How to take a month off without your business falling apart (387)
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Can you actually take a full month off from running a business? I've taken every August off since 2020. I know that might sound a bit crazy depending on where you're at right now, but for me, it's just how my business operates. In today's episode, I'm breaking down the 4 steps that make this kind of structured time off possible. Spoiler: it's not about luck, it's just intentional planning.
How did today's episode land with you? If there's anything specific you want me to cover when I'm back in September, drop it in the comments or send me a DM over on Instagram.
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If you are listening to this episode in the week that it's come out, then right now I will be on the countdown to taking a whole month off in my business. This will be my seventh year of taking August off. I first did it back in 2020 and it is now something that is just so ingrained in my business and ingrained in my brain and my life that I almost forget it's coming. To a dangerous degree, I almost feel like I plan less for it now than I ever did before and whilst that's not a bad thing, I almost have to remind myself of every spring, what do I need to do to make sure that I am planning and able to take this month off. Probably the best place to begin with this episode is about why I take a month off because I do feel like it's one of those things that can get thrown around and it's like the thing to do is to take summer off. I just think anything in business should have purpose and it should have purpose for us as an individual, like not just like, oh that's a cool thing that you can do, but like that's actually aligned for you, your vision and like how you want to be doing things. For me, taking a month off actually originated from me realizing that I didn't have any separation between who I was as a human and who I was as a business owner. In 2019, my business was really starting to scale and at the time I was very busy all of the time, which kind of means you're not busy because you're just constantly just doing loads and it doesn't feel like there's an end point or purpose to that. There was a lot going on, I was loving a lot of it, but I was also starting to kind of feel this sense of like who am I if I'm not running this business? Like I didn't really know that taking a month off would even be something I could do because I was like what am I going to do with myself? And that was when I knew I needed to take a month off is because I was like I want that experience that I kind of never had because I didn't go to university, I started my business straight from school when I was 17. I was like I always want that time to like be playful and find out who I am and spend time with myself and like have a bit of an identity that isn't just me as a business owner. That was where it originated from and I also knew it would have a really big knock-on effect on like sustainability and how I was feeling and being more rested in the business. That's where it began in the seven years since I definitely feel like I now do have that slight separation between like who I am as a business owner and who I am as a person, it definitely helped me to start to build that identity. And I've also seen over the last seven years how amazing it's been for me and the business. Like I would take a month off still every year even if it only just did one of these two things, but the fact that it's good for me and the business just for me makes it such a no-brainer. For the business it allows me to come back in September way more rested, way more energized, thinking clearly, thinking a lot more honestly and analytically because I've almost had a break from things I'm able to see things differently. I also think it gives my business an easier opportunity to evolve because I have this point where I stop and then it's easier to make changes from September because things have been stopped for a month. And I think as well for my community, my clients, my audience, whilst I feared that it would make people like forget me or not like me or be annoyed at me, if anything it just means that there's that kind of energy and appetite there when I'm back and there's not this like constant feeling of I'm trying to make things happen. So for the business it's really good which I kind of didn't expect, I always thought it would be good for me bad for the business, but it's been good for the business and as expected it's also been good for me. Like not just helping me to build up the identity outside the business, but also just very simply like having time where I'm not having to work, having time where I can just kind of be selfish and think about what I want to do and get a bit bored and go and do fun things that maybe I wouldn't always make time for. I would say for me the reason that taking a month off works so well is that I work really well in intensities, I'm a fairly all in person, if I do something I do it well and fully, I don't do things in halves and so for me, resting is kind of the same. Like I go all in on growth and I also go all in on rest, if I were to take four weeks off a year but like one week one week one week one week I think I would struggle to like properly rest in that time because it takes me a little moment to like actually start to rest. And also I think I would then lack the like true break that I need based on how intensely I work because I take summer off and I usually take at least two weeks off over Christmas, I kind of have these two intense periods. I work intensely from January to July and then I work intensely from September to December and that intensity works for me and it works for me as well because I then have the intensity of rest that's followed up with too. So that is why I first took a month off and that is why seven years on I still do it. I will say the more that you take a month off and the more regular and consistent that is, like for me I've taken the holdable list off for seven years, the easier it gets. And the hardest time to do it is the first time but it is so much easier and more doable than you think. I meet so many people and I tell them I'm taking a month off say to me the same thing, I wish I could do that. And I'll just come back to them with like you can, like it will take work, it might be a bit complicated, it might not be the easiest thing you've ever planned for in your life, but like you can do it. And so if that's you, I want to break down what I do to take a month off and of course every business model is different, but I'll give you some kind of examples where maybe it might be a bit different for you to apply this because like anything in business, it's possible, but there's probably just a bit more time and work involved than you're maybe initially expecting. Speaking of time, first thing that I think is key to taking any time off but especially a big period like a month is that you need to plan further in advance than you probably want to. If you right now are thinking, oh I'd quite like to take August off, it's probably too late, at least it's probably too late to do it in a way that isn't really disruptive. And my aim is to take a month off and for the business not to feel the impact, I don't want my month off to disagree with the business's growth, I want the two to be seamless. And the key to that is to plan for an advance. When I did my first month off, I planned it a year in advance and what that allowed me to do was to bake the month off into my planning, not have plans and have to edit them based on the month off coming in down the line. Any time off is a lot easier when you know about it far in advance. You don't necessarily need to plan a year in advance, but that's what I did. And I now am thinking about my month off, at least I'd say six months ahead. From January, I am communicating and I am aware of and I'm talking about and thinking about my August off. Because the further that you plan in advance, the less destructive and disruptive it's going to be. And I think that's a lot of the time people's fear. I don't want to disrupt clients, projects, team. The more foreign advance you do it, the less of an impact that's going to have. So plan in advance would be my first tip. My second tip links to that, which is that once you know what you're doing, whether you're taking a month off two weeks off or week off six months off, you need to become so communicative about it that you are bored of hearing yourself say out loud. This is the one that I kind of forget if I'm not careful because I'm so used to the fact that I take a month off, I think it's obvious to everyone else. It's not, people need to know. Everyone needs to know. My team, my clients, my students, my community, collaborators, people inviting me to speak at their events.
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