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Jillian Dolberry connects Business Impact to Core Values
I probably shouldn’t say things like this, but I’m going to — this is one of my, if not my favorite guest interview that I’ve ever done. That’s right. With over 255 episodes under my belt, I’m claiming it. This interview is MAGNIFICENT.
But before we get into the details, let me introduce you to my guest – Jillian.
Jillian Dolberry is the founder of Serve Your Heart Out, a community that serves agency owners looking to streamline their business. While devoting her heart and time to the members of her community, she helps online business owners set boundaries, get unstuck, and reach goals that honor the reason they started their businesses in the first place. As a wife, mom, and business owner, Jillian has become a master of setting boundaries, allowing her to serve her community, family and her clients well.
Jillian’s entire business is based around helping others create and grow agencies through their core values and in today’s episode, she shares with us how we can use our own core values to create an impactful and unique course for our students.
If you’re someone who believes in building an intentional business and an intentional life, this episode is going to leave you feeling incredibly inspired.
Links and Resources Mentioned in This Episode:
- Join me on Monday evenings at 4:00 pm Pacific time/7:00 pm Eastern time for my weekly YouTube Lives!
- Check out my Playbook for Complete Marketing Game Plan
- This week’s action step: Check out Jillian and her services at the OBM Services | Jillian Dolberry and take some time to commit to the values you want to exhibit through your business
- This week’s book recommendation: Fix This Next by Mike Michalowicz
- Find us on Instagram and tell us you completed this week’s action step: @mrsamandawarfield and @jilliandolberry
Jillian Dolberry is the founder of Serve Your Heart Out, a community that provides personalized coaching and training for VAs and OBMs. While devoting her heart and time to the members of her community, she helps online business owners set boundaries, get unstuck, and reach goals that honor the reason they started their businesses in the first place. As a wife, mom, and business owner, Jillian has become a master of setting boundaries, allowing her to serve her community, family and her clients well.
Social Links:
OBM Services | Jillian Dolberry
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Rather Read? – Here’s the Transcript!
*Just a heads up – the provided transcript is likely to not be 100% accurate
I probably shouldn’t say things like this, but I’m going to, this is one of my, if not my favorite guest interview that I have ever done. That’s right. With over 255 episodes under my belt, I’m claiming it. This interview is magnificent. But before we get into the details, let me introduce you to my guest, Jillian.
Jillian Dol Berry is the founder of Serve Your Heart Out, a community that serves agency owners looking to streamline their business while devoting her heart and time to the members of her community. She helps online business owners set boundaries, get unstuck and reach goals that honor the reason they started their business in the first place.
As a wife, mom, and business owner, Jillian has become a master of setting boundaries, allowing her to serve her community, family, and her clients well. Jillian’s entire business is based around helping others create and grow agencies through their core values. And in today’s episode, she shares with us how we can use our own core values to create an impactful and unique course for our students.
If you’re someone who believes in building an intentional business and an intentional life, this episode is going to leave you feeling incredibly inspired. You are listening to episode 255 of The Chasing Simple Podcast, and I’m your host, Amanda Warfield. This episode was brought to you by my book, chasing Simple Marketing, a Crash Course, and contact marketing for showing up, saving time, and growing your business.
You can get your own copy@amandawarfield.com slash book.
How do I find time to create content without overwhelming myself? Where should I even be showing up in my marketing? How do I come up with fresh content ideas? Where should I be focusing my marketing efforts? What is lead generation anyways and how do I do it? Our launch is still a thing, and most importantly.
How do I put it all together to market my business strategically? Can I really grow my business without spending all of my time marketing? These are some of the questions that float around in your head when you think of marketing. Welcome, friend. This is Chasing Simple where Practical Marketing Strategy meets Simplicity.
I’m your host, Amanda Warfield, simplicity focused content marketing and launch strategist, speaker educator, and author of Chasing Simple Marketing. I traded in my classroom lesson plans for helping creative entrepreneurs sustainably fit marketing into their business without it taking over their business so that they have time to grow their business, take time off, and live the life they dreamed about when they first decided to go out on their own.
When I’m working, you can find me working with one-on-one clients, such as the Contract shop and Rebecca Rice Photography on their marketing strategy and copywriting, or how we, my students simplify their marketing and launches. And when I’m not, you can find me spending time outside with my husband, Russell reading in our hammock watching Gamecock Sports traveling or forcing our cats to snuggle me.
If you feel overwhelmed by marketing, you aren’t alone. Many entrepreneurs find marketing frustrating, overwhelming, and simply an obligation. They know they need it, but they don’t enjoy how easily it can suck up their time when what they really wanna be doing is the thing that they started their business to do.
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So grab yourself a cup of coffee or whatever your drink of choices. And meet me here each week for love, support, practical tips and advice on business.
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because here’s the deal, friend. It is time for your marketing to stop feeling like a constant grind and start feeling like the ball is in your hands. This is the year that you’re going to make more sales with less effort through a simple but impactful marketing strategy.
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Amanda: All right. Hello everyone. For those that haven’t met me yet, I am Amanda Warfield. I’m a simplicity focused content marketing strategist and copywriter, and my mission is to help other women entrepreneurs make some. Build out their revenue streams. Sorry, my YouTube started playing in my ear, build out their revenue streams and find freedom for themselves through simplified marketing.
And today, I’m so excited to have Jillian Berry joining me. Jillian is an operation strategist and team consultant and she helps women entrepreneurs streamline their businesses and get their operations in order. And she has a very unique. Human first, people first approach that I can’t wait to dive into and have her share more about with y’all later.
Um, but today we are going to talk very specifically about making mindful decisions with that people first approach as a course creator, as an educator, and how we can make those decisions as a business owner. But before we dive too deep into that, Jillian, anything else you wanna add to that introduction or anything else people should know about you?
Jillian: Um, I think you did a great job. First of all, thank you for having me. Um, I’m excited to kind of chat through this. I’ve had a lot of, I’ve supported a lot of clients in this way of like figuring out how to make better decisions in their business and do it in a way that honors themselves and honors other people.
So I’m just excited to jump in. So I say, let’s do it.
Amanda: Amazing. Okay. So before we dive into the entire decision making process and what that looks like, tell us about your people First approach. Because it’s something that I think is unique in the fact that it’s not talked about much. But I think it’s something that most of us in this online space want and that we can really connect with.
We just haven’t had anyone put it into words for us before.
Jillian: Yeah, so I feel like people first is kind of a, like the term people first is kind of a, well duh, you know, like, of course I’m gonna put people first. I’m gonna like really honor them. I’m gonna do what they need. We’re gonna serve them well. We’re gonna like do everything that is supportive of people.
But where it gets really tricky is when you have these hard conversations coming up in your business or conflicts that you have to navigate and you’re like. I don’t know how to handle this. I mean, how many times do we get in a situation where somebody says something to us that we like, weren’t expecting, or they’re requesting something that is out of scope, or they’re seemingly pushing boundaries or not adhering to them at all or respecting them.
And so we have to like kind of stand up for ourselves a little bit or. Have conversations where we’re bridging the gap of where we are today and where we need to be. And so this people first approach, I like to call the honor everyone approach because it’s not just about putting others first, it’s about, or, or respecting others.
It’s about respecting everyone involved and honoring everyone involved. So. That means that you’re honoring yourself by establishing boundaries, but you’re also honoring that other person by communicating those boundaries with them as well. Because when you are honored, you’re gonna be able to perform and do a better job for them.
So it’s, it’s kind of like a cycle where it’s not just all about me and it’s not all about them, it’s about everyone involved. And honestly, that’s biblical for me is like. It’s about making sure that we’re clear in what we’re doing and how we’re communicating, because that is kind. And so when we are able to do that, it honors every single person in the room and that is always the focus.
Amanda: Like you said, it’s such a a, a no duh idea, and yet most of us. When asked, we would say, yes, we want to practice that, but then we don’t. What barriers do you often see with clients as far as why they aren’t practicing this honor? Everyone approach
Jillian: fear. Like, fear of losing clients, fear of not pleasing them, fear of, um.
There. I think that there’s internal fears and external fears, right? There’s, um, if we don’t please someone, then that may trigger us internally of saying that we’re not doing a good enough job, or we’re not fulfilling the promise, or we’re not. Doing what we’re supposed to be doing. And there’s that fear of like not performing.
But then there’s also an external fear of like, if I upset them, if I do establish that boundary, if I do put that line in the sand, if I like that could upset them and therefore they could be upset with me. And then that’s like that external piece. So I really feel like when we get in our heads about that, that is our biggest bound or that’s our biggest, um, what’d you call it?
Oh my gosh, the word, what I call it, um, obstacle or whatever it is. So I was like using the word boundary and I didn’t wanna overlap it to get it confused, but it’s that thing that stands in the way of them being a able to implement the honor everyone approach that obstacle for them. Yeah.
Amanda: And the reality being that when you don’t set those boundaries from the beginning.
You could potentially lose a client if you decide to set boundaries. And so how do you help clients navigate this?
Jillian: Yeah, I would say you have to start with like your core value system, like what’s most important to you and something you just said is important to note because if we have brought clients in.
On a process or a way of doing business that doesn’t honor ourselves, then when we do decide to like fully honor everyone in the room, that’s gonna be different for them. So that’s gonna go against what they’re used to. Some people will. Be happy about that and like fall into line. And then some people won’t like that at all because that’s not the original, um, culture of your relationship working together.
And so if someone removes themselves from working with you because that doesn’t align with them, that’s okay. That’s their choice. But we need to be okay with that. We need to kind of release them. Um, but when it comes down to actually implementing some of these things, I think it really starts with what’s important to you.
What are the values that you hold really dear to your heart, but also to your business, and that you want your business to magnify out as an impact on others?
Amanda: And how do you determine what those values are? And I’m. I think I might be jumping ahead a little bit here because I’m imagining that when I ask more about decision making and the framework and all of that, that that’s gonna be an important part of this.
But since you mentioned this now, how do you know, how do you actually get context contextuals not. The word I’m looking for, but how do you, how do you make that real versus something that’s kind of up here, pie in the sky?
Jillian: Yeah, absolutely. I would say you have to think about you as a person.
A lot of us have started our business because we wanted flexibility and freedom, and we had something to give and put out into the world, something that was planted in us that we know can help and serve other people. And so. But the way we do that is equally as important as what we do. So we have to think about what are the pieces about me that make my people the experience of people working with me different?
What do I believe in is important? Is communication really important to me? Is um, honesty really important to me? Is vulnerability really important to me? You have to think about it, not just in terms of like a service. To someone else, but you have to think about it as like you as a person in all of your relationships because.
As women too. Like there we can’t, it’s like we have this inability to be, uh, two separate people. I feel like I, in the movies or in watching other people do business, sometimes they can be someone completely different at the office and someone completely different at home. But I feel like as women, we have this level of authenticity that like this is true to our core, true to our being.
And the same person who shows up at the office, virtual office is the same person who shows up at home. And so. You have to think about what are those values that are important inside your home, and then also what you’re sharing with other people. What are like the, the things that you want people to know about you, to know about communicating with you and working with you?
Amanda: You can definitely say no to this question, but would, would you be willing to share some of the values that you’ve, you know, established for your own business? Or is that too personal?
Jillian: Of course. No, not personal. I mean, I love that question and I think that I love it because it’s so important to me to be clear with people, for them to know and for me to not have, it takes a lot of energy to be somebody different.
Right. And so we just want to be true to who we were created to be and let that kind of overflow out of us. So a couple of the things, there’s like several, but a couple of the things that are really important to me are clarity is kindness and. Honor everyone, which is, you know, the people first approach that we talk about.
Um, and vulnerability. And vulnerability is big for me because growth happens when we let people in and when we let other people in to work with us. And so in sharing. How we were like who we are today and the experiences that we’ve had that allows us to be better every day moving forward and to just really absorb and understand where other people are coming from.
And I think that that’s kind of a superpower in business that was sometimes we overlook because the more we seek to understand, the more we can communicate better, the more we can be more, more vulnerable, the more we can help people and serve people.
Amanda: I love that so much. You, you said a phrase that really stuck out to me that it takes, and I’m probably butchering it, but that it takes more energy to be someone we’re not, and I just think that yeah, it, and it relates so much back to the authenticity piece that you were talking about before, but just we, we find ourselves building these communities.
Of people that were like, I could be friends with you in real life for sure. Like not a problem at all. Um, and it’s so important, just that authenticity that comes with, or should come with vulnerability if you really wanna build a community. And I just think, yeah, I love the way that all of your values, you can see the way they really work together.
Jillian: Yeah. They, and I think that’s the important thing about values too, is you’re never gonna have two values that collide. . Like, your values are all gonna like Be strung together. And I wanted to say too, on top of what you just said, that it’s not, while I say it, it comes naturally to us to be authentic.
It doesn’t, that doesn’t mean that it’s always easy. Because we have these other things at play, our other experiences in life that make us wanna please people versus be honest with them. And none of what makes us up in that way is bad, but we’ve got to figure out how to organize it in a way that is supportive of everyone and not just, um, supportive of keeping us comfortable.
Amanda: Yeah,
I like that. Not just being comfortable. So. First and foremost, for everyone that’s here with us, if you wanna share some of your values in the chat, we’d love to hear them. And if you’re catching the replay, let us know in the comments. But I’m curious, you, you tend to work primarily with people, with teams, with agency owners.
For those that don’t have a team yet, that don’t own an agency, but are course creators and they have students, how can they.
Share those values and be authentic and not just be comfortable. How can they do all of this and implement all of this with students versus team members? Do you have any thoughts on that?
Jillian: Yeah, I think if you wanna spit out like a specific situation, we could like kind of talk through that and kind of play through it.
But off the top of my head. So I have a client right now who doesn’t have a team. Part of us working together is she needs a team. And so we are figuring out who those people are and we’re hiring those people in our time together. Um, so one thing though that is important is. In every stage of business, whether you’re a solopreneur today or you have an assistant or you are clear, you are only working with people who are on the other side of your product, right?
They’re getting your product, they’re experiencing it. There is. The, the simple answer is it’s interwoven into everything that we do, right? Because how we talk to people, the words that we use, the tone of voice we use, all of those things come into play of ex of expressing our values. But a lot of times people will, instead of, so like I would say.
It has a lot to do with the boundaries that you set for yourself and for your business and for how your business is structured. That communicates a lot more about your values than just words that you tell people. Because you could say, I really value communication, but if on the back end of your business you’re sending client updates or weekly updates to your course members, then.
You are communicating with them, that’s, that is communicating that you value communication. Whereas like if you just say, I love to communicate, I love connecting with you guys, but then they don’t hear from you for weeks. Like that’s not communicating that you value communication. So there’s a lot of different ways that we can kind of implement those things.
But a lot of people look at the word boundaries or hear the word boundaries, and they’re like, oh, people don’t like boundaries. So like, I don’t, I don’t wanna like off-put anyone, I don’t wanna upset anyone. Um, even though. Boundaries, and we’re going through this in our season of parenting right now. But boundaries are intended to keep you happy, healthy, or maybe not always happy, but generally a happy person, healthy and safe, right?
And so, and happiness is kind of like the after effect of all those things when you’re healthy and safe, like you’re able to kind of live life in a more free way. But a lot of people view boundaries as the thing that holds you back instead of the thing that makes you free.
Amanda: I love it. Yeah, and I, I love that example so much about communication and I never would’ve thought that, like you said, like words communicate your values, but your actions and the boundaries you put in place really do so.
I’d love to know if someone said that they value. Pulling something outta thin air. So if you have examples, please feel free to jump in. But if they say that they value, um, connecting with their students and they value connection, what’s a way that they could implement that to showcase that value with their course?
Jillian: Oh gosh. There’s so many ways. I’m just gonna use a couple of different examples. Yeah. But if you value connecting with people, um. An example of maybe how we do that in a way that doesn’t have a lot of stability is by opening up a chat. Let’s just say I’m gonna create a chat forum for my students, for them to like, comment in or whatever.
Um, because that to me is like, oh, I’m giving them the opportunity to come to me. But if connection is important to you, and it’s important for you to get to know those people and get to know more intimately like what they’re struggling with, so you can better serve them, then you need a process around.
You going to them. You need a process around that connection piece in your business. So that could be every other month you pick three students that you personally email and you say, Hey, I would love to hop on a 15 minute call and get to know you better because you are my ideal client and you are somebody that I would love to like get to know better, serve better, and figure out what your true needs and pain points are like.
That’s something that you can do. That’s a total of 45 minutes. And every other month. And of course you can change the timeframes and the dates and how, the cadence of all of that, but that’s something specific that you can do that will fulfill that desire and that value of connection for you. But it’s also valuing, connecting with them and honoring them, that now you’re able to serve them better because you actually understand them.
Amanda: Wait, you’re blowing my mind right now. Okay. So let’s say someone has, I’ve never thought about this in this way, ever. Let’s say someone has a value of, um, hit me with it. Just, let’s just go for it. I, well, I’m like, I don’t even know. Um, they have a value of,
personal development and like personal growth. How could they, I don’t know. That one might be a hard one.
Jillian: Well, let me think about it. If we, if you, if we value personal growth and how do we implement that with our. Course members, is that what you’re saying?
Amanda: Yeah. Or how do we showcase that value to our course members, our students?
Okay.
Jillian: So an ex, a way that you could do that is if you value personal growth, then you’re probably investing in books. You’re probably investing in. Um. Courses potentially, or people or conferences or whatever. Let’s say, let’s just say it’s a book. For example, if you are investing your time into growing who you are as a person or growing who you are as a business owner and you want people to know that you, that, that’s important to you.
I think that that comes out in how we build out what we deliver to people. So like. Let’s say if you have a, if you have a Facebook group or a community that you communicate with your course members, you could say, Hey guys, I just read this book. Here are my key takeaways. I think it would be a great read for you as well.
If you are struggling with X, Y, and Z. Or we could say that on social media, we could use our Instagram stories to say like. I just read this book and it is blowing my mind. You got, I think if you like these things or if you value this, or if you’re struggling with this, you would love it. And so it’s just about like.
When you’re friends with somebody and you go get your haircut and it was the best haircut you’ve ever had, you were immediately texting your friends and you’re saying, you guys, I just had the best experience. Right, and that’s because the experience was important to you. What’s important to us pours out.
From us and overflows from us. So it just naturally kind of falls into the spaces that we are in. And so something for personal development, which is a little bit more of a like internal value versus like, and a way to, well, I said that you could like share it with other people and like share the book with other people, but that also supports them developing and growing as a person.
And so I think that it just kind of circles around. Whenever we are, whenever we value something, whenever it impacts us, it overflows out of us in a positive way.
Amanda: This is, you’re a genius. You’re just straight A genius. I’m gonna have chat, GBT give me ideas right now to throw at you. Okay? I love it because I can’t think on the spot.
But also, this is why don’t, don’t let us down chat. I hate naming episodes or saying like, this is what we’re gonna talk about today because we never end up talking about what I think we’re gonna talk about. Um, for everyone listening, I told Jillian we were gonna talk about mindful decision making. I don’t know if we’re gonna get to that.
And this is. Just as great. I kinda wanna do another one about mindful decision making, but, um, I, I always end up in these rabbit holes with guests, so thank you for allowing me to go down this rabbit hole with you. We’re just gonna, you’re gonna go where the mood takes us, um, business values. Okay. Let’s see what chat comes up with.
Um, ooh, sustainability, that’s a good one.
Jillian: Ooh. Okay. So sustainability, can you tell me how that would, do you want me to talk about this from the perspective of a course creator or anyone?
Amanda: Course creator would be ideal.
Jillian: Okay. So sustainability, but I also know that I’m
Amanda: throwing this at you with zero preparation.
Jillian: So true. So you get what you get. Um, okay. So. If it were, let me start with the bigger picture and then I’ll, I’ll zoom into course creators. So, if a client’s, uh, value is sustainability, it’s important to them that whatever they put their efforts into, whatever they focus on is to support the future of the business, right?
So. Sometimes to be able to support the future, we have to reconfigure our mindset to be less about reactive decisions and look at us going back to decision making and then going into proactive decisions. So we have to be, if we, if sustainability is important, we’re not just making decisions based off of what feels good today, what’s most important for the bottom line for this month, we are looking ahead and seeing like.
Who on our team is going to take us to the long haul? Who is going to support us moving forward? Um, it’s less about the here and now and more about the then and where we see everything going because when we have a vision for our business, I. It’s in the then, right? It’s not just always in the here and now.
The impact happens in the here and now. But we have to also support the vision for the future. So some decisions that we might have to make for sustainability. It may mean that we are evaluating our expenses every month. Again, there’s like systems that we implement to support these types of things.
We may implement a decision making tree so that we’re making decisions based off of the future vision of the company and not just like what feels right in the moment. Um, I have an experience in working with somebody where they have. They’ve hired people based off of an immediate need. It’s almost like I need someone to take these things off of my plate, and then a friend gets fired from a job and so they hire that friend because it seems like that’s the best decision.
But does this person have. The experience that you need. Do you have the correct training materials to even like hand things off to them to where it’s not as stressful to be able to train that person? Um, is this person someone that you see being a long-term fit with the company that could grow with you?
You just have to think a little bit bigger to be able to make the decision today. And, um, in terms of a course creator. Sustainability for them will look differently than someone who has multiple team members, right? But ultimately, as a course creator, you probably will get to a point to where you feel like you need to bring someone on your team to just support the everyday activities.
Um, so when you think about sustainability, maybe you’re thinking, well, I get that. I probably need to hire somebody, but I don’t really wanna give up that money. I feel like I need to, um, hold onto that extra $500,000 a month in what I’m making because I don’t know what the future holds. But when we think about it in terms of sustainability, I.
You are going, if you’re already feeling burnt out, you’re gonna need to consider what the impacts of that are if you don’t bring someone on. So it’s almost looking at the opportunity cost of if you make the decision the way that it feels right now versus if you don’t make the decision that’s right for the future.
Does that make sense?
Amanda: Absolutely. Okay. I’m curious, so earlier you mentioned that values will never. Conflict, right? Let’s say we’ve got someone who is currently a solopreneur. They’re running a course or a community, and they are in that place where they are just like, I cannot do all of these things that I once did.
One of my values is sustainability, and so I need to make these long-term decisions for the business where maybe I bring someone else on to help run, said membership or course. But another one of their values is connection with their students. How do they find that balance? So that those aren’t conflicting.
Jillian: Again, I kind of go back to the process piece because that’s a really great point though, is that, is that an active pain point for course creators? They’re afraid that they’re gonna lose the connection with their people.
Amanda: Um, I, let me say this. I feel like as a student, I’ve noticed course creators doing that, and I, I, I’ve had those thoughts.
Of I purchased to learn from you, not from a team member. Hmm. And so I don’t know if course creators necessarily are feeling that. I think I would feel that if I got to that place.
Amanda: Um, because as a student myself, I have felt a lack of connection, which maybe it’s not that course creator’s value to be clear, uh, which is okay, but.
Does that make sense?
Jillian: Yes. Yes. Okay. So I feel like if, if this were somebody coming, a course creator was coming to me and they were saying that there is a disconnect here, or they’re concerned about this being a potential thing, because a lot of times, even if you’re not a course creator, if you’re just a business owner, you worry about and an agency owner as well, because you typically did the work first.
If you bring on somebody else, the clients are gonna be. Like concerned that they’re not being supported in the same way, or it’s a different person, or I hired you versus them. Um. I think that how we present this has to be extremely confident. Mm. And ultimately the, the decision we make to make this change in our business comes from our core values of being able, able to help and serve them in the future.
And you will not be able to help and serve them well in the future unless you bring in some internal support. Now, if there is, and again, like if we get feedback that. Connection is important to us and it’s a value that we have in our course or our business, and yet people are not feeling connected.
That’s worth looking into. Maybe you’re missing some kind of process that is continually connecting you with people, but it’s an unrealistic expectation and, and some people have unrealistic expectations. Shocking, but it’s an unrealistic expectation that as a business grows that you’re being served by the same people.
But as the business owner, you can do the intentional work on the backend to make sure there are processes that, that support those values so that you aren’t, um, communicating that those are no longer values. So if you are missing a piece of that somewhere, it’s always good. Like I said before of like.
Connecting with those people, taking 15 minutes on a call or just sending them a couple questions. Recently I did a, um, I used a video ask for this and just sent it to a couple people because it’s my face. It’s a video of me, but then they’re able to, so there’s that connection piece for them, but then they’re giving me the feedback of what I need to hear so that I can continue to serve them better.
It’s all about how we position it to them as well. Because if ultimately we’re setting a boundary that is gonna help us be sustainable, help our business continue to serve more people, and they don’t respect that, then they may not be your person. May not be the ideal client for you. The people who truly understand it are gonna be able to be long-term clients in the future.
Amanda: Okay. I’m trying to decide. There’s a rabbit hole. I kind of wanna go down based off of something you just said, but I also wanna throw more values at you. Um, I’m kind of intrigued by the rabbit hole. I know. I know. This is my problem. Okay, so you mentioned processes and looking at the processes, and you do so much for your clients.
Uh, I feel like it’s truly hard to put into a really succinct sentence. How you serve your people, because you are just, I mean, operation Strategist covers it, but it doesn’t sound like enough with all that you do and all that you help with. And so this all we’ve talked about is just one tiny part of how you help your clients, and a large part is those processes and those systems.
How would you give someone a quick 1 0 1? Here’s how you look at the processes in your business to make sure that they align with your values. Sorry.
Jillian: Yeah, no, you’re good. Um, it starts with a pain point, and it could be your pain point or it could be your customer’s pain point. So I think that having those conversations to understand where the gap is, that’s where you start.
Like you have to be able to, you’re, you as the business owner or the course creator. Have a very unique perspective and view of your business, but they, you still have blind spots. So you have to one, be open to feedback and like ask the right questions. Um, you have. Communicate with the right people and ask the right people the questions, and you have to know what’s most important based off of that feedback.
Because you may ask someone a question, they may give you all sorts of feedback under the sun, and, but all the feedback they give you has more to do with the season of. Life they’re in, in their business or whatever versus how you’re actually serving them. So there’s like a level of discernment there.
And when I come alongside clients, I kind of serve as that filter for them of saying like, this is not you, this is them. Like this is their perspective of it, but here’s what we can pull from it. Here are the specific things that we can use to our benefit to make adjustments and create systems around how to serve them better.
Amanda: Okay. Can you give maybe a practical example or two of different processes that you look at with clients?
Jillian: Well, we look at everything from the core function of their business. So like if their business is, um, creating a course, then it’s about how all the processes that go into creating an idea or having an idea and putting it out into the world, um, to the internal processes.
So. Whether that be like strategic planning that you have or, um, if you do have team members, uh, communicating with those team members, weekly check-ins or monthly check-ins or team reviews, we look at all of the systems that are in the business and say, how can we do this better? Um, that sounds like you’re looking at a list of like a hundred different things, but really the core of it is that.
It’s the core function of the business. It’s how we communicate with people and it’s how we operate in a bigger picture. So it’s leadership, it’s um, the systems of how we get everything out. And um, it’s also looking at our numbers, making sure that those things are in shape and communicating with our team.
So we try to look at it in those core areas of leadership, profit, systems, and team. And then we. Go into those four categories, so we kind of lump it together in those.
Amanda: And you actually have a quiz that people can take that will give them a health score for each of those core categories, right? Yes. Tell us how we can find that.
Jillian: Yeah, so it’s jillian berry.com/quiz and it will basically ask you, I can’t remember how many questions it is, but I do know that it takes you like less than two minutes. Um, and you just click yes, no, whichever one applies to you. And it’s a really simple questionnaire, but what it. Gives you is it gives you a score of where you’re at in that sustainability versus in all of those core four areas.
So it’ll give you a score in all of them and then it’ll summarize it together, and then it breaks down your scores for each area, why you got that score, and then it’ll give you specific tips on how to improve and tactical action steps of how to improve each of those core four areas. Mm.
Amanda: Okay. So. We’ve got the quiz.
Do you have any resources on uncovering your values?
Jillian: That’s a really good question. I don’t, and here’s why. Well, resources I do in terms of like blog posts and such, so you could go to my blog. Okay. There’s post and look at them there. I don’t have like a freebie and here’s why. People feel like they already know their M they feel like that is such a core foundational business thing, and it’s true. It is. And a lot of times we start our business with a set of values that. Is what we think it is in the moment. But the longer we operate, the more we try to like, the more we realize that it’s a little bit more refined than what we started with.
And so I walk through the process of really figuring out what those values are with the people that I work with. But a lot of times people need someone to walk that line with them because. Doing it by ourselves feels like we already kind of like check out. We’re like, oh, I know who I am, I know what my values are.
Like, that’s something that’s ingrained in me. So we don’t always sit down and take the time to like write those out. So if that’s something that, um, resonates with anybody listening to this, I highly recommend, um, just like sitting down and asking yourself a couple of questions like. What’s important to me?
What do I want people to feel when they interact with me or my business? What kind of impact do I want to have on the world or my students? You can kind of make it as broad or small as you want it to be, um, and just think about what those things are and then look at the systems that you have and do those support that.
Amanda: Okay, so. We’re gonna link to some of your blog posts on values, and we’re gonna link to the quiz, and someone is either going to decide they already know their values, or they’re gonna look at those blog posts and figure them out, and then they’re gonna take their quiz results. How do they merge the two?
How do they use the values that they have for their business and those quiz results and move forward?
Jillian: That’s a great question. I would say, well, first of all, after you take the quiz, you get a free one hour strategy call with me. So I think that that would be really important. I know, so like, let’s, let’s just hop on a call people, let’s just talk it through together and I will walk you through it.
Um, but in terms of implementing it, obviously when someone gives you a list of things to do and you don’t know them and they don’t know you, you have to weigh. Your values next to that to-do list, right? A lot of times we’ll see things on Instagram and we’re like, oh, that sounds amazing, or, that’s a really good idea, or whatever, but that may not be aligned, fully aligned with the core of our business and what we need to be focusing on.
So. That’s why it’s important to like, bring someone into the operations piece so they can kind of help walk you through that and work as an advocate for you and for your clients, for the honor Everyone approach. Um, but something that you could do is you could, again, ask yourself those questions of what’s most important to me, what feels, um, like it needs the most attention right now.
Um. You can also ask questions like, does this fully serve the future vision of my business? Is this going to positively or negatively impact the future of the business versus now? If we’re not looking at the now and we’re just looking at the future, that might be the difference between the right decision and the wrong decision if we’re being more reactive versus proactive.
So I think that, again, we’ve gotta you, we gotta be able to shut out the distractions. And focus in on what those values are. Look at what someone else is telling us to do and say, okay, if I’m looking at these two things, which things on this list feel most important based off of who I am and the impact that I wanna have and the impact that my business has.
Start there.
Amanda: So discerning through your values, what next steps are?
Jillian: Based on exactly’s can help them do that
Amanda: with the one hour call?
Jillian: Yes, absolutely. So I can walk them through it. Um, discernment is something that. Is not like what we wanna hear. Like, because it, it makes us pause, it makes us go inward, it makes us reflect, and that is sometimes very, very hard when we are very, very busy and burnout.
So, you know, we didn’t really talk much about the decision making piece, but one of the things that. I want people to do or start implementing as a practice is when they feel the urgency of someone else. The urgency of fixing something or the, like, they’re being impacted by the, by this outward urgency, or they’re putting urgency expectations on themselves.
I want them to pause. Like give yourself a solid. You may not need a full day. You may not need 24 hours, you may need 30 minutes. It just depends on how quickly you can kind of recenter yourself into your value system. But pausing is going to give you the best chance of making a decision that is most aligned with your values.
Amanda: It’s so funny because this right here is exactly why I wanted to have the conversation about mindful decision making because just like you said, so many of us are overwhelmed or burnt out. We have these big decisions to make about running a business on a daily basis of what do I work on next? What is the thing that’s most important today?
What’s going to move my business forward, but what’s gonna make me money and which one do I do next? You know, we have all these big decisions and we do just want that, like, okay, what’s next? We want the easy decision making, but that isn’t. Always mindful decision making, like you said. So I just think it’s really funny.
This came full circle. Um, if you guys want to hear a prolonged version of that conversation, let me know in the comments if we should bring Jillian back for actually talking about mindful decision making next time. But yeah, I just, I resonate deeply with that idea of there’s so much to do. How do you make the time for it, for deciding I.
Mindfully with those values and with, you know, their, um, I have you heard of Mike Al’s book? Fix this Next.
Jillian: Oh no, but I need to add that to my list.
Amanda: It’s a great book. I love all of his books. He writes, it’s, it’s so easy to read. Um, but I got the book thinking it was gonna give me this quick like. Fix this next and it’ll be great.
And then you read it and you’re like, huh, how do I have time to do that? You know, it’s just, yeah. There’s always so much to do. And I just appreciate your, your approach and your consistent reminders to honor yourself and honor your clients and really take a, a slower approach to running a business.
Jillian: Yeah, I think we get really, um, sucked into we need more quicker because we like put ourselves in this, um, rhythm of putting, putting things out into the world and needing an immediate return. But what I’ve learned is that, and listen, like all of our businesses, if we were to look at them and this, the revenue, we’ll just say the revenue of it.
If we were to look at our revenue over the course of three months versus three years, those pictures are completely different. But the one thing they have in common is a lot of this. And so I feel like the more clear we can get on our values, the more we can. Serve people the best way that we were created to.
And a lot of people see, like have that fear of, if I show that these things are my values that may not align with somebody, and therefore they may be, they may exit my program or they may exit working with me and then I’m losing revenue. But ultimately. If we continue to be consistent in what we put out there and it is very clearly aligned with who we are as people, then that is gonna find the right people to then come back to us to work with us.
And so instead of values like eliminating things and cutting things out of your business and viewing it that way, it’s really more focusing and growing and making the roots richer for us. So I really encourage people to take the time to pause and even like the, I. What we’re almost in February. That sounds ridiculous, but this is still a new year.
February 1st is our new New year. We still have time to like take a second, think through what our values are and how we can make small grace filled changes in our business to take steps forward to communicating those values with other people. And that’s important too. I. Everything that I do and teach my clients has this underlying level of grace.
We are not gonna get it perfect. We are humans, even in hard conversations and conflict like we do our very best and still we sometimes we don’t get it right. But what is going to give you the most power in edge in business is the grace that you give yourself because it allows you to get back up and do better next time.
Hmm.
Amanda: And you know. As you’re sharing all of this, I’m thinking about my business in the last year and changes that I’ve made and, um, you know, we don’t always get it right and also sometimes we get it right on accident. Um, so true. I’m just like, I’m thinking back to this last year and um, previously I have had clients that I loved working with, but that had more of a.
Social media focus for what they wanted with content and not really my values when it comes to marketing, right? I, and you know this, I very much value a cohesive, whole marketing system approach, a systematic approach that’s cohesive and simple, and that isn’t so focused on social media. Social media is just kind of like nice to have on the side.
And I’m realizing this year more of my clients, most of them in fact, if not all of them, are more aligned with that cohesive less social media approach. And I’m realizing as you’re talking about this, that I think that a lot of that has to do with the fact that outwardly, I was posting less on social media, whereas before I was posting a lot, um.
Jillian: Can I interrupt you for a second? Yeah. Yes. And this isn’t like in a vacuum where it’s like all or nothing, right? But if I would say in, in response to what you’re saying, if you’re posting a lot on social media, you’re communicating that that’s a value to you, right? Yeah.
Amanda: Yeah. That’s what I’m realizing is like, oh, I was communicating that value without even meaning to, and.
But I’ve honestly only stepped back because of time constraints and having to make those decisions of like what’s important and it wasn’t a value or not as high of a value.
Amanda: And I’ve showcased that now and it’s showing in my clients. And I did not do that intentionally. It just happened naturally.
Jillian: Because you probably went through a season of your life where you’re like. I’m evolving as a person. I’m growing as a person, and therefore I’m gonna choose something different because I now realize that this is really where I want my focus to be.
Amanda: And you know, I don’t even know if it was that conscious.
I think it was just I cut back my work hours a lot because that I, I took on a part-time job that aligns with some of my other values. Um. This is crazy. This is blowing my mind. I’ve never like consciously thought about this, but by cutting back my hours, things fell off to the wayside. Interesting.
That what a testament for exactly what you’re saying though, of follow the values and the right clients will come.
They will feel aligned with you with what you’re showcasing, even if you’re not meaning to showcase it necessarily in that way. Wow.
Jillian: I think that there is. Also a lot to be said in the longer we can stick it out in business and the longer we can.
Um, and grace is a big piece of this. When you give yourself grace, you’re able to get back up and keep moving. And so the longer we live our lives in our personal lives or in our business lives or whatever, the more we learn about ourselves. And you’re right, it wasn’t a conscious decision of like. Well, I’m gonna choose, or this is no longer my value, so I’m gonna pull back from that.
It was more of a, like this naturally happened because you were clear on what the next step was for you in your life and in your business and in your work and how you spend your time. And so there’s a lot of that that, I mean, I think that anybody could go back and look at their recent life changes or the last time there was a big change and shift and see how.
Their values have C become more refined. And how that’s impacted the decisions they’ve made moving forward. There’s power in the pause. Yeah. Just to like figure it out. Power in the pause. I love that.
Amanda: Yeah. Amazing. Wow. Jillian, I. Love this conversation, even though it was not where I told you it was gonna lead.
So sorry about that. Um, I should just add a disclaimer as I’m talking to all guests, I feel like this is where we’re gonna take it, but also maybe not. Um, no. But thank you for being here today. We are gonna link some of your blog posts on values and we’re also gonna link the quiz so that everyone can check that out.
But is there, are there any additional resources or anywhere else that you want people to connect with you?
Jillian: Well, I’m on Instagram and um, I am not affected by this TikTok band or whatever happens with that. I am an Instagram girl, so, and I love chatting with people in the dm, so if they have questions about their quiz or anything like that, they can DM me or they can just email me, I’m hello@jilliandlberry.com.
It comes directly to me, so if they have questions about it, they can reach out, but if they do take the quiz, they just need to go ahead and book the call so that we can just chat over it. Yeah. So I would love that. Absolutely.
Amanda: All right guys, we will have all of those links for you. Thank you for being here today.
We go live every single Monday at uh, 1:00 PM Eastern Time is our brand new time for the new year, 1:00 PM Eastern, 10:00 AM Pacific for a nice lunch and learn. And we are so thankful to Jillian for being our first guest of 2025.
Thank you so much for joining me here today, friend. You can find this episode show notes as well as all the resources you need to simplify your marketing over@amandawarfield.com. If you liked what you heard here today, be sure to subscribe to the podcast so that you’ve never missed an episode. And if you could take a moment to leave a rating and review, it would truly mean the world to me.
Ratings and reviews are the number one way that you can support a podcast and ensure that it sticks around for many more episodes to come. I’ll see you next time. Now, go out and uncomplicate your marketing and business.
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