Feeling stuck on when—or how—to grow your team? This episode is packed with smart hiring strategies for interior designers who want to scale with clarity and confidence. Whether you’re making your first hire or expanding a growing firm, we’re digging into what it really takes to build a team that supports your business (and your sanity).

My spectacular returning guest is Katie Decker-Erickson, founder of Color Works and host of the Success by Design podcast. She’s scaled her commercial design firm into a multi-million dollar business with a fully remote team across 20+ states, and she shares exactly how she did it.

We dig into when you know it’s time to hire, how to decide who to hire (contractor vs. employee), and what kind of help will actually move the needle in your business. Katie opens up about the turning point that forced her to expand her team and how she’s learned to lead with clarity and strong company culture.

From using personality assessments like CliftonStrengths to managing remote teams with daily check-ins, Katie doesn’t hold back. We also talk about the emotional side of hiring and letting people go—why it’s normal for people to come and go and how to handle those moments with compassion and confidence.

The truth-telling here is fast and plentiful, so grab your notebook. If you’ve ever felt stuck or unsure about growing your interior design team, this episode is your roadmap.

Be sure to also check out part one of our conversation on Success by Design, where we talk all about navigating a slow economy and attracting the right clients.

 

episode highlights

  1. The surprising moment Katie had to hire—and how it skyrocketed her firm’s growth
    (Hint: it involved 40 projects landing in her lap at once!)

  2. Why “hiring” doesn’t have to mean a full-time employee
    Katie breaks down the power of using contractors and fractional support in a modern design business.

  3. The one personality assessment Katie uses to hire smarter and build stronger teams
    (Spoiler: It’s not Myers-Briggs.)

  4. How to create a company culture your team actually wants to be part of—even if they’re remote
    Including the unexpected value of 6:30 a.m. team stand-ups.

  5. Real talk about letting people go—and why it’s a normal (and necessary) part of growing
    Learn how to navigate transitions with clarity, kindness, and confidence.

 

Episode Resources

Read the Full Transcript ⬇️

00;00;00;05 – 00;00;11;02
Katie Decker-Erickson
Whatever your approach is, knowing who you are makes it so much better for them and for you and for the client.

00;00;11;04 – 00;00;43;04
Rebecca Hay
All right. I’m Rebecca Hay, and I’ve built a successful interior design business by trial and error podcasts, 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;43;06 – 00;00;55;09
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.

00;00;55;11 – 00;01;21;08
Rebecca Hay
Hey hey hey, it’s Rebecca, and you’re listening to Resilient by Design. Today I interview Katie Decker Erickson, and in fact, this is the second half of our conversation that we had on her podcast, Success by Design. So once you’ve listened today, go hop on over to her podcast and you can listen to the rest of the conversation. Katie began her career in commercial color consulting as part time passion project in 2007 with her MBA.

00;01;21;08 – 00;01;50;27
Rebecca Hay
Today, her company, Color Works, has grown into a multi-million dollar commercial design firm. She’s currently operating in over 20 states nationwide, with a fully remote team of more than a dozen individuals. She’s known for her business acumen, clear. Having grown an incredible firm and having grown her interior design firm 1,500% in a single year, as well as her passion for teaching others with 18 years teaching graduate and undergraduate courses.

00;01;50;29 – 00;02;11;11
Rebecca Hay
She’s also devoted to her young daughters and committed to women’s empowerment, both personally and professionally. I think you’re going to enjoy this conversation. We talk all about growing a team. When is it time to hire? What does that look like? How do you know when it’s time to bring in the second or the third person? Should they be an employee?

00;02;11;13 – 00;02;36;04
Rebecca Hay
Should they be on contract? Katie shares exactly what she did in her business, and we both share what’s worked and what hasn’t. A lot of conversation around how to manage those people once you bring them on, right. What is the cadence of the meetings? What does that look like? What if they’re not the right fit? It is a very deep and healthy conversation that is going to be beneficial no matter where you’re at in your business growth.

00;02;36;10 – 00;02;41;18
Rebecca Hay
So dive right into the episode. Enjoy.

00;02;41;21 – 00;02;47;05
Rebecca Hay
Welcome back to Resilient by Design. Katie, it’s been a while. I’m excited to have you here.

00;02;47;07 – 00;02;56;21
Katie Decker-Erickson
I’m so excited to be here. We have the best conversations. I feel like it’s just like coffee hour, and I have a coffee in one hand and a glass of wine in the other, and we get to talk all the things. So we’re gonna be a little.

00;02;56;21 – 00;02;58;01
Rebecca Hay
Loopy at the end.

00;02;58;05 – 00;03;00;03
Katie Decker-Erickson
Yeah, yeah.

00;03;00;03 – 00;03;19;16
Rebecca Hay
Well, I’m excited to have you, because for those who are listening, we just finished an incredible conversation on Katie’s podcast. You’re going to want to hop on over there after this one. In that podcast, we talked a lot about the economy and what to do in a slow economy and what does that look like? And some of the tactics that you could employ to get in front of the right clients.

00;03;19;16 – 00;03;25;02
Rebecca Hay
It was a great conversation. So please go listen to that one on Katie’s podcast when you’re done here today.

00;03;25;04 – 00;03;36;26
Katie Decker-Erickson
Yes. And Rebecca, you gave such good advice. So thank you so much for sharing that with our audience. Your audience is so lucky to have you like great, outstanding out of the box insights, which is, I think what we need more of.

00;03;37;00 – 00;03;42;18
Rebecca Hay
That’s what we’re here to do today folks. So we really want to talk about hiring.

00;03;42;18 – 00;03;43;02
Katie Decker-Erickson
Yeah.

00;03;43;07 – 00;04;04;20
Rebecca Hay
How do you know when it’s time to bring on help in your business? What if you were a solopreneur? Or maybe you have one part time assistant and you’re feeling super overwhelmed. You’re wearing all the hats. I want to have this conversation. We kind of started into this conversation at the end of your episode on your podcast, Katie, and it got me thinking that this is worthy of a whole podcast.

00;04;04;20 – 00;04;13;18
Rebecca Hay
So here we are, and I guess I may as well start off by saying, when did you, in your design business, realize that it was time to hire?

00;04;13;20 – 00;04;33;18
Katie Decker-Erickson
For us, it was a very definitive line. There’s gray areas and ours was very black and white. When our largest client wanted to hand us 40 projects at the same time, and I had no other option. And it was very, very apparent. That is very, very abnormal, I think, in hiring. Can we go back and take apart that firm for a minute?

00;04;33;20 – 00;04;51;10
Katie Decker-Erickson
Because I think sometimes when we think about hiring, we think that it means that we are bringing on a full time employee 40 hours a week, and there’s this meltdown that happens up, oh gosh, I can’t afford someone 40 hours a week. I don’t know if I even need them 40 hours a week. And who would that person be?

00;04;51;10 – 00;05;13;10
Katie Decker-Erickson
Because that’s a huge hire. And I just want to say time out. Take a deep breath about that. Yeah, big old fat time out. Because there are so many different ways that you can now, quote unquote, hire for your firm. There are two amazing business brokers to the interior design industry that I’ve worked with, both of them, and they are brokering fractional labor.

00;05;13;16 – 00;05;33;25
Katie Decker-Erickson
So you can call them up and say, I have one project that I need, someone who’s an expert in chief architect on. I need them probably for 5 to 10 hours. Great. You can do that. Or I need an admin, but I only need them five hours a week. Outstanding. Let’s do five hours a week. And you’re not obligated beyond that.

00;05;33;27 – 00;05;51;26
Katie Decker-Erickson
Also, this idea of employees that had gotten so difficult, we were just the thing about it. But employee, it was such a big thing, especially here in the States, because we have Social Security and then you have Medicare and you have medicated. You have. And then all of a sudden you’re into a whole payroll person. Like at that point I’m just not want wall, right?

00;05;51;26 – 00;06;13;17
Katie Decker-Erickson
Like no one wants to do that. But the contractors, we use contractors exclusively in our business because they have freedom and we have freedom. And if it’s not working for either one of us, we don’t have to work together anymore. And it’s a great way to offer different people to, as you’re saying, come aboard, let’s try this out and see if it works.

00;06;13;19 – 00;06;31;17
Katie Decker-Erickson
And if it doesn’t, no harm, no foul. But I’m not responsible for paying your taxes. I’m not responsible for paying your Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid. And you’re here to help me. Of course, there’s rules you can’t dictate when they work. You can’t dictate the how they work. They need to provide their own equipment. But most people want to do that anyway, don’t they?

00;06;31;17 – 00;06;47;06
Katie Decker-Erickson
Especially after Covid. Covid changed everything. As far as work models, I think the 40 hour a week madmen era that we thought for so long doesn’t exist anymore. It’s really just been blown out of the water by all sorts of different options.

00;06;47;12 – 00;07;06;15
Rebecca Hay
Thank you for bringing that up right off the bat, because that is an important distinction. The employee versus someone who is a part of your team but is not a full time employee. They’re on contract. They’re a freelancer. It could vary too. It may not always be ten hours a week. It could be we’ve got a project coming up and a deadline, so you’re going to be putting in more hours.

00;07;06;15 – 00;07;28;07
Rebecca Hay
But then I don’t really have anything until till June, so it’s going to be a little quiet. And it’s finding those people who probably have other clients so they’re able to juggle it. And in my experience, I have had both. I have had people on contract and I have had employees. There are pros and cons, certainly, I think initially for me and I don’t know if anyone listening can relate.

00;07;28;10 – 00;07;49;23
Rebecca Hay
I wanted an employee because I thought that’s what I needed to feel like a team. I felt that I needed them to be fully 100% committed so that they wouldn’t leave me. Maybe. Which is a myth. Of course they can leave any time, but I felt like that’s what I needed. It wasn’t a more antiquated model, and I liked knowing exactly every month what it was going to cost.

00;07;49;23 – 00;08;13;06
Rebecca Hay
It made me nervous, fluctuating hours. But now I see that there are ways to work around that so that you know what the hours are going to be so that you know that they’re committed to your. Yes. So what are some of those tactics that you have employed working with contractors in your business to make them at least appear on the outside and even internally feel like they are a team member and they’re in it to win it?

00;08;13;09 – 00;08;31;25
Katie Decker-Erickson
I love that question. It’s a great question. And there’s two things. There’s the tangible and there’s the intangible. We’ll start with the intangible. You have to have an incredibly strong culture, but you have to know what your culture is. How do you operate? We had a culture expert come on our show and he put it so well. He’s like, it is your operating system.

00;08;32;02 – 00;08;53;21
Katie Decker-Erickson
Like if you have an Apple phone, it’s like iOS 11, whatever. You don’t even know. But when the phone works, it works. It doesn’t work. It doesn’t work. Right. That is what your company culture is. You can feel it and you know it and it’s a way we do business. If your company or your organization or you do not feel like you have a company culture, you’re not defining it.

00;08;53;21 – 00;09;08;20
Katie Decker-Erickson
It’s going to happen to you because there’s more than two people. There’s going to become a culture of some sort or a way that you do business, figure out how you want to do business and let them come aboard and be a part of that. Don’t let them define that. I think it’s really important.

00;09;08;20 – 00;09;10;18
Rebecca Hay
That’s so good. I’m writing that down.

00;09;10;20 – 00;09;14;02
Katie Decker-Erickson
I love it if I need to Rebecca, to write something down, y’all. It’s a big day.

00;09;14;05 – 00;09;29;25
Rebecca Hay
This is a masterclass. I got my notebook. I’m writing this down. This is really good. The reason I wrote that down, Katie, is because I’ve been guilty of that. I have been guilty of while there are contractor. And so like, who am I to dictate how we do things and who am I to say how to organize the files?

00;09;29;25 – 00;09;43;13
Rebecca Hay
And who am I to say like they’re not my employee? And so I find myself even to this day guilty of that, forgetting that I’m actually allowed to create a culture and say, this is how we do things.

00;09;43;15 – 00;09;58;23
Katie Decker-Erickson
You are not alone in that. I think that’s very easy because we think we’re being nice or we’re helping them. And like I actually, I was speaking to a group this morning and I said to them, it’s what Rene Brown says. Clear is kind. And so if you say this is our company culture, this is how we like to do business.

00;09;58;23 – 00;10;21;12
Katie Decker-Erickson
So like that’s the expectation then. And it’s a lot like dating when you’re 18 versus dating when you’re 28. Like at 18. We’re more flexible I don’t know, we’re still kind of figuring out. So now they’re kind of figuring themselves out. We’re seeing if this is going to work. You want a dated 2018 when you know who you are, they aren’t going to tell you everything they’re going to do because they hopefully have done it the last ten years.

00;10;21;19 – 00;10;47;13
Katie Decker-Erickson
It’s very clear, and it either works or it. And maybe this is just me speaking from my personal experience because I didn’t get married, I was almost 31, and I’m really glad about that. By then I knew what I wanted. I had my must haves and I had my can’t fans, and I was okay with that. And I think when you’re defining your company culture, know what you want your company to be known for, and also know what you don’t want it to be known for.

00;10;47;15 – 00;11;15;04
Katie Decker-Erickson
That sets the framework whereby you’re going to be onboarding people when we onboard to our recommendation are we look to bring someone on as a contractor, it is very clear, and I am unapologetic about it, because we have given up trying to apologize for this. We are a very fast moving organization. I will just say it is like getting on a 747 halfway down the runway that’s about to go airborne, and we are going to come alongside and we’re going to help you with it.

00;11;15;04 – 00;11;29;05
Katie Decker-Erickson
But like, if you’re not a problem solver and, you know, going to stick your hand and ask questions and say, what about this? And do you need that and start seeking out problems, you’re going to get run over. You’re not going to be happy. We’re not going to be happy. If you’re looking for something that’s a much more slow paced, this isn’t for you.

00;11;29;09 – 00;11;56;11
Katie Decker-Erickson
Like we move faster, we move part because we’re holding millions of dollars of assets that belong to other people. That is a huge ethical and moral obligation for us. Whatever your approach is, knowing who you are makes it so much better for them. And for you and for the client, because the client’s going to feel it. You know, you can say, oh, they’re not going to notice if our internal shop is a dumpster fire, or I’m figuring this out.

00;11;56;16 – 00;11;59;28
Katie Decker-Erickson
Clients feel they they notice. They notice.

00;11;59;28 – 00;12;00;23
Rebecca Hay
Oh yeah.

00;12;01;00 – 00;12;19;20
Katie Decker-Erickson
It’s like that one little green thing in in your shoe when you’re at the beach that’s driving you. That’s why you feel that. And so if you can prevent that as much as possible by knowing who you are and what you bring to this relationship with the person you want to onboard or the position man, is that a game changer?

00;12;19;20 – 00;12;36;02
Katie Decker-Erickson
And we walked away from people. I’m like, I think you’re great, but I don’t think you’re going to be happy. And here’s the reason why. And they’re like, yeah, that’s probably true. Yeah, I can totally see that. And just to have that honest conversation, a couple accountants ago, we had a wonderful woman and I said, I think we’ve just outgrown you.

00;12;36;04 – 00;12;54;07
Katie Decker-Erickson
And I said, I love you to death. And that’s not a reflection of your skill set. We just need a shop at this point instead of a sole proprietor. And she actually burst into tears. I was like, okay, I’ve done it. I’ve totally pressed her. And she’s like, I just wanted to say thank you. This has been the best job I have ever had.

00;12;54;07 – 00;12;58;06
Katie Decker-Erickson
And I learn and I have growth. And I was like, wait, what’s going on?

00;12;58;09 – 00;13;00;11
Rebecca Hay
Oh, that’s amazing thing.

00;13;00;15 – 00;13;16;25
Katie Decker-Erickson
I think sometimes when we speak to them into those situations, even if they’re set in love, it’s like, yeah, there’s just no good way out of this, right? And so to have that response was just okay. She was relieved. It was like, I know I haven’t been giving you the service that you need. And I feel that too.

00;13;16;25 – 00;13;38;25
Katie Decker-Erickson
And I just didn’t know what to say. So we were relieving a pressure point for her. Those are hard conversations to have, but I also think it’s a sign of making and being a good leader and setting a good tone for your organization. And it’s not always perfect. I don’t want you guys to think it’s perfect, but when you have those moments, you got to hang on to them on the hard days.

00;13;39;00 – 00;13;58;05
Rebecca Hay
Yeah. And also it’s about growth because one thing I learned somewhat the hard way is that the people that you bring on at the very beginning aren’t necessarily the people who are going to be along for the ride all the way up. Yes you do, as you grow as a business, require different skill sets and different things from people.

00;13;58;07 – 00;14;04;18
Rebecca Hay
And yeah, we all look at those firms or we see those designers where like, I’ve had the same team for ten years. We’re a happy.

00;14;04;18 – 00;14;05;11
Katie Decker-Erickson
Family.

00;14;05;11 – 00;14;24;27
Rebecca Hay
I like that is not the norm. I’m sorry, but it’s not the norm. I used to bug me because I used to feel like, what’s wrong with me as a business owner that I don’t have. I still have all the same people. But what I learned is when you’re first starting, and I do want us to dial back a little bit, to go back to the beginning again is when you’re first starting out, who is it that you need?

00;14;24;27 – 00;14;47;06
Rebecca Hay
Because in my experience, who I had at the beginning was like a firefighter. Someone who could wear a bunch of hats, could put out a lot of fires, was really good under pressure. But as the company grew and I started to establish my process and my systems, and I wanted to do things in a more structured way, that person kind of kind of flailed a little because they didn’t want to be pigeonholed into one area.

00;14;47;06 – 00;15;05;23
Rebecca Hay
But really, I knew I needed, you know, you need someone who’s just focusing on the card, you need somebody else is going to be working on the design you need. Somebody else is going to be people forward or whatever it might be. And so those were some growing pains for me where I struggled. And that person ended up not staying on board with me, which was probably for the best for both of us.

00;15;05;25 – 00;15;17;04
Rebecca Hay
Took me a long time to learn that. What’s your recommendation for somebody who is starting out? Maybe hasn’t even hired yet? Who is that first hire that they need? Or how do they figure out what that is, that they need?

00;15;17;07 – 00;15;44;21
Katie Decker-Erickson
That is a great question, and one that I get all the time in my coaching, my coaching clients. Okay. I’m overwhelmed. What do I do? And I’m like, let’s unpack that for a minute. Back to glimmers. What makes you happy and feel alive on the inside? If it’s sitting there in CAD, a quiet at night with a cup of coffee and you are so happy, great, then maybe you need to hire someone to be more the face of your organization.

00;15;44;24 – 00;16;06;25
Katie Decker-Erickson
Are you like, oh my gosh, if I get one more email, I don’t, can’t do it. And I’m interrupted all day by my phone going off. I can’t even get around to creating. This is driving me nuts. Then maybe you need an admit. Maybe you got a letter from the IRS and your taxes are in shambles and you’re like, oh gosh, I didn’t realize I’m supposed to be paying quarterly taxes.

00;16;06;25 – 00;16;26;28
Katie Decker-Erickson
I do recall they sent me a letter last year saying it was my year of grace, and then I was supposed to go quarterly this year. I did all this stuff. Then maybe it’s time to hire someone who is brilliant, whether it’s a bookkeeper or a full blown CPA who can handle your finances for you so you can make good financial decisions that propel your organization forward.

00;16;27;01 – 00;16;55;08
Katie Decker-Erickson
It’s never a cookie cutter answer, which I know isn’t what your audience wants to hear, and I wish I could give you a better one. But back to knowing yourself, your culture, and your strengths and weaknesses. And there is no shame in having the weaknesses. We all have them. The best and strongest leaders are the ones that are able to call them out and find people who can compensate for them and come in and be a part of their organization.

00;16;55;10 – 00;17;14;19
Katie Decker-Erickson
Also, I think we feel like we bring somebody on board. It’s the first hire, to your point, like, oh my gosh, I’m hiring my first person, and if I blow this, I could lose my whole organization. Okay. Yeah. Like calm down. Take a deep breath. Again. This is not life or death. Praise God we’re not brain surgeons and heart surgeons, right?

00;17;14;24 – 00;17;17;20
Rebecca Hay
Feels it though. It really does.

00;17;17;22 – 00;17;32;07
Katie Decker-Erickson
You’re very wrong. Like it’s totally your baby. But I want to say that, like, for any of you parents out there, think of all the mistakes she made as a parent. I remember when I trimmed my first child’s toenails, one of them too short and she bled. I still am traumatized. I feel like the worst parent ever.

00;17;32;08 – 00;17;34;00
Rebecca Hay
What is one of a parent’s nightmares?

00;17;34;00 – 00;17;57;21
Katie Decker-Erickson
Yep, yep. She is now ten years old and a well-adjusted fourth grader and we are all fine. Give yourself that grace to also realize that, like, you might not get this perfect, but look back at how far you’ve come and it hasn’t been perfect. That’s okay. And I love the story you shared because as you were sharing that the organization chain who didn’t want to do processes as a firefighter, so to speak, we needed processes.

00;17;57;23 – 00;18;13;28
Katie Decker-Erickson
There are chapters in life and there are chapters in your hires. And there is nothing wrong with just like on your bookshelf, having a book in. I talk to my coaching team all the time. Oh, but I love her and I don’t want to. I get that go to coffee with her, but maybe she’s not the person that you need on your team anymore.

00;18;14;00 – 00;18;25;11
Katie Decker-Erickson
That’s hard conversation to have. Yeah it is, but just like you don’t expect a floral bouquet to live into perpetuity, there are life cycles to people in your organization. I love that.

00;18;25;14 – 00;18;30;02
Rebecca Hay
They’re going to will to die. People get over it. I don’t love.

00;18;30;02 – 00;18;31;15
Katie Decker-Erickson
Katie know.

00;18;31;18 – 00;18;49;05
Rebecca Hay
Hearing you talk right now is bringing up a lot of ugly, icky feelings for me from the early years. Like, yeah, one day I can’t wait to, like, share all the lessons I’ve learned from hiring, firing, losing people like all of that. It still feels a little raw, to be honest.

00;18;49;07 – 00;18;50;21
Katie Decker-Erickson
Totally. It’s hard.

00;18;50;23 – 00;19;12;18
Rebecca Hay
The people pleaser in me who doesn’t want to hurt someone’s feelings. That girl who would stay with her boyfriend for like years too long because she didn’t want to hurt his feelings, that Rebecca then popped up again as a business owner, and I don’t know if anyone listening can relate to that, but I had a really hard time letting people go.

00;19;12;18 – 00;19;31;08
Rebecca Hay
It was like I kept trying to find a way to work, or maybe they should be in this role, or even though my gut knew it was time to move on, I did not want to hurt their feelings. I did not want to upset them. I do, if you got to get over that, because I wish I had gotten over that sooner, it would have saved me a lot of agony and quite frankly, a lot of tears.

00;19;31;08 – 00;19;50;01
Rebecca Hay
My husband used to say, why do you get so emotional? Like one of my first hires ended up leaving? I like she was one of my first hires. Like, come on, I’m working out of a spare bedroom in my house. I’ve got one child sleeping down the hall, and I have one on contract person who I could barely afford to pay for, and then she said she was leaving me to go work for another designer.

00;19;50;07 – 00;19;53;12
Rebecca Hay
Well, oh my God, you would have thought that my husband just left me.

00;19;53;12 – 00;19;54;16
Katie Decker-Erickson
Yeah, if.

00;19;54;18 – 00;20;01;06
Rebecca Hay
I was so freaking upset. Yeah, but there’s always someone else. And it was for the best.

00;20;01;08 – 00;20;17;16
Katie Decker-Erickson
I mean, like you’re saying that I’m reporting back on my own six and a half year relationship that I put for a test drive before deciding that wasn’t going to end well. I mean, like, all of us have those things that we hung on to way too long, and afterwards you’re like, yeah, I should have let that go sooner.

00;20;17;16 – 00;20;42;29
Katie Decker-Erickson
I can think about so many things in life like that. It’s so cliche, but it’s so true. It’s not what you say, it’s how you say it. Your people, when you talk to them and you’re not authentic, a leader. I think they get it when it’s set in love that way. I think the prior account, there was a sense of relief of like, I know you knew.

00;20;43;00 – 00;20;59;07
Katie Decker-Erickson
We all knew. Thank you so much for giving me a graceful out. Yeah. At least the people that I think are genuine people, which is hopefully who you’re hiring in the first place. There’s always going to be the one that you’re like, well, that’s not to blame them with further affirmation about why I should have done that sooner.

00;20;59;13 – 00;21;16;11
Katie Decker-Erickson
But like for the most part, I think when you really sense the care and you say it sounds like a bad dating show, but like it really isn’t you, it’s us. And we’ve changed and we’ve grown and we have a new culture. We have different needs. We have a new client base. There’s usually a pretty good reason why, but sometimes it really is them.

00;21;16;13 – 00;21;20;17
Katie Decker-Erickson
And those are a lot harder conversation to just say this just isn’t working out.

00;21;20;24 – 00;21;42;09
Rebecca Hay
Also, back to what you said at the beginning. Those conversations are a heck of a lot easier when they’re not an employee. Yes, and I’m not suggesting you should not have employees, because there is definitely an opportunity there for an employee when the time is right and you have the financials and you have the pipeline, but it is a lot easier if someone is on contract because because likely they have other clients, they have other work.

00;21;42;09 – 00;21;47;28
Rebecca Hay
You’re not their sole revenue source. And so it does make those conversations easier.

00;21;48;01 – 00;21;51;07
Katie Decker-Erickson
Ways you’re.

00;21;51;09 – 00;21;59;02
Rebecca Hay
So when you are hiring and this is for any designer listening, what is more important personality or skill set.

00;21;59;05 – 00;22;19;28
Katie Decker-Erickson
Oh that’s like a trick question I want to see all of the above. Oh, here’s the thing I’m going to approach is a couple different ways. One of our core values is care. I can teach you skills. I can do our processes. I can teach you our software if you’re willing. But I can’t teach you to care.

00;22;20;01 – 00;22;48;10
Katie Decker-Erickson
Our clients will feel if you care, our team will feel if you care. It is amazing to me how tangible and intangible topic like here is. You know, when it’s there, it’s very apparent. And when it’s not there, it is very apparent for everybody. Your internal stakeholder is your external stakeholders. Personality is interesting. We use an assessment called Cliftonstrengths.

00;22;48;15 – 00;22;49;13
Rebecca Hay
I love that one.

00;22;49;21 – 00;23;11;24
Katie Decker-Erickson
I love it, I give it to my coaching clients all the time because it’s like Myers-Briggs. Like, are you an extrovert? Introvert? Are you intuitive? Are you thinking but what it is, is it assesses, right? Those are 50 factors of how do you work. So with an assessment of your work style, are you high on woo. Like what do you just love bonding with people.

00;23;11;24 – 00;23;29;14
Katie Decker-Erickson
And like I feel like you’re probably really high on Rebecca. At a level you see you as high woo. Or are you much more systems based or you and it has all these categories you go through and you do a gut reaction. You can’t spend more than like 10s on a question. There’s like 200 of them and then tells you what are your top five.

00;23;29;17 – 00;23;44;22
Katie Decker-Erickson
We look at that very strategically based on the position that we have somebody who’s drafting and who’s designing and wants to be in front of their machine all day. We don’t need them to have I will or project manager. Great example. Love systems. Loves processes.

00;23;44;22 – 00;23;44;27
Rebecca Hay
Yes.

00;23;45;00 – 00;24;09;25
Katie Decker-Erickson
Loves checking things off a list. Getting things done great. We’ll never let you talk to a client, but this is perfect because you’re going to keep the internal organization clicking along, ticking along, making all the things happen, right? So if we’re looking to hire a client facing a handhold or, and a problem solver and, I’ll take your call when we need a very high level of will.

00;24;09;27 – 00;24;13;25
Katie Decker-Erickson
And so we put everybody through that before we’ll even consider hiring them.

00;24;13;25 – 00;24;32;13
Rebecca Hay
That’s interesting. I love that I’ve heard of people doing assessments for skills. Right. So here I’m going to give you this. Can you mock up this cat or you can you do this 3D or can you do an email example. But this is I know bigger organizations do that. I always felt like that was a bit of a bold, ballsy move to ask someone to do a personality test.

00;24;32;15 – 00;24;37;00
Rebecca Hay
At what point in your process, your hiring process, do ask them to take that assessment.

00;24;37;03 – 00;24;55;13
Katie Decker-Erickson
If I’ve met with them and I think they’re a good fit, I feel like there’s so much communication that happens just sitting here doing that, which is why I like I love sitting with you like it should. So easy, right? Like we just gel, we can have the conversation. It’s a very natural 93% of communication is nonverbal. This is what my undergraduate degree is.

00;24;55;13 – 00;25;13;08
Katie Decker-Erickson
I’m sitting here doing this like you get a really good read on people. You really know what you’re talking about. Or walk me through how you did this project. So we make sure to your point that they have the skills, right? Like show me your portfolio. What pieces of this project did you actually do? Did you thoughts it did you draw it?

00;25;13;15 – 00;25;26;17
Katie Decker-Erickson
I think that’s immensely helpful to be able to do that when we’re, like serious about onboarding them. When I’m like, okay, you seem like a good fit. You have the skill set, but do you fit who we are that happens there?

00;25;26;19 – 00;25;27;21
Rebecca Hay
Okay, I love that.

00;25;27;21 – 00;25;56;28
Katie Decker-Erickson
And there’s so that we don’t we haven’t hired based strictly off cliftonstrengths because I’m like they look at they do it. They they can do anything for 90 days. Right. It’s standard in hiring practice that you’re on a probationary period for 90 days in most corporations. Right. Because you can take anything for 90 days. We have found that we’ve been able to expedite that 90 days or a lot faster by simply doing this, because I can show up to an interview and I can be as amazing and dynamic as you want me to be.

00;25;57;02 – 00;26;17;28
Katie Decker-Erickson
But like when I see your cliftonstrengths and it’s not like their weaknesses, it’s just what are your aptitude? It’s not a wrong answer. But then this is like, oh, this is who you really are now, is that really a good fit for the position? We need you. And and we have and sometimes it’s really not. There’s one time and it always think one time right where I was like we’re going to try it.

00;26;17;28 – 00;26;34;10
Katie Decker-Erickson
I’m not sure that Clifton is right. I just am not. Yeah. And I roll my eyes at myself because 90 days, it literally almost 90 days to the day our product manager called me and I’m like, do you feel like the wheels are coming off the fact and she’s like, yeah, I sure do. And I’m like, yeah, agreed.

00;26;34;12 – 00;26;58;10
Katie Decker-Erickson
And we’re like, darn it. One doesn’t feel accurate, but Gallup runs it, which is one of the larger polling organizations in general. And so the amount of data they have about it is just insane. And, you know, that can seem really cold and sterile, and I don’t want it to at all. I think, once again, you’re not only saving yourself, you’re saving them wasted time of being in a position where they would just hate it.

00;26;58;10 – 00;27;06;09
Katie Decker-Erickson
It would be like me being an accountant. Like I’d just rather curl up and die. The idea of sitting with a spreadsheet all day, oh my God.

00;27;06;11 – 00;27;19;08
Rebecca Hay
I love what you said though. At the very beginning. You know when you said, what’s the first thing you need to do? And how do you know who to hire? You know, I’ve always said, don’t hire a mini me like we’re looking to hire like Mini Rebecca, who can do everything I can do so they can be my sidekick.

00;27;19;11 – 00;27;36;21
Rebecca Hay
That’s what I knew. And that’s kind of what I did for another designer for many years. But that’s not what you need to grow that might be good temporarily, maybe at a consultation to take notes, but it’s not necessarily that it’s not gonna help you grow a team. So what I like that you said Katie is, first of all, getting really clear on, like, what is your sweet spot?

00;27;36;21 – 00;27;51;08
Rebecca Hay
What makes you like, what fills your cup in all the things you do? Where do you feel like, oh, I wish I could do more of that and I wish I could do less of this. So I love that you start there. From there though, this is I’ve never asked this before, so get ready. Oh, I’m so excited.

00;27;51;11 – 00;28;15;10
Rebecca Hay
Is there an amount of money that a designer should have, whether in coming from projects or in the bank before they go from a part time hire to either another part time or more hours? Like, I feel like the finance piece holds a lot of us back from that next hire. How do we go from one person to two?

00;28;15;11 – 00;28;16;17
Rebecca Hay
Three plus?

00;28;16;19 – 00;28;50;04
Katie Decker-Erickson
Yeah, that’s a bold question. And I love it because it’s internal and external internally. I think it’s so important to know where are we at when you’re thinking about your first hire. And this is what I coach do, you don’t just be thinking about your first hire. How fast do you want to grow? Do you want to grow and where do you want to grow that’s going to determine a process for you about not just the first hire, but then there will be these trigger points where we’re going to do a second hire, and then there’s going to be the third hire and the fourth hire.

00;28;50;04 – 00;29;06;02
Katie Decker-Erickson
And my ultimate goal is I want to build a team of five, and I want to be doing that. The amount of revenue we aren’t going to do that amount of revenue on your own. So what’s the strategic growth pattern for that? You bring more people on. It’s less about filling your void and more about growing the company.

00;29;06;03 – 00;29;08;11
Katie Decker-Erickson
Like there’s a switch that happens there.

00;29;08;17 – 00;29;16;28
Rebecca Hay
You just said something that you just said quickly that I think everyone needs to hear. You’re not going to get to that revenue on your own.

00;29;17;00 – 00;29;17;17
Katie Decker-Erickson

00;29;17;19 – 00;29;35;22
Rebecca Hay
I think it’s a myth that we tell ourselves that we can get to 500,000 or 800,000 or $1 million with minimum hires. And the reality is, you can’t actually serve that client well or those multiple clients by yourself. You need help. It’s important to recognize that.

00;29;35;24 – 00;29;56;17
Katie Decker-Erickson
It is because even if you think you can, you’ll burn out and your clients will be disappointed. And then you’ve lost your referral network and that’s the worst place you can be as a but yeah, so externally it’s also about what is the work? What do you have the workflow to warrant it? You will know because you will be doing too many hours and you’ll be too frustrated.

00;29;56;17 – 00;30;20;27
Katie Decker-Erickson
And ideally you’re going to see it coming before it gets to that point. But this is just basic economics and this is why I challenge my coaching clients. You got to be sitting with your bookkeeper once a week. I’m in a once a week, a bookkeeper mode, and I like, but nothing much happens in a week. You’d be surprised when you sit with your bookkeeper once a week, and you should be getting weekly reports about where your cash flow.

00;30;20;27 – 00;30;40;06
Katie Decker-Erickson
Is that so you can make good strategic decisions, and then we’re not making fire from a place of emotion. We’re making them from a place of strategy. Okay, I have seen the my income levels have been up at this level this long. I don’t need to keep working that hard in this way. I can hire someone to buttress me so I can work harder.

00;30;40;06 – 00;31;09;14
Katie Decker-Erickson
In this way. I can change this, but you have to have those metrics. And then this is the basic economics of it. If you were billing at 250 an hour and your contractor is billing at 40 an hour, and they can do just as much work as you, that is a really good financial decision, because the whole time they’re working, you’re making $210 for every hour they work.

00;31;09;16 – 00;31;32;16
Katie Decker-Erickson
So if you have to work for them, why wouldn’t you let them? Because it’s only costing you the 40 and you’re getting your sanity back. And then you should be out there like you talked about on our show, doing all the creative marketing things you need to to continue to build, to be able to continue to grow, to then hire the second person that’s become the cycle.

00;31;32;18 – 00;31;49;11
Katie Decker-Erickson
But I think we think, yes, I have to have that much money in the bank in order to make this work. Yeah, you do need to have money in the bank. But instead I feel like the scarcity mindset when we look at it and we’re like, okay, do I have enough money to hire this person? I want to say, do you have enough work to hire this person?

00;31;49;11 – 00;32;14;06
Katie Decker-Erickson
Because when they come to work for you, they’re going to be making this much for you that you do not have to be doing. And that then, but $210 an hour of profit allows you to pay for the bookkeeper, to pay for the marketer to pay for all the things so that you can get back to building your business and growing it in a meaningful way.

00;32;14;08 – 00;32;30;00
Katie Decker-Erickson
It’s not a feeling. There’s an intuitive component of, gosh, I see the pipeline. Like I feel that pipeline coming. In fact, we just had a conversation this morning with my team and I was like, guys, we got a lot I need to know who needs help, who doesn’t, where do we need to build a gap? Because the next three months is going to be crazy.

00;32;30;03 – 00;32;36;24
Katie Decker-Erickson
But it’s also knowing that those people aren’t just a cost to you. Their revenue generator.

00;32;36;27 – 00;32;39;19
Rebecca Hay
Yeah, I think that’s the distinction.

00;32;39;21 – 00;32;57;17
Katie Decker-Erickson
It is. I mean, we’re like, well, but I would be $40. That could be in my pocket. No no no no no no no no no. There’s only one of you. You are the magic you built. Your firm people are coming to you for your brand, your look, your expertise. Take the 210, save your sanity and go build a bigger business.

00;32;57;20 – 00;33;19;12
Rebecca Hay
And one thing I can say, just as an add on to that, is, boy, does it kick your butt into gear, into high gear when you know you now have great people that you want to bring the work in for? There’s something about having even just a couple of people not even full time, like on your team. This is what I saw.

00;33;19;12 – 00;33;39;14
Rebecca Hay
It pushed me to hustle a little bit harder in the marketing, because what I found, I actually I talked about this recently somewhere, and what I found was when I was on my own, maybe with just like a part time assistant and work started to come my way. I started to panic because I felt overwhelmed, because I was still doing most of it.

00;33;39;14 – 00;33;53;06
Rebecca Hay
And let’s face it, I had an assistant, but I was like, I’ll just do it faster or I’ll do you know, it was like that early years and I almost didn’t want the business. It was this funny place to be where it’s like, I want that, I want that project, but I don’t really want it because that just means more work.

00;33;53;07 – 00;34;16;01
Rebecca Hay
Yeah. And more time. And all I could see was the heaviness. And so I didn’t actively treat those leads the way I probably could have. I may have lost some through the cracks because I, I wanted them, but I didn’t want them. You know, it’s this kind of weird catch 22, because I knew it would be very hard to serve those clients.

00;34;16;03 – 00;34;36;23
Rebecca Hay
And so I was stuck in that cycle. Once I started to have people on my team and really wants, I took it serious and we were structured and had a process that every project followed, so my team could kind of move much more smoothly. I was freed up and excited about a new project, because I knew that I didn’t have to do all the work.

00;34;36;25 – 00;35;01;25
Rebecca Hay
That is a big change. And also I’m like, oh shit, it cost me this much money to keep my doors open. I need to get a project that is no less than 20,000 and design fee. I need to get a project that’s no less than fill in the blank. And so I would actually say no. Or I was firmer with our minimum project spend because I knew I knew my numbers, but I knew that I needed to cover me and all these people.

00;35;01;25 – 00;35;07;02
Rebecca Hay
So it actually kind of did bolster my confidence to go out after projects.

00;35;07;02 – 00;35;25;14
Katie Decker-Erickson
Yeah, yeah, I think there’s a lot of people that can relate to that in so many ways. It can be intimidating to stand on the other side of it and be like, am I really ready to do that? The reality is, yes. And there’s a synergy that happens to have all those people, like you said, come into that space and be like, I got to hustle.

00;35;25;14 – 00;35;33;17
Katie Decker-Erickson
We got to make this role. We have an all remote team. We do it stand up every morning at 630 my time. So my day starts like.

00;35;33;24 – 00;35;42;18
Rebecca Hay
Oh, I was actually going to ask about meeting and cadence. I’m glad you’re going there. So I’m super curious how you manage this remote contract only team. Keep going.

00;35;42;21 – 00;36;00;23
Katie Decker-Erickson
Well, it’s kind of crazy. We’re in every time zone. I’m. And so 630 my time and we’re all on that call. And I’m not going to lie, there is no shame in my game in that spot. There are days when it has been a rough night. I’ve had a kid crawl in bed with me and sometimes I show up to that meeting in a bathrobe, and that sounds absolutely abominably horrible.

00;36;00;25 – 00;36;18;02
Katie Decker-Erickson
I’m okay with it. And you know why? Because we’re all there to do the hard work, and some days are just rough. But the reality is we show up. It sets the tone for the day. We go through the boards, the priorities on Monday as we go through all the projects, which is a whole nother meeting called the board meeting, literally.

00;36;18;05 – 00;36;31;16
Katie Decker-Erickson
But on stand ups Tuesday through Friday, it’s what are the priority projects and where are they at for the week. And every morning we’re typing those. Where they at? What’s that? What’s that? Hiccup. It’ll be Katie, I can’t get a hold of this person. I just need to be on the phone with them for they are not listening to me.

00;36;31;18 – 00;36;49;15
Katie Decker-Erickson
I totally got to pick up the phone and call them. It is removing all the speed humps for the day, and it’s back to culture and town again. Everyone has their marching orders. They know what they’re going to do now. When did they do it and how they do it totally up to them because they are contractors. But the company culture is strong enough that we have the expectation it’s going to get done.

00;36;49;17 – 00;37;06;10
Katie Decker-Erickson
And that’s very fair for contractors. There can be deadlines, there can be due dates, and there can be expectations. How do you do it when you do it? I don’t care if you’re up at 2 a.m., one of our best drafted and a designer, I love her. She has four kids and she gets more done at two in the morning.

00;37;06;10 – 00;37;27;08
Katie Decker-Erickson
I’m in my third REM cycle like I’m in perimenopause and I don’t sleep. And when I can’t sleep, I have to pay for sleep. It’s hard to come by these days and I’m like, magically I get up that morning and it’s like Santa came to town because all the packages have been delivered. I’m like, God, would that happen?

00;37;27;08 – 00;37;54;16
Katie Decker-Erickson
Right? But yeah, it really works well for them because they do have flexibility. But we have that flexibility for clear deadlines, their expectations of deliverables. That’s a delicate line. But I also feel it’s fair to everyone involved. And that makes a really big difference. It also is a benefit to our clients because we want brand projects coast to coast, which is great, and they almost always have someone touching their project and their time’s up.

00;37;54;18 – 00;38;14;06
Katie Decker-Erickson
I’m sure of our coaching clients like I was sending them their video of their coaching session. Here’s the latest, you know, blip that I put out about an actionable step for X, Y, or Z all of that is going out. It’s almost an around the clock organization that way. And it’s nice. I don’t think anyone feels overworked in that regard.

00;38;14;06 – 00;38;18;28
Katie Decker-Erickson
It just so happens because of Time’s Up. It’s one of the benefits, which I think is kind of cool.

00;38;19;00 – 00;38;23;21
Rebecca Hay
Yeah. Very cool. I would say though, for someone starting out.

00;38;23;25 – 00;38;24;19
Katie Decker-Erickson
Yeah. Push back.

00;38;24;25 – 00;38;44;14
Rebecca Hay
I don’t know that I would look for people in other time zones necessarily. I think when you’re just starting out and you’re just starting to hire, having someone in a closer time zone is going to be a benefit. Because I think there could be a tendency for someone who doesn’t have the boundaries that you’ve established, Katie, to leak into their evenings and their weekends.

00;38;44;14 – 00;39;03;16
Rebecca Hay
And I want to make sure that hiring actually frees up your time a little bit and doesn’t encumber you. And I have even seen internally for me, and we have I mean, I have people helping me in my business that are in California. I have someone in Seattle, but those are people that I don’t need to be in constant communication with.

00;39;03;16 – 00;39;24;28
Rebecca Hay
Right is like a podcast editor or someone who can work in their own time. I think running an interior design firm with someone who is in another time zone, and it’s not. I don’t have projects in that time zone. Like if I have all my projects in Toronto, I don’t necessarily need to be in Toronto, but you want to make sure that whatever their time zone is and that that’s going to work for you so that you can connect at an hour, that works.

00;39;24;28 – 00;39;25;16
Katie Decker-Erickson
I agree.

00;39;25;22 – 00;39;41;18
Rebecca Hay
I think that’s something to strive for. I think that’s super cool, but I don’t want anyone listening to think like, oh my gosh, now. Because like, there are people who are going to be better in every part of the world. Yeah, it’s about finding what works for you. But I do think it’s important to have a regular meeting cadence.

00;39;41;23 – 00;40;00;29
Rebecca Hay
You know, when we had our our in-person team, when everything before the pandemic, before we started to do this hybrid thing, we always had an in-person Monday status meeting. Everyone had to be there, and we all sat around the table. We went through project by project, who’s who’s on first, what’s happening this week? How can we save each other?

00;40;00;29 – 00;40;14;29
Rebecca Hay
Time will of Judy’s going to like that tile supplier on Tuesday. Turns out two of you were going to the same place just on different days, right? So it’s like a lot of that coordination that had to happen. So that was very important. But you need to have that regularity.

00;40;15;04 – 00;40;36;00
Katie Decker-Erickson
That is the key is the regularity of it. To your point about time zones is really well made. I would stretch on even one hour off. I will tell you one of my greatest admins. She was an hour different than me, and what that allowed her to do is get up an hour before I came into the office and clean up every thing, and that was like magic, right?

00;40;36;00 – 00;40;57;02
Katie Decker-Erickson
Like she would get on my machine, do it all my emails, see all the voicemails that came in. But I think you’re right, especially because of the feelings that go around that first hire, have them closed, whether that closed time zone, whether that’s geographically close, whether that’s culturally, whatever that means that you feel you need to feel good, do that.

00;40;57;02 – 00;41;17;26
Katie Decker-Erickson
And I love what you said about cadence, and it’s coming up over and over again. Right. Like to my point about what I shared about meeting with your accountant bookkeeper once a week, meet with your team once a week. You got to start building these patterns. The back to the culture of your organization become the backbone and the bio rhythms of your organization.

00;41;17;26 – 00;41;40;26
Katie Decker-Erickson
And it was effectively, you know, I hear you, Rebecca, like but you guys, I’m hiring one person, but that’s where it starts. All great things started small. I think being intentional about that out of the gate is really important in setting the tone of like, yeah, we’re going to do that meeting on Monday, we’re going to do that status update because we’re not going to duplicate trips to the title for me.

00;41;40;26 – 00;41;59;16
Katie Decker-Erickson
And that step is powerful. And it reminds me of the book Atomic Habits. I love that book and the power of 1%. Just the power of 1% can change everything. Sometimes I think we think, oh my gosh, I got to change all this and I got to move that, am I? I’m never going to grow if I don’t like move Mount Everest tomorrow.

00;41;59;18 – 00;42;26;02
Katie Decker-Erickson
And it’s like 1% change over time is in daily productive and powerful. And so don’t let it intimidate. It’s like what you talked about on my show about mindset again, mindset, mindset mindset. But like don’t be intimidated by that. Pick one thing, figure out your 1% a day that you can say, you know what? I’m going to start thinking about my company culture, or I’m going to think about what I want my company to look like in a year.

00;42;26;04 – 00;42;34;15
Katie Decker-Erickson
It doesn’t mean you have to do it all today, but you also can’t determine where you want to go if you haven’t even pulled up a map. Woo!

00;42;34;17 – 00;42;42;28
Rebecca Hay
Boom. Mic drop. That’s a good lady, I like it. I like it a lot. What I’m hearing is it’s progress over perfection.

00;42;42;28 – 00;42;43;26
Katie Decker-Erickson
Every time.

00;42;44;01 – 00;42;44;26
Rebecca Hay
All day long.

00;42;44;27 – 00;42;47;14
Katie Decker-Erickson
Don’t let the great be the enemy of the good.

00;42;47;17 – 00;43;04;24
Rebecca Hay
Exactly. You might decide, I’m going to make this hire, but guess what? It doesn’t work out. At least you took a step forward. You might decide we’re going to meet on Mondays. The Mondays turn out to be super chaotic because the contractor is calling you, and everyone needs to be everywhere, so you move it to Tuesdays. This is spoken from experience, right?

00;43;04;27 – 00;43;20;08
Rebecca Hay
You’re going to be trial and error and you’re going to be shifting. You know, I try to set out at the beginning of the year like what is my ideal week look like in my calendar? And that’s in the ideal scenario. But you know what? Maybe six months into the into the year, I’m like, you know what? That doesn’t make sense.

00;43;20;08 – 00;43;39;23
Rebecca Hay
I don’t want Wednesdays for design meetings anymore. I’d rather do them earlier in the week. I want to do them on Tuesdays. It is progress over perfection, but if you don’t take a step towards doing something, you’re going to be stuck in that limbo, in that indecision zone, in that I feel like I need help, but I’m not ready and I’m not ready, and you’re just going to be like, dragging your feet in the mud.

00;43;39;24 – 00;43;57;03
Katie Decker-Erickson
Yeah. It’s interesting. I had a coaching client who’s like, oh, I tried marketing meetings there every Tuesday. And I was like, why do we dread Marketing Minute? Well, the social media person doesn’t get along with this person who doesn’t get along with that person. And they’re all creative, strong personality is the model. Then why are we doing the meeting?

00;43;57;07 – 00;44;12;10
Katie Decker-Erickson
All because they all need to talk to each other. Can they talk to each other on your project management software and can they tag each other? Can they still work it out and they still figure it out? And then can you do meetings as you need them? Yeah. Okay. So maybe we have five. That’s for a month. Looking for a month for the meeting.

00;44;12;14 – 00;44;24;06
Katie Decker-Erickson
Let’s see what it looks like. And then we have that. Oh okay. And it’s hurt by the cancel meeting. Right. Because you feel like you’re letting that like all of a sudden it’s like this is going to descend into other utter chaos and become Lord of the flies, right?

00;44;24;06 – 00;44;27;04
Rebecca Hay
Nothing’s going to happen. No one’s going to know what’s happening.

00;44;27;04 – 00;44;50;03
Katie Decker-Erickson
Locally the end of the month. How’s it going? Amazing. Really. You don’t know the personality out of it now. It’s just down to what are the solid deliverables? More was getting done. They didn’t have to go to a horrible marketing meeting every Tuesday. Agility is the heartbeat of any good organization and really, the bigger you get, the harder it is to keep.

00;44;50;05 – 00;45;14;21
Katie Decker-Erickson
Fight for it. Fight for it because your clients will feel it. Fight for it because you, as a owner and all of your employees, contractors, whomever will feel it too. If something isn’t working, walk away. Find a better way. Don’t be afraid to say it’s not working. That doesn’t mean you’re a failure. Fail faster. Figure out it isn’t working faster and then figure out what is the best path forward.

00;45;14;21 – 00;45;24;03
Katie Decker-Erickson
You didn’t learn to ride your bike because you were afraid. You fell off 100 times and then you soared. It’s no different in business. I mean, everyone thinks it is, but it’s not.

00;45;24;06 – 00;45;41;22
Rebecca Hay
If anything, it’s more in business, don’t you think? Like you’re failing more in business than you do in life? Because there’s so many different things that are going on. You try this software, it doesn’t work. Well. You get this bookkeeper there. They don’t get it. Like whatever it might be, you’re constantly learning and growing. Okay, I could talk to you forever.

00;45;41;25 – 00;46;02;09
Rebecca Hay
So thank you for this conversation. This has been so wonderful I agree. So if anybody is looking to dive into listening to us chat like this more, please go back and listen to Katie’s podcast. We will link it in the show notes so you can hear the conversation that started this whole deep dive. We really started it in a very different place, which is so cool.

00;46;02;09 – 00;46;10;02
Rebecca Hay
Yeah, at the end of my episodes, I always ask my guests to share a last nugget of wisdom. What would be a nugget of wisdom to leave our designers with today?

00;46;10;05 – 00;46;31;10
Katie Decker-Erickson
So I was just in Arizona last week, and I actually got some time by a pool with a book because my kids are now eight and ten, and I can do that for like one hot minute. And I was reading Mel Robbins Let them. I think it’s way the everything we’ve talked about, we can say, well, this firm is doing this or that firm is doing that, or I’m not good enough to or I should have, or why is my business not growing as much.

00;46;31;10 – 00;46;52;05
Katie Decker-Erickson
And I think my golden nugget would be let them. And if that doesn’t motivate you to make your own decisions, to do what you want to do in your firm, then step back and ask why? Because you can’t change them, but you can use them to empower you to move forward in the way that you want to build what you want to have your business serve you, not you.

00;46;52;05 – 00;46;52;21
Katie Decker-Erickson
Serve it.

00;46;52;23 – 00;46;54;13
Rebecca Hay
Love that you.

00;46;54;13 – 00;46;57;00
Katie Decker-Erickson
Have a great thing to offer the world. Go offer it.

00;46;57;03 – 00;47;01;26
Rebecca Hay
I love it, I love it, I love it. Thank you for doing this with me and I can’t wait to do this again in the future.

00;47;01;26 – 00;47;16;09
Katie Decker-Erickson
My pleasure is such a good collaboration. I hope that your audience truly feels like they’ve shown up to one of our coaching sessions, because the value that they get by looking at your show is just huge. And thank you for the privilege and the honor of being on it.

00;47;16;12 – 00;47;44;00
Rebecca Hay
Well, I hope you guys enjoyed that conversation with Katie. I really, really love talking about the areas in business that most of us struggle with. And let’s face it, hiring is really challenging. And, you know, it’s one of those areas that you will constantly be tweaking and honing and getting better at over the years as you grow and as it changes, and whether or not you just want to bring on a one assistant or a couple part time people or a few freelancers, or you want to grow a team to help you scale your business.

00;47;44;03 – 00;48;05;18
Rebecca Hay
These are the strategies that are working. These are the things that don’t work. And I don’t know if, but you guys have. One of my biggest takeaways with Katie today was her conversation around that morning stand up meeting at 6:30 a.m. now I’m definitely not going to be doing that. I love the idea. Katie. Thank you for sharing.

00;48;05;20 – 00;48;28;05
Rebecca Hay
However, it’s a great reminder that we need to have a regular touchpoint with the people who we work with. I have kind of fallen off doing that as people have moved to a more hybrid remote situation. We’ve not been as consistent, so this was a great reminder for me, especially in my online business, where it feels a little bit like less necessary.

00;48;28;05 – 00;48;46;20
Rebecca Hay
You know what I mean? It’s not the same as who’s going to go pick up the tile and who’s going to be on site. Yet. That’s still really important to have. I’m curious what your big takeaway was from this conversation. Please send me a DM on Instagram. And of course, go listen to the first half of this conversation on Katie’s podcast, Success by Design.

00;48;46;23 – 00;49;08;29
Rebecca Hay
It’s phenomenal, if I do say so myself. We do a deep dive into the economy right now. What to do when things feel slow. You’re going to love that conversation. So head on over there. We’ve linked that in the show notes. Okay, see you soon.