The Power of Letting Go: Why This Designer Stopped Managing Construction

This episode explores the journey of launching a new interior design business after stepping away from an existing and thriving design-build. Keely Gow, co-founder of the newly launched JK Studio in Muskoka, Ontario, shares her infectious passion as she talks about the decision behind her new business launch, why she chose to work with a partner, and what led her to shift her focus exclusively to offering full-service interior design.

Keely opens up about some of the hard truths and realizations she had before making these major career moves, as well as the specific goals she set—goals that Power of Process helped her bring to life. She discusses the role of intuition in guiding her decisions, how she learned to listen to both her heart and her head, and how the community she found inside Designer’s Room and the Power of Process course provided the support she needed to take the leap.

Plus, she shares insights into forming a business partnership, the challenges and advantages of working collaboratively, and her recent Style at Home magazine cover feature! If you’re an interior designer looking to refine your process, streamline your business, or take the leap into a new phase of your career, this episode is packed with valuable insights and inspiration.

 

Episode highlights

1. Why Keely transitioned from design-build to launching a full-service interior design firm.
2. The challenges of balancing construction site management with creativity.
3. How she found the right business partner and built a new design firm from the ground up.
4. The role of Power of Process in solidifying her business strategy and boosting confidence.
5. How intuition and community support played a crucial role in her journey.
6. Lessons learned from being featured in Style at Home magazine.
7. The importance of community and learning from other designers.

Episode Resources

• Learn how to refine your design business processes: rebeccahay.com/powerofprocess

• Style at Home – Check out Keely Gow’s feature in the November 2024 issue!

• Connect with Keely (once available) – Stay tuned for her website and Instagram updates

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Read the Full Transcript ⬇️

00;00;00;00 – 00;00;20;11

Keely Gow

I just felt that all of my time and my energy was navigating all of the back end work of a construction site, and then I felt like the design, which is probably the most important part, was falling by the wayside. But I wasn’t able to put forth all of my attention to the quality of the design that I was putting out there.

 

00;00;20;16 – 00;00;25;21

Keely Gow

And that’s what’s most important to me.

 

00;00;25;24 – 00;00;54;25

Rebecca Hay

All right. I’m Rebecca Hay, and I’ve built a successful interior design business by Trial and error, podcast, online courses, and so many freaking books. Over the last decade, I’ve grown from an insecure student to having false starts to careers. And now I’m finally in the place where I want to be. Throughout my journey, it’s been pretty obvious that I’m passionate about business and helping other entrepreneurs do the same.

 

00;00;54;28 – 00;01;20;07

Rebecca Hay

Each week, I’ll share tangible takeaways from my own experience and the experiences of other badass women to help you build your confidence and change your business. Hey hey hey, it’s Rebecca and you are listening to Resilient by Design. Today I interview Kelly Gow of JC Studio in Muskoka, Ontario. Muskoka is cottage country, is kind of like the Hamptons of Toronto.

 

00;01;20;09 – 00;01;48;23

Rebecca Hay

It’s fancy pants. And she is a recent Power of Process alumni who has recently launched a new business. So at the time of recording studio is three weeks old. She, though, has been in the industry for 13 years. She has worked in various roles in the interior design industry, most recently was a partner at a design build firm for four and a half years before deciding to go out and dive into just doing interior design.

 

00;01;48;23 – 00;02;11;16

Rebecca Hay

Today, we talk about her transition, why she decided to leave the design build world that so many of us covet, to simply eliminating that aspect and doing only the interior design and partnering with builders. We’re going to talk all about that decision and what that looks like. We also talk about the power of investing in yourself and some of the big takeaways that she took from Power of Process.

 

00;02;11;22 – 00;02;30;27

Rebecca Hay

Despite being in the industry for over a decade, she still felt the need to take the course so that it could help to validate where she was at and where she was going. She is a mom, a wife, the designer that I mentioned, a business owner, and she lives in Huntsville, Ontario. She has always been passionate about design and knows this is what she’s meant to do.

 

00;02;30;28 – 00;02;52;05

Rebecca Hay

She is a woman who follows her intuition. We talk about this today and she started in the early years working for a high end residential builder. Learning about the business, learning about the build process, how to run a jobsite. And then she refined those skills while owning her own design build firm. Before now making this transition to a full service design with a business partner.

 

00;02;52;05 – 00;03;17;21

Rebecca Hay

We also talk about that. What does that look like? To join forces with somebody else and create a business together? How did that come about? She is very passionate about what she does. I think you will enjoy this episode with Kelly. She’s also a cover designer cover girl for a very recent Style at Home magazine feature. Enjoy my conversation with Kelly.

 

00;03;17;23 – 00;03;41;04

Rebecca Hay

Welcome to the podcast, Kelly. I’m so excited to see you here. We were just together in person last week. At the time of this recording. You came to our mastermind in the studios. It was so wonderful to put, like, a face and like a 3D. I don’t know what you would call it to name it into a person, but before we get into all the things, why don’t you share, a little bit about who you are for our listeners today?

 

00;03;41;06 – 00;04;02;03

Keely Gow

Thanks, Rebecca. I am so excited to be here to talk to you today. I’m Kelly Gal. I own JC designs. Sorry. Taking studio. Oh my word. The reason I get it mixed up is because I’m transitioning between two businesses at this point. I live in beautiful Huntsville, Ontario, so all of our work is up in the Muskoka region, which is amazing.

 

00;04;02;10 – 00;04;13;00

Keely Gow

So excited to be a pop alumni and so grateful for the experience that I had with you through that channel and then into the one day mastermind together.

 

00;04;13;06 – 00;04;36;09

Rebecca Hay

Yes, I’m so excited to dive into all the things with you today, because I feel like there’s sort of two areas that I want us to kind of dive a little bit deeper. One of them is the transition that you’ve made, because I think it will resonate with a lot of our listeners who are maybe in a partnership or working for somebody else and are ready to kind of take that leap and start their own thing and just shift gears a little bit.

 

00;04;36;12 – 00;04;53;12

Rebecca Hay

Often times we talk a lot here on the podcast about leaving corporate and leaving a full time job, but in this scenario, you’re already in the industry. So I really want us to have this conversation. And then I also want to talk about the role that power of process has played in that transition for you. So let’s dive in.

 

00;04;53;14 – 00;04;59;17

Rebecca Hay

Talk to me because you said, oh, our new company name is like, how new is this new company?

 

00;04;59;20 – 00;05;18;06

Keely Gow

Three weeks. We are three weeks into developing a new company. So I’m still sort of laying the groundwork going to branding. The name sort of came to us really quickly, which is obviously why I stumbled over it there at the beginning, because we’re still getting used to saying it out loud to people because it’s such a new development for us.

 

00;05;18;07 – 00;05;21;28

Keely Gow

So yeah, we’re about three weeks, three and a half weeks in.

 

00;05;22;00 – 00;05;24;15

Rebecca Hay

And when you say we you have a business partner.

 

00;05;24;15 – 00;05;26;10

Keely Gow

I do have a business partner. Yes.

 

00;05;26;14 – 00;05;33;21

Rebecca Hay

How did that come about? Because I know a lot of designers are listening with envy and they’re like, oh my gosh, I wish I didn’t have to do this alone.

 

00;05;33;24 – 00;05;56;27

Keely Gow

Yes. I would not do this alone. I’m the kind of person who needs support all the time. Someone who’s at the same level, who works at the same level, who has same sort of design style, same home life, that we can feed energy off of each other. That’s how I work best. And I knew that going into this next phase of life, my previous business, I also had a business partner.

 

00;05;56;27 – 00;06;05;29

Keely Gow

But I know that about myself, and I knew that that was going to be best business practice for me. Moving forward was to have that person.

 

00;06;06;06 – 00;06;09;06

Rebecca Hay

How do you find that person, though? Because like, this sounds amazing.

 

00;06;09;08 – 00;06;31;19

Keely Gow

Yeah. I’ll show you how I or tell you how I found that person. I worked with her previously in a similar job where we were working as project managers for a high end construction company, and we got along so well. I knew what she was capable of. She knew what I was capable of. We sort of went our separate ways by open ended business.

 

00;06;31;19 – 00;06;52;21

Keely Gow

She ended up selling, high end furniture, and then it just got to a point in my previous business where I was like, I can no longer do the design and the office management myself. So I needed to bring on a staff member that I knew I could trust and not have to train because I didn’t have the time to do that.

 

00;06;52;23 – 00;07;14;24

Keely Gow

And she was the perfect fit. So I went after her. So it was because I already knew her and could trust her and knew what she was capable of, that I was comfortable diving into that relationship. And then our relationship grew as fast. An employee in the previous company, to the point where I was like, we’re ready to make this transition, let’s do this together.

 

00;07;15;01 – 00;07;32;17

Rebecca Hay

That’s so exciting. So it wasn’t somebody that you, you found like cold, like you weren’t out searching for a partner. It wasn’t somebody who was running her own design firm. Because oftentimes you hear that, right? You see a lot of, like, two designers running their own interior design firms independently. They have a similar esthetic and they get along.

 

00;07;32;17 – 00;07;52;11

Rebecca Hay

And so they decide to join forces, which I think is awesome way of doing it. By the way, if you’re listening and you’re feeling like, oh, I feel alone, I’m struggling to bring in leads like it’s a really great way to just spice it up a little bit. And I, I’ve actually heard lately of designers kind of partnering just on jobs, like not necessarily building a business and with a name and all the things.

 

00;07;52;11 – 00;08;06;19

Rebecca Hay

It’s just like, hey, I’ve got this job. I don’t want to do it alone. It’s pretty big. You want to work, do it with me, and we’ll just split 5050. And I think that’s really cool. Opportunity. So for those listening, that’s always another way to like look at what’s especially if you’re slower, but you are actually finding someone you already knew.

 

00;08;06;22 – 00;08;12;07

Rebecca Hay

Were you like, hey, I have this idea. I want to go out of my own, want to join me?

 

00;08;12;10 – 00;08;34;20

Keely Gow

So it was a little bit softer than that. So what happened was when I originally brought her on as an employee to the previous company, just fell out at work. I was purchasing furniture from this other company and we were still talking. We were still in communication, and I was casually asking her, how’s your job these days? Like, are you still comfortable here?

 

00;08;34;20 – 00;09;01;02

Keely Gow

Like, what are your reactions? And do you have any different goals outside of high end furniture sales? And she liked what I had to offer, so she jumped. At that point, I feel like my heart was already on the verge of navigating strictly full service interior design. So I had made the comment that there would be a possibility of ownership of that previous business one day, which really sparked her interest.

 

00;09;01;02 – 00;09;22;07

Keely Gow

So, I think by sort of laying that foundation at the very beginning, it’s what led her to make that change. And then we worked together. It was probably a year and a half, maybe close to two years now that we worked together in that capacity before deciding to leave one business and and start the next.

 

00;09;22;09 – 00;09;43;20

Rebecca Hay

Yeah, I think it’s interesting to share here as well that what you were previously doing, it’s not like, oh, I was doing interior design with someone else, and now I’m just doing interior design with myself or with this partner. No, you’ve actually shifted like you were in design build, and now you’re moving from my understanding exclusively into, like, interior design services.

 

00;09;43;20 – 00;09;47;28

Rebecca Hay

You’re no longer offering the build in the construction. You’ll partner with contractors. Is that right?

 

00;09;48;02 – 00;09;49;06

Keely Gow

Correct. Yes.

 

00;09;49;09 – 00;09;59;03

Rebecca Hay

Talk to me about a little bit about that decision, because I know a lot of designers think that the aspiration is to do design build. Why did you decide to make this change?

 

00;09;59;05 – 00;10;29;22

Keely Gow

My heart just wasn’t in construction site management anymore. There’s so many moving parts to a job site and the back end administrative work that goes along with it is taxing and it’s not creative. And I just felt that all of my time and my energy was going in to making sure that workflows were correct and people had what they needed, and we had tight bins and toilets and navigating all of the back end work of a construction site.

 

00;10;29;24 – 00;10;51;29

Keely Gow

And then I felt like the design, which is, I would say probably the most important part of these projects, was falling by the wayside because my attention needed to be in making sure that the progress was happening on the job site, but I wasn’t able to put forth all of my attention to the quality of the design that I was putting out there, and that’s what’s most important to me.

 

00;10;51;29 – 00;11;13;29

Keely Gow

That’s what brings me joy. That’s what lights me up. I love making sure that spaces are functional and beautiful and work really well for our clients. And it just it wasn’t there anymore. It wasn’t there anymore. So I had been saying to my business partner, I’m not sure I really want to build houses anymore for probably about a year before deciding to take that leap and make that change.

 

00;11;14;01 – 00;11;31;13

Rebecca Hay

It’s interesting to hear you say that. I mean, I can relate in a different capacity, but did you ever feel like because your attention was so pulled into the project management, the ordering, all those things, do you ever feel like maybe sometimes you had to rush the design choices and like you didn’t give it the time that it deserved?

 

00;11;31;19 – 00;11;58;00

Keely Gow

Absolutely. Our process was so condensed with working through because I did all the architecture for the these projects as well. So I would take them to permit with all of my drawings. And then we would start and there wasn’t any time in between to sort of work through the design process, give it the time that these decisions require to make sure that you’re making the right choices or looking at different options.

 

00;11;58;00 – 00;12;05;11

Keely Gow

It was it was quick. We were moving quickly. And yeah, that rush is just it’s not effective.

 

00;12;05;12 – 00;12;27;23

Rebecca Hay

Yeah. It’s interesting hearing you talk. These are bringing back somewhat traumatic times for me in my own business. But that really was what I found happened to me. And I was not a design build firm by any means. I always felt like, you know, I got into this because I wanted to be creative and I wanted to do beautiful work, and I wanted to be able to do those magazine worthy designs that I see other designers doing.

 

00;12;27;25 – 00;12;55;26

Rebecca Hay

And I used to get so frustrated because I was so stressed out and overwhelmed running around, going to site, making decisions, you know, million decisions a day, right? Yeah. And then placing orders, maybe trying to manage a team or start hiring. I hate to say it this way. I’m not suggesting you did this, but in some ways I kind of would phone it in in the sense of that’s going to be good enough or sure, that’s like, I would really love to come up with something more creative, but the client will be happy with that.

 

00;12;55;26 – 00;13;22;13

Rebecca Hay

And at least and that’s that’s one box that I can tick off and I can move on to the next thing. And no surprise that those weren’t really the magazine were the designs. I wasn’t getting there because I wasn’t allowing myself the time and then interestingly enough, for me, that’s where process came in. That’s where getting very strict and setting boundaries, saying, no, this is the way that we work, and I’m going to work on it in this vacuum without my client for two weeks.

 

00;13;22;15 – 00;13;40;00

Rebecca Hay

All of a sudden it was like, oh, I had time to maybe think about it a little bit more and let’s me to kind of look at those tiles, you know, be really cool to incorporate that thing that I saw over there. Oh, yeah. Do you think we could do like it was like all of a sudden I was more creative is.

 

00;13;40;01 – 00;13;40;09

Keely Gow

Yeah.

 

00;13;40;09 – 00;13;49;06

Rebecca Hay

Because I gave myself the structure to be creative. I wasn’t being pulled in different directions. I think I can really relate to that coming from a different experience.

 

00;13;49;08 – 00;14;18;07

Keely Gow

It’s like the downtime that you need when you’re not rushing around trying to navigate all of the other to do’s that your brain needs to just slow down. It needs space, and it needs time to be able to be creative. Because when your brain’s busy, you can’t. There’s no way it’s not possible. That was a major part of the decision, was knowing what I wanted this next step to look and feel like.

 

00;14;18;10 – 00;14;39;04

Keely Gow

I have a very clear vision of how I want to feel moving into this next phase of business, and that’s part of it, is the slow down and giving myself the time and the capacity to process things differently and think through decisions on a deeper level than just making decisions to make decisions.

 

00;14;39;10 – 00;14;59;15

Rebecca Hay

Yeah, I love that. Just rushing to move on to the next thing, move on to the next thing, because your to do list is so long, you’re never going to get through it. A huge part of that can be also, having the support of other people, right. And hiring. So I’m curious then from your perspective, and I don’t really remember the timeline for you, but you come from this design build firm.

 

00;14;59;15 – 00;15;09;09

Rebecca Hay

So like you obviously know what you’re doing. You also just recently had a big feature in Style at Home magazine. You actually got the cover, I believe, right?

 

00;15;09;10 – 00;15;09;26

Keely Gow

Yes, I.

 

00;15;09;26 – 00;15;30;04

Rebecca Hay

Did, it’s a beautiful feature. It’s a huge spread of this beautiful home that you design in Muskoka, which for those listening, are Americans. That is like the Hamptons of Toronto, right? Like that is like the place to be viewed. I’ve done projects in Muskoka. I used to always say if I had my writers, I would just do Muskoka cottages because I love it so much.

 

00;15;30;04 – 00;15;43;29

Rebecca Hay

I love I just feel like I have that connection with you because you’re doing the thing that I love so much. But how did Power of Process fall in? Like you were already running this design build firm? Why did you think you needed to take a course on process?

 

00;15;44;01 – 00;16;07;01

Keely Gow

That’s a really good question. I was running through all of these things sort of internally, so the process was just me, and I was just making those steps and taking those steps and one foot in front of the other, because I knew that I had to. I knew that this kind of growth was inevitable. This is where I wanted to head.

 

00;16;07;03 – 00;16;32;26

Keely Gow

I knew that I wanted to lead a team, and I knew that in order to do so, I needed to document my process. It couldn’t just be me. I couldn’t just be do as I do, not as I say. Like I had to write it down. I had to put it on paper. I had to have the structure to be able to pass on to other people, to follow this process, to be able to move to that next phase.

 

00;16;32;28 – 00;16;53;05

Keely Gow

I didn’t know where to start because all of these things were inside my head. I’m like scrambling to try and figure out what to put on paper first. What is the most important part of the process? All of these things were within me. I had just never written them down before. And you had followed your podcast and followed you for a very long time.

 

00;16;53;08 – 00;17;11;23

Keely Gow

It was just the right moment. I think my heart knew that I was ready to make this step, and this was one of those foundational efforts that I needed to make in order to transition was document my process so I knew I couldn’t do it alone. That’s why I took the course.

 

00;17;11;29 – 00;17;29;26

Rebecca Hay

Haha. So you knew enough to know that you needed the process already, but you wanted sounds like you want a little bit of like a hand-holding or guidance to make you do it. Almost like hold you accountable like here’s and then show you how others. I imagine there’s part of it that was interesting for you to see how other interior designers are doing it.

 

00;17;30;01 – 00;17;48;13

Keely Gow

Yes, it’s the community. It’s like being able to talk back and forth with other people and like even at the one day mastermind, the questions that I wanted to ask were like, how is everybody else running their business? Because it’s such a huge question for all of us. We’re alone. We’re in the dark. We’re we’re thinking we’re doing things the most effective way.

 

00;17;48;13 – 00;18;05;09

Keely Gow

But what if there is a better solution out there? What if somebody else has found the right structure, the right technique, the right software, whatever it may be that’s working really well, that would make all of our lives a lot easier. So yes, I think having that community is so important.

 

00;18;05;11 – 00;18;24;28

Rebecca Hay

I mean, I always say that people join Power of Process because they’re looking for structure. They are tired of the chaos. They want to get clarity. They want that time. So they’re not rushing to make design choices like they want the time to be creative, and they want to attract those amazing premium clients who value your structure and your service.

 

00;18;25;00 – 00;18;44;27

Rebecca Hay

And yet, what I think people come away with more than anything is the community is the in, I’m going to say, in person is not in person in zoom like in connections, because it is so empowering to see how other people do it and realize, oh, either I’m on the right track or oh, I could do that too.

 

00;18;44;27 – 00;19;03;18

Rebecca Hay

Look at all these people charging for consultations. Look at all these people charging like $10,000 in design fees, like, oh man, I’m definitely at that level. I can do it. Or wow, that’s something to strive for. And so I think that the community aspect is really neat to see. And I think probably a takeaway for you, especially after the mastermind where you’re asking your questions and finding out.

 

00;19;03;25 – 00;19;25;03

Rebecca Hay

And we went around in the circle and everyone shared different aspects, is one of the exercises I had to prepare for the mastermind, which was what is one challenge or bottlenecks that you’re experiencing in your business that you want feedback on? Yeah, and so everyone sort of came and shared. We went around the table and it was like one clear, straightforward question would get ten different answers.

 

00;19;25;10 – 00;19;26;00

Keely Gow

Yeah.

 

00;19;26;03 – 00;19;43;07

Rebecca Hay

So the takeaway is there’s really no one size fits all to running a design business. But you can learn how others are doing things and then pull from it or even learn from how I do process, because in my course, I’m not saying do it my way, it’s my way or the highway. I’m like, here’s what I do.

 

00;19;43;07 – 00;19;56;04

Rebecca Hay

It works and here’s why. But take away from that what you want to make it yours. But feeling the support of the women around you who are crushing it in one area are crushing it in another.

 

00;19;56;06 – 00;20;15;25

Keely Gow

Yeah, and just knowing that everybody has struggles too. We’re all humans. Yeah. No matter what, no matter who’s on a magazine or who’s got a TV show or who’s killing it, or who’s struggling like we all have shit. Everybody has things that are not working, things that are working and sharing that, airing that out, letting everybody know that we are on the same page.

 

00;20;15;25 – 00;20;18;06

Keely Gow

Everyone’s on a level playing field.

 

00;20;18;08 – 00;20;19;13

Rebecca Hay

Yeah, yeah, totally.

 

00;20;19;16 – 00;20;20;28

Keely Gow

That helps a lot.

 

00;20;21;01 – 00;20;29;06

Rebecca Hay

Was there anything that, surprised you when you took the course that you didn’t expect to either learn or experience?

 

00;20;29;08 – 00;21;06;28

Keely Gow

Yeah, I was surprised at how much I already knew. Like you said, I already had the process. It was within me. I didn’t think that I had a process, but the minute I started putting pen to paper and started writing through things and strategizing, I actually had a very clear process and I feel like it was my heart’s way of telling me, take this course to be more confident in what my process was, and that’s what I needed.

 

00;21;06;28 – 00;21;34;22

Keely Gow

I needed to know that I already knew this, and it was just that course that sort of pulled it out of me. And let me be more confident to take this next step. There’s been so much personal growth and behind the scenes work that I have done. I would say probably since July of this year in order to prepare myself to make this transition.

 

00;21;34;22 – 00;21;59;16

Keely Gow

It was definitely not overnight. I am not same person. I was back in July. So it’s been it’s been a really great and wonderful process. A lot of it’s been easy because it’s the right path. If I met resistance along the way, it probably wouldn’t have been the right choice. But I mean, there’s been ups and downs and it’s been hard at times, but never extremely difficult.

 

00;21;59;18 – 00;22;06;23

Rebecca Hay

I love that, I love that you really have leaned into your intuition, and you are following your path and your journey, and I you’re speaking my language, lady.

 

00;22;06;23 – 00;22;14;04

Keely Gow

It’s that it’s all a feeling. It has to be feeling. You can’t always listen to what your brain tells you. It’s what your heart says is what’s more.

 

00;22;14;04 – 00;22;37;03

Rebecca Hay

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Because we do have a way of rationalizing ourselves out of the thing that we’re called to do. The fear pops up and they’re like, oh, well, of course I’m not going to leave my job because here’s what could happen, and here’s this and here’s this, and this person would probably think this and the money and the and like, we can rationalize anything, but we need to start to learn to trust our inner knowing, to trust our gut.

 

00;22;37;03 – 00;22;41;00

Rebecca Hay

Like where is it drawing us? Like, what does that mean? And pay attention to that?

 

00;22;41;03 – 00;22;41;18

Keely Gow

Yes.

 

00;22;41;25 – 00;22;48;22

Rebecca Hay

How many years were you in this industry working before making this transition? This past year.

 

00;22;48;25 – 00;23;11;28

Keely Gow

I started working in the high end residential interior design construction industry. Back in 2012. I was eight years working for other people in the industry. Then I owned Arc for four and a half years and now moving on to JC studio. So I don’t know how many years is that?

 

00;23;11;28 – 00;23;18;28

Rebecca Hay

Rebecca well, that’s more than a decade. If I’m doing the math. I could do decade math. I could do ten. That’s my.

 

00;23;19;00 – 00;23;21;29

Keely Gow

Math 13, 13 years.

 

00;23;21;29 – 00;23;48;15

Rebecca Hay

So 13 years. So. So you have that experience, which is what helped you to develop process in your head so that when you took the course, you were like, oh, what I’m doing is what she’s saying, or I’m doing it a little bit different, but I at least I actually have a process I didn’t even realize. And I love that you shared that because we’ve had other power of process members come who have been in the industry for more than 20 years running successful design firms.

 

00;23;48;18 – 00;24;01;26

Rebecca Hay

And when I ask them, what are you doing here? They say, I just want to see how everyone else is doing it. And I want to make sure that what I’m doing is still relevant and is still the most efficient way of doing things.

 

00;24;01;29 – 00;24;02;18

Keely Gow

 

00;24;02;20 – 00;24;18;09

Rebecca Hay

A lot of the times what those designers say is exactly what you just said. Kelly, which is it really instill confidence in me to see like, oh yeah, no, I do got this. And sometimes that’s worth the investment alone. So you come out of it feeling like, yeah, man, I am like, golden.

 

00;24;18;09 – 00;24;38;00

Keely Gow

Let’s go. Yep. And that’s what it was. It was like, okay, this is stuff I already know. This is stuff I’m already doing. It was just a confirmation that what I’m doing is correct and I thrive off of that. Like, I know, I know myself well enough to know that I work really well with rewards, and that was the reward.

 

00;24;38;00 – 00;24;46;18

Keely Gow

It was okay, you’re doing the right thing without even taking powered process, which was the confirmation what I was doing was right.

 

00;24;46;20 – 00;24;58;24

Rebecca Hay

Yeah, I love that. And I’m sure along the way you learned all kinds of new nuggets from different people from the course. It’s like, oh, I hadn’t thought to do this thing or ask that question that way or handle this situation. Yep. I love that.

 

00;24;58;29 – 00;25;35;02

Keely Gow

Yeah. I got a lot out of like the pricing strategy. And I know we didn’t dive into that in great detail within Power Present, but just like the little nuggets that we got about sort of when you leave budget or when you invoice or what you include with an invoice, it was all very eye opening to me because I was also under the impression, and this is just really naive of me to think this, like my ideal client and the people that I actually generally work for 90% of the time are full builds or full remodels, and they are second homes.

 

00;25;35;05 – 00;26;01;07

Keely Gow

And that’s just the nature of the industry up here in the Scotia. So I just was under the impression that everybody sort of did that, which was very wrong of me to assume that, because there’s a lot of designers who do one room at a time, like they do a powder room or do a bathroom, or they’ll do a mean for renovation and they’re not full belts or they’re not like full house renovation.

 

00;26;01;07 – 00;26;22;06

Keely Gow

So the pricing model for each of those different design styles is very different. And here I was thinking, I’m like, how are these people charging this money when they’re doing a full house? Whether or not that was the disconnect that I had, because my brain just kept telling me, well, everybody does this. This is just what interior design is.

 

00;26;22;06 – 00;26;45;19

Keely Gow

But that was just me being naive. Like, I really had absolutely no idea of the the differences. And it really made me look back at how we price again, because the capacity of work that we do is just much different from a one room to an entire house. So that was super eye opening.

 

00;26;45;21 – 00;26;49;20

Rebecca Hay

And sometimes one room can take as long as one house it can.

 

00;26;49;20 – 00;27;06;27

Keely Gow

That’s the thing. And that’s definitely not where I want to focus my energy. I know that the one room is not my ideal client because of that reason, because it takes as much time and energy to do one room as it does to do the full house. In my opinion, for me at least.

 

00;27;07;00 – 00;27;25;17

Rebecca Hay

Yeah, and I think that’s what’s really cool about, you know, doing a course like this where we have that live component, we have those live study hall sessions where you actually go into breakout rooms with other designers, and you’re able to talk to them and see how they’re doing things. And that’s where you start to see, oh, this is really what’s going on behind the scenes, or this is really what you’re doing, because let’s face it, we all follow each other on Instagram.

 

00;27;25;21 – 00;27;40;18

Rebecca Hay

It’s all beautiful little squares now I guess they’re rectangles, right? But like no one really is sharing in their stories. Like, oh, the last time I did a project in Living room, it was this. And then I lost this much money and I put it in this many hours. But those are not conversations you’re having publicly, right?

 

00;27;40;18 – 00;27;43;10

Keely Gow

Oh, nobody really knows. It’s all the secret.

 

00;27;43;17 – 00;28;06;20

Rebecca Hay

Those are the conversations we are having in the room. Those are the conversations that we have in designers room. But inside Power of Process. It’s a really great opportunity to to share. And I always say like, it can it can be whatever you want it to be. The more you show up, the more you’re available for those eight weeks you’re in that, you know, we have the private Facebook group, you share it, you can share examples of here’s my process, what do you think?

 

00;28;06;26 – 00;28;21;06

Rebecca Hay

Or here’s where I’m struggling, who can help, like take advantage of the community because it can really boost your confidence and give you different ways and methods that you hadn’t necessarily thought of beyond even what I teach inside the core content of the course.

 

00;28;21;09 – 00;28;25;26

Keely Gow

Yeah, yeah. No. The community again, back to the community. That’s where the magic is.

 

00;28;25;28 – 00;28;44;06

Rebecca Hay

So as we wrap up our time together today, this is so inspirational. I’m so excited to support you on your journey as you and your business really just start. Yeah, but I know you have all that experience under your belt and you know what you’re doing. What advice would you have for designers who are maybe on the fence?

 

00;28;44;06 – 00;28;50;20

Rebecca Hay

They feel like this course, like taking care of process sounds like it could be a good fit, but they’re hesitant to invest.

 

00;28;50;22 – 00;29;35;24

Keely Gow

The one thing that, and I mentioned this earlier, the one thing that I find is the most beneficial for any type of growth is personal growth. So the more you can invest in yourself, the better all aspects of your life will be. Make the investment it’s worth every penny to learn something new. And whether you already have an established process and it’s locked inside your brain like me, or you’re brand new and deciding that this is the path you want to take, you want to become a designer, setting your process, or even getting an idea of how other designers work is so beneficial for the growth of your company.

 

00;29;35;27 – 00;29;57;16

Keely Gow

And having that community and having those conversations. The investment in yourself is so important. So power of process or any training modules for that matter, anything you can do to help reset your mind, sort of the way that you think. Anything like that self investment. That’s the nugget.

 

00;29;57;19 – 00;30;14;12

Rebecca Hay

Okay. That’s a good nugget. I do love that you said earlier that you are not the same person that you were six months ago. No. Like that. That speaks volumes and that’s personal growth. And that’s incredible. Like the last thing we want is to be the same person every year for the rest of our lives. There’s no growth there.

 

00;30;14;12 – 00;30;26;28

Rebecca Hay

There’s no I mean, it’s possible you can stay the same forever, but if you are a career driven and you are looking to grow and get more out of life, you’re changing. And so I love that. That is something that you’ve recognized.

 

00;30;26;29 – 00;30;44;26

Keely Gow

Yeah, personal development is so huge. Read the books, listen to the podcast, take the courses, all of it. There’s so much wisdom. There’s so much knowledge out there that we can all absorb. It just makes us better human beings, because we have a greater understanding of how other people function, how other people work.

 

00;30;45;02 – 00;31;02;26

Rebecca Hay

All of that, I love it. This has been so wonderful. I’m so grateful to have you here today as my guest, having just spent the entire day with you last week, which was so amazing to meet you and Jackie and get to know a little bit more about your business. Yeah, I can’t wait. So anyone who is listening today, where can they find and follow you?

 

00;31;02;29 – 00;31;27;05

Keely Gow

We are in the process of branding with a new amazing strategist, so we will soon have a website and we will soon have an Instagram. But those things are being created right now so they are not currently available. So that’s for you to reach me. That’s a really good question.

 

00;31;27;12 – 00;31;45;23

Rebecca Hay

Well, how about this one? What we’ll do is once you get all the things set out, all the things, send us an email, send it to Vera and say, listen, can you update the show notes for that episode and that way. So if anyone’s listening to that, you can come back. If you’re like, I want to find her, come back in a little while and you can find the links there.

 

00;31;45;25 – 00;31;51;06

Rebecca Hay

Can you please let everybody know which issue and which magazine you had the cover and the big feature in?

 

00;31;51;08 – 00;31;55;19

Keely Gow

Yes, it was still at home November 2024.

 

00;31;55;24 – 00;32;06;20

Rebecca Hay

Awesome. If you guys already have that on your shelf, go take a look at it. That is who’s on my guest. Who’s my guest today? It’s so beautiful. You’re very talented, Keely, and I cannot wait to watch you succeed.

 

00;32;06;22 – 00;32;11;22

Keely Gow

Thank you so much, Rebecca. It’s been wonderful chatting with you.

 

00;32;11;24 – 00;32;29;14

Rebecca Hay

Guys, I love talking with Keely. I could have spent way more time on here diving deep and picking her brain about the partnership and what she’s implemented from her process after taking the course. Like so many things. I hope you enjoyed that episode, and I hope it maybe gave you a little kick in the butt to do something different this year.

 

00;32;29;16 – 00;32;54;04

Rebecca Hay

What is that calling on your heart? What is that thing that is pulling you? Stop ignoring it. And if you love the idea of being in community with all these other amazing designers, you need to be in power of process. It only comes around twice a year. Please, please come and join us inside the course. It is rebecca.com/power of process.

 

00;32;54;06 – 00;33;08;04

Rebecca Hay

That’s where you can find us and join us for our very next live cohort that’s about to begin.