Latest / The Life-First Solopreneur / 105. Strategies for Integrating Your Business Goals with Your Desired Lifestyle with Jordan Tait

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105. Strategies for Integrating Your Business Goals with Your Desired Lifestyle with Jordan Tait · The Life-First Solopreneur

• 0:00
  Carly Ries: Ever have one of those days that seems so insignificant at the time, yet it ends up being a major turning point in your life? For me, it was 2016. My husband and I both worked remotely, and the year prior had begun traveling and exploring the country in an RV while working full time. That's pretty great. Right?
• 0:17
  Well, it would have been had I not been in our RV working from 5:30 AM to 6 PM most nights, stopping just in time for dinner, a quick hangout, and then bed. Basically, missing the entire point of life on the road because I was working so much. That day 2016, I had finally had enough. There had to be a way to earn a living that supported my life goals as well, and I was on a mission to find it. Today, we invited on Jordan Tait who feels the same way, and he helps overworked owners get their life back by growing their business and income while working fewer hours through his company, the intentional business.
• 0:52
  This isn't a get rich quick scheme. These are just pointers to truly reclaim your time while still earning a living. We discuss things like how he helps solopreneurs identify their ideal lifestyle and align their business goals with it. We discuss the strategies he recommends for maintaining a healthy work life balance while growing a business and the guilt or fear of prioritizing personal time over business demands. We also discussed the role that delegation, automation, and processes play in this whole idea and how to set boundaries between work and personal life to prevent burnout.
• 1:24
  He has such great recommendations and words of wisdom. And if you feel like you are in this boat that I was in back in 2016, I highly recommend you've listened to the episode. We also get to hear some success stories from his clients and it's just a great episode overall. So be sure to tune in. You're listening to the aspiring solopreneur, the podcast for those just taking the bold step or even just thinking about taking that step into the world of solo entrepreneurship.
• 1:54
  My name is Carly Ries, and my co host Joe Rando and I are your guides to navigating this crazy, but awesome journey as a company of 1. We take pride in being part of LifeStarr, a digital hub dedicated to all aspects of solopreneurship that has empowered and educated countless solopreneurs looking to build a business that resonates with their life's ambitions. We help people work to live, not live to work. And if you're looking for a get rich quick scheme, this is not the show for you. So if you're eager to gain valuable insights from industry experts on running a business the right way the first time around, or want to learn from the missteps of solopreneurs who've paved the way before you, then stick around.
• 2:34
  We've got your back because flying solo in business doesn't mean you're alone. Okay. So before we jump into this episode, I just have to share this new free offer we have called the SoloSuite Starter. Being a solopreneur is awesome, but it's not easy. It's hard to get noticed and most business advice is for bigger companies, and you're all alone until now.
• 2:54
  LifeStarr's SoloSuite gives you free education, community, and tools to build a thriving one person business. So if you're lacking direction, having a hard time generating leads, having trouble keeping up with everything you have to do, or even if you're just lonely running a company of 1. Be sure to check out solo suite starter at LifeStarr with 2 r's dot com and click on products and pricing at the top menu. It's the first one in the drop down. Again, it's totally free, so check it out at LifeStarr.com.
• 3:24
  Click on products and pricing, and it's the first one in the menu. Hope to see you there.
• 3:28
  Jordan. Jordan. Jordan.
• 3:30
  So this is so funny because, Joe, I feel like we're almost interviewing ourselves for this episode because we have, like, the exact same messaging, exact same thought process. We we like to help solopreneurs live a life that supports their goals. And Jordan, you yourself never were or at least you say you never work more than 35 hours a week. You take months of vacation every year, and you help others do the same. And I am I'm so intrigued by this.
• 4:01
  Can you just give us your background and what led you to being basically a solopreneur coach?
• 4:06
  Jordan Tait: Yeah. So my background what I always say to people is I never intended to end up where I am. It it just evolved naturally over time, but it it started I had a painting business in university, and I it was my first freedom oriented business. So I used it to travel 4 months a year all over the world. I'd work 8 months, save every dollar, and then go travel for 4 months.
• 4:31
  And I immediately learned at a university that you can make your business work for you and your lifestyle. And then when I eventually kinda grew out of that business and realized I wanted to try other things, I got into coaching and training other people how to run business. And for years, I helped launch new businesses. I was working with brand new entrepreneurs on day 1 all the way through their first two years of growing. And I got to see the vision that they came in with, the dreams that they had for the life and the business they were gonna create, and then where they got stuck along the way, where there was road bumps, where they got held up.
• 5:08
  And over time, I started to see the same thing happen pretty consistently, where people came in with this idea of, I want freedom, I wanna work less, I wanna be with my family more, I'm gonna take more vacations. Like, all the reasons that you hear about when someone leaves a corporate job or a previous career. But then I saw them actually losing all those things in the process of building their business and growing. And so when later in my career, I I became a management consultant. I was a CEO for a while.
• 5:42
  Through all that experience, I just kept feeling that tension in in small business owners and entrepreneurs. And so I, last year, set out to start solving that for more people and created my current business, which is called the intentional business. And it's about building a business that provides the lifestyle you want from day 1 rather than waiting until you're 60 or 70 and you can finally retire because you grinded your way there.
• 6:09
  Carly Ries: Joe, doesn't this messaging just sound so familiar and like music to your ears?
• 6:14
  Joe Rando: It really does. And it's interesting. I mean, we just did a kind of an informal poll of why people chose to be solopreneurs, and the two top answers were what you mentioned, which is, you know, the idea of having time to kind of do what you want to do, time with family and that kind of thing. And the other one was only doing the kind of work you wanna do, which was interesting.
• 6:37
  You know, the people that just don't in a corporate job, there's so many aspects to the job that they just don't like doing. So they wanted to be able to do the things that they like doing and not the other stuff. So it's about freedom.
• 6:50
  Carly Ries: Jordan, what I'm intrigued. so when I went out on my own as a solopreneur, I had the issue of saying yes to everything because I no longer had the safety net of a salary. And so any project that came my way, I was like, yes. Yes. I wanna do that. Yes.
• 7:05
  Because I was just nervous about just a consistent paycheck or not having that, and it was to my detriment. I failed miserably saying yes to everything. I was arguably making the most money I've ever made, but I was also the most miserable I've ever been in my career. And so you help you wanna help people from day 1 so they don't experience that. So what are the other challenges you see solopreneurs run run into to prevent them from having that lifestyle that they're looking for?
• 7:37
  Jordan Tait: What you shared is really common. It's when you start a business, it's really hard to appreciate how much pressure you're gonna feel every day to work, to perform, to save money, and that safety net or that security that you may have felt as an employee where you were guaranteed a certain amount of mon money every month, when that goes away, it it's a different mentality, and it definitely drives people to work more hours, push themselves harder, and it it drives them. Other challenges that people have are when you launch a business, what it takes to succeed is very different than when you have a stable business and you're growing it for the long term. So what I like to say is in your 1st year or 2, you're pushing through trial and error, and you're making a ton of effort. And not everything you do is gonna work.
• 8:29
  Not everything you gonna you you do is gonna be efficient or effective, but you just push effort and you learn and you figure out your marketing and you try sales, and there's so much to learn in those 1st few years. And that's where people really, really struggle. But when you break through that, now you get into the place where you can't keep growing just through trial and error. You can't put in any more effort because your time is limited. And that's when people have to start to change their mindset around, how am I gonna grow this for the long term without burning myself out while providing the freedom I want or the income I want or the different things that are important?
• 9:07
  And so I've helped people from day 1 all the way through to 5 or 6,000,000 a year. But where I see most people get stuck is the transition from doing it all themselves and being alone and hitting the wall, and then having a smaller team of 3 or 4 people and pushing to hit a million, but they just they don't have enough systems in place. They're trying to do all the trial and effort stuff I've been talking about. And so those are the 2 transition points that most of my clients come to me when they've hit those, where they've plateaued for months or even years, and they're just tired of of pushing so hard but not getting the results they want anymore.
• 9:44
  Joe Rando: I'm curious. do you find any people that kind of start off with a plan and a vision for a business that doesn't match their goals and that they need to even kind of come out of the gate differently if they really want to achieve their goals, given the the the fact that their business isn't gonna serve those. Do you see that happening, or is it more later on?
• 10:07
  Jordan Tait: No. Definitely. I'd say it's very rare that the original plan ends up being the way that you get to where you wanna go. And a huge part of how I help people initially is reviewing their strategy for how are you growing and how are you leading this business and tweaking a few things so that it becomes more efficient, feels easier, and it's more aligned with their goals. Because some people come to me and they wanna grow a big business, but they're afraid of the effort it's gonna take to get there because they can't they can't see how it's gonna grow beyond themselves. And so working with people through those different challenges and getting more clear on if if we know where you're aiming, what's the right approach to get there faster? That's where I bring my expertise coaching 100 of businesses and working at all different levels and being able to say, I know the path because I've seen it before.
• 10:59
  I've seen what works. I've seen where people get stuck. And that's where I think working with a coach is so critical because you can avoid all that trial and error and and pushing so hard in the wrong direction.
• 11:11
  Carly Ries: Well, you were talking about, processes and team, and that's what's so funny is so many solopreneurs think that they have to go it alone in business, and team doesn't need to be an employee. It can be you working with other contractors collaborating with other contractors. So you you do have a methodology that you use now to to get these solopreneurs into the right place. What are some of those steps that you guide people through?
• 11:36
  Jordan Tait: So I've created a 4 step process I called the earn more work less road map, and it's to help people earn the money that they deserve, but while working the hours they choose. Because often, they're earning the money they want, but they're they're working way more than they want to to get it. So what I focus on is 4 growth levers that are about creating efficient, sustainable growth. And the first one is how the owner invests their time, which as a solopreneur, every hour you have is the most valuable resource you have to grow your business. And especially the bigger you grow, the more valuable your time becomes.
• 12:14
  So choosing to invest your time in the right things that create the right results is so important, and it's way more important than just working really hard on the wrong things and working long hours. Number 2 is looking at their pricing and their profitability because it's very easy to get lost chasing revenue growth, but not all small business owners or solopreneurs are thinking about the profit, which is what they keep. And so I'd rather help someone grow their profit than just their revenue. Because I've worked with businesses where they were doing 4 or 5,000,000, and the owner only made a 100,000 a year because it was not a profitable business. And then I worked with solopreneurs doing 500,000 a year paying themselves 250,000 or more because they focused on profit.
• 13:02
  To me, profit is about efficiency.
• 13:04
  Carly Ries: Have you read profit first?
• 13:06
  Jordan Tait: Absolutely. Yeah.
• 13:08
  Carly Ries: I feel like we're speaking the same language. Sorry. Keep going. I didn't mean to cut you off, but it just sounded relevant.
• 13:12
  Jordan Tait: No problem. So like I said, I focus on efficiency. So you can grow by working really hard and doing all these things. But if you're investing your time well and you're you're investing it in profitable activities, you can actually grow a pretty sustainable and lucrative business without working 60 to 80 hours a week and pushing through nights and weekends. The 3rd and 4th steps are more about the systems and the support.
• 13:37
  So once you are investing your time well and you're you're making good money, then it's about optimizing the business so that it can keep growing without requiring more effort from you. And so I look at what's the most important piece of support we could get in your business to free up your time. And often that's virtual assistant, bookkeeper, marketing support, or service support, depending on the business. When you identify that, it's all about how do we buy back 20 or 30 hours a week from the work that the owner is doing so that they can then either take that back and enjoy their life more or reinvest it in the higher value activities to keep growing. And then lastly is systems, and this is where a lot of my background comes in.
• 14:25
  I was an operations manager and a CEO, and I really focused in on what's the most efficient way to do things that we do every day. And as a solopreneur, when you're wearing all those hats in your business, where you're marketing, selling, delivering, doing your bookkeeping, doing your admin, There's a million different things you have to do every week. And if you can systematize just a few of those, the ones that require the most time and effort, that's where we often get people back 10 hours a week just from doing the exact same thing they're doing, but by making it a little bit more efficient.
• 14:59
  Carly Ries: Okay. So here's my question on that. You said that you can get people back 10 hours a week and all and, like, all of this is that you don't work 80 hours a week and you can actually have your life. But as a solopreneur trying to grow your business, a lot of times you want to feel that, like, it's hard to be like, okay. I'm not gonna work those 5 extra hours this week.
• 15:18
  I'm gonna spend time taking my dog for a hike, but it's like at the back of your head, it's like, oh, I should be putting my time and energy towards this business. And so how do you help people actually find that work life balance when they're when their mind immediately goes to, oh, I have a free hour. I should totally work on my sales deck or whatever.
• 15:39
  Jordan Tait: It's a really big challenge, and it's something I've spent years kind of managing and perfecting for myself. But for me, what it comes down to is remembering why you started the business and remembering what's important to you outside of work. And it's very easy to get lost just pursuing money, watching money stack up in the account, trying to become more successful, trying to grow a bigger business. But when you do that at the expense of your health, your relationships, your your time off, your vacations, which are all really normal things I see entrepreneurs sacrifice, eventually, you lose meaning in the business, and you start to reach that burnout period. And that's where I've seen too many businesses fail when it's all about the business growth and the life is just second to that. where I try to help people is remembering that you started this business because you wanted to spend more time with your partner, your kids, or you wanted to travel more. So what do we need to do to make the business provide that without taking so much from your time? And often when people have those things available to them, my my full belief and philosophy is that time freedom is not an expensive thing. It's just a decision that you have to make for yourself that my time is valuable, and I deserve more time. If I'm gonna work 8 or 10 hours in a day, I deserve the other 6 to 8 hours at night to live my life.
• 17:09
  And so there's a lot in there. There's some mindset stuff, but I really believe that any business owner can decide that they want time freedom today.
• 17:19
  Carly Ries: So with the mindset stuff, do you have any actual tools or techniques you use for people? So one of the things when I was first starting out is I would actually calendar block for my personal time too because in my mind, it's like, oh, it's meeting. I need to stick to that. So I would have my meetings in the morning, and then in the afternoon, it would say, I'm just gonna go with the take the dog for the hike thing for this whole episode, I guess. But I would say, like, hike with the dog or, my grocery trip or happy hour with friends or whatever.
• 17:49
  But I would have it on the calendar so it seems like to me I was, like, crossing something off the to do list, if that makes sense, which is so weird because you don't want the hanging out with friends to be to do list. Do you have any tactics like that, Or do you recommend something like that?
• 18:03
  Jordan Tait: Definitely. I think prioritizing yourself is as important as prioritizing your business. And the challenge of being an owner or solopreneur is you've got clients, potentially employees or vendors. You've got your family and your friends, and everyone needs so much from you. But I always ask people, what do you need?
• 18:21
  And often, it's very simple. It's, yeah, I need to go for a walk outdoors every day, or I need to get some exercise, or I need a little bit of time to do these things that are important to me, and, absolutely, put it in the calendar. Make it as important to you as the meeting with the client. Make it as important to you as as the things that you have to do to succeed in your business. And building those boundaries into your schedule are the easiest way I've found to make them actually happen.
• 18:50
  For me, like I said, I end my day at 4 at the latest, and that's when I do my exercise. And it's the way I transition from work into life again. And then I just turn off notifications on email and social media and everything after that so that those interruptions don't take all those micro moments of my life afterwards. And I recognize that that's hard, and it took me years of kind of practicing and getting to there, but now I truly can turn off and let it go. And I believe that if you didn't get to the work today, you'll get to it tomorrow.
• 19:23
  And if you don't get to it tomorrow, it probably wasn't as important to you as you thought it was.
• 19:28
  Carly Ries: That's one of my favorite sayings right now is when somebody says I don't have time for it, they need to tweak it to say I don't prioritize it.
• 19:35
  Jordan Tait: Yes. Totally.
• 19:36
  Carly Ries: And when you frame your mind like that, it's like, oh, I'm trying to work out today. Like, no. You didn't prioritize. It's not important to you to work out today. Then that mental shift is like a big eye opener, I feel like.
• 19:50
  Jordan Tait: Definitely is. That it's something that you're not really taught when you start your business is that just like you're prioritizing your clients and your business, you're gonna have to prioritize your life because no one is gonna tell you to shut off when you're your own boss, except for you. And that's where a lot of people struggle because the work is always there, and your business will consume as many hours as you give it. We'll never hit the end of the to do list. So part of the long term path of growing a business is recognizing that if I'm in this for the next 3 years, 5 years, 10 years, I need to take care of my energy on the way.
• 20:26
  Need to enjoy the process more, or it's just gonna be hard the whole time.
• 20:32
  Joe Rando: You said it out loud. You're never gonna hit the end of your to do list. I've been trying to convince myself of that for a long time. It's like, it's never happened. Never have ever happened.
• 20:45
  Carly Ries: Well, it's funny. we had a huge snowstorm here in Colorado a few weeks ago, and, and we had sickness in our house before that. And then we went on spring break, and it was just like a whirlwind of stuff that took me away from my to do list. And, last Thursday, we have our team status calls, and before Joe hopped on, I was like, you guys, it's crazy. I feel like I'm finally caught up. And everybody was like, why would you say that? Like, why would you do that? Because then, of course, right after I said that, it was like, oh, gosh. We have all these events this week.
• 21:18
  We have events next week. We have all these emails. And the second I said it, I immediately was, like, oh, what? I take it back.
• 21:24
  Joe Rando: Take it back. Take it back.
• 21:25
  Carly Ries: I didn't actually say it, and, of course, the new kids came flooding back in.
• 21:30
  Jordan Tait: Yeah. I used to love crossing things off and getting to the end of a list, and I would fixate on solving a problem. And in my mind, I was like, when I solve this problem, I'm gonna be so much better. I'm gonna be so much freer. But you solve the problem, and then a new problem emerges.
• 21:47
  You cross the thing off the list, and a new item emerges. So that's actually just the process of growing a business. There's always gonna be more to do. And when you start to recognize that, like, I I'll never actually get there, then it's part of breaking free and recognizing like, for me, what I love about managing my time intentionally is if I set a limit of I can only work 35 hours a week, it means that I need to prioritize my time really effectively within that, And it's more of a puzzle versus I'm just gonna work until I feel, like, caught up or the work is done. I could work 70, 80 hours and still never get there.
• 22:26
  And so it's about prioritizing, like you said, and then protecting your time for living because that's the whole point of running a business, of having a job, of anything is having the money and the free time to enjoy your life outside of work.
• 22:41
  Joe Rando: Jordan, what do you think about the idea of making a to do list for the day that doesn't allocate the entire time you've allocated to your day, but some portion of it, and then actually finishing it and feeling good at the end of the day. Do you think that's an okay strategy for people?
• 22:58
  Jordan Tait: Definitely. I saw a post about this on LinkedIn today of a guy who actually time blocks every 15 minutes and and gives himself a check mark if he was working productively during that time. He's trying to, at the end of the day, say to himself, I put in the effort I needed to. So that's a very
• 23:13
  Joe Rando: That's a little different, but, yeah, but it's a little interesting.
• 23:16
  Jordan Tait: So What I do personally is every morning, I write down my top three priorities for the day. And though I've done this for 5 years now, and if I get these three things done, my business has moved forward, and these are the important things to me. And then I obviously, I'll get other things done throughout the day. But if I get to the end of the day and I haven't hit one of them, then it immediately becomes the thing I have to start on the next day. And just if you can get 3 important things done each day, you go way further than getting a 100 unimportant small things.
• 23:49
  And that's where I really I help people understand that productivity is not just about how many things you do. To me, it's much more about are you doing the right things? Are you focusing on the things that are you gonna create long term value versus you're on a treadmill of just trying to keep up with I answered a 100 emails today, and I did 5 posts, and I did this. But tomorrow, there's just gonna be more. Don't get me started on email.
• 24:18
  Carly Ries: Well, it's also funny, just like prioritizing and using your time wisely. I mean, looking at your phone and seeing where you spend your time. One of my my buddies who's, constantly busy, like, constantly has something going on. Kid doesn't have time to do anything It's also constantly sending me Instagram reels and constantly you know what I mean? It's like I like people think they're using their time wisely, but there are so many distractions. I also think that think it's interesting to log how you're spending your time and also to take note of where your screen time is and everything to help get that the full picture of our why you are or are not accomplishing those three things.
• 25:00
  Jordan Tait: Definitely. A lot of people, they'll they're, like, ashamed to admit to me. They say, you know, I was on YouTube for 2 hours today, or I I was on Instagram for an hour at lunch and might it lost track of time. And because of the lost time to distractions, then they feel like I have to work an extra 2 hours tonight to make up for it at home, and they talk about sitting on their couch with their laptop. My big thing is when you're working that late at night and you're just and you're tired, the the productivity is way lower anyways.
• 25:33
  And so you actually may as well just wait and do it tomorrow when you're fresh. You'll go through it faster and more clearer, and then you'll have that time to recover tonight. And that's something that I don't think a lot of people are thinking about is just like an athlete, when you're working on a business and you're pushing yourself and you're learning, you need time to recover. You need time to rest, and you need time to turn your brain off of work so that it can come back fresh the next day.
• 25:59
  Carly Ries: Absolutely. Well, so it sounds like you are great on setting people up for with their processes, just everything they need to to work more efficiently to get that time back. How often do solopreneurs need to reassess their current situation and kinda reflect on their business? Because it's so easy to, like, we always say working on or working in your business. And so how often should they take the magnifying glass and be like, okay.
• 26:24
  This is what needs to be tweaked. So I feel like if you're doing it constantly, you're not getting a big picture, but if you're
• 26:31
  Joe Rando: never doing
• 26:31
  Jordan Tait: it, it's an issue. I love quarterly review and planning. So I'm in I'm in that mode right now with my clients, and it I just have a very simple process that I use with people where you just do a few questions reflecting on how did the last quarter go, what did I learn, what's working well, what's frustrating, what do I wanna change moving it forwards. And then for the next quarter, we set what are the top three priorities for the business. You'll notice there's a trend in threes.
• 27:00
  But if we were only to move the needle on three things, what were they? And then what are the specific actions we can do to hit those on a daily and a weekly basis? So I'm I'm really big on focus and clarity and that process of what just happened, is it working, what's frustrating me specifically, and then how am I gonna approach the next quarter. It it really works well. I think beyond 90 days, too much can change.
• 27:28
  Your energy can change. It's hard to stay focused on the same thing for more than that. I like that as a process. And for myself, I just have a template I use. And then for my clients, we just book it in at the beginning of every agreement. It's every 3 months, we're gonna review and refresh where we're going. Yeah. I think that's a great idea. it's funny. I used to use a 90 day plan for every client. My past life was age marketing agencies, and we would have 90 day plans. I keep telling Joe, like, this is such a good idea, but I just haven't implemented it with us and I need to because I just think it's it's just so great to kinda have a reflection every 90 days.
• 28:08
  Joe Rando: But we're changing so fast. I don't know if 90 days is too far in the future.
• 28:12
  Carly Ries: Exactly. Exactly.
• 28:13
  Joe Rando: So much going on.
• 28:15
  Carly Ries: So We haven't done that. But I feel like this episode is gonna be so inspirational for people wanting to to either make the leap from corporate or who are have already done so and are just starting. So can you we have some digital nomads who are are, in our community and and just feel with fun stories of your clients. Can you tell some 1 or 2, success stories of what they do and then how they've been able to make a cool life for themselves by being a solopreneur?
• 28:43
  Jordan Tait: Definitely. So my partner, Maddie, and I were both solopreneurs. We both started our own businesses during COVID, and we did it with the pure intention of we wanna have total control of our time. We wanna travel on a monthly basis and live and work from anywhere. And we set up with that as the goal, and then we've accomplished it.
• 29:05
  So, we work constantly from different places and countries. It's been really fun to see that come to fruition. With a client, I have a great story example recently where she came to me. She was working 84 hours a week, 7 days a week, often just no free time, no space to live her life, and she was really struggling. And she had 2 businesses at the time.
• 29:29
  So we sat down and we worked through it, and what we identified was the reason she was running her businesses was because she wanted to be able to take more time to travel with her partner. But then her businesses had become the barrier to actually accomplishing that. So we changed some things around how she was managing her time, and we got her some support in one of the businesses to get her back 40 hours a week. And within 3 months, she was able to go take a 3 week vacation with her partner where she actually turned everything off. She was just minorly available on email.
• 30:00
  She was down in Colombia with him and his family, and that was life changing for her. And then she came into this year, and her goals were, I don't wanna grow revenue at all. I just wanna make the same money, but I wanna do it while working half as much. And that was really inspiring to me with seeing someone who said, growth is not important to me because I wanna live this year, and I'm gonna make that a priority.
• 30:25
  Carly Ries: Yeah. Oh, that resonates with me so much because when I decided to make the leap into solopreneurship, I was working for an agency, and I was working 80 plus hours a week, but my now husband and I were RVing around the country, and I wasn't seeing anything. I was he like, he was out on bike rides, and I was just in the RV working nonstop, and it was like, the whole point of this is to see the country and here I am in front of a screen. And so it's possible to work those z plus hours while doing something cool, so you just have to make sure it doesn't take away from that cool thing that you're doing. So that's awesome. She was able to do that.
• 31:01
  Jordan Tait: Yeah. And your example is great. I mean, a lot of people have these beautiful dreams, but then when they actually get into it, they they haven't made the changes to be fully present in it. So the questions I ask are often, what's the main thing that's keeping you working more hours than you wanna work? Or if you had to cut half your work, what part of your work would you let go of?
• 31:24
  And if you're gonna take a vacation, how do you take a real true vacation where you don't think about your business for 7 days and you don't have client calls and you don't have emails? Because most entrepreneurs that I speak with will go 3 or 4 years without taking a real vacation where they didn't take the laptop and they weren't working half the day. And so freeing people and helping them do that is really satisfying, but when they come back, they also come back with more clarity and more energy to get going.
• 31:52
  Joe Rando: I did 7 years . When I first started my business. I went 7. And that was a business trip that I morphed into a little vacation on top of it with the family. It was, 9 years before we, like, just took a vacation, but that was back in the nineties when that was a badge of honor.
• 32:10
  Jordan Tait: Right.
• 32:10
  Joe Rando: Now we know better.
• 32:12
  Jordan Tait: Yeah. That definitely changed. I think there's never been a better time for having that freedom lifestyle, having the time freedom, and building the business you want because the resources are there. It's widely acceptable that you can work from anywhere remotely. Just in the last month, I've worked from Korea and an island and the mountains, and that's allowed me to be in all these different places that when I had a corporate job, I could only get those 2 weeks or 4 weeks a year to go explore.
• 32:43
  And now I have unlimited time to explore, and sometimes I'm working and sometimes I'm not.
• 32:48
  Carly Ries: It is so funny how things have changed. When my husband and I hit the road, we were just dating at the time, and I decided to leave my job and I was gonna look for 1. So from my dad's perspective, it was I'm leaving my reliable job to travel around the country with my boyfriend. It just wasn't a wasn't a good tagline.
• 33:09
  Joe Rando: He was not impressed.
• 33:10
  Carly Ries: He also was nervous b`ecause he was a financial adviser, and so he was always, like, have the job, 401 k, save blah blah, He was by the books. So I literally put a presentation together and gave him a PowerPoint. Even though I was in my twenties, I didn't necessarily need dad's permission, but we're just really close, so I didn't want him to look down or anything. And he was like, if I had that opportunity when I was your age to work from anywhere, I would have done it. He was like, I just didn't have that. We didn't have the opportunity to do that.
• 33:41
  And he was like, now that you do, you need to do it. I think that's so true. we have the ability to work from anywhere. We have the ability to create our own hours. So if you want to do that, do that.
• 33:55
  Jordan Tait: Yeah. There's an amazing book called The Good Life, and it's about the longest ranging study in history on on, like, human behavior and what what generates quality life. And they did it over 80 years on on all these, guys and their families. And, basically, what they said across the board was the number one predictor of a good life is good relationships. And across the board, when they ask these people at near the end of their life, if you could go back and change anything, what would it be?
• 34:24
  They all said I would work less, and I'd spend more time with my family, and I wouldn't have missed so much of my life. So I love reading stuff like that and learning from people who have gone ahead and and looked back and said, here's what I would change. And then I take that really seriously. And I'm trying to live a life today that I don't wanna retire from and a life that is super sustainable and that I could keep up this pace of working forever because I'm not burning myself out and I'm not sacrificing the things that are important to me outside of work. And that's where when people get in tapped into that, everything changes.
• 35:01
  Often when people start actually working less, their business grows faster. They start earning more money because they're enjoying the process more. Their energy is better. They're more clear. They're making more intentional decisions. So that's where it's so important to let yourself off the hook, pull back a little bit on your work, and and get that even extra hour a day to live your life.
• 35:24
  Carly Ries: If you saw me looking off screen just now, it's because I was typing The Good Life into my phone because I wanna make sure I didn't forget to get that.
• 35:31
  Jordan Tait: It's a great book.
• 35:33
  Carly Ries: Well, Jordan, this has been such a fun conversation. You have been so successful in helping solopreneurs find success on their terms. So we have to ask, what is your favorite quote about success?
• 35:46
  Jordan Tait: Yeah. So I had to think about this one before, but for me, I've always lived my life based on the healthy habits that I wanna build and the habits of where I'm gonna go in my life. So a lot of that came from James Clear, who most people will know from Atomic Habits. And the quote that I left from him is every action you take is a vote for the type of person you wish to become. So when you think about the success you want in life, it's not based on these massive overhauls in your life. It's based on the small things you do consistently.
• 36:18
  Carly Ries: It's so funny you said that because I am relistening to an audiobook right now.
• 36:26
  Joe Rando: Atomic Habits.
• 36:28
  Jordan Tait: I have it right in front of me right now too. It's an amazing book.
• 36:31
  Carly Ries: I know. I was literally listening to it this morning. So, James, shameless plug for you. Jordan, where can people find you if they want to learn more about your business and kick start their solopreneur career in the right way?
• 36:47
  Jordan Tait: I spend most of my time on LinkedIn. That's where I post content every few days. I'm on LinkedIn under Jordan Tait. And then my website is www.theintentionalbusiness.ca.
• 37:02
  I'm based in Canada, but I serve clients across North America. And, wherever you are in your journey, whether you're dreaming about it, you're starting out, or you're further on and you're trying to figure out how do I optimize this so it actually works better for me, I'd love to connect, and I can ask you a few questions that might help you on the way. I also offer a free hour coaching just to give anyone a sample of what it's like to work together.
• 37:24
  Carly Ries: Awesome. Well, all of that will be in the show notes. we just can't thank you enough. This has been such a fun conversation, and we have loved having you on today.
• 37:34
  Jordan Tait: Thank you both so much. I love what you're doing, the community you're building, and I love how aligned we are in helping people build that lifestyle that they want from their business.
• 37:44
  Carly Ries: Absolutely. Thank you so much. And listeners, thank you so much for tuning in. All I ask of you, we love providing this content for you. We want to reach as many solopreneurs as possible and to help us do that, we would love a 5 star review. We would love you to subscribe on YouTube, subscribe on your favorite podcast platform. Until next time, have a wonderful week, and we will see you next week on The Aspiring Solopreneur.
• 38:17
  Closing: You may be going solo in business, but that doesn't mean you're alone. In fact, millions of people are in your shoes, running a one person business and figuring it out as they geo. So why not connect with them and learn from each other's successes and failures? At LifeStarr, we're creating a one person business community where you can go to meet and get advice other solopreneurs. Be sure to join in on the conversations at community.lifestarr.com.