129. Using the Planner as an Entrepreneur

Episode Transcript

Blake Stratton:
All right, Courtney. Welcome back from Disney World. All right. If you thought she was into Peloton, you have not talked to her about Disney World. Courtney, share with us, how was your journey?

Courtney Baker:
That is not true. I’m much more crazy about Peloton.

Blake Stratton:
Really? Wow. [crosstalk 00:00:23]. Is that what your new tattoo means? Before we started recording, you showed us.

Courtney Baker:
Nope. No, I will. I mean-

Blake Stratton:
Can’t believe they got that much coverage on your back. That’s just wild.

Courtney Baker:
Stop. Stop it. Stop it. Now, yes, we did have a great time. Although I did tell Verbs the other day that we totally traumatized the kids that were with us. My daughter, my five-year-old daughter. Listen, PSA for everyone out there; do not ask the people working the ride if the ride is age-appropriate for your children. They will say yes or things like, oh, it has a small dip. So we took our five-year-old on the rise as a resistance. Guys, bad choice, terrible choice. Okay. I feel like this is going to go in the journal. You know, when she gets older, like she’s going to say, my parents put me on the rise of the resistance when I was five years old. Guys, we traumatized the children. Well, it’s not even that, it is-

Blake Stratton:
Just opened underneath you.

Courtney Baker:
– how realistic that thing is from the get-go. The kids were crying long before we got to the drop. It was like, I am in Star Wars. These star troopers are very real. All the adults were like, that’s amazing and all the children are screaming. So there’s that, but other than that, it was a great trip. I am glad to be really good to be with you. Verbs and I got to spend some time together recently doing an onboarding webinar, which was really, really fine. And yeah, it’s good to be back.

Blake Stratton:
You heard her here first, Disney world, not appropriate for children. Have them ride the Peloton instead. Courtney Baker-

Courtney Baker:
Are we going to get sued by Disney?

Verbs Boyer:
Probably so, but let’s keep going. The topic we’re going to be discussing today guys is whether you have a team or whether you’re solopreneur or even just an aspiring entrepreneur, there’s times where you feel like you just need maybe a better way to organize a better way to keep things togethers. So you continue to momentum that you’re seeking to achieve. And the cool thing is that today we’ll actually be having a guest. Bringing her on and talking a little bit about what she does in her business and how she uses the planner.

Verbs Boyer:
But I just wanted to pose this question to you guys. Have you ever felt that way, even in your professional career where you just knew, I’m hitting the wall, I need to figure out a better way to get this stuff done?

Blake Stratton:
Absolutely. That’s actually how I got into using the Full Focus Planner. I was a solopreneur myself and I didn’t even know how much I needed it until I started using it. Because you just learned to live with the inner chaos. Someone that’s doing their own thing you, take for granted sometimes I think how much structure’s built for you when you’re an employee number 47 in a company or a number 120 in a company. There is no structure when you’re out on your own. And the weight on designing that structure, building that structure, holding that structure, questioning whether it’s the right structure, plus all your personal life ambitions. It can be overwhelming. And for me it definitely was, I was not sleeping through the night. That obviously had an effect on me. My brain would just always be running with what I’ve got to do next. And the Full Focus Planner, the literal planner and writing stuff down and going through that process was game changing. And to be honest, it’s why I’m here today, speaking with you and besmirching the good name of Walt Disney.

Verbs Boyer:
I just appreciate you using the word besmirching. Thank you for that, Blake.

Courtney Baker:
Yeah, Blake. I have never thought about it the way that you just framed that. When you’re a solopreneur, like the lack of structure, that aspect of really you’ve got to go create all of that when you’re in any business. Even if it’s a really small one, there’s already an existing frameworks. Obviously, as a business grows and scales, you’re going to get more and more systems and processes built around it. I think that’s really wise, and I’ve never thought about. Thanks for sharing that. That’s so good.

Blake Stratton:
I agree. I’m really wise. Thanks, Courtney.

Verbs Boyer:
Welcome to another episode of Focus on This. This is the most productive podcast on the internet. So you can banish distractions, get the right stuff done. And finally start loving Mondays. I’m Verbs, here with Courtney Baker and Blake Stratton. Happy Monday to you too.

Courtney Baker:
Happy Monday.

Blake Stratton:
Happy Monday to you, Verbs.

Verbs Boyer:
Thank you very much.

Blake Stratton:
Our podcast audience will never know, but I totally nailed all the claps during that intro. So this episodes off the double [crosstalk 00:05:21].

Verbs Boyer:
Yeah.

Blake Stratton:
Already super productive.

Courtney Baker:
I totally missed that. I was not paying attention to, how were these claps like, were you doing those in the air? Why was this clapping happening?

Blake Stratton:
Well, I was air clapping. Yeah. I didn’t want to mess up. Verbs is wonderful intro there, but-

Courtney Baker:
Good to know. Okay. Next time I’m going to hone in on this.

Verbs Boyer:
As we mentioned at the top of the episode, we are joined today by a true professional in many ways. Please welcome to the podcast, Stacie Simpson, all the way from South Carolina. Welcome to the show, Stacie.

Stacie Simpson:
Thank you. Thank you so much on having me.

Courtney Baker:
Yeah. Thanks for joining us. So why don’t you Stacie tell us a little bit about yourself.

Stacie Simpson:
Sure. I would love to thank you. My name is Stacie Simpson. I live in South Carolina. I have a really interesting living situation. I actually live at YMCA Summer camp where my husband is the executive director. So we live wow on 1,400 acres in the mountains, in a beautiful wilderness area, in the middle of nowhere. And we live and work and do everything here on this mountain. I’m in South Carolina. Now I’m originally from Wisconsin, so you might hear my Wisconsin accent come out as I’m chatting with you here. I am a former nonprofit executive, but I started my own business in 2016 called Stacie Simpson Consulting so that I can put anything that I want under that umbrella as the seasons of life ebb and flow and change. And now I homeschool my 14-year-old stepson and I do some consulting and project management for nonprofits. I lead a sales team of 100 people all across the US. And most recent addition to my resume, I am a Full Focus Planner Certified Pro. Which I’m very excited about

Verbs Boyer:
Round of applause, standing ovation. Yes.

Blake Stratton:
Wow. Wow. So you’re a Full Focus Pro now in the inaugural class? Did I say that word right? Let’s just say that I did, which makes you a legend in the making. How did you first hear about the Full Focus System or Full Focus Planner?

Stacie Simpson:
That’s a great question. I wish I could remember. Feels like it is so ingrained in the way that I work and live my life and who I am at this point that I do not remember my life before it almost. But I so all come across my Facebook memories the other day in January from 2018. So I must have been one of the first users of the planner if I definitely had it in Q1 of 2018. And I think I was following some of Michael Hyatt’s work prior to that, and that’s probably how I jumped right into the planner world too. And I started my business in 2016, so it all happened right along that same timeline of getting my self-employment journey up and running.

Verbs Boyer:
So you mentioned Stacie that it was hard to remember what life was like before the planner, but do you remember anything of what your organization process your setup was like before you actually discovered the Full Focus System?

Stacie Simpson:
Yeah. It was a very interesting process coming from being an executive in nonprofit organizations and working in that system and structure and knowing what to expect in that structure in terms of the day to day and how we work collaboratively with other people in an office, for example, and how our strategy cycles move and our business plans move and change. And then shifting into a self-employment situation. When we moved here to a very remote location and I realized that commuting two hours, one way is not realistic for an office type job. I needed to figure out something else that I could do in my location, and not having that structure, I felt very untethered. Like I had some ideas, but I didn’t know if they were good ideas or not. I didn’t know how to structure that into a game plan of any kind.

Stacie Simpson:
And I was just doing whatever opportunities presented themselves to me. So when people that I knew in the nonprofit industry were saying to me, will you come do this project for us? Will you come do this project for us? Here’s what our budget is for it. I was just saying yes. Sure. Yes. Sounds great. Thank you so much for inviting me. And there wasn’t discernment around what’s really a priority for me or what is the most effective use of my time. And that’s the biggest piece that changed. When I started using the planner, most importantly, the system behind the planner is when I was able to start putting all those pieces into place and start doing what made more sense for me in my life.

Blake Stratton:
Can you talk a little bit more about that? Like saying yes to everything versus maybe contrast that to no. Because for other people that own their own business or they’re working for themselves as a freelancer or something, I could speak for a stand, it’s hard to say that they would know when you may not have as predictable, either it’s hard to predict your revenue or it’s like, well, I got into this so that I could make more money or do more. How was that shifted, I guess? Or could you give an example of like, oh, you know what I said no to this, or here’s how I knew that wasn’t a fit for me, or here’s how I’ve structured things to protect against overwhelm of too many things.

Stacie Simpson:
Sure. It’s multifaceted in some ways. So it’s not just one piece necessarily, but what I found as I was starting to do the reflection pieces was that I was doing work that felt very comfortable to me. And I felt confident saying yes to clients that were reaching out to me because it’s the work I had been doing for so long, but it wasn’t necessarily using my creativity and feeding me in the same way and bringing me joy. But it’s risky to think about how do I leave behind the work that I’ve always done and step into potentially a new space and not even knowing what that is. So I began to set some goals around dabbling in other areas I had worked in sales before. And so I started working in a very part-time sales role and added that on. I’ll tell you that I made the mistake of adding too many things on.

Stacie Simpson:
There was this season where I was trying new things, but still doing all of the old things and finding that balance. But what helped me through is week by week and quarter by quarter, as I’m doing the previews in the planner and having that reflection time, and having that intentional planning time moving forward, the balance got better and better. It didn’t happen all in one quarter, but over the course of maybe four quarters or six quarters, I was able to balance out more and more doing a little bit less of the work that wasn’t feeding me and using my creativity and using my full scope of skills, and more of the things that were a bit risky. I love when we talk about smarter goals that that are stands for risky. And we can, especially as someone with a high achiever mindset, I’ve always wanted to get A pluses in school and wanted to. So sometimes I set the goals where I know I can definitely achieve it. So reaching a little further outside of my comfort zone and the whole process working together over time to get me there.

Courtney Baker:
What I think is so amazing about what you just shared is, we talk about the Full Focus System and what that really is, is vision alignment, execution, and all three of those pieces are so critical for the system to really work. Because what you shared is like, Hey, I could have just done the things that was comfortable with, and you could’ve just knocked those out and kept executing against them, like over and over and over and over and over. And you probably would’ve been successful. You would’ve been good at them because you knew how to do them, but it took the system of getting the vision of like, oh, actually, that’s, I don’t want to just execute on these things I’ve always done. And the system really helps you get the vision and then continue to align with it each week as part of your weekly preview. I think what you shared is really a beautiful picture of how the Full Focus System works together and really does. I always hate saying it makes life transformation, but I believe that it really does.

Blake Stratton:
I’m curious about, as you’ve been working on a consulting basis, and now that you’re a certified pro, when you’re, I’m sure you’ve had interactions with people who are three, four years behind you on their own journey of clarifying what they want, putting that into words as a goal, and translating that, aligning that with their calendars and their tasks and projects and all that stuff. Where do you start with somebody? You know, if someone’s listening to this and maybe they have their own business or want to have their own business, how do they start using this? Or where would you say, I guess is kind of, maybe the biggest needle mover for you in the Full Focus System or using the Full Focus Planner so that if someone’s just kind of getting into it, they could start to see some differences, start to get some traction in the right direction.

Courtney Baker:
Can I jump really quick, Stacie, before you answer? For anybody listening that may not be familiar with Full Focus Planner Certified Pro. It’s a newer program for us that we’re so excited about. But we have a whole group of people that have been certified to train and teach and coach on the Full Focus System. And we have a great directory if you’re curious about finding these people, if you would like to work with somebody like Stacie, you can find the directory at fullfocus.co/directory.

Stacie Simpson:
I think there are a couple different parts. I think where I would tell people to start with the Full Focus System and where I would say the made your transformation happens. It happened for me, are two different places. But you have to have one before you could have the other. And I think that just starting is the way to start. So when I’m coaching my clients on the Full Focus Planner specifically, I have them start with the daily big three, because is, I think if they’re stepping into this for the first time, the simplest thing to wrap your mind around that, I just have to pick three things tomorrow that I am going to accomplish to move me toward generally where I’m going. And so just to start is the first step, and then to start pre practicing that, making a habit of it and adding on.

Blake Stratton:
But Stacie, but Stacie, I have my own business, I’ve got a million things to do. How could I possibly just choose three?

Stacie Simpson:
Exactly. So this is where the real, real, real transformation came for me when I finally clicked with the ideal week, which may not be the thing that most people would say is the life changing thing for them. But it was for me because I was an over doer and an overachiever and had the doing mindset. And for more quarters than I would like to admit, I would sit down to do the ideal week as an exercise, and I would get frustrated and give up because it didn’t all fit. I couldn’t make it fit. I couldn’t make the puzzle pieces go on the page and I would get frustrated, and I would say, this is dumb. I just need to keep going. And then I would keep moving through my quarterly preview and moving onto the next things, and I would never come back to it.

Stacie Simpson:
And finally, I don’t know what the catalyst was. So maybe me saying this could be the catalyst for someone else, but finally it clicked in my mind that that’s the point, that’s the problem. If the pieces don’t fit on the page, I need to fix the pieces. I need different pieces. I need to get rid of some pieces. I need to shrink some pieces. I need to grow other pieces. It has to fit on the page or I’m headed toward serious, serious burn out, or I’m already at a burnout stage and not recognizing it. And once I realized that and already had the other good habits of the daily big three, the weekly three, the doing the weekly previews, I had been practicing those habits going through the motions of them, even though not all the pieces of the had clicked yet, that was like the last peg in the cogs of my wheel, realizing that I had to let go of something and really prioritize the whole picture.

Courtney Baker:
I love that. Also, we should show if you’re listening, you don’t have a Full Focus Planner. The ideal week is in your planner, but if you don’t have a planner and want to try it out, you can go to fullfocus.co/idealweek and download kind of a printable and do that right now to get started.

Verbs Boyer:
So, Stacie, you mentioned some of the critical elements of the planner on your journey as a user, but do you have any personal hacks or something that you found or created with the planner that was a modification that you use that helps you out quite a bit?

Stacie Simpson:
That’s a good question. I tend to be, I think I mentioned earlier, I have a good student approach to things. So I tend to use it in the traditional sense and the way I’m instructed. But one thing that I love to do that I share with others is when I’m going through my weekly preview and I come to the end of that, and I’m setting my big three for the week, I actually go ahead right away, I do my weekly preview on Sundays, and I go ahead and flip forward to the next week and prefill in my weekly three in that section where I am next weekend going to be reviewing and reflecting on how far I got. So throughout the week, when I’m reviewing, when I’m setting my daily big three, I actually flip forward in my planner to reference my weekly big three instead of flipping back. And it’s a tiny little thing that helps me mentally and emotionally. So I never feel like I’m going backwards in my planner. I’m always looking forward toward progress.

Courtney Baker:
I love that.

Verbs Boyer:
That’s an air horn moment right there.

Courtney Baker:
But Stacie, I know you said you use it the traditional way. The real question is, do you use the index?

Stacie Simpson:
I did attempt using the index one corner.

Courtney Baker:
That’s great. We love the index people. Verbs and I did a webinar recently about getting started with the Full Focus Planner. And I love hearing all the people that love the index. They’re the best.

Stacie Simpson:
Speaking of rolling quarters. I actually read a fantastic tip about rolling quarters from someone in the Full Focus Community that I want to start using. And I already filled out rolling quarters in the traditional sense in my planner for this quarter. But next quarter, I want to start doing what she suggested. She suggested it differently, but I’m applying it to me and my team because we’re in sales, there’s a little box for every single day. And I use, this is wild, I use a spreadsheet and every day I type my sales number for that day, so I could see it increasing over the course of the month. And then it sets back to zero of the next month and I track it. And that’s the perfect use for people in sales or tracking any kind of daily number for the rolling quarter layout. I thought it was brilliant.

Courtney Baker:
[crosstalk 00:22:48] I will steal that one.

Courtney Baker:
Yeah. I love that.

Verbs Boyer:
So, Stacie, how have you been able to implement the idea and the elements of the Full Focus System into the way that you run your business on a day to day basis?

Stacie Simpson:
Yeah. In addition to how I’m using it to keep myself organized and I’m track, I am what you might call a solopreneur. So it’s my business, but I still have business strategy, business plans, those quarterly goals that are really focused on my business as a whole. And that was one of the hardest parts for me transitioning from being an executive in an organization and leading that organization and leading strategy conversations in goal setting sessions and things like that, with a room full of maybe 40 people to me sitting at my desk by myself, figuring out what’s our plan for the quarter. And sometimes I feel like I’m having business meetings and talking out loud or talking in my head with multiple personalities or competing interests, similarly to sitting in a room with a bunch of colleagues, but working through the Full Focus Planner from quarter to quarter. And the system that comes with it really creates the structure for me to follow that sets up not only my personal goals, but my business goals and the action plans that support those goals as well.

Stacie Simpson:
So it is me and my solo business, the structure that I previously had, a similar structure that I previously had within an organization, but I’m able to process it as an individual, and that has helped hugely.

Blake Stratton:
I have one more question. And it relates to the ideal week when you were talking about just how helpful that was for you. I talked to a lot of people who are business owners or they’re freelancers doing their own thing. And a lot of them struggle with this feeling of, I can’t really control my calendar in that way, because opportunities may always be coming or there’s a lack of predictability in my business or how my business interacts with my life. I mean, you mentioned you’re also doing homeschooling right now, which is just another layer. So you have a decent amount of complexity and you’re set up right now because you’re doing different things professionally plus you obviously have personal obligations. So what would you recommend to someone who’s, I know we’ve stumbled our way into focusing maybe on the ideal week, but what would you say to someone that feels like they have that lack of power or control from a calendar or scheduling perspective that wants to try using the ideal week, but it felt like a pie in the sky ambition.

Stacie Simpson:
Yeah, I think I struggled with that a lot in the beginning of my business before the ideal week really clicked for me. I often felt frustrated because I thought an additional perk of being self-employed was I would be my own boss and get to make my own decisions and set my own schedule. And then when you have your first clients, you’re so grasping onto that so hard because you don’t want to fail that you find yourself feeling like, at least I did, like I had eight bosses instead of one, because I was so fearful of losing those clients. So I did not feel a sense of control. Then I realized that as I started baby stepping my way into setting boundaries around my schedule and people respected those boundaries. It gave me a little bit more and a little bit more and a little bit more confidence.

Stacie Simpson:
And I realized that if I just say this is when I’m available, they will work within that. And so I started testing out that theory and it worked. So once I had a version of the ideal week that I felt comfortable with and everything fit, it only fit perfectly. When you put a jigsaw puzzle together, there are no gaps between the pieces, right? So I didn’t have any room at that point to let people walk over lines of things. So when we have homeschool time, that’s from 12 to four o’clock every day. And my sales team knows that from 12 to 4 o’clock every day, I don’t answer emails. I don’t answer phone calls and I don’t answer texts or anything because I am doing middle school social studies. And I have to hold myself accountable to those boundaries too, because as soon as I start responding to them on our snack breaks or whatever we might be doing, then they see that as an opportunity to take my time.

Stacie Simpson:
And I need to respect it as much as I’m asking them to respect it. I have used some online tools that have been hugely helpful to me. There’s technology out there that allows me to say to my clients, here’s the link to schedule a meeting with me and you’ll see my availability. And that only shows them the morning time periods where I don’t have other things scheduled because my time in the afternoon is not available for them. So I think the combination of setting the boundaries, respecting the boundaries for yourself, and then communicating that to the people that you’re working with, baby steps building, building that confidence in building the structure.

Blake Stratton:
Stacie, you recently became a Full Focus Planner Certified Pro. So I’m curious, this is a new program that we launched. We’ve got a lot of people jumping in and other people are just curious about either becoming one of themselves or how do I hire or work with someone who does this? So cast some vision for me. How is this certification interacting with your business? Or how are you planning to incorporate this into what you do?

Stacie Simpson:
Yeah. So I am currently offering some trainings and one-on-one coaching in a couple of different formats out to the Full Focus Fommunity or anyone who’s looking to dive into this a little bit more. Whether it’s like through a one day training, or I’m actually working with a quarterly cohort of women who are going to be implementing the Full Focus Planner over the course of an entire quarter. And it’s been really fun to get to know some of the other certified pros that have started around the same time as me through our community. I just had a zoom the other day with a gentleman named Joe, who is a pastor and a podcaster. And we were chatting about how we’re each utilizing the certified pro credential and training and, and what we’re doing with that. And then I even saw in the Full Focus Facebook community for everyone that someone was asking, how do I find a coach in my specific area?

Stacie Simpson:
And I think they were working with lawyers on the topic of mental health. And I remember meeting a woman named Amy who is a certified pro, who specifically works with lawyers. So we were able to get them connected up in the group as well. So I know that there is an online directory where people can look for certified pros, as well as utilizing that Facebook community to find people that match up. The ladies that I’m working with over the course of this quarter, all have experience in homeschooling, which I do and are also currently sales professionals. So we’re able to connect on a bunch of different kind of playing fields that we have in our experience. So it’s great to get to know people as we’re going through this.

Blake Stratton:
Love it.

Verbs Boyer:
All right. So the good news is you don’t have to stay stuck and overwhelm. When you leverage the Full Focus System and the best thinking of the Full focus Community, you can experience breakthrough. Blake, Courtney, or Stacie for that matter. Do you have any final thoughts for our Focus on This listeners today?

Blake Stratton:
Stacie, I’m looking at you. What have we missed-

Verbs Boyer:
Go for it?

Blake Stratton:
– What wisdom have you gained these last two years, or even more recently as you took this step to go deeper into learning this stuff. Any parting advice for other folks who are in your shoes?

Stacie Simpson:
I think just getting started and building those good habits is the best advice I can give. So if you haven’t set your big three for tomorrow, go ahead and do it now because that’s going to be the first step to get you going down this path

Verbs Boyer:
Well said. Well, thank you for joining us on Focus on This. This is the most productive podcast on the internet, so please share it with your friends. And don’t forget to join us in the Full Focus Planner Community right there on Facebook. It is Stacie approved as well. So we’ll be here next week with another great episode, but until then, stay focused.

Blake Stratton:
Stay focused.

Blake Stratton:
Great job, Stacie. Thank you so much for being here.

Verbs Boyer:
Awesome.

Stacie Simpson:
Thank you.

Verbs Boyer:
That was great.