Ep. 19: How I had my highest grossing month while on maternity leave

Are you set up to achieve your highest grossing month while also on maternity leave?

Having the right mindset is important for growing a business that can remain successful even when you decide to take a step away.

In this episode of the Love Your Gut Podcast, I talk about the importance of having the right mindset, turning my business around during my maternity leave, having a second child, the importance of investing in yourself, and creating effective processes to maintain the business.

My mindset was so wrong that 2 years before i had my daughter I actually got a job so that I would have maternity leave – instead of investing in systems and processes to create a sustainable business. I started changing my mindset the day after my daughter was born and I realized that I didn’t want to go back to working the way that I was before.

Whether you invest in my program or someone else’s, this will not happen by accident. You need to develop the tools in place to allow your business to grow when you need to take a step away, whether it is to have a baby, to address unexpected personal matters, or just because you want to take time off.

I look back at the struggles I had after my first birth and realized that there had to be a better way. 

1. Invested in myself.
2. Developed a team and processes in place.
3. Continued to learn.

…and then I repeat the process.

Topics Covered in This Episode:

• [02:07] It started 4 years ago.
• [05:01] Having the wrong mindset cost me in the long run.
• [10:42] Having another baby.
• [12:50] Setting my team up for success.
• [14:35] The importance of investing in yourself.
• [16:53] Empowering other leaders on my team.
• [18:04] The processes that kept the business running.
• [20:07] Feeling empowered after the births of my children.

Investing in myself and my business allowed me to step away, become a mother, spend time with my children, and keep the business running more successfully than before.

If this episode has been helpful, hit me up on Instagram, and tell me about your experience!

Resources Mentioned:

• Episode 1
• https://drheatherfinley.co/quiz

QUOTES:

• “A successful business does not happen by accident.”
• “My growth has led to my team’s growth, which has led to our clients’ growth.”
• “You don’t have to completely reinvent the wheel so that you can take a maternity leave.”
• “Destination is determined by my direction, not intention.”

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TRANSCRIPTION:

SPEAKERS

Dr. Heather Finley

Dr. Heather Finley  00:00

So I started thinking about one my client experience. That’s always been the number one priority for me is client results. I want my clients to have the transformation that they desire, and I want them to get the highest level of support possible.

Dr. Heather Finley  00:20

Hey, welcome to the love your gut podcast. I’m your host, Dr. Heather Finley, I know you’re thinking, how am I supposed to love my gut when all it does is hold me back. I thought the same thing before I found my own relief from my own gut health issues. I dedicated my life to getting to the bottom of my own gut issues, so I can help women just like you transform theirs. Now I’m here to guide you through your own gut health journey. We do this through identifying your root causes and making sustainable and transformational changes. As a result, you can unleash your true potential. My goal is to empower you with the information and tools you need to love your gut. So it loves you back right here on this podcast.

Dr. Heather Finley  01:04

Welcome back to the next episode of the love your gut Podcast. I’m really excited to bring this episode to you, late at night from my office after my kids are asleep. But it feels just so genuine to what the topic actually of this podcast is. And it’s about how I had my highest grossing month while on maternity leave. I often get the question on Instagram about how I do it all How do I run my business? How am I a mom? How do I have time to market on Instagram? How do I have time to coach my clients? How do I do all the things. And part of that is an episode for another time in that I have tons of support and tons of help. But the purpose of this episode is really to answer the question, How did you set yourself up for maternity leave and have your highest grossing month. So I want to take you back about four years ago, my daughter Charlotte, she’ll be four and a couple of weeks, which is mind blowing to me. I can’t believe how fast that went. But four years ago, when she was born, my life changed. And if any of you are moms, you know that the minute your first baby is born, your world is so much better. So four years ago, my world was so so much better. But my business also came to a screeching halt. I was working in my brick and mortar private practice, I was seeing 20 to 25 clients per week, which if you’re a practitioner, you know that that’s not 20 hours of work, or 25 hours of work, that’s probably 40 or 50 hours of work by the time you see the client and chart and Bill and do all the things. So I was extremely busy. And I also had a full time job. At the time I was burning the candle at both ends, I had actually finished my doctorate prior to that. At one point, I was working in my practice working a full time job and finishing my doctorate. Thank God that all wasn’t going on when I actually had my daughter, but I was super busy. And I realized that in that moment when she after she was born and I you know a couple weeks into maternity leave started thinking about how I was going to go back to my business, that I had the completely wrong mindset. And really, my mindset was wrong two years prior to that. So two years prior to having her I got that full time job. I was doing marketing for an eating disorder treatment center, which was an amazing job. I loved it. Don’t even regret it one second. But I had a terrible mindset. I the reason that I wanted to have a full time job was because I thought that I needed to have paid maternity leave. And the reason that that mindset was so wrong is because I could have spent those two years investing in growing my business investing in systems and processes to create a sustainable business. Because reality was that when my business came to a screeching halt after she was born, it was a lot of work to get it back up and running because I was every single position in my business. I was not only the provider that was seeing the clients, but I was answering the phones. I was the finance department running the billing. I was the marketing coordinator. I was you know paying all the bills I was doing everything. And in reality if I think back to that mindset that I had two years prior to having her this decision to have a full time job probably cost me 1000s of dollars in the long run, because at the at the root of it, I was so worried about not being paid for 12 weeks, but that that mindset cost me so much money in the long run. And really, for me, it wasn’t even that much about the money. And now that I look back, it also costs my clients, a lot of things too, it costs them not getting the support for 12 weeks, it cost them having to find someone else to see while I was gone. And this mindset that I had at that point of trading time for money was completely incorrect. When I didn’t have time, the money stopped. And of course, my clients also stopped getting support. And any person that gets into any kind of health profession, the reason we get into these professions is because we want to help people. My story, I talk a lot about it on episode one. But as you guys know, for my story, I am incredibly passionate about helping individuals find relief from their digestive symptoms, because I once was in your shoes, and I know how it feels. And I know how devastating it can be and hard. And I desired to provide really comprehensive support to my clients. But because I had this mindset of trading time for money, I couldn’t actually provide the support that I wanted to because I was booked out every single day. Hour by hour, I was seeing clients and then I’d go home and I wanted to be mom. And I worked a lot of nights, sending notes and protocols and things to clients. And as I was sitting there on maternity leave, I realized, okay, something has got to change. So really, I I started changing my mindset the day after my daughter was born. And I just realized I can’t go back to working the way that I was before. One it’s not fair to my clients. And to it’s not fair to her. And it’s also not fair to my family, my husband, and myself. So what I want you to hear from this episode is whether you invest in really any program, whether it’s my program or someone else’s, I want you to know that a successful business does not happen by accident, you need to develop the tools to allow your business to grow. When you want to take a step away, maybe you want to take a step away to have a baby like me, maybe you want to be able to take a step away to go on a vacation. I remember having intense anxiety about going on vacation, because who was going to answer the phone or who was going to see the clients again, that time for money mindset. Or maybe you want to be able to take a step away, if something unexpected personally comes up, it’s it’s empowering to know that you have the freedom to take some time if you need it. I remember actually a couple months ago, I before I had my son, my second baby, which we’ll talk about that in a second. Last fall, I was getting my business ready for maternity leave, which we’re gonna talk about, I was writing a book and was extremely busy. And I remember sitting at the dinner table one night with my husband and I just said, I just need to, I just need a couple of days to not have any meetings, I need a couple of days to just sit and think and be creative and plan. And because my business was at the place that it was, I could do that. I rescheduled calls and it was not a big deal. My team took over for three days. And I came back feeling so refreshed. And that’s exactly on a larger scale, what we’re going to talk about here, so it’s important to have this mindset of you’re no longer going to trade time for money, you’re going to allow yourself to have freedom in your schedule freedom financially, and also provide your clients the transformation that they desire by providing them a higher level of support and a higher experience. Because when you’re just seeing a client for an hour and billing them for that hour, all the work that you’re doing with your clients house happens outside of that hour. So being able to provide them support in between those hours that you see them in your office, whether you see people in person or online is so important and I think that’s the number one reason that our clients and they got together program are so successful is because we’re not just charging them for an hour that we see them. We are literally walking side by side with them. So it’s a better outcome for us, and it’s a better outcome for them.

Dr. Heather Finley  10:03

Hey there, I know you are absolutely loving this episode, but I have to jump in really quick and remind you that I have a quick, free quiz that will help you finally figure out why you’re bloated. In order to live a life free of discomfort, you need to figure out what the root causes that’s making you experience these uncomfortable symptoms. The easiest and fastest way to do this is by visiting Dr. Heather Finley Dotco backslash quiz, take the quiz as soon as you can. So you can transform your gut issues and lead a happier, more vibrant life. Now let’s get back to the episode. So as I mentioned, I really had to start my business from scratch after my daughter was born. And I knew that I wanted to have another baby. So fast forward to 2022 will really 2021 I got pregnant with my second child. And I knew that January 2022, I was going to be delivering this baby. And I was determined to have a different outcome than last time, I wanted the space, I wanted the flexibility, I wanted the time to be able to not only physically recover from giving birth, which could totally be another episode. But also, I wanted the time to bond with my child. And I didn’t want to feel rushed to get back to work because I was worried that my clients weren’t getting the support that they needed, or that I wasn’t making any money or that, you know, I just had to get back to work because no one was I didn’t have a team doing anything. So I have been planning for this for years. Yes, I got pregnant and most of 2021 was prepping for January 2022. But the reality is I started planning for this after my daughter was born, because I knew that this you know, God willing, if this were to happen again, I wanted that outcome to be different. So I started thinking about one my client experience, that’s always been the number one priority for me is client results. I want my clients to have the transformation that they desire. And I want them to get the highest level of support possible. So keeping that in mind, I knew that my quote unquote maternity leave had to be different. Because I obviously, if I desired the time to recover and bond with my child, I knew that I was not going to be the person to be able to provide them with that support. Come January 2022. So after I found out I was pregnant, it was really good time,

Dr. Heather Finley  12:49

I was really excited about this because I know that my team, or I knew that my team was prepared for it. And we had been working on this. So at the time in spring 2021. I had several people on my team. I had one registered dietician on my team at the time, shortly after had hired a health coach to join my team to also support our clients. And then in the fall actually ended up bringing on another registered dietitian, and an operations manager. So someone to help me with all the operations behind the scenes. And it was transformational because I had tons of processes in place. But I was able to take a step back and look at okay, what can I automate? What is important to not automate? What can I outsource? And what are the most important things that our clients need from us and who’s going to do those things? So we spent months planning as a team to make sure that everyone was completely clear on exactly who was doing what, who was seeing the clients, who was messaging the clients back, who was doing the food and symptom log reviews, who was onboarding, who was off boarding, who is keeping track of client outcomes, who is doing all the things that we do behind the scenes that probably most people don’t know that we do things to make sure that we are touching base with our clients, as well as making sure that they’re getting the results that they desire. And that of course, we desire for them as well. So this really all started I’ve talked a lot about investing in my team. But before I can even invest in my team, I had to invest in myself. I’ve talked a little bit about this on the podcast before about I think in episode one, I talked about how I hired my first business coach on a whim. And just to kind of backtrack a little bit. As you know, I’ve talked a lot about my daughter’s birth and how that really transformed my mindset about my business. I was on a walk with her one One day, she was really little. And I remember I was going in to see clients that afternoon we had a babies that are coming to watch her. And I just remember thinking like I, something has to change. And that was the moment, I remember exactly where I was. I remember exactly what I was wearing, I remember exactly what she was wearing, it was a transformational moment, it was one of those core memories that people talk about in their lives. That was a core memory for me. I was on a walk with her. I knew something had to change. I had listened to a business coach on this podcast before and on a whim, I booked a call. And the call was for a couple hours later, or maybe the next day, I don’t remember and took the call, said yes, on the call hadn’t even asked my husband about it, which is really not like me to do something like that. But on a whim said yes to the biggest investment that I’ve ever made in my old sense that that point had ever made it myself. And I was excited about it. I wasn’t scared, it was a lot of money. But I was like, I desire this for myself, for my family, and for my clients. Because remember, the client outcome is really at the forefront of this. This was so much about being able to provide clients with the support, I knew that they needed to be able to have the transformation that they desired. So since then, I’ve worked with many different coaches, and they’ve all been transformational in my business, masterminds coaches, experts in mindset and nervous system support. And all of that has helped me to become a better leader, and to empower my team. And my team really now is I couldn’t do it without them. My business I think for years, I was so scared to outsource anything. And this is something I hear from clients a lot is How could I possibly How could someone do it the same as me, I’m really scared to let someone take over this task. And I realized that I was the pinhole in the whole thing. I was preventing the growth of my organization, and also preventing people from finding relief from their digestive symptoms, because I was controlling everything instead of empowering other people to be able to play a part in my business, and allowing them to take a leadership role as well. So for me, investing in my leadership has also allowed me to empower other leaders on my team, to then empower our clients, our clients are getting better results than ever, and our business is doing better than ever. And I know that those things are directly correlated. My growth has led to my team’s growth which has led to our clients growth, and I wouldn’t change it for the world. So now here we are in August 2022. If we backtrack a little bit to January 2022, my second baby Weldon was born January 18. And again, my life totally changed a couple of weeks, up to actually delivering him. Unfortunately, I was sick with COVID. And pretty much for the entire month of January, I didn’t work I was sick. And then I delivered him and was on maternity leave. But yet my business didn’t stop. Because I had put systems in place because I had empowered my team because I had put processes in place. Everything ran, we still had clients enrolling in our program, we still had clients being seen, we everything was running all of our group calls, all of the individual calls, all of the food and symptom log reviews, everything that we do within our program ran. And we also like I said still had people enrolling because we had systems in place for that to be possible. I think the mindset often is, okay, I need to create something passive or I need to create a way to make money and not have to support my clients or not have to be present for clients while I’m on maternity leave, and that certainly can work. But you also don’t have to shut down your entire program. If you’re able to build the systems to be in place to support your clients. Your business can continue to run you don’t have to completely reinvent the wheel so that you can take a maternity leave, everything can run as long as you take the time to allow it to do so. So I look back at the struggles that I had after my first birth and my business and I knew that there had to be a Better Way. And I’ve shared with you a lot of the ways that I got there on this episode. But I also realized after I gave birth that after I gave birth, I knew that I could do anything, I felt so empowered and wanted, I was up for the challenge. So I invested in myself, that has been the most important thing that I’ve done. Secondly, I developed a team and I put the processes in place, because I knew that if I didn’t have systems and processes that my growth in my company and as a leader would continue to stall. And it was important for me to develop my team, because I knew that if I were to be in this situation, again, having another child that I wanted it to be a completely different outcome. And I continue to learn. And to be honest, I’m still learning, I want to keep supporting our clients better. I want to keep developing my team, I will always continue to invest in myself when it comes to mentorship, because I know that it’s critical for my growth. And since having Weldon in January, my business has continued to grow, I’ve been able to spend tons of time with my kids, we’ve been able to go on trips, our clients, as I mentioned, are still getting amazing results. And it’s because the support and accountability is in place. So I want you to know that if you’re struggling with the same mindset that I had a couple of years ago, or if you’re thinking about having children or just thinking about feeling really stuck in your business, wanting to be able to step away for really any purpose, then it’s that it’s possible. It’s possible for me, it’s possible for you. But like I mentioned, it’s it doesn’t happen on accident, it happens on purpose, because you put yourself in a position to succeed. There’s this quote, I’m not sure where I heard it, but it says destination is determined by direction, not intention. So you can have all the best intentions in the world to scale your business, grow your business, hire a team. But if you’re continuing to do the same thing over and over again, you’ll continue to get the same results. And sometimes you just need a direct interruption, like I had to completely change your direction. But you also don’t need to have that you might just need to decide. I don’t like the direction that this is going. I’m burning myself out. And I’m not interested in continuing to be burned out. But I want to change the direction that the way that this is going.

Dr. Heather Finley  22:46

So I hope that this episode is helpful. I know it’s a little different than your typical gut health content. But I really wanted to record this because it’s a question that I’m getting at least weekly, if not multiple times a week from other dietitians and health practitioners and want you to know that I’m here to support you. So if you have any thoughts, reflections questions about this episode, shoot me a DM on Instagram. I’m happy to have a conversation with you about how we can work together and how I can support you or just hear about where you’re at in your business. So please feel free to reach out my DMs are always open. And thanks so much for tuning in. So I will catch you guys next week on the next episode of the love your gut podcast.

Dr. Heather Finley  23:42

Well, that wraps up the next episode of the love your gut podcast. Thank you so much for joining. If you are a health practitioner or a registered dietician and you are interested in expanding your knowledge of gut health, or growing a sustainable and profitable business, I invite you to apply to the next cohorts of that practitioner. We are enrolling now. You can check out the link in the show notes

Please note that this episode is not a substitute for medical advice. And you should always consult your healthcare provider prior to making any changes.

I’m giving your gut a thumbs up because you just finished another episode of the love your gut podcast. Thanks so much for listening in to this episode. I hope it was helpful.

If you are a health practitioner or a registered dietician and you are interested in expanding your knowledge of gut health, or growing a sustainable and profitable business, I invite you to apply to the next cohorts of gutPractitioner.