Month: November 2017

Here’s a Checklist for Using Your Values in Your Creative Business Projects

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Having strong personal values tends to be a common factor among creative business owners.

You can use these values in lots of different ways for deepening or growing your business.

One of the ways might be understanding which are non-negotiable and which are negotiable values, so you can choose the projects you want to work on with confidence. Read more about that here.

I have clear personal values which help ground me and my life, including the work I choose to do.

Before I take on any job, I have a checklist of questions related to my values which I run through to see where the job fits, and where it doesn’t.

I wanted to share how I made that checklist with you so you can create one for your own creative business.

Everyone’s values are different, so me sharing my exact set of questions won’t be that useful to you - but sharing the way I’ve constructed those questions will help you get organised so you can use your own values with confidence.

 

 

The first question I ask is always:

What are my first impressions and intuitions?

Sometimes, our intuition can tell us everything we need to know. We might not be able to explain, logically, what the problem is, but our intuition feels it.

The value questions are therefore a way to counter this intuition and make sure you’re not just relying on gut instinct.

How am I using [a value] in this project?

I ask myself exactly how I will be using each of my values in this project. Some of them are very clear: for example, for my personal value of ‘helping’, I can ask “How am I helping in this project?”.

Other of my values, like ‘nature’, require a bit more thought: the question might be “How am I valuing and respecting nature in this project?”

According to [a value], what specifically will I get out of this project?

I then ask myself what the benefits are to me of doing this project, in relation to my values. For example, one of my values is ‘learning’, so I ask myself, “What specifically will I learn during this project?”.

If I find it difficult to answer these questions, I can then ask myself “Why am I really taking on this project?”. The answer may be because it’s bread-and-butter work, in which case I can answer the remaining questions with this in mind.

Will what I get out of this project according to [a value] be useful to me in the future?

It’s important to think long-term with your creative business, so I consider what I might get out of a project, according to a value, which might be useful to me later down the line.

One of my personal values is ‘play’, so I might ask myself “Will the playful experimentation and new ideas I get out of this project be useful to me in the future?”.

You’ll have noticed that I don’t stick to a rigid question scheme, and instead mould it to fit what I’m talking about.

The key is to developing a themed question you can actually answer, not reproducing a specific question structure that might not make much sense to you.

How does the client/customer fulfil [a value]?

You’re going to be working quite closely with someone on a project and therefore writing down your understanding of how they fulfil (or don’t fulfil) a particular value of yours is very useful.

As an example, one of my personal values is ‘love’, so I ask myself: “Do the people who work at this company really love what they do?”, “Does the client demonstrate love and connection in their relationship with me and their customers?” and “Does the client believe love is an important part of their work?”.

Finally, I ask myself a set of questions based on the principles of sustainable marketing. These are more specific to my way of working, but I wanted to share one question with you which will add something extra to your values checklist.

How does this project acknowledge its role and responsibility in shaping the future of:
… the businesses involved in it?
… the customer receiving it?
… the community surrounding it?

As an independent creative business owner, this last question is so important. You want your business to last, and you want it to deepen or grow. You want to connect with your customer and other creative business people like you.

Understanding how this project - this one on your desk right now - will be shaping the future of the businesses that are involved with it (including your own), the customer receiving it and the community surrounding it is therefore essential.

By understanding these things, you can understand whether the project will help your creative business connect, deepen, grow and live for a long time. From that, you can make a more confident decision.

 

Here’s the full checklist of question structures so you can start creating your own:

  • What are my first impressions and intuitions?
  • How am I using [a value] in this project?
  • According to [a value], what specifically will I get out of this project?
  • Will what I get out of this project according to [a value] be useful to me in the future?
  • How does the client/customer fulfil [a value]?
  • How does this project acknowledge its role and responsibility in shaping the future of:
    … the businesses involved in it?
    … the customer receiving it?
    … the community surrounding it?

 

Having a values-led creative business means having a business that’s true to who you are and what you want to achieve in the world.

These questions are a simple way for you to organise those values so you can feel confident about selecting the right projects for you.

If you’ve found this article useful, please share it with your network.

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How I Pick My Projects Based on Personal Values as a Creative Business Owner

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The other week I had a fun brunch with Alix, who asked me:

“How do you do the work you do, and manage to stick to your values?”

If you run your own creative business, there will always be a time when you have to make a decision about a job which pays well, but doesn’t fit your values.

It might be that it’s the wrong sort of client, the terms of the project aren’t ideal, or it’s just not the sort of work you want to be known for.

The decision is between your personal values and the money.

Sometimes, you will choose the money, and I think that’s completely fine.

Bread-and-butter work might not be exciting but it pays the bills. It’s not called champagne-and-cupcakes work. It’s called bread-and-butter because it gets the cash in the bank and basics on the table.

I’ve taken jobs for the money, because I see what that money could do. It could pay the bills. It could be invested.

It could also buy me time elsewhere to spend developing projects and work that aren’t commercially viable yet. That money can get me organised and help me feel confident.

The key to taking on a job, even it’s mainly for the money, and still running a values-led business is knowing which of your personal values are negotiable, and which are non-negotiable.

For your creative business, a negotiable value is one you can easily find in your life without having to do it through work.

If the job doesn’t fit a negotiable value, you can choose to take the cognitive hit (and the cash).

For example, one of my values is ‘play’. It’s a negotiable value. Not all of the jobs I’m offered enable me to ‘play’ in one form or another.

But I might take those jobs because I can easily get ‘play’ elsewhere in my life at the same time as doing that job (for example, through creating my planner or what I wear that day).

One of my other values is ‘helping’. This is a non-negotiable value. I won’t take a job if I believe my work or the outcome of my work won’t help someone. Normally, this is the end user.

For example, if I got offered a copywriting job where I was ‘helping’ the client, but the article I had to write was focused purely on selling to the reader (the end user) and not giving them anything ‘helpful’, I wouldn’t accept that job.

It’s about knowing your personal values, knowing which are negotiable, and allowing yourself to take that bread-and-butter work if you can see that it will help you elsewhere.

Problems happen if you, as a creative business owner, consistently allow all your personal values to be negotiable.

You end up feeling frustrated at yourself, frustrated with the work you’re doing, and disappointed that you’re not creating a space in the world doing what you want to be known for.

I’ve worked in businesses whose values all became negotiable, and it ate away at the confidence of the people who worked there. There’s nothing to believe in when you negotiate on all your values.

Values are like roots; they steady and support you, and in times of confusion they can be relied on to ground you in what you know to be right.

Some of those personal values will be negotiable, and that’s okay. Know them and make sure to find them elsewhere if you decide to take on work which doesn’t fit with that value.

Sometimes you will take on a job for the money, and that’s okay too. Use the money wisely to help support yourself and direct the time towards what you really want to do.

I want you to think about your personal values.

  • What are they?
  • Which are non-negotiable, and why?
  • Which ones are negotiable? How could you fulfil these values if you take on work which doesn’t fulfil them?
  • What questions would you ask about a job to find out whether it fulfilled your values?
  • Do you know how much ‘bread-and-butter’ (aka cash) you need each month to keep doing projects which fulfil your values?

 

Knowing my personal values and deciding to build a creative business and brand around them changed my life. The key is knowing exactly how to use those values with confidence.

If you’ve found this article useful, please share it with your network.

 

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How to Organise Your Creative Business so You Can Take a Holiday Without Worrying

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You’re convinced you need a holiday. Now what?

(If you’re not convinced you do, read this first.)

The biggest myth for creative business owners when it comes to taking a holiday is that their business will collapse without them being there.

The truth is it won’t.

It might be tricky to manage. You might have to set up some things in advance. But you are not going to lose all your customers, piss off all your suppliers, and your business will not go up in flames if you are not there.

Your creative business does need you to function effectively and brilliantly, in its 10 out of 10 perfect experience. But if you go away, it might come down to a nine out of 10. Eight, at a minimum. Because you have a good business, with great customer service and good processes in place.

It doesn’t matter if your creative business is not perfect all the time.

(I really need to take this bit of advice to heart, pronto.)

You will go, you will drink sangria/long island iced tea/martinis [delete as appropriate], you will return and your business will still be brilliant. In fact, it’ll be more brilliant for the break you’ve had.

Here’s how to make that break work.

How to take a holiday as a creative business owner (and relax while you’re there)

 

1. Let customers know you’re going on holiday

Yes, that’s right, tell people you’re going away! Admit you need a holiday, and you’re taking one, and you’re going to bloody enjoy it. You are a human and so are your customers, and they will respect your honesty.

Be clear on how long you’ll be away for and what changes they should expect to your normal service. This information will alleviate any issues that might arise because you’re not there; people know you’re away so are likely to cut you a little bit of slack. How many times have you visited an Etsy shop to find that the owner is ‘on holiday’? No-one gets pissed off; you just favourite the shop, sign up for email notifications and forget about it.

On that point; remember the appearance of exclusivity I mentioned in my article about saying ‘no’? A holiday does the same sort of thing. You aren’t always available - customers will have to wait. And if you have the right processes set up - like an email wait list - then you can actually encourage that exclusivity and gain an eager customer base at the same time.

 

2. Schedule marketing content

You can let your existing customers know you’re going to be away while at the same time making sure you’re still drawing new customers towards you by scheduling marketing content.

I’d recommend you do this for digital marketing content only; responding to print amends are too stressful to try and do while you’re sunning yourself on a beach somewhere. You can schedule social media content using the channels’ in-built tools (for example, scheduling Facebook posts for your business page) or do it all in one place using a third-party scheduling tool like Buffer or Hootsuite.

You can also schedule blog posts for when you’re away, as well as other digital marketing like email newsletters. All of this, of course, does require extra time before you go away to set it all up. But to keep things ‘ticking over’, and especially if your holiday coincides with a useful marketing season for your creative business, scheduling marketing content is incredibly useful.

 

3. Avoid marketing clashes

This seems like an obvious one, but make sure you don’t accidentally schedule any marketing promotions - like a sale or a discount voucher - while you’re away on holiday. Ongoing content which keeps customers engaged is fine, but anything designed to draw in big crowds is difficult to manage from afar and there’s more chance of things going wrong.

Depending on the type of creative business you own, you might find your potential busiest periods are also during traditional holiday times; for example, around Christmas boutique retailers might not get much of a break as they put in the hours for gift-buying customers.

If you can take holidays at the quietest times of your business year, it can be useful for managing your business and making the most of that productivity kick when you get back and jump onto the next busy period.

 

4. Be clear about whether you’re available or not

If you’ve been used to running your creative business single-handedly, the idea of not being in regular contact with customers and potential customers probably makes you feel uncomfortable. It’s also totally natural to end up checking work-related emails or messages on holiday - especially if you love your work.

However, before you go on holiday be clear on whether or not you want to be contacted by customers, suppliers or staff. Once you’ve chosen what you want, stick to it. You might feel like the constant communication - like the ’email pressure’ I mentioned - is actually what you need to escape from. If so, let your customers and other contacts know, and do not look at work messages while you’re away.

If you do, you’ll slide back into it very quickly. If you’re worried things will slip without you to field the communications, you could hire a virtual assistant (VA) for the duration of your holiday, who’ll be able to manage any issues that come up.

Alternatively, if business communication isn’t the thing you need to escape from, then let people know you’ll be available but set yourself specific times when you’ll check and respond to work-related communication. It’s a good idea to do this all the time, but especially on holiday, so you have clear boundaries of when you can switch off from work.

 

Time to enjoy your time off.

 

Taking a holiday when you run your own creative business is essential for your health and the continuing health of your business. It’ll mean you come back refreshed and ready for the next challenge.

Managing your business while you’re away is possible: let customers know you’re going away, schedule your marketing content and avoid any big clashes, and be clear on whether you’re available for business chat - or not.

And make sure you enjoy your holiday.