, working with my husband, if he said to me, hey, have you done that yet? I’d get really defensive and be like, no, why are you asking me? You know, take it really personally. So it was nice to have other people keeping me accountable too.

Nicole Smith
Yeah. That’s a whole different dynamic working with your partner, isn’t it?

Leanne Webber
Ohhh, yes.

Nicole Smith
I guess she must learn a lot of different things on how to deal with different situations and being with the community as well, like again they’ve probably been through similar things. And taking those mines of gold and applying them into your world. And yeah, I think I don’t have a problem with getting things done. No surprises there. Like when I have a focus, I know what I’m doing, break it down into those minut actions and just take action is my thing. But for those who don’t have that natural drive to do the things, what are some like, ideas or suggestions that you do? Like what do you do in your world to get the stuff done?

Leanne Webber
I also don’t really have, well, I do and I don’t. So it depends if it’s something that makes me nervous, I will procrastinate on it because it makes me uncomfortable and it gives me butterflies and I don’t like feeling nervous. And then sometimes I’ll yeah, just get stuff done. And as you mentioned in my bio, I have endo. So having limited time is actually quite a good thing for productivity because you know, you’ve only got X amount of hours or X amount of days to get the things done, it’s a lot easier than if you’ve got all the time in the world and you can put it off and do something different or something you enjoy more first. So I don’t know if that’s an easy tip to implement. But if you give yourself less time, you will get the things done quicker, and you will stop overthinking it. So that’s one tip. Another tip is to join a mastermind or a community of some sort or find an accountability buddy or have you know, an outside pressure on you. Someone that you know is going to check in on you and make sure that you’ve done the things. That’s another tip on staying accountable when you don’t have a boss. And one of my other favourite things, which I know you love as well, Nicole is Pomodoro. If I’m procrastinating again, it’s usually things I’m nervous about, like sending podcast pictures, or yeah, doing something that’s out of my comfort zone, or doing things I just don’t enjoy. I’ve found a bookkeeper now, but that used to be something I would procrastinate on. Setting a timer and just going, okay, you’ve got 25 minutes to do this, let’s get it done. And then you can have a coffee, or I reward myself with a piece of chocolate or something in the break. So I know that there’s like a light at the end of the tunnel to get the hard things done.

Nicole Smith
Absolutely, Pomodoro is a fabulous tool for that, be it 25 minutes or set out to the length of duration of time that suits you and the activity but doing that, choosing the thing, doing the thing, and then rewarding yourself at the end. It’s just a beautiful way to work, like.

Leanne Webber
Yeah, I love it. Although it means that I drink too much coffee sometimes as well.

Nicole Smith
All in the name of getting things done, right. Oh, that’s so good. I think something that I’m taking away from this as well as really checking in with you, and knowing how you like to operate. And what are those sort of, not triggers, but what are those motivation points for you? Like if you are not naturally like yeah, I’m going to do the things. I’ve got the thing set? What can be that driver? Is it a coffee or chocolate? Or is it someone else going hey, hey, hey, hi, knock, knock. Have you done the thing? Yeah. Great. So in your community, there’s such a wide range of businesses and lots of different I guess people from all over Australia, do we have any international people just Australia isn’t it?

Leanne Webber
New Zealand, we have a few New Zealand team members.

Nicole Smith
There we go! International, international love it. And everyone’s so nice. Everyone is so nice in it, everyone that I’ve met, mostly online now we’ve met in person so that’s exciting, tick that off the box. Do you find that like attracts like, in the way that you operate?

Leanne Webber
Yeah, yes. And I think that it comes just like in a team in a corporate environment for example. Same as business, it comes from the top. So I always try and show up as my authentic self, I’m vulnerable, I share my challenges and lessons and wins as well. So that our members know that it’s a safe space to come and they could show up as themselves, you know, all show up on Instagram with no makeup on and you know, oily hair and that kind of thing. Because we don’t want that as a barrier for people to come along and participate in, you know, the things that we do. And we also have a very in depth questionnaire to join the community. Yeah. And I also think having it as a cost, which is, you know, I mentioned earlier, we were only charging $35, upfront. And so we were getting people that weren’t committed, or you know, that were coming along just to make connections. Whereas if you’re paying upwards of 150 a month, you know, you want to get the value out of it. You’re not just there to like find business, you’re there to grow your business. And so that was a big lesson for me in the beginning that yes, like I really do want it to be accessible for people. But also we need the commitment to make sure that it’s valuable for everyone involved, not just someone coming along to get new business and make connections.

Nicole Smith
Yeah, that’s right. There’s lots of places for that already. You know, yeah, I know, you mentioned Facebook groups before, like, there are so many that you can just do what you want over in that space. But you know, when you do make a financial investment in yourself and in your business, you do show up differently, don’t you? Yeah, good, really good point. I love that with your survey because I’ve obviously done it a few times. It is really good. And it also makes us as business owners. Think about those things that maybe we haven’t really thought about before.

Leanne Webber
Yeah, I love reading them as well actually sent an email about it this morning. I love reading the new applications that come through. And we do get a lot of feedback that people enjoy the process. And I think that that’s another way that we can kind of combat those people that are just coming in to get new clients, there are barriers to entry, you know, you have to complete a survey, that’s going to take about 20 minutes of your time. But that really ensures that the people applying are committed. Initially, when we started the founders team, I would give away free places in the mastermind as like a competition. And I don’t do that anymore. We don’t discount, we don’t give away free places, because it is really important that people are committed and genuinely want to be there. So that’s been another lesson as well.

Nicole Smith
Yeah. And all of those things just come with trial and error, practice yeah, give it a go see what happens. Oh, no, that’s not right for us in our community. And I guess as like a leader of the community, it is, you know, it’s our responsibility, your responsibility to make sure you’re protecting all the people in there, because they’re there for the right reasons. So,

Leanne Webber
Yes, exactly. That’s why it’s application only as well, because we don’t want people just coming and getting what they need and leaving again.

Nicole Smith
Yeah, yeah. So as we sort of touched on business can be lonely, especially if you’re your own person and don’t have a team yet or not planning to grow a team. If you’re not already a part of something like the founders team, how do you find that you combat that or you can overcome that loneliness factor, right at the start, or wherever you are, in your journey,

Leanne Webber
I think it’s really important to find those communities, or even if you’re not a big community person, just finding one or two people that you can have in your corner that are gonna support you. Because I am lucky enough that my husband is a business owner as well so he gets it. But a lot of people are in partnerships where, you know, their partner doesn’t understand what it’s like, what the journey is like. And often, they’re encouraging them to give up and go to a stable job and get that stable income for the family and less stress. But it’s just so different. You know, we’re so passionate about what we do, and we love our businesses, we love building our dream. And so it’s really important to to surround yourself with people that also understand that and understand the journey. So finding those people, I know, it can be kind of tricky until you find them. But again, it’s trial and error. I, in the early days went to so many networking events, some were great, some were not. But that’s part of the journey, and just finding those ones that you really connect with qnd, you know, because even as business owners, you’re going to find people that you connect with, and people that you don’t. People that run businesses differently or have different values, which is so fine. But yeah, it’s like making friends I guess. And it will be it will take a little while. And then it takes a little while to grow and nurture that relationship as well. But it honestly makes such a difference to the journey.

Nicole Smith
Yeah, I’ve been to some of those events as well, where you kind of walk in and you feel like a little bit awkward. Yeah, why am I here? No one actually talking,

Leanne Webber
This is not for me?

Nicole Smith
Yeah, when they come up to you it’s like business card. And I’m like, yeah, oh, no, no, no, who are you, I want to know who you are first. And maybe if that’s a thing, then we’ll you know,

Leanne Webber
Exactly. Such a good point.

Nicole Smith
And protecting yourself a little bit. Because I know in my personal world, I was always very much come in, come into my inner circle, I love you, you’re my friend lalalalala and then get burnt, you know, as time goes on, and, and I’ve sort of seen that at the start of my business life as well is as an approachable and what’s the right word? People are attracted to me and my vibrance and my exciting, now my headbands or the sparkles, I have to be very wary about who are those people that are there for genuine connection and who are those people that are just wanting to take. And that’s a thing as well because we all want to, especially if you’re running your own show, and you’re just by yourself and you want to have some people to chat with finding those core people, once you find them, like I’ve got mine and we’re in the DM’s on the daily you know and we we actually work together as well because I believe in her business she believes in my business like it’s just such a beautiful space to be in. Also I can have tears with her if I need to know that genuine connection. So yeah, so good when you find it,

Leanne Webber
And it is, I keep saying journey.

Nicole Smith
It is a journey

Leanne Webber
To find those people and and figure out who is yeah, like you said there for genuine rapport and not just taking. And I’ve actually you just mentioned it as well working with those friendships, relationships, I guess I was telling my husband about it one day and he’s from a very corporate kind of background and can’t really understand how I could be friends with my clients. He said how do you, you know, how do you keep that separation if you’re working together or you know, it can kind of get a bit messy and I realised that you know, those friendships and those relationships that we have mutual respect is when we pay for each other services, you know, discounts for friends, sometimes, but still paying and respecting each other’s times and not trying to get things, you know, out of them sneakily like, hey, let’s catch up for a coffee. And it’s just like, okay, so I need help with this, this, this, this this? Yeah, it’s really like respectful. So it will take a little while to find those people. But once you do, yeah, hold on to them tight.

Nicole Smith
Yeah. And be okay to recalibrate those relationships as well. That’s a as a big thing that I’ve learned from my business bestie, Kathy, my business wife as we call each other, we’re constantly recalibrating. And you know, she’s tried to break up with me a few times, but it’s a joke, it’s long, it’s a lot of 10 jokes, one day, she may, but at the moment, we’re like, we’re done now. But also, that’s fine. recalibrating your relationships wherever you are, because that’s actually going to continue your journey on and there’s and support you both to grow and scale your businesses to where you want them to be. So I’ve seen that from a personal point. And I’m sure you have with yourself and with your business people in your groups.

Leanne Webber
It’s actually been a big lesson for me this year, I, as I said, I was spreading myself too thin and trying to do too many things. And I realised that, you know, back before I started the founders team, one of my big goals was to be a well connected business owner. That was like my dream to be one of those people that knows everyone. And now that that’s happened. And you know, I’ve met hundreds of people through the founders team, I’d realised when I’ve been trying to make these big changes in my business that I actually had no one that I felt comfortable enough to talk about those changes with, you know, I realised that all of those, all of these connections are really surface level. And so this year, I’ve been focusing on strengthening the relationships that, you know, with the people that I think are my people.

Nicole Smith
Yeah, yeah, that’s because you kind of can just, like fire it out, like, bring all these people in. And then yeah, it is very Hi, how you doing? Yeah, let’s catch up for coffee, and then never actually do anything about it, but if they’re your people, you’re like actually booking a date. Let’s do the thing and build up. Yeah. So good

Leanne Webber
And those surface level relationships are the ones that how’s business? Yeah, good going well, yeah, busy. But really business. How’s business? The answer is like, everything’s falling apart. I don’t know what to do help me how do I make these decisions? I’m just Swimming?

Nicole Smith
The real, honest, genuine conversations, which I know is what you’re all about. Yeah. So yeah. Um, you mentioned business goals, or a business goal. I actually disconnected from that word. Well, I don’t think I’ve ever been connected with goals. Kathy says it’s because I’m not a sports person. And I’ve never really enjoyed ball sports, which is so true. Absolutely true. So I now call them bigs. Because they’re, it’s like some something big that you’re heading towards. And you’ve got lots of little bigs that together make the big. So that’s going to be a thing keep watching

Leanne Webber
I like it!

Nicole Smith
Yeah, I know right. But in terms of our conversation, we’ll call them goals. So how do you help yourself and your community to really take control of what direction they want to head in? And actually make it a thing? You know, because life’s busy. We’ve got on the business, in the business clients, community, personal world, sometimes it can seem a little much, how do you support them to focus in on the direction?

Leanne Webber
Well focus is so hard for entrepreneurs, isn’t it?

Nicole Smith
It’s like, oh, what’s that, that’s nice.

Leanne Webber
Shiny object Syndrome is such a common challenge for us, because we are the big thinkers, we’re the big picture vision people you know, a lot of members are not all but a lot. So to focus in and figure out what what is right for you and what is right for your business. It goes back to values, I think, and sometimes those values will change over time. Sometimes you’ll have business values and personal values, but I find that to really find that that one thing that really the big it’s like a combination. Yeah, there you go. It’s a combination of the business values and your personal values because yes, your business is separate from you. But you’ve got to show up all the time. Like it’s it’s a big part of our lives and you’ve got to enjoy what you’re doing and it’s got to be connected and it’s got to sit right with you as well as your clients. So yeah, I think it’s a combination of those values and intertwining those and yeah, figuring those out first, and when the shiny objects come up, which they will, does that align with my values? Is it going to benefit me? Is it going to benefit the clients? What does it, how much extra time is this going to take? If I’m doing that, what’s it going to take me away from? All those types of questions are really important when those shiny objects flutter past?

Nicole Smith
And they will, constantly. I find it also understanding and being super comfortable in no, yeah, saying no, understanding who your no clients are, understanding what you’re no, is in your boundaries or your you know, your perimeters of what you you do with your values. As soon as I realised that power, things started to become a little easier in my decision making process as well.

Leanne Webber
Yeah. And I think it’s okay, as well. I feel like a lot of us forget this, it’s okay to change your mind. My vision for the founders team was to have 1000s of members and huge events a`nd I’ve realised recently, like, personally, as well, I’m really valuing the deeper connections that make a difference. And a lot of our members are valuing that as well, and realising that as well. So that’s why we’ve made those changes, I guess. Yeah. And the vision is different now. And that’s okay.

Nicole Smith
Yeah, that’s right. Because we are, we’re humans, ultimately, we’re humans, and we’ve got our own things and our own stuff going on. And, you know, that is the benefit of having a small business, you know, when you’re in the corporate space, can you imagine if you just decided to change that will take like years to get through all the red tape and up the chain down the chain, and across and up and down, and logos and all the things. Whereas we can make those decisions and know that it’s the right thing. Because if you continue on the journey, there we go, journey again, and it’s not aligned, you’re not going to enjoy it, the people around you can see that you’re not enjoying it, and then it’s going to just flutter away and not be a thing anymore. So it’s so good to just connect back in to what that core purpose and value is for you.

Leanne Webber
Yeah, and I think that it’s, it’s a hard thing to do as well, because typically not all, but typically, business owners are doers, and they want to go go go. And making those decisions and coming back to those values often requires a bit of stillness and a bit of calm. And so it can feel very uncomfortable. But having those couple of people in your corner that you can bounce off during those calm moments, rather than just continuing on the path is very important.

Nicole Smith
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Nicole Smith
Those still moments and those calm moments are so important. So important and something that if you’re listening and you’re not doing it already, open your diary up, pop in some time for just stillness. You know I love how I’m watching on the socials, secret stalker. Not secret because I like it, isn’t that a weird thing, the whole anyway, that’s a whole other topic. But I love how you go away to places you know, both you and your husband and puppy off you go. And I see a few of the members in the founders team doing those same things going and booking them into hotels for a couple of nights just to you know, decompress and process and move on forward. I think even if you can’t do the hotel thing at this point, just being able to even at home, just create yourself some time and space to just reflect and ask yourself is this actually where I want to be going and always checking in because things change?

Leanne Webber
Yeah. So it’s it is very uncomfortable and it’ll take practice, though. Took me a long time to be okay with not having 100 things in my calendar.

Nicole Smith
Yeah. Yep. Yep.

Leanne Webber
So yeah, maybe starting small actually, that’s something that my husband started doing because he is a massive workaholic and literally works every single day without fail. So he started with an hour, an hour week of stillness of you know, doing something that’s not work, intentionally, and then building up a little bit, and a little bit more, and then a whole day off. And then two days without the laptop, holy moly.

Nicole Smith
Who even is he anymore. You’re right though, all of it, everything we do takes practice. So like, I remember when I first started and like I’m from a theatrical background, right? Give me a microphone, and I would jump on a stage and sing at you. Easy peasy. But then I grab a phone and tried to do the Instagram stories. And I would be recording like four times editing, cancelling.

Nicole Smith
Really??

Nicole Smith
Oh, yeah, absolutely. Now I don’t, I jump on and it’s fine. But practising that, you know, it doesn’t matter where you are, if it feels a bit uncomfortable just keep on chipping away. Keep a little bit at a time and then all of a sudden, you’ll be going away for a week with the laptop closed, because you know your business is going to just run beautifully without you.

Leanne Webber
Yeah. Yeah. I used to struggle having naps during the day, which I need to do sometimes. And it took practice. And you know, what made me you know, be okay with it. I would open my phone, and there’s no emails, no one knew I was napping. I used to get really stressed that someone was gonna find me out that I was having a nap when I was sick. And I’d wake up and no one even knew. And I was like, Oh, yeah. People don’t care about this as much as what I think.

Nicole Smith
I think it stems back from I don’t remember, you worked in corporate, didn’t you at some point? Yes. So I think it stems from that. Yeah. And that old school and look that’s probably I know, corporate still got its absolute place. But that real like, okay, you got to clock in, clock off, don’t slack off, do the things like tasks, tasks, tasks, action, action, action, work hard. Hustle. Yeah. And then we come over this space. And we’re all we’re now sort of transitioning into oh it’s our own business, we can tune into our own natural rhythm of how we like to work, when we like to work, where we like to work. And we don’t need to ask ourselves, but you saw my story yesterday, right? That’s a great example. I was ill yesterday. And the first thing was like, oh, no, you can’t rest. And I’m like, you’re being an idiot. You can, you can, yes, I had clients yesterday, but I know, if I had have got pushed on through and done those sessions, I would have been disappointed in myself, because I wouldn’t have shown up the way I wanted to. The clients may have had the right experience. But I know me, I would have felt not right. And then I would have felt more unwell. And I’m like no, this is silly, just Nicole checkout, block it off, out you pop. And I felt so much better waking up this morning, knowing that I had done that for myself. So practice!

Leanne Webber
Practice makes perfect. Well, not even perfect. It just makes it easier.

Nicole Smith
It makes it easier. Yeah, exactly. Now, I would love you to share a little bit if you’re comfortable and happy to share a little bit about the new scale places with us.

Leanne Webber
Yeah, I’m more than happy to share. As I said, I’m really valuing and a lot of our members are really valuing the deeper connections. And I mean, there’s so many reasons I’ve made these changes. And this is why it took me a long time to make them because there was just so much going on in my head. So until the end of June, so we’ve still got a month left of running things the way they currently are. We’ve got a membership, a mastermind, and then like a second tier of mastermind for our business owners that have been in business for a longer amount of time. And kind of have, you know, got their groove and running events as well. I was trying to run an event every month. And in the membership we run a masterclass co-working sessions, q&a sessions, and I have a chronic illness. And

Nicole Smith
You’re making me tired Leanne.

Leanne Webber
I’m so tired, what was I doing. Oh my gosh. And I just have been constantly feeling in this place of overwhelm, falling behind, obviously taking time off to rest, which I have to do, we should do anyway but I have to do my body forces me to rest. And then you know, I’d be constantly feeling I’ve got to catch up and you know, I am an organised person, but I have not been organised because I’ve just been spreading myself way too thin, which means that the experience we’re providing is not the experience I want to provide to our paying members. And also with a membership business, it’s all about numbers to make it profitable, to bring in that revenue, you know, it’s $44 a month to bring in a decent amount of revenue. You need a lot of members Yeah, and that requires marketing. And I absolutely hate marketing. I prefer, as I’ve said, building relationships and connecting with people. And so that wasn’t aligning, the spreading myself too thin wasn’t aligning, our messaging was really confusing for, you know, if you’re not in the founders team, you come across it, and it’s like, oh, I don’t know what, what tier to choose, how do you make this decision, we even had to make a quiz about it, to choose which service to pick. So it was confusing. So there’s yeah, honestly, so many reasons that I’ve just been pondering. And it took me a long time to come to this decision, because I knew that we do have members, that wouldn’t be the right fit for this programme moving forward, which is called scale blazers. It’s for scaling business owners. And I was really stuck on that, because I’m a people pleaser, and I don’t want to let people down. And it’s the reason I started the business was to have this accessible option for people to grow their business and feel supported. And so the fact that I was going to close this, these options down and not support these people was making me like, quite upset and nervous. And yeah, just like not having an option for them. I wanted to be able to be like, okay, so we’re launching scalp lasers. But if you’re not a scale blaxer here’s something we can do for you, but there isn’t that and it feels really uncomfortable for me, because I do just want to support as many people as I can. But I know that something had, I knew that something had to change. Again, spreading myself too thin, our profits are shit, terrible, terrible profit margins. Also, having the membership wasn’t sitting right with me, because you know, the reason for a mastermind, that the powerful thing about a mastermind is you can brainstorm what’s relevant to you right now. You’re not learning things, just because you should probably learn something. So many, there’s just so many reasons and it feels so right now. Yeah. And it feels aligned. Yeah. And so I’m trusting my gut. And I always have trusted my gut. And I knew something wasn’t right. But I couldn’t pinpoint it. Probably because of all the reasons I’ve said, yes. There’s so many reasons, I couldn’t pinpoint what was not working?

Nicole Smith
Yeah. I think it’s a really good decision. When we are trying to help everyone, we’re helping no one. You know, you’ve heard that before. And I know that you shared like coming right back to that initial first session, and the value that you got out of that close knit community, and being able to offer that to people at the right stage as well. Because I know that when you go through the journey of oh gosh, we do say journey a lot, but it is the road to live, you know, you start here at the start. And, you know, like me, I wasn’t a newbie to business. So I had some business smarts been working with entrepreneurs before, but you come in here, and you still need the basics, right? You don’t need that level yet. But when you get to that level, you got to then find the people that do the thing. You don’t want to be back in here. Because you find that you’re giving the advice that you’ve just learned to the people that need the advice at that stage. Yeah, I think what you’ve done is great, because you’re really capturing where it’s really going to be so impactful for those scale blazers to just take it and absorb it and connect deeply with other business owners at the same stage and just go with it and scale to where they’re going to go.

Leanne Webber
Something as well, I caught up with a friend for coffee this morning. And, you know, I was talking about the fact that in the initial stages of the founders team, you know, comparison is a big thing, seeing all these businesses on Instagram and having the membership and mastermind has helped with that. But now it’s also I feel like our innovation isn’t there anymore, because we’re just seeing what everyone else is doing and seeing what’s worked for someone and thinking, oh, well, I need to do that. And we’re really forgetting to go within and and think about what what’s right for us in our business. And I feel like having this membership with loads of people does the opposite. Yeah. Do you know what I mean?

Nicole Smith
Yeah, I do. I know for me, there’s something coming, I can’t really tell you right now. But any who, it’s been something I’ve been resisting for a long time, interestingly enough, and I had to do some deep diving and work out why that’s what that is. And now I’ve connected with it, it feels in alignment, it feels right. So it’s the right time. But you can sometimes have those feelings and see that bright it’s a bright shiny oh they’re doing that, got to do that. Yeah, the thing, must post every day on all the platforms must, you know, show up alive on all the things like if it doesn’t work for you, then it’s going to seem not right. And it’s gonna feel not right. So yeah, connecting into a gut feel. I spoke to one of my friends who’s human design. And it actually when I looked at it my whole decision making is gut feel is what that says anyway. But I’ve always been that way. So knowing oh, yeah, okay, that feels right. Let’s do it.

Leanne Webber
Yeah. What are you? What’s your human design?

Nicole Smith
Oh, I can’t remember. It’s really bad. I haven’t fully connected with it yet. But I know my thing is gut feel. That’s the one thing I took. I was like, Yeah, it’s interesting when you ever do those things, a lot of them come back pretty much like yeah, that makes total sense to me. Yeah, like, I’m a Scorpio. And I don’t really do the astrology stuff much. But there’s a lot of things like, you know, fiercely passionate about my friends and family. Fiercely, like I’m there for you. Little things like that. So anyway, we go completely off topic.

Leanne Webber
Now an astrology podcast.

Nicole Smith
Yes. Hello, my name is Nicole. Welcome, I’m a scorpio nice to meet you. Okay. Is there anything else you’d like to share with us or talk to us about before we jump into three questions?

Leanne Webber
I don’t think so. If you’re looking for clarity as well, I’ve I’ve shared this a few times over the past like two weeks, because I feel like there’s a lot of people that are struggling with clarity right now.

Nicole Smith
Correct. I feel that too.

Leanne Webber
Yeah. Maybe it’s this. Yeah. Going back to horoscopes and astrology might be the season or something.

Nicole Smith
Something you do with the moons I find every time there’s like, I’m going through a bit of a whatever. And I say to Kathy ooohh, she’s like, the new moon.

Leanne Webber
Isn’t wasn’t. Exactly, yeah, yeah. So clarity, I find a lot of us seek clarity from an outside perspective. And it’s actually kind of a red flag for me or something to dive deeper into when someone says on their application form that they want to join the founders team to get clarity, because you’re gonna get five different opinions from your team, and it’s gonna make you more confused than ever. So clarity while we’re talking this episode is really about you know, connection and combating loneliness, clarity really does need to come from within. And it might take you a little while to find, but it will come. And no one’s going to give you the answers. So if you’re looking for clarity, yes, you can ask people’s opinions, but really dive deep within and trust those gut feels.

Nicole Smith
Yeah, exactly. I love that. That’s fabulous thing to end on. Clarity is from within. Love it. Love it. Love it. Love it. Okay, are you ready? Ready to rock and roll? Okay, let’s go. What is your go-to app that creates ease in your everyday. And it doesn’t have to be a productivity app. It doesn’t have to be a business app can be anything that you use on the daily,

Leanne Webber
I would have to say my calendar. I could not live without my calendar app, my Gmail calendar. I mean, I would forget to do everything. Yeah, I would just be at home going I think I was meant to do something today.

Nicole Smith
Who was on meeting for coffee, was that day or three weeks time? I don’t know. Yeah, we not only in business, but in personal life. We have a shared calendar. And that’s been from the day Simon and I got together basically, I’m like, share calendar. If it’s not on there, it’s not happening. Like yeah, you know, if it’s not there, I’m gonna play my things and with the family. And so yeah, I agree. Gotta keep keep organised because you’re an organised person. So having that central place makes sense. Yeah. Okay, online, paper, hybrid to-do this lover?

Leanne Webber
Hybrid, /I’m a hybrid.

Nicole Smith
Great. Love it. How do you hybrid?

Leanne Webber
I’ve got a bond maxi weekly planner. So that’s paper, you do a brain dump at the bottom, and then you know, pick each thing, pick things for each day. But sometimes when I’m laying in bed, I think of things I need to do. And so I put that in my notes on my phone. And then sometimes if I’m going to be out and about as well, like, I was meant I was actually meant to be co-working this morning, but we ended up just talking the whole time.

Nicole Smith
Hey, that’s still brain working. CO-working you know, communication working. Yeah.

Leanne Webber
I love co-working from cafes and getting out of the house because I do work from home. So I’ll use my phone to-do list to just like write maybe three to five things that I want to get done during that time while I’m out of the office.

Nicole Smith
Yeah, that’s awesome. Good bond maxie. She presented at The Huddle. Yes. Amazing. I loved loved her session. Beautiful. So I didn’t get to meet her though.

Leanne Webber
She used to be in the founders team. Yes, I thought she was yeah, but we struggle finding ecommerce businesses that are at a similar stage as her so we’ve got like three ecommerce businesses that really want to get involved and I can’t find a team. So if you’re an e-commerce

Nicole Smith
And you’re ready to scale come on over. Yeah, it is um, sorry I’m going off topic and I’ll come back to our questions in a minute. But do you find there is differences between e-commerce and service?

Leanne Webber
Yeah. And I didn’t realise that at the beginning. So I used to put them in the same team, and they just have such different things to brainstorm. And I feel so out of depth when I’m facilitating the e-commerce because it’s like, what threePL do you use? And then like talking about, honestly, yeah, definitely different.

Nicole Smith
Terminology. Yeah, I had a conversation with someone. I like, I know what it is now. But like, luckily, I did know that term. But I couldn’t imagine anything like that. I guess it’s the same if I start talking about the techie tech stuff, like you get it, because you’re, you’re quite techie, but other people probably does whoosh, straight over there head. So yeah. It’s about understanding the audience really, isn’t it? Yeah. Awesome. Sorry, digress. But important. Okay. What would you do if you created more space in your world, which is clearly what you’re on the path to join right now?

Leanne Webber
I am on the path to doing this right now. So when I make all these changes, I’ll be working approximately 20 hours a month.

Nicole Smith
Amazing.

Leanne Webber
I’m going to have so much space.

Nicole Smith
You’ll be like, who am I? Looking into the puddle, isn’t it Zoolander, he looks, who am I into the puddle.

Leanne Webber
I already have plans on what I’m going to do with this space. And it really is this whole thinking and pondering and figuring out my next step. I don’t want to scale, scale blazers, which is funny because it’s about scaling. But also, you know, a lot of us think we have to scale this one business in a certain way. But there are multiple ways to grow your businesses. And for me, it’s going to be about diversifying what I do, and my income streams. But what I’m trying to do, as we’ve discussed in this podcast episode is focus on scale blazers for the next six months, and building those relationships, figuring out how I want to market it next year. That doesn’t involve Instagram, and trying not to distract myself with other, I’ve already got five business ideas,

Nicole Smith
Of course you do.

Leanne Webber
Yeah, five! I’m trying really hard to just park them for now.

Nicole Smith
Do you have a car park spot for them?

Leanne Webber
You mean, like physically?

Nicole Smith
No. Well, you can if you fancy, no, I’m in an online digital carpark for your ideas carpark?

Leanne Webber
No, I don’t.

Nicole Smith
I know, you clickup, right. So create yourself a document and allow yourself a page for each of your ideas. And every time you think of something, allow yourself to think and pop it on there and then know you’ve got it there for later. How do you how do you knock it over there?

Leanne Webber
That’s a great idea Nicole. Yeah, I know that I want to do something in the space of working with ambitious people that have chronic illnesses. Yeah, I just don’t know what that looks like yet. And so I’m trying really hard not to just like go into it. Yeah, because as someone with a chronic illness, it’s very hard to keep up with the bare minimum, let alone something else. So the answer is not a cause. It’s not a membership. It’s not something that I want to add something to those people’s plates, they’ve already got enough on their plate. So I need to figure out what that looks like. So I’m just going to think and play and Webinet is growing crazy amount so Jake needs help in that business. So I’ll be doing some more stuff with him. Like organising a retreat for his remote team

Nicole Smith
Beautiful! That’s fun

Leanne Webber
Organising event and I don’t have to pay for it even better!

Nicole Smith
Win, win. Winner winner chicken dinner! Let’s go.

Leanne Webber
Yeah, I’m just gonna, I don’t know just play and research and ask people questions and build on my relationships, and also really focus on my health. And so for me, that looks like acupuncture, saunas, resting, moving my body, gently. I really love boxing, but it doesn’t agree with me and taking care of me.

Nicole Smith
Yeah, that’s great. And what what I love about what you’ve just shared there is building big, which is what I talk about looks so different for everybody. And being okay with what your you know, your journey looks like where you’re headed, and however your business looks will be different to old mate next door. And that’s fabulous. Because everyone has their own unique beautiful things to share and do in the world. So, yes, yeah, I’m excited. I’m excited with you. It’s gonna be great.

Leanne Webber
Thank you.

Nicole Smith
Oh, I knew our conversation would be amazing. We need to know though the most important things is for people that don’t know who you are, where can they find you? Share all the things.

Leanne Webber
So I do still love using Instagram for my personal brand. I don’t love using it for the business. I like using it for my personal brand. So you can find me on Instagram, leanne_webber. I did finally download Tiktok this week. So

Nicole Smith
I’m still not on the Tiktok bandwagon yet. Yeah. And but, yeah,

Leanne Webber
I’ve never wanted to download it because it’s just another distraction. But with the way Instagram is going I don’t know I thought I would just see what it’s about. I don’t know how I feel about it yet. So I’ll share my profile on Instagram if I do end up going down the TikTok.

Nicole Smith
Perfect. Wonderful. So we will put that in the show notes. And you pop on over to Instagram and connect with Leanne and follow her journey. And if people are interested to learn about scale blazers, where can they find that information out?

Leanne Webber
foundersteam.com.au. And I also do one on one mentoring, which is another reason I’ve made these changes. I bloody love it. I love it so much. So yeah, if you’re looking for some help in your business with one on one, also do that as well.

Nicole Smith
Absolutely. And is that on founders team or is that on your own website?

Leanne Webber
leannewebber.com.

Nicole Smith
There we go. Cool. All of those links are going to be in the show notes. So click them connect, book some sessions, find out about all the information. And thank you again, Leanne, for joining me today.

Leanne Webber
Thank you so much for having me.

Nicole Smith
Wonderful. Everybody out there who’s listening. I hope you have a wonderful rest of your day. And enjoy creating space and time freedom bye now.

Nicole Smith
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 socials yet? If not, please come on over. Say hi, I’m on all the platforms @theartisanssolutions. So I’d really look forward to seeing you over there. And if you enjoyed 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.