Latest / RHYTHMS OF REST℠ Leadership Podcast / Episode 13: Why Working Less Made These Two Business Owners Grow Faster
Transcript
- Kent: A business owner that I coach cut one day a week out of his work week, and he expected to lose ground, but instead he gained two new retainer clients. And I want to show you what actually changed when he tested the belief that he had never questioned. You don't need balance, you need the right rhythms. And much like a heart where all four chambers work together. Real success depends on four key rhythms working in harmony: relational, emotional, spiritual, and tangible rhythms. I'm your host, Kent Murowski, and welcome to the Rhythms of Rest Leadership Podcast. In this podcast, we build rhythms for sustainable success. The kind that don't leave you coming home empty all the time. Before we dive in, would you just take do me a favor and take one minute to hit the follow button wherever you listen or watch this podcast? This ensures that every time a new episode drops or special episodes drop, which I do from time to time, you're automatically going to get it in your feed. Well, it's the first full week back to school, and hallelujah. I'm back in a normal groove. It feels great. Yesterday was my creative margin day, and I got the developmental edit back from my editor for my upcoming book. and I started going through that. more on that in a future episode. but I'm excited that you, business owner, executive, leader, that you're here with me today, and I'm ready to jump in. I think you're really gonna enjoy today's episode. So you've told yourself the number the number of hours that you work are directly tied to revenue, but they're not. See, this episode isn't about Another productivity hack. This is about the underlying beliefs that drive your rhythms and what happens when you challenge them. So the real question isn't how many hours you work. It's what you're afraid of will happen if you cut one day or if you miss a day. So if you're working too many hours and you're burned out, those are just symptoms. That's not the disease, okay? The real underlying issue is that you're out of alignment with the rhythms you and the world were built to run on. See, the world is moving at an unsustainable pace, and it's not slowing down anytime soon. I've actually given up trying to keep up with everything. Sure, I still listen and watch and read and do that, but I've I've just taken I've just removed the pressure off myself with trying to keep up. With everything, the news, AI, whatever the latest thing is. And I learn about it, but I do it at my own pace. So here's my prediction. The people who learn to slow down and create margin in their lives, these are going to be the people, these will be the ones who enjoy life the most, who make more money, and who have the focus and the clarity to make wise decisions amidst a rapidly changing world. That's my prediction. As things speed up even more in the days to come. Well, how would you like to work one last day a week, make more money in your business, and have a clear and focused mind to make better decisions when they come up in this frenetic world? So today I'm going to share stories of two different business owners in two different industries who had similar fears, shifted a belief and a behavior, and had a similar outcome. Are you ready? Well, first we have Jesh. That's spelled J E S H. Jash is a marketing expert, mainly primarily for mental health and wellness companies. He also happened to design my website and help me with my new rhythms of rest assessment, which if you haven't taken yet, you should take immediately. Kent Moroski.com forward slash rest dash assessment. Jesh always wanted to take Fridays off. Okay. He wanted a full weekend, but he's an elder at his church, so Sundays aren't really a day off. He had all day responsibilities. he already had Saturdays off, but it had been years since he'd actually had a full weekend off. Now, whenever Jesh thought about taking Fridays off, he got anxious. His chest would tighten because he was afraid of losing revenue. So one during one of our coaching sessions, I proposed that he take Fridays off as a summer experiment. Now we dealt with the underlying belief too. He was afraid that he would lose revenue, as I mentioned. We kind of delved into where that was coming from because it's not just behaviors that change us. We first have to shift beliefs if the behavior is going to stick. So we dealt with that belief, and I proposed he take Fridays off as a summer experiment. In other words, it's reversible. Now, Jesh had never thought about it that way before. We tend to think in absolutes, don't we? Like if I take Fridays off and I start that precedent, then it's all then it always has to be that way. But I tend to like I tend to think of things this way, that everything is an experiment. Okay. Especially things that don't have life-changing repercussions, like taking a Friday off. they're reversible. So here's what happened. Within two months, Jash's revenue had gone up twenty percent. He had two new retainer clients and he hit his yearly revenue goals six months early. Now, you might say, well, it's not from taking Fridays off. That's just a coincidence. Well, is it? I don't think just the act of taking Fridays off did that. There's some more reasons behind it, which we'll unpack as we go. But nonetheless, it happened. Now we have business owner number two. another client that I work with, James owns two companies, a trucking company and a land development company, both in Florida. James assumed that it wasn't possible to take Fridays off. At the time I suggested it, Jesh was last year, so last summer, James was this summer. The times I at the time I suggested it, his revenue, excuse me, his revenue was already down. He thought he couldn't afford To do it, but I kept sensing like it was the right move for him. I didn't try to talk him into it. So we just grappled with it one day and again dealt with that underlying belief. His was a little different, some the same, some different. you may remember James from a previous newsletter. If you get my newsletter, I'll link to it in the show notes. But James also feared, in addition to losing out on revenue, that if he didn't hustle and grind, he would not be successful. We talked about that in a previous newsletter. Now I use the same, excuse me, I need to sneeze. Bless me. I used the same experiment framing. Okay, James. Let's just back up. Let's try it as an experiment. Let's just try it for the summer. Now he's, I think at this point, around three months into this, and he hasn't been perfect at it. He'll admit that. There's been Fridays he just he's jumped back in or, you know, checked email or done things. It's not like a a hard and fast. And there are some Fridays where he's had to actually like, I I need to do this and I feel okay about it. So this isn't some legalistic, you know, rigid thing that we have to implement no matter what. There were there's some exceptions to it. But he's a few months into it and he has more clarity and peace than he's had in a long time. Now beyond the clarity and peace, which are wonderful, they're great tools for making decisions, but clarity is usually an after effect of something else. He's also had new jobs coming in. He just got a large land development job that has come in, and he has more trucks on the road than he has had in months. Is it a coincidence? I don't think so. So Jason James had different underlying different reasons, same underlying fears. What if revenue drops? And am I lazy if I take Fridays off? And in both cases, revenue increased. Now you may think that. Okay, that's two cases. That's anecdotal. Maybe you're right, but I've heard a lot of other stories from other people about similar things when we loosen our grip a little bit. I think a lot of it has to do with our tendency as leaders to grasp onto things too tightly, to try to control things too tightly. And when we loosen up and open our hands a little bit, things ease up. Our mind gets clarity, we get a little rest and peace, and things begin to flow. It's kind of like taking a hose that you're squeezing and the water can't flow through, and you're loosening your grip, and water begin can begin to flow again. Now, I hear the pushback. you know, I've read the pushback. Many experts say a day without redesigning the work just piles up and it's just going to be higher for Monday. So In other words, you know, if you don't change something about your rhythm and your structure of work, if you just take off Fridays, it's just gonna pile up and you'll have it on Mondays. Well, maybe in some cases, but I have not found that to be true. this concern also is usually for employees, not owners, but I'm not really sure it's valid for employees either, to be honest. I didn't have Jesh or James redesign anything, they just stopped. And it held and revenue has been increasing. Why? I'm sure there's many reasons. one of them might be Parkinson's law says that work expands to fill the time you give it. In other words, if we're done working by Thursday at six, if we set that boundary, we'll get done working by Thursday at six. In James and Jesh's case, most of what they felt was urgent could wait. or they didn't need to do it at all. This plays into the 80-20 principle and 80-20 framing. If you don't know what that is, I didn't necessarily believe the Pareto principle until I tested it myself. The Pareto principle basically says, and if it's right, and I believe it is, that 80% of what we act sorry, 80% of what actually matters comes from 20% of your effort. This principle has been found true over and over again in all different facets of life. In other words, find what's working and do more of that and do less of what doesn't work. If this principle holds true, then 80% of your results at work come from 20% of your hours. Meaning one day out of five or eight out eight hours out of 40 hours is where 80% of your results come from. In that case, you could certainly afford to let one day go out of a week. So one day out of five. In knowledge work, especially Fridays and in particular Friday afternoons, they have a lower output and errors increase. I'm sure that probably goes across many industries, and I understand that all industries aren't aren't the same, and it doesn't mean that you shut down your mac manufacturing plant on Friday. I'm talking just in this case about the leaders who decided to take Friday off from their business in two very different types of businesses. Now, I used to be that guy who believed that the harder I pushed, the more work I did, the better results I'd have, which is part of how I now know what to look for here. Now, it wasn't always tied to revenue for me, sometimes it was, but it was more that I had to feel. Like I was working hard. I had to feel like I wasn't lazy because if I was lazy, things wouldn't work. But I've never been a lazy person. And you know, that the really the issue was within me and my belief system about work and revenue and results and laziness or quote unquote working hard. But now I've been practicing this for years, this Friday thing. Now I don't do nothing on Fridays. I don't know what James and Jesh do on Fridays. They can do whatever they want. They've told me a little bit about it, but I don't do nothing, though that would be okay if I chose to. I've chosen to end the week on things I enjoy. So Fridays typically look like this for me. I have a coffee date with my wife early in the morning, like eight to ten. I write and work on my upcoming book or another project, so a creative project for two to three hours. And then I have lunches. Afternoon meetups, rounds of golf with friends or business owners, but I don't do any operational meetings, no admin, none of that stuff. Now, here's what happened. this was maybe four or five, six months ago. I started violating that for a few months and putting meetings on Friday because I just felt like I didn't have any other slot to put them and I felt like they were necessary. Well, I realized when I started doing that. That I was totally drained at the end of Fridays and I had nothing left for my family heading into the weekend. Instead of being energized, it carried into my weekend and I went in feeling stretched thin and stressed and totally exhausted. When I but when I do this, when I end Fridays the way I just described, end the week the way I just described to you earlier, I feel energized instead of drained. Friday night begins a 24 hour Sabbath day for me or day of rest. That lasts until Saturday night. It often extends to Sunday morning. I go to church on Sundays usually. I spend time with my family. And then I do some high level planning for the week ahead on Sunday afternoon or Sunday evening, whatever works better. Sometimes Sunday morning when church is happening in later on Sunday. Now, Monday, I'm usually ready to go instead of running unempty. Monday, I do some of my hardest work, so I stack the week like this. Monday is hard work that I don't really like. Friday is enjoyable work that I do like. Monday is admin day, finance day. I like finances, but the admin of all of it all and my business, and then it's all tied together personally with me because I'm a solopreneur. So I'm spending a lot of time in admin, but I've started to stack something I enjoy on Monday too, and and at least starting my newsletter by hand in a journal with a Blackwing pencil. So my point is though that when I do things this way, Fridays I finish energized, even though I might be a little physically tired. And Monday I usually am ready to go instead of totally running on empty, ready to tackle those, some of those undesirable things. and the reason I do some of that admin on Monday is so it doesn't dog me the rest of the week. Anyway, that's a little brief about my life. I'm sure yours looks different, but the principle stands that it's not by working more that results happen. It's by working smarter, and the 80-20 principle says that. So each time we take a moment at the end of the podcast. To focus on one of the four rhythms of rest, R, E, S, or T. And we do an action step. I give you an action step that you can do in the next 24 to 48 hours, and then a reflection question to help you go deeper on your own. Now, many people think Fridays off or working too much reads like a tangible problem. Remember the R E S T T stands for tangible. The tangible chamber in the rhythms of rest framework, the what that stands for are those embodied patterns through which our priorities become visible. They shape how we work, how we use our time and our resources, and how we care for our physical body. So they deal with the output or the things that manifest in a physical way. But the actual driver in these, in this week's In this week's podcast, in this week's edition, is not the tangible rhythm. It's actually the emotional rhythm, the emotional chamber. If you remember, there are like four chambers in the heart, they all have to work and sync together in order for us to move towards wholeness and flourishing. If they get out of alignment, if they get fragmented, we feel burned out, we feel overwhelmed, something feels off. So if the actual driver is the emotional chamber, Why do I say that? It's because the driver that was driving both Jesh and James to not want to take Fridays off was the fear that less time means less revenue, or that they were lazy if you don't if they're not hustling and grinding all the time, or that their business something was going to break down, something was not going to work, or how they felt about themselves feeling guilty for taking a Friday off. It was more about the E, it was more about the emotions. And the feelings behind that than it was about the behavior of physically taking Fridays off. So I think that happens in a lot of cases. We often think it's one chamber driving a decision, but it's often another chamber that's driving the decision. So we have to do a little sleuth work. We have to think about what's the belief driving this behavior because, or driving this thought. So the next time you have a thought about something and it kind of falls in line with the way that you've always thought about something, I want you to ask a simple question. Actually, two simple questions, and they're and they tie together. The first simple question is: what's the belief driving this thought or behavior? Because how it works is beliefs lead to thoughts, thoughts lead to feelings, feelings lead to behavior. Okay, so what's the belief behind this? Thought that I'm having. And then here's a question you can ask in conjunction with that. What else could be true? What else could be true? So you might have a narrative you're telling yourself in a mind that drives a feeling. So the narrative is maybe that if I take Fridays off, I'm going to lose revenue. And that creates a feeling of anxiety. And therefore the behavior is I can never take Fridays off. But what is the belief behind that feeling and behind that thought that is driving that? Behavior. Okay, that's what you have to ask yourself and then ask yourself what else could be true. could it be true that revenue is not directly tied to me taking off Fridays? Could be. Could it be true that the less I work, the more clarity and insight I have because I'm not stressed all the time? Could be true. Could it be true that if I take Fridays off, things don't work out well and I have to go back to taking you know, working on Fridays could be true. Ask yourself what else could be true and be willing to test your assumptions. So the action in the next 48 hours, here's the action that I want you to take. It's a very simple action. I know you can do it. It's low, it's low cost. It's like what Jim Collins called a, you know, I don't know if he called it muzzle, muzzle loader shot or whatever. It's the small, the small balls. The small balls versus the cannonballs, you know, the small shot, buck shot. That's what it is. so take a small risk. Here's the risk. Block one recurring appointment of at least one hour with yourself each week for margin creation or just for white space. Maybe to think, to reflect, to be creative, and don't fill it with some something else. Now, if you're like, I can't. I can't block one every week. Well, let's start with this. Can you block one this week? One hour of white space for creative thought, for margin, for thinking, whatever you want. but it's not related to your normal flow of work. You're not going to check emails, and maybe not gonna do meetings. It you have space for you. And maybe instead of if you're at the you know, if you have to go into the office. maybe instead of being there, maybe you go to a coffee shop for an hour. Maybe you take a walk in the park. I guarantee things will come to you during that time that you didn't think would happen just because you clear some space and take some margin in your calendar. So schedule one one hour this week or one recurring hour each week and try it. Or maybe you want to go big and you want to try an experiment like Jesh and James did. And you want to take Fridays off for a season and see what happens. I would say you need to give it probably three months as an experiment. maybe two might work, but three months and see what happens when you do that. So here's a reflection question for this week. What is one unchallenged belief that you are holding on to? And what could happen if you were willing to try something? Comment me on social media, hit me up, DM me on social media or leave a comment on YouTube, hit reply to the newsletter. This went out in a newsletter earlier in the week, and tell me which hour are you giving up or s blocking for yourself and what you did in that hour? I would love to hear it. Now, if you're reche if you're achieving by every metric that matters and you still feel like something's off. The rhythms of rest assessment will show you exactly which of your four rhythms is off, is out of sync, and your highest leverage move this week. In less than three minutes, you can have some real clarity and have an action step to go with it that's going to help you gain momentum. Just go to Kent Moroski forward, sorry, Kent Moroski.com forward slash rest dash assessment. In this episode, I described if I described a challenge that you knew all too well, that's what the newsletter is there for too. Every other week I send some tools I use with clients to build rhythms, to help you with your leadership. There's not a lot of filler. It's just stuff that's going to help you grow and develop as a leader. So just go to Kent Moroski.com forward slash newsletter to get on the last the list. It's free. And that's where the new frameworks show up first before anywhere else. Well, have a great week, and I will see you in a couple weeks. Bye for now.