Dale and I recently had to navigate hearing that two family members were taken too early from us, all within 7 hours. 

I have no words to express what that was like except just complete and utter sadness,  surprise, and disbelief.

I’m hoping that you’ve been lucky enough to be in a position where you haven’t had to experience this before, but if you have, you understand what I’m talking about.

And there is nothing greater than the feeling of something or someone disappearing too soon.

One of the biggest things that stood out to me as we navigated this and what life looks like in a period of loss was this:

The entire two weeks we were out of the office, only operating at 10% capacity, my business was self-sustained.

Because truly, the biggest blessing throughout this entire experience was having a business that could survive without me, a team that knew what to do in my absence, and ways to serve clients that didn’t demand my presence every single day. Which begs my first question for you: 

In preparation for the future,

How are you structuring your role today?  

All of those things I just mentioned came off the back of me previously deciding I wanted to set up a business that I didn’t have to be inside 24/7. 

In other words → I’m not required to be there for it to function, bring in revenue, or serve our clients. When our family needed us, we could leave at the drop of a hat.

We were able to say, “Okay, we’re booking a plane ticket. We’re flying back to the UK. Where do we need to be? How can we support? How can we shift gears from business to regular life mode and be there for people when they need us most?”  And that’s what we did. 

If you know my story, you know that I started out as a teacher who had absolutely zero freedom. Who was constrained to school holidays where I had to miss one of my closest friend’s wedding, being Maid of Honor, being there for the birth of their children, and so many other important life events because I was completely trapped in this work schedule.

And I have my team to thank so much for not being in that phase anymore.

Because I chose a route of offloading and hiring for the things I knew I couldn’t carry on my own, I can now step away and trust that they’ve got their part and I’m not responsible (or the bottleneck) for everything.

This is why I highly recommend looking realistically at what you can offload and hire for, because as the team becomes more efficient, they continue to take more and more off of my plate.

How are you structuring your company?

I really want you to start thinking about how you’re structuring your company and your business as a whole. This isn’t something that necessarily changes overnight, but it’s a slow, intentional change – something that you’ll continue to evolve and build on.

I know I still am.

But as we continue to grow as a team, as we continue to grow as a company, we’ll also continue to evolve the way this looks in the future as well. 

Are you in a position right now to step away and have everything continue? Or would your business need to be put on pause?

The final step

On top of having a team that carried so much weight, I had a business that was structured to run without me having to do 1:1 projects and have my hands in everything. We’re talking digital products, pre-made funnels, passive courses, and evergreen content. 

It felt so good to know that the choices that I made (and Dale’s clever funnel-work in the past) directly impacted our ability to step away together, to drop everything and leave to be a family when we were needed most.  And then to come back and say, “Oh, wow. We still made more sales. We still had more inquiries for client work. We still had new customers coming in. And our existing client base was still being served.”

But all of that was only possible because of the systems we diligently set in place.

And guess what? I want to teach you how to set up similar systems within your own company so you can actually achieve your income goals AND give yourself the flexibility to be with your family at the drop of a hat. To really lay the foundation for the dream life on your vision board.

If you want to learn more check out the Freedom Found Collective. This is a lifestyle-focused mastermind for the experienced copywriter ready to build a multiple six-figure brand, secure their Big Vision, and scale-up.

Tap here to learn more and apply now. We enroll small-group right-fit cohorts of copywriters ready to get in the room and grow their copywriting business alongside an expanding network of peers.