Today, we are so excited to have this conversation, mostly because one of our favorite things in the world is to either learn, do something, or unlock a strategy, and then, in two seconds, turn around and start talking about it! We don’t like to let things fester for too long and want our listeners to take a peek behind the curtain as quickly as possible! Some of you might have seen on Emylee’s personal Instagram (@emyleesays) or our stories @bossproject, that she just did a rebrand! It’s so different in an amazing kind of way!

Part of why Abagail loves it is because for the first time in forever, she didn’t do it herself, so it turned out nothing like it would if she had done it. It’s modern, woo, and earthy! For the first time in forever, Emylee was the client, so today, she gives some behind the scenes insights into how her rebranding process went. She talks about how long it took, what she did herself as far as preparation, the relationship she had with her amazing designer, and a whole lot more!

Today on the podcast we have Jamie King, the owner of Flex & Flow PDX (originally Fit Approach) joining us! Together with her cousin/business partner, she has built a successful online fitness community, but that’s not what we are talking about today. Nope, we discuss company culture, how to establish it based on who you are as a human being, integrating it into your business, and how you can maintain it even when you have a virtual team.

We also talk about the evolution of our company culture and what our business values are. We have often alluded to company culture in our conversations, but since it is something that seems abstract and isn’t necessarily featured on the everyday to-do-list, we tend to easily forget about it. For a long time, we let our company culture be what it was and watched the evolution of it over the years, but now we are trying to give it more direction. We aim to cultivate a relaxed, easy-going culture that promotes independence and functions on a trust basis. But company culture does not happen overnight either; it develops when you show up consistently over time. At the same time, company culture is in everything you do: every social media post, every graphic, every email you send out—so be mindful about it. We had such a great conversation with Jamie today, so be sure to listen in!

Hey, friends! Today we are super excited to bring you another Boss Project profit report. As you may know, we love sharing all of the behind-the-scenes data about what worked, what didn’t work, and how everything got split up within May of this year. In this episode, you’ll get a little peek behind the curtain of our business, comparing last year to this year, and asking the hard questions for you to consider in your own business.

Before we dive in, we want to know: are you joining our podcast party? Because if you haven’t yet, now is the time! It is super easy to be a part of it. All you have to do is make sure that you are subscribed to the podcast, take a screenshot of the show, and share it over on your social media to be entered to win our monthly contest. Plus, make sure to leave a rating and review! As part of the perks of winning, you get to choose your prize: either a free copy of Trello for Business or one month free to the Creative Template Shop.

We have this theory that you can make less revenue and walk away with more money in your pocket if you do a few very strategic things. Like many of you, we came to a point in our business where we were ready to see big growth—and we don’t mean make a little bit more money, but exponentially more! Who doesn’t want that, right? And we managed to do that. In the first six months, we made $100,000, doubled it four months later, and we went on to have a multiple six-figure business in our second year, and over $500,000 the year after that. We just kept going after bigger dreams and pursuing more.

But we believe there are some things you can do to help you along, and it doesn’t include focusing on that top-line number—which you can shoot yourself in the foot with. We know people who look like they are super successful online, but when you dig a little deeper, you would discover that they set themselves up in such a way they get to keep very little of the money they make. We were headed in this same direction. In this episode, we talk about this learning curve we experienced in 2018 and 2019 during which we thought we needed to do XYZ when we didn’t! Besides, what’s the point of reaching your big goals when you are not personally making any more money? Stay tuned to find out.

Today on the Strategy Hour podcast we have Kat Harris joining us. She is a Brooklyn-based online educator, digital content creator, co-founder of The Refined Woman, and the host of The Refined Collective podcast. Kat is also a photographer who has spent the last decade working from home—so she can teach us a thing or two about getting working from home right! After so many years of experience, she had tons of advice and shares her strategies for organizing your schedule to serve you. Because, for Kat, your time and energy matters and you should be spending it exactly like you want to while still getting the job done.

She talks about how she has adjusted her schedule, mindset, and expectations during the crisis to strike the balance between growing and giving yourself a lot of grace. This episode is full of practical advice everyone can implement on some level, according to your reality and set of priorities. Let’s jump in!

For those of you who don’t already know Emylee – welcome to her anxious life. She is the type of person who can tell you where every exit in a building is, or how to stop drop and roll in case of a fire, and where to hide just in case a tornado suddenly appears on route to the mall. In business, Emylee is the kind of person that likes to go through every single worst case scenario. She always has a back up plan… and a backup plan for the backup plan. Emylee is the queen of doing this and it turns out this can be a super helpful attribute to have in a business partnership.

This episode is about planning for the things you can never plan for. It’s about answering those difficult “What if” questions. It’s about securing your business for the future and the reassurance this brings to your life. For those of you who are single business owners, we’re not sure you’ve thought of planning for worst case scenarios and exactly how to do that. So in today’s episode, we’re going to be sharing our experiences and the reasons we have made planning for worst case scenarios an integral part of our overall business strategy. We discuss buy-sell agreements, the various insurance options you have, the tough questions you need to ask yourself today and how you can effectively plan for the worst, in the best kind of way. Take a listen!

We dunno if y’all noticed, but March was weird. March was also hard, hurtful, and 7,000 times longer than January. That’s probably because March asked us to adjust to a new normal and we were still getting used to being home—all the time. And we’re not here to pretend like our situations are better or worse than anybody else’s because, like you, neither of us knew what was going to go down in 2020. What we do know is that this period will be a watershed in small business, the impact of which will likely be felt years from now.

While we don’t know how this will pan out, we can give you our March profit report and roll it out into a Q1 report in general for you guys to see how the first three months of the year went for us. You can always DM us if there is anything you want to know that we didn’t cover—we’re all here to learn together, right? In this episode, we tell you how each of our products fared, including the surprises and the disappointments we had and how we overcame certain obstacles. One thing is certain: tuning in to this episode will encourage you because we show you how reaching your goals is still possible!

Hey everybody and welcome back to the show. This is going to be a really good episode because today we are finally talking about the Human Design personality test method. We have heard such muttering about this topic and we are obsessed with personality tests in general. It’s amazing how in this Human Design model, personality is seen as something baked into who you are. You don’t get to pick or adjust over time like in other test models. It’s literally based off of your birth hour/minute/location, so you cannot change what you are.

We know very little about this topic but wanted to share what we have learned so far. Tests like the Enneagram and Myers–Briggs give you such good insight about who you are, and you can learn how to be a better person and understand your faults. The Human Design model, by contrast, can help people become more balanced through collaboration. Our conversation today is structured by running through the book Human Design: Discover the Person You Were Born To Be, which helps breakdown how Human Design came about. We will talk about some of those basic principles today and how they relate to our types as business partners. Enjoy!

Today on the Strategy Hour Podcast, we figured that – in light of the current coronavirus restrictions – it might be a good idea to share some strategies for creating a super productive work environment at home. With a great deal of travel suspended, in-person events canceled, schools closed, and employees asked to go home, people around the globe are having to think about how they can remain productive out of the office.

Some of you might already be working from home, but for some, this might be a first-time experience and we want to help you master the most common challenges when living, working and parenting in the same space. With kids at home, parents are now confronted with the added challenge of having to look after their children while still maintaining work productivity. In this episode, we dish out strategies for getting your to-do-list crossed off, whether you are a business owner, parent, or both!

Like most of the US population, we are currently obsessed with the new hit show on Netflix Love is Blind! Today we are picking apart why we think this has been a viral sensation that has hit our country, and most importantly, what takeaways there are for your business. It may seem odd that we are comparing a reality show about finding love to business but you will be surprised at the similarities – especially when you look beyond what happens in public view. And if you haven’t watched this show or aren’t caught up, you might want to wait before listening to this episode because there will be spoilers.

Love is Blind came out about two weeks ago but Emylee was late to the party since reality television is not her thing, but after watching the trailer, she was hooked! Let’s be honest though: reality shows are trashy more often than not, and some of us don’t even like admitting that we watch them – it’s a guilty pleasure for many. But they can be a rich source of learning life and business lessons. In this episode, we compare relationships to business and the principles that apply equally to both. Just as the dating stage is required to build trust between two people, so business owners need to find strategies to attract customers and then to establish themselves as trustworthy and relatable. We also talk about the importance of showing up as your true self rather than trying to be who you think others want you to be — all of which we relate to the choices of the contestants in our new favorite show. Let’s jump in!

Hey friends! We are back for another profit report. It is time to break down January’s profit, the first profit report of 2020, and we are super excited! If you’re new here and this is the first profit report you’re listening to it might be a little bit different than what you’ve seen floating around online where people do ‘income reports’. We decided last fall to change up the narrative, not only for ourselves and our mentality when we’re talking about business and our own goals but also for the ‘comparisonitis’ that happens. Sometimes when you hear income reports where people list high figures and goals it gets really overwhelming and unattainable, and we can’t really compare that progress or those strategies to our business because we feel like the expectations are so different.

So, what we have tried to do is share percentages and profit. We have made it a goal to focus more on profit than big, shiny, sexy revenue, and that goal is continuing into 2020. It feels really good too! So, throughout this episode, we’re going to share percentages of products or expenses in our own business so you can begin to see the weight those things bear on us, and can make easier comparisons with your own business too!

Life as a successful female entrepreneur can be frazzling with all the different responsibilities you have to take on. Sometimes it can be difficult to know which thing to tackle first! Today on the podcast we have Jessica Korthuis, founder of Sohuis, a marketing and branding education resources company that provides on-demand training for early-stage female entrepreneurs. Jessica is a powerhouse brand strategist marketer, and she has worked with brands like Red Bull, TEDxWomen, Girls Who Code, Stanford University, Bloomingdale’s, and Florida Institute of Technology.

In this episode, we are talking about all the differences between small business ownership and entrepreneurship. We cover marketing tips, feeling the need to do everything and be everywhere, and how to prioritize the stuff that is actually working in your business so you can move forward. Joining this discussion, you’ll hear some top tips for validating your product, how to stop being a perfectionist and take action, and the value of being transparent to build audience trust. There is a lot of mindset-related stuff we are tackling today! Jessica is really in tune with female founders, and the different way intuition works when running a business. So, if you’re feeling a little overwhelmed about what is on your plate and what you have to handle, perfect! This episode will definitely provide some clarity for you.

Oftentimes the people closest to us are the most apprehensive about our business goals and dreams, and this can be isolating. You worry that perhaps you have done the wrong thing as their lack of enthusiasm or support makes you doubt yourself. But have you ever considered that this might be because you going for your dream might remind them that they are stuck? Maybe their skepticism is more about them and how your aspirations make them feel – how it highlights their passivity or the rut they find themselves in. Conversely, it could be your loved ones offer the wrong kind of support or they share their fears around your decisions because they do want you to succeed.

It could be that your spouse is more anxious than you are and that he or she is uncomfortable with you taking risks. As we all know, being an entrepreneur is all about insecurity and unpredictability! In this episode, we share our thoughts about why strangers are often more supportive than our loved ones. We talk about setting boundaries, not giving power to the wrong people, keeping a healthy perspective on the opinions of others, and why it is okay to unfollow people on social media!

You may have wondered what kind of revenue our business made over the holiday season, so today we’re giving you all the details about December. So, even though we’re properly settled into 2020 by now, let’s just backtrack a little to the end of 2019 – because there’s still something we can learn there. During this past December, we took time off for family and enjoying the holidays, but we also prepared ourselves for a big launch in January. We recognized making a big profit was not on the cards for this month as we had other plates spinning and purposefully decided to focus on our long-term vision. 

Sometimes it’s okay not to have profit as your biggest priority each month because as your business evolves, different things are required at different times. Sometimes you have to do the groundwork for what is to come and sacrifice the quick short-term cash and by listening to this episode, you will hear that this was what December looked like for us. Still, we talk about the outstanding performance of our Trello for Business course, why we expected a decline in profit from Strategy Academy, how we’ve rediscovered the power of strategic emails, and a whole lot more! 

Today we are giving Emylee the guest chair and are diving into her newish side-hustle, making clay earrings! You have probably heard it mentioned on the show in the past couple of months since she started hand-making everything from home and selling it through her personal Instagram account. She has kept the whole thing quite fun and casual, not wanting to put too much pressure on the fledgling business. 

In this episode, we talk about four major thoughts and ideas for growth in a product-based business and Emylee weighs in with her experience of each. The truth is her earring side-hustle might be a fully-blown business soon! So without further ado, let's hear what she has to say and get into some strategy!