The Floral CEO

 Hello, flower Freds. This is Jen and you are listening to the Floral CEO podcast. On this week's episode, I wanna talk about burnout. Uh, last week I had a very big week. It was, especially on Saturday, it was a 21 feet long. It ended up being, and then. Three feet on each side, and then it was larger than the actual structure itself, so it was probably almost like 80 square feet of flowers on this hanging installation.

And my tear down person was out of town that I normally use, and there was a room flip and it was like Saturday. I had got up at the crack of dawn to get there because we had this installation really complete about like 90% complete. So the only thing we were adding on site was Pampas grass. I know Pampas grass was in the house, um, and hanging amaranthus and then just transition blooms in between the cages.

And I was tired. You guys, like I had worked really hard. The cages, we used the jumbo cages, so they were heavy. Um, I had worked out last week. I had. You know, taken the kids a million different places. So like, hashtag life is happening. And then I had these weddings I was trying to finalize for this week and like the actual day of details, like, seemed like some were changing and a wedding planner was out of town.

It's fine, but it's not fine when it's a big pile of shit all like on top of each other. And on Saturday I just was like, I had a bunch of stuff that I could have done at our Bloomington house 'cause we need to clean out a few things before the house. Um, we closed on the house and I was like, fuck this.

I deserve. To relax. I deserve to rest. And I went and got my nails done and I went and got a little mini massage at the mall and I just chilled for a bit, which is really unlike me. But I realized it was a pretty important chill because I was feeling the burn. And so one of the big things I think that.

Really gets in the way of people being able to consistently deliver is that they let things just peak up. It's like a tea kettle. They're never pouring out that excess, so their tea kettle's just super filled and it boils over fast. But if your tea kettle is half full or you. Put and fill your tea kettle and you don't keep refilling it, you just run it until it's empty.

That is going to feel better. That is going to feel more in alignment with realistically you, you know, being able to maintain success. I've told this story before, but I have a mastermind member that they were in their shop. And there was shit everywhere. Like it was just busy. And they sent a picture of it and I said to 'em, this is, I was like, you should be proud of yourself because this is what success is.

This is what success is defined when you have a shop that you are bustling with orders, that things are crushing it. And the thing that's really important to, to reflect on is that. Do is, is that what is in alignment with you? Because what's in alignment with me is not in alignment with most people. Most people are like, when they see the, the volume of the work that I'm doing, all the different things, the momming, the, the CrossFit, the farmer now, I mean all the things, they're like, I couldn't do that.

So really kind of understanding what your threshold is, is the first part of really understanding how you're going to avoid burnout. Because if you don't know what feels comfortable and you overbook, it could easily turn out that way. So I always think that ramping up, instead of just diving into the deep end, wading into the.

The kitty pool area really helps you understand what feels good, and I have had coaching clients that are like, I cannot do more than one wedding weekend. I have had coaching clients that are like, we can do five. You know, like everybody is different, and that means everybody's burnout level is different.

I have to be going really, really hard for me to feel like I need a break. My burnout usually is exacerbated or I'm feeling more burnt out. If I'm having, like I, I was in two car accidents. I don't think I've ever talked about this. Actually. I was in two car accidents. I both, I was rear-ended one time in my van and I was t-boned in 2001, I believe it was.

And the kid was just cruising and Totally you know, just. Slammed into the side of driver's side of my vehicle, and I have neck pain. Like I've, I've had it for years now, and as I've gotten older, it's just gotten exacerbated and then it gets kind of better if I am doing CrossFit the right way, which is part of the reason why I go to a personal trainer because I wanna make sure that I'm doing it in the right way to support my neck being healthy and.

It's funny because it, it is definitely, I felt like it's stronger, but if I'm doing things that I'm using my neck muscles or around my shoulders, like I get headaches easier and that is so much when my neck or my body isn't feeling good, it is so easy to feel like that's a trigger for me to feel like things are too much.

So I wanna talk about ways to avoid. Season burnout. Um, and we're gonna actually talk about 10 of them. The first thing is if you are feeling like things are heavy. Start time to start managing people's expectations about communication. Put an out of office reply on that. Lets clients know that responses may be delayed during peak wedding weeks or whatever.

Maybe you could even include some helpful links or an FAQ page, uh, that will just help reduce your overall email volume. Or maybe you need to get help in your inbox. That is a thing. You can hire a virtual assistant to help manage your inbox. All right. The next thing is batching your communication.

Batching. Anything you're doing realistically is going to be more helpful today. An example of of batching was alive and well in our studio because I had. Someone batching doing all of, there was actually like three people doing all of the rose processing. Then I had someone doing the batch work on all of the foam that we needed for the week.

Then another person was. Cleaning the Bud VAs. So we weren't going from task to task, we were batching. Like this whole task is going to be done. And when you segment tasks and you segment your attention and you segment your focus and your energy, like it's a cluster. So I try to do strategic times where I go in and I'm responding to emails because I'm going in with clear.

Communication that I am going into, this is what I'm going to do. I don't have my son yelling in the background, or I'm not just picking him up from camp or something like that and trying to respond to somebody where I, when I hear kids yelling, when I'm in the car, when I'm not focused, when I'm on a tiny keypad, all the things not helpful.

So try to batch your communication batch. Whatever, so that you can avoid constantly checking messages and it will help protect your mental bandwidth. All right. I just mentioned outsourcing, but that is a great way to manage burnout. You can go in and hire freelancers or far part-timers or like I mentioned, virtual assistance for admin work, de delegate, bouquet deliveries, clean up, tear down.

Supply runs, building foam processing roses, whatever it is, if there are things that are going to help make things feel less heavy for you, I know it is a financial investment, but you are going to be a better human in the end because you are going to be able to be functioning. In a higher capacity that isn't strung out, that isn't reactive.

When somebody reaches out like, oh God, I don't even wanna talk to another client because you're, you're tapped out. Let's stop tapping out and let's start tapping into to good energy and to creating space for yourself to grow. Without space, you will not grow. All right. The next one, and I, I wholeheartedly do this because you never know what kind of emergency you're going to have.

And my emergency kit comes with on every event, and it is, basically every single thing that I've ran into that we need. So it has zip ties in it. It has. Floral putty. It has floral glue, it has wristlets, it has, um, safety pins, downy wrinkle, releaser different clippers, uh, ribbon, scissors, everything.

Everything I've, it's got business cards on the top of it. 'cause I always get asked when I'm like in the middle of something for a business card at a venue when I'm setting up. So I have my business cards in there, like this emergency kit is. My go-to fail safe so that I'm not unprepared in case something happens.

All right? Then automate repetitive processes. So if you are constantly going into the gram and you are, you know, okay, I gotta do this post, I gotta do this post, and you're going in to do this post and you're just dragging ass, and then you're doing that like every day. You are segmenting your focus and your time, and your concentration and your energy.

Over little bursts that are not as effective if you just batch that content. So use a scheduling tool or something similar to help batch your social media content to make it more brand cohesive, to make that energy of focus towards that specific task, really on point so that you can move forward and get all of those done and take that worry off your plate.

It is a really easy to do and something that I feel I, it just saves time. It saves headache and then you can have chat GBT to help write your captions 'cause you're on your desktop and you're planning things just so much easier. And then you can also automate other processes. So like.

Templates for proposals, templates for emails templates for invoices, templates for your inquiry. Templates for your brochure, whatever it is, like create systems for those repetitive processes with templates or playbooks of communication to make things easier. All right? Then blocking out recovery days if you were going hard.

Going hard, going hard and have no rest. Your body is going to run outta battery. If you do not ever get back on the charger, you're gonna run out. So actually scheduling in like Sunday, I am not doing Jack shit. That is a good plan. Like this Sunday, I might need to run up to home Furniture to get the new sleeper sofa for up in the.

Floral Studio, um, because I am going to be hosting, like if one of you guys wants to come to the farm, hang out. Have a lesson, have life coaching, do business planning. I have a upstairs in our studio that's beautiful and has a bathroom and a shower and a little kitchenette, and you can stay here on the farm for a couple days while we work on your business.

So I need to get the sinker cell phone. And so other than that, I ain't doing shit. Because I have been working really hard. I actually on Sunday helped move 250 bales of hay for my neighbor. That's really helpful to us. So like I just am running to camp every day this week. I just need a break. I need a break.

And that is what Sunday is all about. So build in those breaks and I know that. Sometimes, and I, I know like that's, it's really hard for me to take a break because I am one of those people who is wired to be an achiever. And as women often it is hard because we are wired to be taking care of everyone and everything but ourself.

But we need to build in that time and we maybe even need to have a discussion with our partner. I need your support on this. But it is so critical and so helpful to have that recovery. All right? Prioritizing your health, prepping healthy snacks to be in the studio, making sure that you have built-in exercise, that you have a built-in space for exercise, I, I can have a full studio of people.

Working and I will still leave to go to CrossFit. Like I have prioritized that this is really important to me and this is happening. And if that is not the case for you, how can you make that happen? Because of, without. You taking care of yourself, taking care of yourself to prep some healthy snacks, to be drinking water, like you're just burning the foundation down.

You need to make sure you're taking care of you, foundationally going to the doctor. For me, if I don't go and get a massage, like my neck starts to be hurting more, and then that makes me. Really perform less. So what is it taking care of you that are like your non-negotiables? Like, this needs to happen for me to function.

And to me that's like taking my, my vitamins every day. I take several, like I take holy basil, I take, um, soft aloe because my. Spouse just don't function well. And I take you know, like a back pain medicine, like I need to take all those things. And if you don't even have time to open your pill bottles, 'cause this used to be me I'm like, I, I can't even, I can't even spend time doing like opening all this shit.

Like I'm just gonna skip it. That is not helpful. So what is your bare baseline? For taking care of yourself and how could we even elevate that to take care of yourself at a higher level? All right, then this is also something I've worked on for years and just saying no, when something doesn't feel in alignment, saying no, when things are overwhelming, when things feel extra saying no, when.

You're, I mean, you could really use the money, but like the damage that it would do to your mental state or your physical health is not helpful. So really figuring out like, what is my tipping point? Like, where are we at right now that if I took the job on that week, how is that week going to feel if I took that job on?

Am I gonna feel strung out like I'm an addict? Or am I gonna feel like Wonder Woman? Am I gonna feel like I'm unstoppable, that I can do anything? Because this client is so in alignment with me and, uh, this other wedding planner, I love working with them. So doing two feels really good, or I literally, this past weekend had a horrible experience yet again.

With a cultural decorator, not mine. My faves, this is a new one that I've dabbled with and they are such a tornado of a mess. I decided this weekend I can no longer work with them because every time something is fucked up and it's not on me like they went and. Of course had $110 budget for a compost that they would give me the compost.

They sent me the dimensions to the compost, which was five inches wide and five inches tall. I'm like, I can do hydrangeas and a couple roses over it for that budget. No big deal in your, they drop off fruit bowls, you guys, fruit bowls that are 11 inches wide and five inches tall. Not even close. I was so disappointed 'cause they also dropped them off two days late and were really, they're, they suck at communication.

And here it is a fruit bowl and I mean. It was from Amazon. So they said they had them, they ordered them from Amazon. I'm like, you could have just had them delivered, but these were not what we had agreed upon. So here was this like this is twice as big. I don't even have enough product for this, so I just can't do it unless we use something of mine and it's way smaller.

And they end up inevitably agreeing with that. But I ended up inevitably coming to the determination that I can't work with these crazy people. 'cause this was like, they're always having me send pictures of everything that I make because they wanna make sure that it looks like what they sold the client.

And I'm like, you guys have given me inspiration pictures. I'm not an idiot. I can copy a picture or take the essence, but have it within your budget. But it's just. Crazy. So protect yourself against people who basically steal your energy or. Make you angry. Like I was angry. I'm like, are you kidding me? I come into my garage at our Bloomington home and I look down, I'm like, what in the hell is this?

This is not at all. It was so far off that it was ridiculous. But they don't see that in their culture like they are always crazy, always crazy. Like this is just standard operating procedure to be back. Shit crazy and that's just not gonna work for me. I just. Don't need any crazy in my life. I have animals to be crazy.

I don't need anybody else. So coming up with those hard boundaries is something that takes time. It is an evolution. But once you can save with conviction, no way. I will not be doing that. Like it feels so good that you've come to this point, that you've elevated to this point of being a fucking rockstar.

That you don't need to work with people like that because it's not worth it. All right then. Creating systems for your team. Developing like really clear roles on who does what and everybody knows exactly what they're doing. This re really reduces for one confusion. People do not like working in a space of confusion.

Two. It also helps everybody just have a task and have focus on those tasks, and so everybody's not segmented. Again. It's like that batching, this is my task, and that is really helpful for keeping people on track to execute things on certain timelines, and to really just be accountable for producing specific things in your studio.

All right. Then another thing that I really work hard on. Is celebrating and reflecting. At the end of every event, I go around and I take video content and photos. For one photos I just document what I did, and then maybe I come up with something pretty for Instagram. Videos, I'm always thinking of content for you guys or content for just on, you know, my regular social of the floral business.

But this is something that is a system for me because I can go around and I can appreciate what I made. I can appreciate what I accomplished and I can sit in the moment for a minute of this is my business. I got to make these beautiful things and the bride or the client loves it. Like just sitting in this is fucking amazing.

You guys like, this is so amazing that this is what I do, that I get to create beautiful, magical things for people's events, and I get to create joy. I get to live in joy because it's so joyful for me to create those things. And with all of those things together and really reflecting, it's so much easier when you are living in your purpose and you're reflecting.

It really just counterbalances that exhaustion, that wedding se season can be, and exhaustion isn't fun for anybody, but. It's a lot easier to not be exhausted when you love what you're doing. So I hope one of the biggest things is you're doing something that you love, that this is something that brings you joy, something that brings you life, something that really is giving to you and that you can really just shine.

Because when you have that, the burnout stays away so much easier. But if you are living in resentment because you're undercharging, if you are living resentful of your business because it's just not producing the kind of income that you need, and so maybe you have a spouse who is salty about the situation or you are salty because you're working so hard and you're not being able to pay yourself.

That is one of the biggest factors of burnout, feeling resentful, feeling like you are being undervalued. So stop undervaluing yourself. Start knowing in your heart that you are worth it. You are worth charging accordingly, and you are worth taking of space to share your gift. So thank you so much for listening, flower Friend, and you have an amazing flower filled day.