How to DECIDE What to Give (and What NOT to Give)

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Welcome to Episode 10, of UNcomplicating Business for Teachers Helpers and Givers. My name is Sara Torpey. I am the hostess here at this podcast and I'm happy you're here. This is one of my favorite places. And I'm glad you're here with us. Today we're going to talk about how to decide what to give, if you haven't listened to the episode before this, which is episode nine in the second season. And it's called How to know if you're giving too much. It's worth maybe thinking about doing that one first. But essentially, you know, what we learned in that episode is if you're over giving, it's time to rebalance. So today, what we're going to talk about is the first step in how in this in getting, giving and receiving back in balance in your business so that you can be more successful for the long term, because that's really what this is about. When we balance these two things giving and receiving, we build our businesses in such a way that we are built for long term success and to be happy in them. So today, that is what we're going to talk about, if you haven't listened to that previous episode, you can try it, it's not super long, I think it's, gosh, I can't even tell you at the moment, it's it's not super long. I can't remember, I want to go look at now I can't find it. But please know that you still can listen to this. It's okay, it's safe. But the first step here is balancing what you give and what you get back. So, you know, when I think about this with clients, what we start initially talking about is, what they love about the work they're doing and what they don't love. So, you know, these are questions that I asked, I actually made my list. My planning for this podcast is like a list of questions. It's Santa scrolls, and I'm not going to dump them all on you. But so what I think it helps to start with, is by thinking about what you love giving in your business, for example, I have a Facebook group, it is called UNcomplicating Business for Teachers Helpers and Givers just like this part podcast, and I love my group, I give a ton of things for free in there. And on a fairly regular basis, people suggest to me like, well, you can do this thing that you're doing in your group, and you could charge for it. And I don't want to do that. I love my Facebook group, I love the way I give in there. I love what I give in there, and I don't want to mess with it. So for me, if I think about what I love about what I'm doing, I love that. Okay, so you have things that you give you give happily and freely, and you would give 100 times tomorrow, over and over and over again. And so add those to your list. Think about what those things are the things that light you up. Like I love giving time to people, I'm just meeting. So like when I have connect calls with new people that I meet through networking, I am absolutely thrilled when they spend 45 minutes talking about their businesses, and we like geek out about things that they can change and do better. And all that kind of stuff. Like I love that. Am I going to keep coaching them like that forever? No. But I love those meetings. I love learning what they're doing. I love learning what people aspire to, like, I would not trade those times at all. But there are other cases where you know, I don't do this so much now, but early in my business where I was giving things that I didn't enjoy giving, where I was working with certain types of clients, or the kind of work we were doing just didn't fit what I was doing and what I enjoyed doing what I was good at, like, Ah, so there were times where I was like, Do I really like doing this? No. And so if you look around at what you do day to day, think about what you're giving that you love to give and you would happily do over and over again. And the things that you're like, I really don't want to like I have a client who tutors and she mostly works with kids and reading and recently she has been working with an older child typically out of her, you know, the people she works with, and they've been working on study skills. And so you know, I said to her, like, do you really enjoy doing that? And she said, You know, I love the kid, but I don't like the work. Okay, well, don't do that anymore. You don't have to offer that. Just because you're not offering that doesn't mean all the clients will go away. And so the one thing I want to clarify in this episode, when I talk about what we're giving, it's not just what we're giving for free, right? It includes what we're giving as services so like my client, that tutor she's not helping this kid with her study skills for free. She's being paid but she all So doesn't enjoy it. So it's making her business feel harder when she does it. So, you know, first, it's what do you really like that you're giving that you're offering? What don't you love? What are you doing, that's just not something that lights you up that you're like, if right? Then you can think about what you want to give for free. And what you really want to be paid for what you feel like is a lot of effort on your part. So like for me, I know that I am happy to have those initial meetings with people where we have, you know, short, we have discussions about their businesses and my business and what they're working on. And I ask them all the questions because I do it, I just can't help myself. And then if they really want regular help, or more than just like, friendly check ins here and there, then then they need coaching. And I charge for that, like, I'm happy to give them coaching. But I'm not happy to give them coaching for free. I like to do little mini workshops, I love to do those for free. I'm building a course though a class that I'm going to run in the in the spring starting in March, called selling by giving actually which is fun to hear. And that is not going to be free, because I think it is going to be me putting all of my best things into a way that makes them really accessible and easy to implement. A and B, I think people will get more from it. If they're paying for it. They invest, they'll actually invest right, it'll be more worthwhile to everyone. So for you take a look at the things you're doing that you want to continue to give. What do you want to give for free what feels good for you to give for free? Like I don't ever want my Facebook group to be behind a paywall? Because I don't enjoy that. Like, I don't want a membership in those might be famous last words, but I just don't. And what do you want to be paid for? Then? You know, what's the line? Right? Where is the line between free and paid? And you may not know the answer to it. But you definitely have examples of when you've crossed the line too far, where you're like, Oh, God, I wish they were paying me for this, or I wish they were paying me more for this. Go back into your memory bank and think about where those places are. We're like, this is not enough for this thing. I'm doing those. That's where you start to find the line. Then, you know, the other thing to think about and I clients always laugh when I say this, but like where's the wiggle room? When are the cases that you're going to be willing to bend the rules and the boundaries a little bit. And what you give versus what you receive what's for you What's paid, right? What you love to do what you don't love to do. Like sometimes, if I have a current client that I've worked with a long time, who needs help with a particular kind of thing that I don't really do. But I know how to do that I've sort of taken off my menu, I will do it with them. Right? Like I will help them in that thing. Because they're an established client, I know that they know the boundaries, like I'm happy to help them in this short period of time with this thing. But I wouldn't do it for just anybody, right? Like, I have boundaries like that. Sometimes I adjust pricing for people I know really need it. Like as a business owner, I have that ability, or I adjust the package. But I do that, based on my want to serve and help and the person in front of me and how much I want to work with them and all these things. There's so many factors that go into that. But sometimes I bend my own rules, it is what it is. So you know, where's the wiggle room? And then the other thing, the best question I think of this bunch is how do you know when it's too far? So like, you know, think back again, to the experiences where you really felt like the giving and getting was out of balance? How did you know? Right? How did you know that it was out of whack? How did it feel? How did you act? How did the other person act? Because if you can get a little transparency into those interactions, and those things that have happened in the past, it will be easier not to do it again. But sometimes we just kind of carry forward without reflecting on those things. And we forget. And so if you look back and you're like oh, you know that time where I was like no, no, no, you guys are taking advantage of me. This is why I felt that way. Oh, maybe I shouldn't. Maybe next time I won't do it like that. Maybe I'll build in this guardrail that will help me not do it like that. And then, you know, the other thing to do is to schedule yourself some check ins. So like I schedule in my calendar, like a dork. Periodically that I go and recheck how I feel about By pricing and how I've structured my packages, I don't do it all the time I do it like two or three times a year, I haven't my calendar. But it's like a hey, is what you're doing right now working. And if it could use adjusting, how do you want to adjust, I put it in my calendar so that I don't have to try to remember. That's a, that's a whole different ball of wax. But you here's the whole of it, you get to decide what you give, and what you don't give. You cannot have too short of a list of what you give. There are people that like, think about all the very, very niche things that people do out in the world, like people that are like there's a guy here that will paint your trash cans and clean them. Like he has a whole business. Okay, well, he's powerwashing trash cans and painting them, okay, that's a whole business, he does two things. So for you to narrow down your services, not gonna kill you, this guy has a whole business, he does do things. And if you want to do some of it for free, and draw a really clear line between free and paid, that's fine. So in the end, you are the decider of this. And whatever you decide today is today's decision. So what I want you to remember is that the decision you're going to make, you're gonna make intentionally and you're going to stick to, but it is not written in marble, like we did not carve that sucker into stone. So if you know two months, three months, four months down the road, you look around, you're like, Ah, that feels really bad. Right? It feels really bad to not be getting paid for this. The amount of money that I'm getting for this doesn't feel fair to me, the thing that I really wanted to be paid for, I really feel good about giving for free, you know, something you decided you'd sell as a course when you could just give it away. Like you'd rather give it away like I have things like that, where I'm like, I could have people pay for this, but I would really just rather hand it to them. That's fine. You can change. But do it as intentionally as you're making the decisions right now. Right? Okay. So that's how to start. We're step one in sort of getting the over giving, in line rebalancing, the giving and the getting is by deciding what you want to give and what you don't. That's it. The second step, what we're going to do on the next episode of the podcast, is we're going to talk about the beliefs that are really a part of giving and receiving the things you have to believe about yourself and your business, things to be aware of that you might believe about yourself and your business that are standing in your way potentially. And then from there, we're going to talk about boundaries and getting it wrong, because you're gonna get it wrong, because we all get it wrong constantly. And that is we're gonna embrace that sucker. So, if you enjoyed this episode, please feel free to share it. Subscribe on your podcast platform. If you want to throw a rating at the podcast, I would appreciate it so much. And if you want help with this, if you're like, holy how I don't know the answers to these questions, I don't even know how to begin. I know how to ask them in a way that you will have answers to. I know how to help you figure this out. So if you want help, figuring out how to rebalance this giving and getting right now so that you can walk into 2023 feeling really good rather than really burned out. I am here to help. I will link my calendar and the ability to book a free call in the transcript for the podcast. And then I will see you next week to talk about the beliefs of giving and receiving Happy Tuesday, or whatever day you're listening