Take the sabbatical — why agency owners need to unplug with Louise Oliver

Hey, everybody. Drew here. You know, we are always looking for more ways to be helpful and meet you wherever you’re at to help you grow your agency. It’s one of the reasons why we’ve produced this podcast for so long, and I’m super grateful that you listen as often as you do. However, there are some topics that are better suited for quick hyper-focused answers in under 10 minutes. That’s where our YouTube channel really comes in. For quick doses of inspiration, best practices, tips and tricks, head over to youtube.com/the at sign agency Management institute. Again, that’s youtube.com/the at sign or symbol.

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Running an agency can be a lonely proposition, but it doesn’t have to be. We can learn how to be better faster if we learn together. Welcome to Agency Management Institute’s Build, a Better Agency Podcast, presented by White Label IQ. Tune in every week for insights on how small to mid-size agencies are surviving and thriving in today’s market with 25 plus years of experience as both an agency owner and agency consultant. Please welcome your host, Drew McLellan.

Hey everybody. Drew McLellan here with another episode of Build a Better Agency. And it’s a good one. I’m really excited to introduce you to our guest and have you hear her story. I think you’re gonna find it inspiring. I think you’re gonna find it kind of thought provoking and I’m looking forward to going on that, on that journey with you along for the ride. So it’s gonna be a good one. You know, Danielle and I are just wrapping up the fall season of the live peer group. So from August to December, about every two weeks we hop on a plane and we travel and we meet with a group of agency owners. So we’ll have been with, I don’t know, maybe 200, 225 agency owners for, for, usually we’re with them for three days, and then we get back on a plane and go back to another group, you know, in a week or so.

And we’re with them from like 7:00 AM to 10:00 PM between you start the meetings and have dinner and all of that. And, and you know what? A lot of you are tired. You’ve been going hard. 23 was a tough year sales wise. You didn’t really let up your, let your foot off the gas. 24 for some of you has been better, but many of you are feeling like you used to have a slow season and you don’t really have a slow season. Sales cycles are still slower than you want them to be. You are investing more and more time in your team and growing them and nurturing them. And all of that has kept you kind of on the clock pretty much 24 7. I know being an owner means that you’re on the clock 24 7 anyway, if you’re, even if you’re not at work or you’re not, you know, doing work, you’re thinking about work or you’re waking up worrying about work, and that takes a toll on a person in a way that you don’t really think we understand.

I think we just keep going. And even when we get a break, air, air quotes break that break is like the holidays. And that’s a whole different level of stress. And I don’t know about you, but the holidays around our house are no, no easy peasy days. They’re packed with activity. There’s lots of people, there’s lots of to-do lists. It’s all awesome, but it’s certainly not relaxing. So when do we relax? When do we catch our breath? When do we have time to think? That’s really kind of the topic of today’s episode. And before I introduce you to our guest, I just want you to open your mind and think of that maybe going 24 7 and pushing, pushing, pushing isn’t the only way.

And that maybe there are some benefits of taking a step back and maybe pushing, pushing, pushing 24 7 is actually detrimental to the business and your agency and your team. So today’s guest is Louise Oliver. She is the owner of Perus. It’s a PR firm down in Alabama, and she has a very interesting story to share with you, and I’m excited to introduce you to her. So let’s, let’s bring her on the show. Louise, welcome to the podcast. Thanks for joining us.

Thank you, drew. This is such a surreal moment.

Yeah, so it’s, it’s, I’m sure it’s weird to be on the other side of the mic, right? You’ve been a listener for a while and we’ve worked together, and so to, to be in front of the mic, having to share your life story with everybody else is probably a little different.

It is. But I think about how many moments over the past couple years as our firm’s been growing and maturing, I’ve gotten from this podcast. So it feels nice to pay it forward a little bit. Yeah.

So, so we have a very specific topic we want to talk about and, and it really revolves around you were, so you, you were pregnant with your third child, the last, the first two maternity leaves were less than ideal. You were scrambling dealing with a newborn and really trying to still manage the office and all of that. So talk about a little bit about what, what was different this time leading into you actually giving birth to your daughter and sort of how your head was in a different place.

Yeah, like you said, through maternity leave, I assumed it would be the usual leave that I think many of your listeners likely take, where we are busting it as much as possible before taking time off, checking those boxes, ensuring we’re getting everyone in a good place and knowing that we’re gonna take a leave, of course. But that we’d still be checking in right there if something blows up. But that’s part of the good, bad and ugly of owning your own business.

And I really thought that was the only way to do it. Anyone in my support groups, that’s their experience too. Right? You know, just enjoy it as much as you can, but of course you need to be somewhat accessible in case something happens and something always pops up, right? Oh yeah. For, for my first beginning of Covid, well, great excuse there, right? Or my second leave. One of our most tenured employees left the firm two weeks before my child was born. So, you know, been there and done it right there. There’s always a reason to stay somewhat accessible.

I think most agency owners would self admit that we like to be a little bit like the hero. And, you know, someone for call me, you know, call me if, if I can help save the day. But I think,

And really before with the first two, you were not just accessible to your team, but you were still accessible to clients. You are checking email, you are participating at some level in some work or some strategy, all while juggling all of the new responsibilities of having a newborn in the house.

Oh, yeah. I, I’d have to think back, but I think on my first leave I didn’t even put up in a away message. So we’ve come a long way, drew. Yeah, right. To say the least. Right. But I think to answer your question, right, I think there’s some irony in that, right? A lot of your listeners are like me, we wake up every single day thinking about how we are gonna make our workplace a great place to work. Hey team, take that time off. You’ve earned it. Rest, go put your family first. Recharge. But in that same breath, myself included, we think this is just the price we pay as a business leader. And I think thanks to good mentors and resources like this podcast, I realized that there was a lack of authenticity in that.

And instead of constantly asking myself, well, how would I make that work? I started to shift into a mindset why not? And I think leading up to this leave I had, I was the fourth out of six extended leaves in a team under 15 Yeah. In a year, right? So I knew the team was tired, but our firm is very big about taking care of our own. So I figured I’d do the usual song and dance leave. And five weeks out from giving birth to my third child, I was sat down by our firm’s mentors who challenged me to do the hardest thing any business owner could ever imagine.

Louise completely walk away. And I remember tears streaming down my face because my ego thought, how would this firm ever survive without me? And how could I abandon my teen, you know, to during such a pivotal point of our growth, like they need me. Right? And Drew, I don’t know if you remember what you told me, but I think politely you said to me, Louise, respectfully, you are not as important as you think you are. Do this for you, Louise, but also just as important, do this as an opportunity to show your team that you trust them Yeah.

And give them this experience to level up.

Yeah. And you know what we’re talking about something very specific, a maternity leave or a paternity leave. But agency owners talk themselves out of even a long vacation. Oh, yeah. Or any sort of a leave or sabbatical for a million reasons. Right. They, it is, like you said, we had a key leader who just quit. But we have some clients who are unhappy with us right now. My team can’t make the big decisions without me. I, I, I’m worried that because I, I’m still billable, I’m worried about the revenue implications if I’m not still doing the work. I, I don’t want the team to feel like you used the word abandon them. Right. And, and what’s ironic about all of that is what, what you and I talked about before, your maternity leave is the message when you can’t be gone for something that’s important to you.

Again, family vacation, maternity leave, paternity leave, whatever it is, what you’re saying to your team is all that smoke, I’ve been blowing up your skirt about how good you are and how much I trust you. Sort of. True. But, you know, I really feel like I have to keep my hand in it. ’cause otherwise it’s gonna get mucked up. That’s really the message we send.

Absolutely. And it shouldn’t take a child entering this world or an intervention inter French, I guess in our case, for a business owner to get a break. And we hear a lot on helpful resources about the value breaks provide, but I don’t think there’s enough conversation on the value. It’s providing your tea with leveling up. Right. And something you taught me, drew, was how much I would learn about myself in how I need to not only grow the firm, but learn about some of the challenges that I face with my personality style that may impact me from scaling this or even one day walking away.

Right. Well, and you think about it, if you have to be involved all the time, 365 days a year, you only have so many hours in the day and you only have so much attention. And so for a lot of agencies that are stuck kind of in that 12 to 15 person size, it’s because the owner can’t envision not knowing everything and not being involved in everything. And so one of the benefits of a sabbatical, like the one you took or a extended leave, is that you get to see how the, how the agency functions without you at the helm. And, and we’ll talk about this in a minute, but you see both the good and the bad. Like, wow, they did some things a lot better than I thought they would.

Oh yeah. And I also see there are some places where I need to spend more time mentoring and growing. ’cause this was harder for them than it could have been or should have been. So it also gives you a path for really growing your leadership team into a true leadership team.

It absolutely does. And I think a lot of people assume when they’re taking a leave that it’s going to put the firm in a stage of we can’t be proactive. Right. It’s more sink swim. Yeah. We’re

Treading water, we’re just treading water until she comes back. Yep.

And so where I wanna preach the leave gospel, ’cause I’m drinking the Kool-Aid, and I’ll never go back, is I think for where our firm is now, six months after my extended leave, that it likely would’ve taken me years plural to get to where we are. And we will talk more about that. Yeah. But just, yep. It, it’s, it expedited our growth exponentially. So I think that’s a, just an interesting myth buster that at least my experience showed.

Yep. So let’s talk just the mechanics of your leave so people have a sense of it. So how long were you out and what access did you have to the firm, to your email to the thing? Like what? Talk, just talk about like how unplugged were you and for how long?

Great question. I was out for three months as far as my access. There really was none. We operate off of Slack, obviously, email monday.com for project management all deleted off. And Drew I think was helpful in saying you delete ’em off your computer too, not, you know, it’s one thing to delete, right? Just off your phone, but one big lesson I had was, was the trust factor, right? I think so much is thinking, oh, you know, I’ve gotta show my team. I could trust them, but you really helped me realize that this was also about showing I could trust myself to Right.

No one would ever know if I looked at email, right. Just did a quick scan on the old Slack channels to see if, you know, business was looking good. And so I think many business owners never give themselves the permission to cut off like that. And then years later they have trouble letting go or retiring. Right. Or admitting a partner. Right. So yeah, my access was pretty limited, but we did have some guardrails in place, which we’ll talk about a little bit. And we also, like every overachiever agency owner, we had thought through every system and process and who’s responsible and accountable for this and how are we messaging this to clients and let’s think through worst case scenarios.

So, but I think that’s pretty typical, right? Of most agency owners when they take leave off, the question is do they really stick with that?

Right? Right. Yeah. Yeah. It’s easy to, it’s easy to plan for the, for the absence and know who’s gonna, who’s gonna own all the things. And if this blows up, who’s gonna do that is different to say I trust them enough that I’m not gonna basically read their diary. Right? I’m not gonna sneak into my kids’ bedroom and read their diary. I’m gonna let them do their thing. I’m tr I’m trusting that they have a good head on their shoulders, they’re gonna make good decisions. Put in your case, you got a leadership team of three people that we really empowered to make decisions together with one person being clearly the sort of final decision maker.

And you had me in the mix.

Yeah.

So let’s talk a little bit about that.

Yeah, absolutely. So our leadership team with me out of the equation was we had someone more focused on our day-to-day operations. How we were functioning as a firm. We had someone more focused on our growth business development, how we were marketing the firm and protecting our brand. And then we had a teammate a little bit more focused on our very high stakes account work and capacity issues, right. The sort of that project management mindset. And they would meet together regularly and consistently, but also would meet with Drew and go to the him with challenges they were facing, have opportunities to figure it out on their own, talk it through together, but also propose that suggestion to Drew to where, I think for anyone stepping into a position of power, they’re not used to, those guardrails are so important for giving them the confidence of feeling like not only is this important, but as you’ve talked a lot about these, I don’t own this place.

Right. These aren’t my resources. So Right. They take that responsibility to heart and just knowing that there were proper guardrails in place with you, with our HR partner, with our legal partner, that they, they could get questions answered if they were facing a really unique or unexpected crossroad.

Yeah. Yeah.

And Drew, I don’t know many listeners are likely where I was a year and a half ago, where those guardrails likely for a firm of our size all exist internally. And I think that’s great up to a certain point of growth. But I do think that it’s important as businesses start growing, that they identify opportunities to explore additional guardrails outside of the walls of their own business so that you can take breaks like this or you can allow some of your leadership team, even if they’re not the owners, to take these similar extended leaves.

Yeah.

Right.

Yeah.

So, so, so what did you, what did you learn about, first of all, you did a very good job of actually staying unplugged, which I’m sure was very hard. Did it get easier?

I think I went through multiple stages of separation, right? That first stage being the grief. Yeah. I think once I moved past the grief and really started to recharge, I began to realize that this was easier than I thought it would be. And it was giving me the space to think through how we wanna grow the firm, how I can feel inspired for the type of life I wanna create, not only for myself, but to build the type of culture that doesn’t necessarily exist as an agency norm.

And I think part of the lesson there is realizing that you’re not the answer necessarily to creating all of that. Right? I’m not as important as I think I am. Right. And I think we get so caught up, drew for years, and for some of us decades in habits, right? Our hands are in every decision, every structure, every problem that needs to be solved. And in reality, a lot of our business functions can thrive without us micromanaging every detail. You said something that’s so true for a lot of business owners, this is our first baby. So someone taking care of that baby feels unnerving, right?

Shook to the core. And you asked me something that I’ll never forget. You said, Luis, what is the worst thing that can happen while you’re out? I want you to, I want you to verbalize that. So of course I think my answer was something to the effect like, okay, we go outta business, you know, and you made me sit there and try to explain how that could even be possible. Right? Right. A series of freak Unfortunate. Yeah. Catastrophic ends, catastrophic race.

Yep.

Yeah. And so it’s like, instead of focusing on the things that went wrong after that exercise, I began to shift more to the art of possibility. How this could push our organization several years ahead in its maturity, just by giving people a chance to level up.

Well, and I think one of the other things we talked about is that for many business owners and agency owners, you’re the safety net. And so even if your people are perfectly capable of doing it, they’re gonna check in because it’s like, Hey, problem with a client, here’s how I think we should handle it. Are you good with that? And on the surface, that feels great that they’re checking with us, but really what they’re saying is, I feel like I have to cover my rear end by getting your blessing. And I don’t have the, just the confidence to just move forward and report to you that I did it. But when the safety net is removed, they move confidently through their day making those decisions, knowing they’re the right decision, sometimes conferring with their, you know, their colleagues or whatever, but they’re able to move, they’re able to keep things moving, they don’t get stuck.

We actually are often what gets them stuck because they have to wait for us. We’re the bottleneck. They gotta have time with us, they gotta figure out how to present it to us. But if they, when they’re untethered and they’re able to just make the decisions that you’ve empowered them to make, they do pretty good.

So true Drew, and honestly, I could self admit my flaws. I should call myself the queen of stuck. I probably caused so much of that to happen. And a lesson I had in giving people a chance to level up right before my extended leave, our team had finished evaluations and a clear issue across the board came up. Our team felt like we were value aligned as a leadership team, but our leadership team felt a little siloed.

There was less visible collaboration. Well right. Ego flare of a business owner. I’m like, what do you mean? I’m on the phone with these people every day and we are absolutely aligned. And what I realized was that I had unknowingly been the glue, right? Yeah. Keeping our leadership team together and side baring with our director of growth and then taking those takeaways over to our director of accounts and, and by removing myself, I was, I gave them an opportunity to learn to lean into each other and get to know each other’s strengths and forge their own bonds to trust one another in their trenches To a certain extent.

When I got back, it almost felt like you were late to the party, right? Like there was just this new level of ha ha ha. And yeah, you’re, this person’s awesome at these things. And they, I, I thought I was helping as so many business owners feel like, right, we have the best of intentions, but by stepping outta the way they were able to not only flex new skills, but really forge that bond that is so essential to an owner getting out of the weeds.

Yeah. So let’s take a quick break and then let’s talk about the before and after. When you, when you look at your, at your agency and some of the, some of the places where you saw you were surprised by growth and new opportunity. So let’s take a quick break and then I’ll come back and talk about that. Hey everybody, just wanna remind you before we get back to the show, that we have a very engaged Facebook group. It’s a private group just for podcast listeners and agency owners that are in the AAMI community. And to find it, if you’re not a member, head over to facebook.com/groups/ba podcast. So again, facebook.com/groups/bab podcast.

All you have to do is answer a few questions to make sure that you are an actual agency owner or leader. And we will let you right in and you can join over 1700 other agency owners and leaders. And I’m telling you, there’s probably 10 or 15 conversations that are started every day that are gonna be a value to you. So come join us. All right, we are back and we are talking about Louise very bravely stepped into a three month sabbatical, really a go dark sabbatical and and allowed her leadership team to really run her agency in her absence. And it was true absence and also to allow herself, and I wanna get to this in a minute, to allow herself not only the time to actually just enjoy the moment of new baby growing family and all of that, but also like when your brain is untethered by day-to-day things, what happens?

And so we’ll get into all of that, but first reflect back now, so, so you’ve been back now about three months, right? Yes. So now you look back, how does your agency and your leadership team, how do they look different than when you left?

I don’t recognize our team, and I mean that in the most genuine and inspiring way possible. Our team of course, leveled up in ways I could not imagine. But what I also found was that there were habits, tasks, things that I was doing or holding on to in the assumption that a business owner had to absorb that and realize there were people not only that could do that job just as good but better.

And now they’re able to move things off their plate that someone else on the team is finally getting that opportunity to step up. So that trickle down effect has been remarkable. But I will say it has not come without learning to embrace the humbling feeling of irrelevance. So happy to talk about that.

I would argue, I would argue that it is actually not about you being irrelevant, but it is about you actually finally being able to do your job.

Yes.

Right? So it’s not totally, it’s not irrelevant. It is that you finally are free to do the work that no one was doing because it was on your plate. but it was things that you could never get to ’cause you were too busy in the trenches running the day to day serving clients, leading strategy sessions, fill in the blank. All things that your team is perfectly capable of doing. But there are some things that only you can do. It’s financial planning, it’s some of the biz dev efforts, it’s some of the, you know, high profile relationship building that now you finally actually have time to do.

It’s so true. Drew, and I actually have a funny story about this. So when I was out, someone on our team that has been with us for years really stepped up into running our operations. And through that I found out what a perfect alignment of their gifts and strengths. And for anyone that’s a consistent listener, you had a recent episode on the value of A COO. I think we assume we’re too small for someone, for some agencies feel like they’re too small for a COO, but the exercise of me going out clearly showed we’re ready for this and this role’s perfect for this person.

And when I removed myself from the guilt of, oh, where do I fit in here now? And like you said, it wasn’t irrelevance. Do you know how I spent my first day as a non wearing COO hat? I remember sitting around like, gosh, I mean I, I guess I can look at some financials I never get around to. But Drew, I sat there and I wrote hand handwritten notes to dream clients movers and shakers in Alabama where a firm is headquartered to people that have inspired me for years that I’ve always said I would love to get in front of this person.

But Right. Life gets in the way with the operations running the business and hand delivered them to multiple of these people. And you know what, within a week of delivering those notes, I had three meetings set up with potential dream clients. Right? So you’re right, it’s not irrelevance. This is a process that I promise you will lean to greener pastures and honestly a role that is a better aligned with your strengths likely in more fulfillment.

Right? Right. And if you aspire to grow your firm, this is the way you get out of the way. So it can grow.

You absolutely have to, and I, I think there is some level of over preparing for these leaves, right? Sure. More of the technical side where you think through all the X’s and O’s that have to happen, right? We pride ourselves as communicators when we know we are gonna be prepared for anything. Yep. We had contingency plans for every imaginable scenario, right? Clear responsibilities, action items in place. And I think life always right is gonna have a sense of humor when you go out.

One lesson we had, I thought we had thought through everything and the week I transitioned back, our financial specialists on the firm shattered their wrists. And the only other person in our firm that really manages the financials is me. But yet, I never once thought through the worst case of what if that person has to be out. Right?

Right, right.

I think it’s the perfect example of like, you can’t out plan life happening. Dope. And something you taught me, and it did happen then, was that if something’s brewing or simmering and you maybe are handling it right, or whether it’s an ops issue, a capacity issue, an HR issue, when you go out, guess what? It’s gonna likely boil over Right. And blow up in some way. And I don’t want that to scare people off from wanting to take a leave a, I hope it allows people to get more proactive on tackling the stuff we wanna kick down the curve, but also know that in some ways when those things boil over while you’re out, we again assume that we have to be the one to come in and save the day.

But that is going to give your leadership team opportunities to build their confidence, step up to the plate, build trust with the team on how they manage conflict, and honestly give them a dose of what ownership looks like. Especially if you’re an agency considering succession planning partnerships, right. Or, or giving additional responsibilities to mid-level or rising star leaders. Those experiences help shape their ability to get that real world experience and determine if your workplace is somewhere they wanna be for more than a chapter.

Right? Yeah. Which holds retention, all the things.

Yep. So I just wanna say, you know, when your financial specialist shattered her wrist, you were still out on leave and so your leadership team had to handle all of the parts and pieces of that and they did a good job.

They did a great job. Yeah. And

Again, so even when something we couldn’t have ever anticipated happens, your capable people are capable of stepping up and if they feel like they can’t answer it, and in this case, I was a safety net for them for sure, but they knew that you were the last ditch, you know, break the box in case of emergency call. But they didn’t really feel like they had to do that because they were, so this was on the tail end of your leave. They were so confident in their ability to take care of the firm and take care of the employee and take care of getting the financial information everybody needed that they kind of knocked it outta the park.

They totally knocked it outta the park. And I think through that process, and gratefully she’s our financial manager is, is is doing great now. But through that process, I think we figured out holes in our systems and processes that we can strengthen and make it more efficient and help us be a leaner meaner machine. So it, it’s just remarkable to me that by stepping away across the board, you step up and as business owners this time of year, right, we’re hustling, trying to get back in front of clients and secure contracts for next year and think through positions for our team and who we’re promoting and what budget forecasting looks like for next year.

Next year. I challenge people to think through what can stepping away look like for you? And if it feels impossible, likely that’s a good indicator that you may want to look at how your team is structured, what your roles are, and how you can make strategic planning changes to give yourself an opportunity to make this one of your absolutes. Not just for a year, but I would argue consistently.

Yeah. For the firm. And yeah. Just so people don’t think this is a well through with my parental leave and you know, likely will experience this again, our team had a retreat a month or two after I returned and I made an announcement that I would be taking a consistent sabbatical likely annually from here on out. And that for any future partner, we admit in the firm that we’re considering doing that for them as well, or our director level teammates, A, because we’ve seen that it works, right?

B, we know that it can help support retention for keeping those senior staffers. And C, we wanna give our mid-level managers something they can be excited about something

Yeah. To aspire to something,

Yeah. That they look forward to because we want our mid-level managers to want our job not to go Well, good lord. I’m gonna get my experience and head on to, you know, and something else here. Non-agency gig. Yeah. Yep. Absolutely.

Yep. All right. So now thinking back on your time off, talk about what it did for you. So we’ve talked a lot about what it did for the agency, the barriers were removed, that people all stepped up, that you don’t even recognize your agency anymore because they advanced the agency so well. In your absence that you can now step into your, your proper role as the COO and visionary of the agency, but what did those three months give you in terms of mental, emotional, intellectual, like what physical, even what, what did it, what did it do for you as a human being, as a business owner that surprised you?

I don’t wanna get emotional on a podcast, but it, right.

We’ve had people cry before.

Well I think that was the most special three months that I have ever had, of course for enjoying time with our caboose and our family. But I think what made that time even more special was realizing so much about myself, things that inspired me going on a walk and not thinking about whose calls I need to return, but thinking through how experiences like this are likely not the norm for agencies.

And that I can create the type of culture that I don’t think really exists in a lot of agencies across the globe. I love to read, right? And I think finding creativity and inspiration and things that aren’t just leveling up and sharpening my leadership and tactical skillset, but finding inspiration and unexpected places. And I cannot preface enough the importance of getting away from the noise and how much clearly I think now.

And I hold myself more responsible for protecting that silence and thinking more than doing. And even as I’ve transitioned more into a CEO role, I’ve been telling myself I should be on the keyboard less during the day, right? Each day I, I need to be protecting more time for thinking and creating and imagining the art of possibility. And Drew, I think you have, I think it’s on YouTube, you may have done a podcast episode about it, but do you remember that exercise you gave me on thinking if a news reporter sat me down Yep.

10 years from now and made me think through what did my office space look like and what type of teammates did I surround myself with and what did I do for fun and how did I stay motivated in my role? I think exercises like that are so important during time like this and right, it’s not about adding something to your, to-do list, but it’s about giving yourself permission to say there’s a better way to enjoy the ride. And not just to make a paycheck and feel obligated to our teammates, but really enjoying our trade and using our gifts to make a difference and watching our kids growing up or getting to do that side hustle we love or retire early or just spend a a few more hours making the space you work in inspire you.

And so now that is, I joke at the beginning, I’ve drank that Kool-Aid. I cannot imagine not giving myself permission to do that consistently. Not just for myself and for my family and for those that matter me to me, but for what it’s doing to our team. And hopefully what it’s inspiring other agency owners to consider so that they find better ways to do this job that we all love so much in the trenches every day with a little bit more of a sense of purpose and enjoyment.

Yeah, I mean really what, what you’ve, what you’ve discovered is you’ve gotten comfortable actually doing your job. I think one of the reasons why a lot of agency owners don’t step out of the day to day is because we’re, we’re so used to being deadline driven and busy and making the things and writing the things that the idea of thinking or planning or reading or learning feels like we’re not accomplishing something. Right. And, and what you’ve discovered is what happens when you give yourself the room to do those things and to write those handwritten notes and to make connections with people that you’re actually doing the highest calling of your job as CEO and visionary of the agency, which is leading the path forward, seeing the path, and then leading the team on that path.

And you can’t do that if your head’s down all the time.

Absolutely. And I will self admit this, sometimes I ask myself now that I am starting to operate more in this role that I need to be in and that I should be responsible for as a CEO and vision focus professional is, thank God we’ve made it as far as we’ve made it operating the way we have. And I would tell anyone listening, no matter what stage you’re at, know that it helped you get to where you are. But that doesn’t mean that you have to be in that role forever.

And this is just a great time and season for someone to take a hard look in the mirror and say, in order to level up this firm, how can stepping away allow me to operate in the strengths and have time for the more big picture, vision focus way to do things. And chances are your organization will never look the same.

Yeah, I think that’s true. This, this has been a great conversation. I, I’m grateful that you are willing to share. This is a very personal story. I mean it’s a story of fears and insecurities. It’s a story of having to find the bravery to step out and do something that I can remember when you and I first started talking about it, you were like, no, like no, like you could not fathom. Yes. Right. Uhuh, you were very adamant in the know. And it took us a while for you to explore the idea of this is possible if we put in these safety nets and these other things. But again, this is the vulnerability of being an agency owner and you know, nobody’s done this before.

This is, this is the first time you’ve owned your agency. It’s the first time for everybody and you’re at a different place in your agency that you’ve never been before. So it is always, I think, as leaders about being brave enough to be vulnerable, being brave enough to try new things, being brave enough to do what’s scary, but sounds like it might be the right thing for the business. And to be able to close the loop on all of those very human reactions with the gratitude you have, the pride you have in your team and what they’ve been able to do and the excitement you have around your agency because it’s now at a completely different level that’s gonna let you and the leadership team take it even further than you thought was possible.

That’s a great full circle story.

It is. And I’m really proud of myself for doing it. But Drew, thank you again for the bottom of my heart for just asking the tough question, which I think is your job as a good consultant to tell me things a lot of times I don’t wanna hear, but also to challenge me to think differently and not assume that this is the way you always have to approach your work and whether someone’s working with a MI or not, I think every one of us needs our version of that drew conversation in our life in order to not get down the road, you know, five years, a decade from now and, and wish you would’ve done it differently.

Right,

Right. Yeah. I I I think an outside perspective, wherever it comes from, is always helpful. Yeah. If, if you’re open to hearing it and you were open to hearing it, so, so yeah, I appreciate that. So, alright. Need to let you go. Thank you so much for being willing to share all of this with everyone I know. I know. Like I said, I know it’s a very personal story and I know you have a very generous heart and, and want other agency owners to learn from your experience. So maybe they’re not as afraid or don’t have the same trepidation that you did to sort of dabble in the idea of a leave. If anybody wants to reach out to you and ask you questions about how the mechanics of how you did it or anything like that, would, what would be the best way for them to reach you?

Yeah, you can find me on LinkedIn, Louise Oliver at Parus pr and just the same way you’ve helped me, I’m more than happy to serve as a resource if someone just has a question or needs the encouragement to take that leap of faith.

Yeah, thank you so much for that. So, we’ll, we’ll include, we will include a link to Louisa’s LinkedIn page in the show notes if you’re looking for that. But this has been a great conversation, so thanks for sharing it,

Thankful for you always Drew. Yeah,

It’s a, it’s a, it’s a privilege to walk out this out with you, so thank you.

Thank you.

Alright folks, so unlike many of our episodes where there’s very specific homework, what I’m hoping is this episode just kind of bangs around in your brain a little bit that, that you start thinking, ’cause here’s what I know you were doing through the episode. You were like, well, she must have a rockstar fill in the blank person. And don’t get me wrong, Louise’s team is top-notch, but a lot of you have top-notch team members. So you are, we’re already trying to discount the reason why you can’t or shouldn’t do this. And what I want you to do is just soak in the idea of, but what if I had to, what if, what if, you know, in Louisa’s case, she didn’t have to, she could’ve worked the whole time. She, you know, she could’ve given birth and then bet on the computer the next day.

But what if you had to step away for a little while? What if you had to have a surgery or you had to have something, or you had something go on in your family? Or what if it is time you’ve earned the right to take the rest? Just let that all bang around in your head and start thinking about how might I do It doesn’t mean you have to be gone for three months. It could be a month. I think it has to be at least two or three weeks for it to be meaningful. The first week you’re, you are just trying to wind down and the next and the second week you’re winding back up to go back. So I think a month is the ideal exploratory length. You know, when we do succession work with agencies and we are helping an employee buy from a founder, we make the founder go, go dark for a month and go on a sabbatical so that the employee can feel what it’s like to run the business.

You don’t even have to be in that circumstance, but all of you have earned the right to actually be free of your business for a period of time to enjoy your family, to enjoy your friends, to enjoy, enjoy solitude. If that’s what you wanna do, to hike a mountain, to sit on a beach, to take a cooking class in Italy, but to not think about the work that you just are in that moment and you let your brain and your heart and your soul just go where it wants to go. ’cause I think it’s gonna surprise you. I think you’re gonna be surprised at the ideas you have. And when Louise came back, she was full of big ideas, not little ideas, not tactical ideas, but big ideas for her firm that she, that would’ve never bubbled up into her consciousness if she hadn’t had that quiet time.

And so I want all of you to let that bang around. All right. And I wanna of course say a thank you to our friends at White. Label IQ. They’re the presenting sponsor of the podcast. They go out of their way to help agencies with resources on white label design Dev and PPC. They’re born out of an agency. They understand your world. Their pricing structure allows you to make money even though you’re outsourcing to them. And they are just, they’re good people. They have the agency mindset in terms of how you take care of your clients. So if you are not familiar with them, head over to White Label IQ dot com slash aami and you can read more about them and how they serve agencies just like yours.

Alright, this wraps up the episode. Thank you as always. I, even if you’re an occasional listener, I’m really glad you didn’t miss this one. This is, this is not just about the nuts and bolts of running the agency. This is about your life. This is about your future. This is about your sanity, this is about your health. This is about something so much bigger than just running the business. Yes, there were absolute business benefits. Yes, Louise’s team leveled up and stepped up in new ways. Yes, her agency is in a better place. All of that true. But more importantly, she got centered. She now has a better sense of her role in the agency.

She was able to rest and recuperate and enjoy this important family time. You deserve that. You take all the risks of owning an agency, you deserve the good stuff too. So don’t deny yourself. Alright, with that, I’m out. See you next week. Thanks for listening.

That’s all for this episode of AAMIs Build. a Better Agency Podcast. Be sure to visit agency management institute.com to learn more about our workshops, online courses, and other ways we serve small to mid-size agencies. Don’t forget to subscribe today so you don’t miss an episode.