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PM Collective - The ART of property management
The ART of property management with Ashleigh Goodchild is a leading platform supporting collaboration not competition through an online community and events throughout the year with one purpose: to create happier property managers. She creates connections for property managers looking to create momentum in their careers and personal life. Join Ashleigh and her guests as they discuss challenges, struggles, mental health, mindset and give advice to property managers and anyone in the industry. To get the support in your property management career, join our PM Collective Facebook and Instagram community.
PM Collective - The ART of property management
SPOTLIGHT EPISODE BY SHANNON WELCH: Practical Tips for Managing Stress in Property Management
Unlock the secrets to thriving in the property management industry with our special guest, Hermione from Sidekick, a seasoned professional who has seamlessly transitioned into a successful career in training, consulting, and coaching.
Discover her inspiring journey from managing properties to launching an outsourced inspection business, and ultimately finding her true calling in coaching. This episode promises to equip you with essential mindset strategies for managing stress and maintaining a balanced life amidst the chaos of work and family responsibilities.
Explore practical techniques for stress management with actionable tips such as talking to a friend, writing down your thoughts, and meditating. Learn how self-awareness and recognizing the signals of overwhelm can significantly improve your productivity and emotional well-being. From personal routines that offer moments of solitude to the science-backed benefits of gratitude, we share insights that will help you foster a positive outlook and transform daily challenges into valuable lessons.
Join us as we discuss the power of building strong support networks in the property management field. Understand the importance of shifting from a scarcity mindset to an abundance mindset, and how collaboration can lead to profound growth. Hear personal anecdotes that highlight the transformative impact of coaching and support networks, and celebrate significant business milestones with us. This episode is a treasure trove of inspiration and practical advice for anyone looking to navigate their property management journey with a more balanced and positive perspective.
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more business come about. You're obviously in property management before. I know a little bit of your background, but yeah, I'm keen to know more. So how did it all happen?
Speaker 2:Well, funnily enough, after being a property manager for many, many, many years, I was working in. I worked in training and consulting for a little while for another company. I did some software work with real estate software for inspect real estate, um. And then I wanted to kind of go out and start my own thing, to have more freedom and flexibility, like most of us who go and start our own businesses do, um, and originally it's funny you do what you do now, because originally Sidekick was an outsourced inspection business, so when it very first started it was to do outsourced inspections.
Speaker 2:However, I was pregnant at the time with my first child and I quickly realized I was not going to be able to be out on the road doing inspections, which would have been needed to build the business. So I kind of shifted and pivoted it over that time and I realized I started to do a lot more a bit of outsourcing kind of stuff, but more online. So I was helping businesses with a bit of like admin and you know I did a couple of it's like PM, temp support and things like that.
Speaker 2:But it didn't really go anywhere because I had I had this inspect real estate stuff going on and I was trying to build something else but I had had a first child, which anyone who's listening has child knows.
Speaker 2:It's a bit tricky to juggle all of that, so it kind of all got put to the side and then eventually, through going out and meeting people doing my other job with inspect real estate, people are like oh, like you know, you seem to know what you're talking about Do you do any training or coaching? And so I realized that I did really love training and coaching people and so I sort of pivoted it back to that and Sidekick then became you know, coaching, consulting and training for that property management space. So a bit of a pivot, a bit of a change in what it originally started in and on. But I think it's allowed me to really play to my strengths and since then I've done, you know, my own personal development work, I've done coaching courses and so now I'm able to really help people kind of get them from where they are to where they want to be in business and life and their mindset and all of those beautiful things.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's awesome, did you? Were you a property manager before starting with the other training company that you were at?
Speaker 2:Yeah, perfect, yeah I wonder that I did it for many years Like I didn't know, like most of us didn't know what I wanted to do when I finished school and ended up falling into a real estate reception admin kind of role, did a diploma in property and real estate at that time and then, yeah, just gradually worked my way up property officer, property manager, both here and overseas in London, and then ended up managing a really high-end portfolio in Sydney and then was managing a team of like leasing a new business for a multi-office agency and sort of ran their property management department during that time. Before then, yeah, moving to the adjacent services for supporting that industry yeah, cool, oh, that's awesome.
Speaker 1:I love that. Um, what was I gonna ask you? Oh, I had another question there, but it's gone anyway, yeah, no, that's really cool. So, um, I guess the main reason why I wanted to partner with you as well was because I love your mindset stuff like, I think last year for me obviously having Bo and trying to juggle the business and, um, basically, I had a team in the office that work for me and I'm so grateful for that um and I don't need to be there, you know 100% of the time, but you know my business is still my baby right?
Speaker 1:so you always want to make sure you're supporting your team too, I think, um, and then you were doing your Zen PN program and I jumped in on that and I loved it, so I think that was, yeah, main reason why I wanted to partner with you, because I feel like they were so. The things that you would teach or just get us to recognize was just so simple, but we don't recognize it or we don't look into it, and I feel like that's so important for a property manager.
Speaker 1:Days can get so overwhelming and people don't know how to deal with their overwhelm. I guess Do you have any kind of like tips for people that might be watching that would help with their overwhelm. Obviously, property managers we know that that's on the daily, we can feel that. I feel that as a a business owner, I guess we all do in any way. But do you have any tips on managing?
Speaker 2:that I suppose the first thing I would say is it probably comes back to that mindset piece and you know, hop on about the mindset.
Speaker 2:It's actually probably like, firstly, a believing that there is a different way of operating. So I think we get stuck in overwhelming property management but also life in this state of oh well, it's just busy, it's just overwhelming. That's just how it is, like we just kind of accept that that's the status quo and that's normal. But I think you know, for any of us, there are ways to better manage our time, become like more optimized in how we're spending our time. There's ways to better manage and be aware of our stress and actually become better at handling it. There's ways to improve how we deal with and handle conflict and all of these kind of different aspects that come into property management. So I think that first piece is that belief to kind of go okay, it doesn't have to be this way, like we can actually operate differently and, you know, be able to manage it and actually even be able to kind of thrive on it and enjoy it a little bit more, which I think has got lost along the way.
Speaker 1:Yeah, definitely, and I think that kind of ties into like, yeah, just first being aware of it, like being aware of when it's happening or how those I mean for me, I know when I get stressed or I'm getting to that point I get short, you know, with answers, even with Stu.
Speaker 1:Like I'll get stroppy at home or, um, I'll start running around the house, like my thing is like I'm on like speed dial, like literally like a racing car through the house and I'm like why am I being like this, like there's no need, but I've got too many things on.
Speaker 1:And I think for me I've started to understand that if I've got too many things in my head, one of my little, I guess, ways that I tackle that and I make myself realize that I am becoming overwhelmed or I am becoming stressed I write it all down, like I'll do like a brain dump and I'll get rid of it. I'll write it on a piece of paper and I even have it happened to the other week and even after doing your Zen PM program, I picked up so much from there. And then the other week I was talking to a girlfriend. She's like, can you just write it all down? She's not even in real estate, but she could see how, up here, I was freaking out about all these things and I was like you know what I do? I need to do that, and I don't know why I haven't done that, because that's what I've been doing for the last like six months and it just I just forgot about it again and then I wrote it down and, oh my god, I felt so much better again.
Speaker 1:I was like there's not even much I have to do I actually can delegate these things to the people that need to do them rather than holding on to it myself. So, yeah, I think that's one thing is like identifying it right and then actually understanding or giving yourself a strategy on how to tackle them.
Speaker 2:Moving forward is that sort of what you suggest to do yeah, oh yeah, and I mean I think there's so.
Speaker 2:There's so much in that. I think it like, often we we do know what the right thing to do is, but often the thing that's actually going to be best for us to calm us down or pull us out of that state, it's actually the harder thing to do so. Actually stopping instead of being in that momentum, actually stopping and pausing and pulling yourself out of that and making a proactive effort to sit down and write it down sounds easy in theory, but when you're in that default mode of just go, go, go, get through, that's actually harder to do that and as humans, we're, like, hardwired to stay comfortable, right. So it's actually harder to do the things like that until we practice them so much that they become easy, right? So then when you're in a habit, if you're doing that every day, it doesn't seem as hard because it's just part of your routine and your habit to write it all down or map out your day or plan it out, those things that are those habits, right?
Speaker 2:but, I, think it's like it's same in what you're saying. It's the awareness that a well, yeah, I know what to do, but it's the awareness that, oh, I have fallen off and we're all going to fall off right like I've. I fall off like I talk this and I teach this and I, you know, I'm out here preaching this every day but I still fall off. But the difference is, I suppose, because I've been practicing it for so long, I can now self-correct, and I can self-correct a lot faster than I would have say five years ago. Like five years ago the walls might have been the walls, the wheels might have been fallen off for a week, two weeks a month, a couple of months a year, I don't know. Like a long time before. Like maybe a friend would say, hey, maybe you should try this.
Speaker 2:But like now, the awareness and practicing those like it's like I can catch myself. And it's like what you're saying in the signals, it's like, okay, am I running around like a headless chicken? Am I snapping at my kids? Am I, you know, not doing the things that I know are going to keep me and my business going? Like am I missing all of that because I'm stuck in a state of overwhelm, and there's nothing wrong with us when we're in that state, like we're just kind of probably in a stress state, and when we're in that state we can't think clearly and we can't process properly, because we are in a different, our brain is being wired differently at that point.
Speaker 1:Yeah, exactly.
Speaker 2:So having a friend to talk to or writing it all down or going for a walk, or breathing or meditating or just taking a break and pausing for a second, like it's a slightly harder thing to do, but then it calms our nervous system and then we can actually think clearer, we can actually feel calmer and we can process at a higher level yeah, yeah, definitely no.
Speaker 1:I think when we're just talking about that now, one of my things um to like, it's almost not like switch off but just kind of reboot, because I obviously work night as well, like most of us do. Um, but I'll get home obviously. I'm come home from work. I'm often making phone calls even on the way home from work. We, you know, we grab the kids or we do whatever we need to do when we get home. So you're immediately you have to turn your your phase into mum mode, right, and try and not be half work mode and half mum mode, like I think that was one thing.
Speaker 1:I've really coming back into work in the last um four weeks with both daycare and all of that. I've really made sure that I'm real intentional with that um. But one thing for me I'm getting there is, um, having a shower at night. It it's the weirdest thing, but just like I can't relax until I've had a shower by the end of the day. It's something about just standing under the shower and it just it's water, I think. I think water has a lot to do with it as well. I don't know if that's like. I think that's something to do with mindset and all of that and just being around water and all that. For me it's always like I'm washing the day away. And then I come out and I'm like cool, like I can sit down and work for another hour in front of the tv. Like it's obviously not hugely productive, but I'm chill. I've got rid of all of that feeling and emotion and I don't know something about it. It just really helps me. Do you have anything weird like that? I guess gets you into that.
Speaker 2:Then that, then part, or um, well, I have, like, I have a theory on this, and I don't know that it's been scientifically studied or anything like that, but I always, like I always say you know, have you ever wondered why, like, your best ideas come to you in the shower, or like you suddenly get clarity in the shower or you suddenly feel calmer after a shower.
Speaker 2:And, yes, there's definitely some stuff around. You know water and the flow and all of that sort of stuff. But I have this theory is like for people like you and me when else in our day, from the moment we wake up to the moment we go to sleep, do we have a time where there is no one talking to us? We're not listening to anything, we're not receiving anything, we're not checking anything, so there's no nothing coming into our heads, right? We're not listening to the radio, we're not seeing advertising, we're not looking at what's happening on the road. Like it's one point in that day, for those few minutes, where there's nothing coming in. So after that moment of standing there, it actually allows our brain to go okay, I can process some stuff and I can wash all this stuff away.
Speaker 2:It's probably the same as when you're falling asleep at night. Again, you're like oh, that's popped into my head and that's popped into my head and I'm like, I'm thinking again, you have to probably email yourself or write stuff down. But I think part of that is probably because it's like like, and I'd ask you when else in the day. Do you have a time where you do nothing else? Yeah, but there's no messages, no kids at you, no, no one asking you questions, no radio, no podcast, like nothing. Is there any other time in the day when that happens?
Speaker 1:I know there's literally not. Is there now when you actually ask the question? There isn't. Some people might say like the toilet, but you can take your phone to the toilet. Your kids can knock on the toilet door, which actually happens.
Speaker 2:I never believed it before, but I do share the toilet with my children it is the thing right, yeah, yeah, it's, yeah, there's some alarming stats like but like there's a lot of people take their phone to the toilet. There's even more alarming stats that no one actually washes their phone or sanitizes their phone, but that's for another day yeah, um yeah, no, I think the water thing is.
Speaker 1:I think I've read a lot about it and it does. It makes sense how you say it now. There's literally no distraction, there's nothing. You can't hold your phone, you can't like.
Speaker 2:Well you know sometimes someone might come in and try a conversation but it doesn't happen.
Speaker 1:Often it's yeah, it's so maybe that's something that can help other people too. I find it really helps me, like I. I just don't feel relaxed if I don't have that shower. I have to just have that and then I'm like so good to go. It just makes it. It makes my night feel like accomplished.
Speaker 2:I feel like I'm I'm good, I'm just resting, I guess yeah yeah, and I think that's the thing is, everyone's got to find, you know, what works for them. You know we could say you should go and do an hour yoga class at the end of your day to become calm and zen and all that sort of stuff. But I suppose it's like you know, as you know from probably doing the zen pm program, like you know, that's not feasible for everyone to go and become a you know buddha, zen swithi, drinking goddess every day. Right, it's like we have to actually find, fine, how do we actually bring more calm throughout our day? So, finding the moments, not the hours, but like the moments, like the shower or just at least going okay.
Speaker 2:I'm not going to take my phone to the toilet or like, yeah, just if you, if you're waiting for something as well, like we're prone to just pick up our phone while we're waiting for a doctor or a you know, next appointment or anything.
Speaker 2:It's like maybe just trying to find a couple of more moments throughout your day where you can just do nothing and like I've even started if I've got a drive now. I used to put podcasts on all the time or call people, and sometimes now I just drive with nothing on, like just silence.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I'm exactly the same. I was loving yeah, loving the podcast and loving doing that self-development, I guess, and listening to so much. But, yeah, the last couple of weeks I've been like no, I'm just going to hold off on a minute and just not, and it's been nice as well. Don't get me wrong. I feel like I've got a backlog of things I need to listen to now.
Speaker 1:But it's still been nice and I think that's what you've got to pick and I guess that sort of moves into like how do we kind of offer a bit of a solution to property managers for preventing those future stress bombs, sort?
Speaker 1:of thing and I know a lot of you talked a bit about, um, like gratitude.
Speaker 1:I'm really big on that and I think, um, my hubby has done that to me because he's very grateful for everything in his life. I often tell people he would happily live in a tree house as long as he has his laptop and his phone that allows him to work, because he loves what he does. He genuinely loves what he does and that's why he works maybe 90 hours a week like he just loves it. Um, and I think sometimes when I talk to people property managers and they're feeling really stressed and they're not enjoying their positions, I think it's almost coming back to just remembering that we can be grateful for so much more and I feel like that almost sets you up for the day. I think you talked about writing a bit of gratitude in the Zen PM program, I think as well, like every morning. I think we talked about that briefly, but is that sort of? Is there anything you can suggest for preventing the stress from happening? Or not necessarily prevent, but just help ease in every day?
Speaker 2:Yeah, oh, I mean, I think that's the whole thing. I think and I'll say I say this in many of my training sessions is like I'd love to wave a magical wand and tell you that there's going to be no more stress in your life, but like there will be, like it's part of life. We can't, we can't have the highs without the lows and and in between. But I think what happens is we get lost in focusing on the lows, on the negatives, what's wrong, like all the crap, and when we do that, like our mind keeps looking for more of the same right we've got. You know, there's many different things going on, but it's almost looking for what we believe like evidence that that is true.
Speaker 2:So it's like, if we're focused on the negative, we're focused on oh, this is crap and this is bad, and like, oh, this is hard. Like we're gonna find more things like that in our life and the, the practice of gratitude, and it's something I've actually really um, I struggle with myself, though, because they tell, they tell you to, you know, write three things every day you're thankful for. On those sort of things, I'm like I don't know. I really struggle with that. I'm like I'm like I don't know my cup of coffee. The sunshine like I find it hard to find meaningful things yeah, but the theory behind it is it's just starting to program your mind to look for the good.
Speaker 2:So, even if it's really basic stuff, like it actually just starts to program your mind to look for the positive things, right, um, you know there's a. Um, there's a, there's a couple of different like studies and stuff that have been done on this, but like it's sort of like that effective if I tell you oh, shannon, I just went out and got a new blue mazda car, right, and then you go out, you become aware of that, you suddenly start seeing blue mazda cars everywhere. Now those blue mazda cars have always been there. Your brain has just not been looking for them. But now you know I have one and you've seen me in mine. So like you're probably going to notice more of them and so it's a little more complex than that, but it's that.
Speaker 2:That's why they say gratitude practice is important, because if you're starting to note the things that you're thankful for again, your mind starts going, looking for the good in each day and the positive in each day, and where you put your focus, more of that comes and you, you, you start to then notice more of those things. It's um so you know, I I struggle with doing it myself, but it is actually something I do with my kids. At the end of every day, I say you know, what was your favorite part of your day today? What was your, you know?
Speaker 2:who was your favorite friend, like what was your favorite food today, and I try and get them focused on what was good about me as opposed to, you know, if they've had a crappy day. So it's there's. There's science behind it. It's not just I think some people go like, oh, you know gratitude and journaling, it's all you know, airy fairy and woo woo, but there's actually science behind it and it's actually really big in the mental health space at the moment as something that can not stop the stressful things from happening, but help you to see the good in every day and help you to be a more positive person.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that makes sense yeah, definitely, it's realigning the focus to something positive, rather than it just consistently being all those things that are going wrong, essentially, and just focusing on that. Even, like you said, if it's something small, like the clean air that we get to breathe here in Australia, like who would even think about that? But when you actually stop and think of how, how lucky we are or how blessed we are, I should say to have that, like that is a really cool thing. Um, but yeah, I guess I'm the same. I don't write the three things down every day, but I know if I have had a really, you know, hard week or whatever and I'm feeling myself get overwhelmed again and I'll come back to going. Okay, let me just work out what are three like positive things that happened this week and then like, okay, it's not so bad, there were still positive things, like it's nice to just remember that. And, yeah, reflect, I guess, is that but, yeah, 100%.
Speaker 2:And I think also, um, one thing that's worked really well for me is, uh, practicing this growth mindset and I've spoken about this a lot in my like training and socials and things and it's like it's actually realizing that anything that's what we're perceiving as bad or negative or bad situation, that's happened. There's always something to learn from it in everything we go through. So if we can start to go, even if it's been a bad week, if I've had a crappy week, nothing's gone right if I can actually go okay, instead of being critical of myself, negative on myself, um, hard on myself, hating the world. If I can actually go okay, what, maybe? What worked, what was good, but also what didn't work. Why didn't it work and what could I change, like, what could I do differently? Because sometimes if there's nothing I could do differently, then I can kind of accept it for what it was.
Speaker 2:But if I go, okay, well, this week didn't work really well because I wasn't planned and organized, that's something I can fix and change. If this week didn't go well, you know, because, um, I don't know, like I didn't get any leads in my business because I haven't done any marketing, well, that's something I can like, fix and change, you know. So, yes, I'm looking at things with a, with a filter of having that growth mindset, in that we there's always something we can do to get better and improve. And so if we can just not look at things as failures and look at they're just, they're just opportunities for us to learn, get feedback and tweak and improve things, it sort of just leads us on this path of continual evolution and improvement yeah, taking more accountability for it, really isn't it, rather than just doing a poor me?
Speaker 1:it's like okay, what can I even change it?
Speaker 2:um, and I think that accountability, accountability or acceptance, if there's- nothing you can do like it's actually, you can kind of go well, it is what it is. Like you know, like, yeah, I can't do it's actually, you can kind of go well, it is what it is. Like you know, like I can't change it. Or you know bad stuff's happening in the world around you, like if there's nothing we can do to change it, like we just have to maybe accept it and kind of focus on what we can control.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, absolutely Sorry. I'm just telling you I'm running out of time again um we're almost there anyway.
Speaker 1:Um, that sort of brings me into property managers drowning in a to-do list, so, or anyone essentially.
Speaker 1:Um, I actually listened to an audio book the other day and the lady said in there um, you need to accept, just like what you've said now, um, you need to accept that you are never going to have nothing on your to-do list.
Speaker 1:And I was like that's really interesting because, like, we all try and tick off this to-do list and get everything off it and then we feel accomplished, right, but is there like the next day you're going to have a whole to-do list again.
Speaker 1:So, or you, consistently, within an hour, you think of something else that you want to write on that to-do list. So she said just feel comfortable with the fact that you're never going to finish the to-do list, but do it a different way, prioritize it, or, um, one of my biggest things that I say, and I like to try and encourage my team, my hoppers managers, to do, is I call it swallowing the frog, like getting that biggest thing done first, because then that just takes all that weight off your shoulders. If you don't do it first, you'll carry all that weight till the end of the day and you make it the last thing you do in the day, you probably won't get it finished, and then it carries on to the next day. So you've got all that weight, stress, anxiety, overwhelm happy. So, um, yeah, do you have any sort of tips on a drowning to-do list and kind of how to do it? I guess, or get things done.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean, I think there's a couple of things, and I think that's probably one of them. I remember that as a really big aha moment when I was a property manager, like because I was always like I have to get everything done and I was so stressed that I couldn't get everything done in one day, or that I'd get everything done and then tomorrow there'd be like a whole new list, like a. Yeah, I even remember I can I don't know, I can visualize it now that I remember, like the office that I was in, I remember the desk that I was sitting at and like I just remember kind of going like oh okay, property management, like you're never going to have everything done, and so I think then over time it was around okay.
Speaker 2:Well, how do I remove this stress and how do I get better at managing my time? And yeah, exactly what you said. Like you know, there's that green frog theory eat the green frog first. But I think I often find with myself and my clients, the big stress comes from finishing the day and feeling like you've been busy all day and working all day, but you, you actually didn't get the big things done. You feel like you haven't got anything important done.
Speaker 2:So part of that is flipping it to go okay, like when you have that to-do list, like that's great, like that's one level of time management.
Speaker 2:But the next level is actually learning how to prioritize that to-do list and, like in its simplest format, just using, like abc or 123 or color coding, whatever it is, to work out okay, what is must do today, like absolute must, what would be like nice to do today, and then what can wait.
Speaker 2:And so what happens is you might have, you know, 10 things on your list to start the day, probably more, probably 20. You know you might actually go okay, well, there's actually only three to five on there that actually have to be done today or the world will burn down, and then it allows you to go. Okay, I can actually look at myself at the end of the day and if I got through those things, I can actually be a bit less stressed at the end of the day. So I think the to-do list, or, you know, having a list, is one, but prioritizing it in order of importance and knowing your priorities is level two, and then level three is actually the concept of time blocking. So it's then taking those priorities and knowing okay, priority one that's going to take me an hour to do, and going to your calendar for the day and actually like blocking it in there, so that your day is actually like blocked out.
Speaker 2:Within you know maybe 15 minute increments and you can actually see what you've got on for the whole day. If you look at my calendar, mine is literally like get kids ready, take kids to school, come back, plan and do my daily planning. Do my emails like do this phone call, do that bit for my socials, like every single day, unless I've fallen off the wagon, is literally blocked out, because then what it allows me to do I can clearly see exactly what I'm going to get done that day. I can let go of the other stuff or I can start to put some of the other stuff on future days, so I can feel like I can get it done on another day. And it also means that if new stuff comes in right, something new lands in my inbox or on my phone, or like a new thing comes in, yeah, I don't just say, yep, cool, I can do it now.
Speaker 2:I can look at my day and go, okay, well, I've got a full day ahead, so I need to either go that's more urgent than what I've got planned and move something, or go actually yeah, I can get that done for you, but not until Friday, as an example yeah, so it allows me to kind of forecast and know what I've got coming up, as well as then making sure I'm getting those important things done, and I think for me and the clients that I've implemented that kind of methodology with it allows them to be much less stressed at the end of each day yeah, I think it's so achievable too, and I think that's the main thing.
Speaker 1:Is that, like, that's what I mean when I said at the start that there's so many things that we can do that seem so simple, but we just forget and we just don't put them in place. So, yeah it, it's making things that really are easy and just becoming a habit. Like you said at the start, it just has to become that habit. If people are doing it, then it makes it easy, um, in terms of like support network, um do you have any sort?
Speaker 1:of ideas or tips and things around that. There's a lot of. I find there's a lot of property managers obviously going out on their own nowadays or they're working for boutique companies, so they're not around too many people. Um, I speak to a lot of them, I guess because you know we're quite heavy on social media and we do offer that. Like I say that all the time, just jump in my DMs, I'm happy to chat and it's nice for me too. That's my support network and I love it. But, yeah, do you have any sort of tips around that? How to create their own little support crew, I guess?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I hate to bring it back to mindset again, but I find for a lot of people it's actually just knowing that everyone's doesn't have to be the competition. I think a lot of us have that like, oh, I can't be friends with someone else who does what I do because they're in competition with me.
Speaker 2:But I've got some of my clients are in the same suburb, in the same network and they are friends with their competition and they call each other and they lean on each other and each other. So I think shifting that mindset to go, you know, collaboration over competition is a thing and it can completely change how you network and how you build that community of people around you. First of all, yeah, but yeah, let's, um, you know, let's, let's be open to that. And then let's look for opportunities where whether it's through, you know, like the coffee and conversation catch-ups that happen, or going to conferences, actually staying for the networking, or actually, you know, getting out of your circle and going and talking to someone new, like that's how you build friendships. Again, I got to another two of my clients. They didn't know they were going to an event, neither of them knew each other.
Speaker 2:I told them to go and talk to each other and they, they're like now, super friend, like super best friends and it's like, yeah, you don't know the new contacts are going to be, but you kind of have to put yourself out there a little bit. So, attending events, putting yourself out there, shifting the mindset, um well, yeah, like you know, if you're really alone, like you know, reach out to people like you and me on socials and just, yeah, say hey, I'm really struggling with this and I'll always give advice. If I can, like, I'll point you in that direction yeah, a hundred percent, I think.
Speaker 1:Um, I even spoke to a girl the other day where her um her business owner wasn't the type to share. So she found it really hard. She called up with me to have a coffee because she was like I love what you're doing with social media and stuff.
Speaker 1:She goes, but I couldn't sit myself in a room of other BDMs and talk about my BDM process and I was like, but it's not like that and I just I don't know, I couldn't explain it, but she just said I think it's, she thinks it's a way that she's always been around, um, you know a business owner that hasn't allowed that um, and says keep things quiet, keep it to yourself.
Speaker 2:You know that sort of thing, so I'd love know.
Speaker 1:So I was sort of saying, in terms of that support network, I was speaking to my property manager and yet she was super happy to catch up with me, but she just couldn't believe that I caught up with, like other people in my industry essentially, and she was like, how do you do that?
Speaker 1:But she's always been around business owner that doesn't encourage her to do that and says no, that's your idea, that's our idea, like let's not share it. And it's really, even to this day she still feels that same way. She still can't put herself and she's actually removed from that business now and she's gone out on her own or partnered with one other person. And she's actually removed from that business now and she's gone out on her own or partnered with one other person. And she's still in that mindset. And I've tried to sort of encourage her. No, like it gets ideas, everyone's there to help, like that sort of thing. Um, and yeah, she just, she just. I don't know if it's a confidence piece or not, but I can't put my finger on it. To be quite honest with you, um, but I guess there's a lot of people that I'm sort of don't feel like that. Do you think? Do you come across that?
Speaker 2:oh, I can speak from, yeah, absolute first-hand experience with that, like I was. You know I've worked for one or more people that were 100%, you know, closed books. You know that's the enemy, that's the competition. You know we don't collaborate or liaise with them, like they're the enemy type kind of approach and like it forms a belief system.
Speaker 2:So, and for anyone where you want to even make a change, where it comes back to a belief system, a core belief system being changed, like it's a hard one to change and it actually takes the awareness piece that we were talking about before, it takes, um, the mindset piece, to kind of know like it doesn't have to be that way and that you can think differently and you actually then have to start thinking and believing different things and trying to put yourself in those situations and it's, um, it's definitely not something that can shift overnight. But, yeah, if you are listening and you are stuck in that space of, oh well, you know you can't, you can't meet up with people and you can't share with the competition, I would encourage you to, yeah, a, consider why. But B, maybe look into the concept of an abundance mindset versus a scarcity mindset.
Speaker 2:So a scarcity mindset believes that there is not enough. There is, you know, we've got to keep it all for ourselves, whereas an abundance mindset is there is more than enough for everybody. Right, the right people will come to me, the right people will go to the other people. There is more than enough to go around, there's, there's more that will come. And so for me, until I really worked on my mindset to kind of move from like you know, I've got to keep it all to myself and, you know, protect everything that's mine to okay, like there's more than enough for everyone, like I think it wasn't, until I really worked on that that things probably shifted. But also then being exposed to other people who thought that way, so once I wasn't working anymore, just then, by nature of seeing people like you know, hearing people like yourself and other people who are, wow, so open to sharing and collaborating, leaning into that and being a part of that really helped to shift things as well yeah, I think it's being around those people.
Speaker 1:So, even if you don't feel at the point where you can share which is obviously that struggle that they're feeling even just attending the coffee and conversations, that or whatever for us here it's team collective but just being there you don't have to have an input, input, you can just sit there and watch right and just sort of take a back seat for the first time and, yeah, it puts you out of your comfort zone. But we all know that when we do that, we feel so much better after right most of the time and, yeah, I think when you are in that situation, it probably makes things a lot easier to understand. Oh, so this is why and this is what they're talking about it's actually not how it was perceived to be or how we were programmed by those previous managers or business owners or that sort of thing and it actually like you.
Speaker 1:You said, um a week or so ago, there's a lot going on in your space at the moment, um, in terms of coaching around property management and stuff like that, and you said the same thing that there's going to be people that will come to you, um, because they will feel that they will feel drawn to you rather than another person. It's good to have options. Um, so I guess, in terms of that, like what, how do you, um, how does your coaching style and your business sort of instead of things I think coaching can be can sound really boring at times, right, and like people want the coaching, but then they're going. Well, what can I learn from this person? Or, like, is it actually going to be that effective? Like, what are some of the things that you feel that you offer compared to other people in your space?
Speaker 2:essentially, yeah, oh, and I mean it's exactly what you said, right, like, and I think there is this, a there's more than enough business to go around like I don't feel threatened or upset that if you know, 20 more coaches came into the space tomorrow, I'd be like awesome, amazing, because now more people have access, more people can get the right person for them like I might not be the right person for everybody, and that's okay. Um, I suppose for me and I and I've had to like work through this myself to really learn the difference between training someone and coaching someone, and I think, um a long time, I was definitely training people, so I would be more teaching, meditating, information strategies, tools, like. I remember, you know, my first coaching sessions, people would come on and I would probably spend, you know, it would be 70% of the time me talking versus 30% of the time them talking. Now, through my own development as a coach and my own coaching skills and courses that I've done, my coaching is very I suppose it's more consultative, right?
Speaker 2:So, if you come on a coaching session, I'm trying to work out where are you at right now in your life or business, or wherever you're at. I'm trying to look at, okay. Well, where do you want to be? How do you want to feel? What do you want to be doing? What do you want things to look like? And then I'm trying to work out what's in the way of that, right? So if you're not where you want to be, there's something that's in the way. It might be that you don't have the right skills and knowledge. So how do we get that for you? You might have some belief or mindset that's stopping you from getting there. You might have some time or physical blockages from actually allowing you to achieve what you want to achieve, or a variety of other things that might be getting in the way. So a lot of my sessions now it's 30% me talking and asking questions, but it's actually helping the person I'm working with work through their stuff to get to, almost sometimes, the conclusion on their own.
Speaker 2:Like there is obviously still a bit of the teaching and training element especially. You know you know where people are, you know maybe stuck, and I can kind of guide them to the right solution. But I think it's my, I suppose my. I don't even know if it might not be different to the way that other people do it, but I really feel like the way that it works best for me and my clients is A me understanding that I don't have all the answers, but I'm very good at helping people work out the plan and the strategy that's best for them and helping them.
Speaker 2:Then, when they go okay, well, here's where I want to be, but I don't know how to get there. It's like, okay, well, here now are the steps and behaviors of whatever you need to go and do and implement to help get you there and then keeping that person accountable along the way, not not in like a stick approach, but like hey, we didn't get there, so what's happened? Let's do that reflection process Like I spoke about before what worked, what didn't work and how can we shift and change that for next time. So I'd say that's the style and approach I take when I'm trying to work with people.
Speaker 1:Yeah, for sure. I think it's almost like just having someone in your corner as well, especially if you're, you know, solo business owner and that sort of thing.
Speaker 1:Obviously, I'm sure you work with large teams as well, but for me it's I don't know having someone there that you're accountable to, but also, yeah, it's like you're holding my hand through that process and I think that's one of the hardest things for people who are solo. I've actually just hired a coach for, like, my health and fitness side of things and I am on a weight loss journey and just having her there has.
Speaker 1:I don't know why. It's just clicked this time and I've had a lot of money for her, like it's not cheap, but it's not always the money factor. I think for people as well, because sometimes you can just pay for something and you forget you've paid for it in a way, like it does, and I don't know. It's probably sound ridiculous, but it's not as accountable, I think. But having her there, I have to check in every week, I have to talk to her about what I got through, what I didn't get through, why I didn't get through it. And I'll admit, the last six weeks since we've come back from Christmas, I've really fallen off, but she's always been there and I've been able to talk to her and she helps me build those habits and it's just those small steps and having that person actually hold your hand through. Um, you know, there's just something about it. So I think that's sort of when you're a solo person, it's nice to just have someone in your corner.
Speaker 2:Um, oh, 100% and I think that's a lot of my I would say the bulk of my clients are those small business owners. They have, um, started their business, they've got it to a certain size and then they need to grow, they need to bring on team, they need to put systems in place. They need, they want to go to that next level and, yeah, it's, it's hard to do that on your own because what you've got you to that first you know, 50, 100 clients isn't what's get you to three, four hundred clients. So it's, it's a different um, it's a different ball game to have someone in your corner. Like you say and a lot of people say that to me when they first start working I just want, I just want someone in my corner, someone to bounce ideas or someone to just, you know, keep me accountable, hold my hand through it.
Speaker 2:Um, which you know, ironically, with psychic not really starting as this kind of business, psychic actually is a really good name for it because, like that's what I aim to be is that coach in their corner. I'm like, I want to be their psychic. I want to be the one that's there cheering them on, giving them a nudge, like trying to, like you know, help them fight the battles that they're out there fighting. So, um, I think it's a good analogy as to, yeah, what I'm trying to do when I'm working with someone as a coach.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's awesome. No, you seem to be doing amazing things, so well done. How long has it been now that you've had a business?
Speaker 2:Today, when we're recording, is actually Sidekick's ninth birthday since I started the business. Sidekick's nine years old, but probably full-time in this doing the coaching. It's probably been about three years now, so right, yeah, cool, yeah, oh, it's so cool.
Speaker 1:That's exciting. Nine years we're actually we're nine years in almost for property assist, so it's so cool. There's actually a couple of other people that have been in business the same kind of time like that came to 10 years around, so it must have been something in the water at the point we all get fed up and wanted to go out on our own, yeah literally, literally. Oh, thank you so much. Did you have anything else you wanted to kind of squeeze in there?
Speaker 2:no, that's all good. I think there's some good else you wanted to kind of squeeze in there. No, that's all good. I think there's some good chats and some, yeah, some good content in there. I think, yeah, I think it's covered a lot of ground. Yeah, definitely.