0169: Eradicating Business Overwhelm with Virtual Team Development with Barbara Turley

Intro [0:00]

EA Interviews Episode 169. Inspiration, transformation, success stories, and the Imperfect Action Round seven days a week. Join Mario Fachini for today’s Expert Authority Effect Interview. 

Mario Fachini [0:13]

All right. Ladies and gentlemen, I am excited to have none other than the lovely Barbara Turley here today, Founder of The Virtual Hub. And I don’t know about you, but have you ever had overwhelmed with your business and just thought there’s all these great things you want to do, but you’re not sure how you’re going to get it done. I know that I have. And it’s why I started building a team years ago and continue to grow it. And I’m super excited to have her here because she is going to be sharing with you how you can build the team and how it’s going to impact your business for the better. We’re going to thank our sponsor and I’m going to bring her right up. 

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Mario Fachini [1:08]

Here she is ladies and gentlemen, the lovely Barbara Turley from Chamonix, France. How are you doing, Barbara? 

Barbara Turley [1:14]

I’m good. Thank you. Thank you so much for having me today, Mario. 

Mario Fachini [1:18]

I am excited for you to share because you are solving the problem that I would confidently say every business or some fact checker is going to say 99.9999 percent of businesses have. 

Barbara Turley [1:32]

Absolutely. And I’m apparently the best status at delegation and eradicating overwhelmed, but I still feel myself. So overwhelmed. It’s just something that’s it’s part of business and there are ways of eradicating that we could talk about today. 

Mario Fachini [1:47]

Well, I’m glad we can. Because I’ve had so many people, even my own clients in years past, we’ll be working on publishing one of their business books, or working on a live stream, or something and every single time, when you’re working together for eight weeks, 16 weeks, most of my clients a year, a-year-and-a-half, things come up. It’s called life. And at some point, it’s like I can just sense the energy and then something happens. And they’re like, “Okay. What are we going to talk about, blah, blah, blah?” And I’m like, “Stop. What’s going on?” And I’m like, “Is it the kids, the husband, the wife, this, that, or the other thing?” Because it’s always something and it’s just like you have to remember that people have lives. Their life isn’t their business, even though it’s a large part of it. And everyone experiences overwhelm. How do you take people out of that and get them back on that path of being productive? 

Barbara Turley [2:43]

Yeah. It’s a great question. And I think every time overwhelm hits you – I experienced it myself today. And I actually said to myself, “I need to take myself through this process again.” And it’s almost like every quarter you need to do this, no matter how good at it you get. So first of all, everybody experiences it. But one of the first things you’ve got to sit down and say to yourself, “Is everything that I’m currently doing stuff that I absolutely need to be doing?” And what you’ll find is a lot of stuff that you’re doing, you need to stop doing and delegate to somebody else effectively. The reason people don’t do it is because there’s overwhelmed even involved in trying to think about how do you then delegate to somebody effectively? But the first step is definitely asking yourself, do you really need to be the person doing this task or doing this part of the job? 

Mario Fachini [3:34]

How would you decide if you are? There’s a lot of stuff I don’t like doing but I probably should, but maybe I shouldn’t. 

Barbara Turley [3:43]

Well, to two things. So the number one thing that you want to think about, most people will say that you should play in your genius zone. And of course that is true. Unless your genius zone happens to – well, unless if you’re making a canvass images yourself, but you’re trying to run a business, then you have to ask yourself, you might be a brilliant asset. But is it an effective use of your time as an entrepreneur or as a business owner. So that’s number one. The second thing is, if it can be processed – if you can create a process for it and it can be delegated, then as a business owner, it should be delegated. Because your job as a business owner is to run the business, to work on the business, and not necessarily so much in the business. Now, I know that’s a bit of a cliche. But it’s definitely asking yourself, if it can be processed up, then do, and then delegate that so that you can free up your time to grow the business more. 

Mario Fachini [4:39]

I want to ask you to repeat that one more time because it is that powerful. It is a great Expert Authority insight. What is your role as the business owner or CEO? 

Barbara Turley [4:50]

Your role is to be the conductor of the orchestra. You don’t see the conductor playing any of the instruments in an orchestra. That’s the best way I can put it. You’re there to lead. You’re there to build systems. And then delegate those systems for your people in your business to run those systems for you. 

Mario Fachini [5:09]

I’m going to play devil’s advocate. But what if there’s no good people out there and I can’t find the right ones? 

Barbara Turley [5:18]

First step with that is, usually, that is a process problem first. So a lot – I see this happen with so many business owners. They’ll say, “Delegation doesn’t work for me. I can’t find the right people. I want A players who can – ” this is the best one, “I want somebody who can just step in and hit the ground running without me having to micromanage.” And I’m like, all of those statements are just so loaded with problems. Because first of all, even if you do find an A player that can step in and hit the ground running, they are still not going to hit the ground running from day one because it’s your business and it’s how you’re doing stuff. And unless you’re going to hire an agency or a consultant or an external expert to come in and and work for you, you’re dealing with having to create processes and systems and teach people in your business how things are to be done and to learn to delegate effectively. The most cost effective way of doing this is to make sure that your systems are so strong and your processes are so strong, that you can actually delegate those at more cost effective staff. So you don’t have to have experts in every role within your business. 

Mario Fachini [6:32]

What if someone doesn’t want to let go of the reins? 

Barbara Turley [6:36]

Oh, mindset. Mindset issue. Where do I start to unpack that? If somebody doesn’t want to get let go of the reins, the first thing that you really need to do is to think about why. So there’s usually trust issues. There’s fear issues. People fear losing control. At the end of the day, as entrepreneurs and business owners, we are all control freaks and it’s totally fine. We can just put that out there and say it’s okay to be a control freak. And a lot of the reason that some business owners are successful is because they are a bit control freak-ish. They like things done the way they like them done. People see delegation as losing control. But if you have the right foundation, if you’ve built your systems properly, you have the right processes built, and then you train your people on how to run the systems in your business correctly, and how to report back to you, and you have a level of oversight, then you can let go the control without losing control. And that’s the key. So you don’t want to lose control but you need to let go the control and have oversight so that you’re not losing it completely. 

Mario Fachini [7:43]

For some of those people who might be on the more side of the – I don’t even want to say OCD. Because I’ve ran into some people that they’re so extra with it. They’re more like CDO, they even organize the OCD. How long do you think is a reasonable expectation for them to say, “Okay. We’re going to have a 30 days transition window, a 60 day transition window, a 90 day transition window. ” Or do you think you can really just pull this off in seven days and change your entire company around and let go of the reins in a week? 

Barbara Turley [8:22]

No. No, you can’t. Not in seven days. No. So first of all, letting go the reins of your company, there’s so much to unpack here. So I’m just going to try and unpack it from the top down. Letting go the reins of your company, it sort of implies that your company’s already built. Now, as we know, companies are dynamic, living, breathing, evolving things that are always growing, evolving, and changing as the market changes, as you change, as the needs of the client or the customer change. So to think that you can just delegate it all out, systemize it up in seven days, and wipe your hands and sit on the beach. Absolutely, no. Because what you’ll find is the minute you delegate one department successfully, you’re going to have to move on to the next one and the next one. And by the time you get through 12 months, you’re usually circling back. And as businesses grow, you have to continue to evolve and develop your team, your systems, your processes, it’s sort of a never ending thing. That’s not to make people feel like, “Oh, no. I don’t even want to start.” But the idea is that you if you don’t start this work, you’ll never get there. But to think that you can do it in seven days is really misguided. I think if you’ve got no processes and no systems in your business, you’re probably staring down the barrel of about six to 12 months to really nail it. And just systematically going through it every week, putting a new one in. But typically, if you’re going to delegate to somebody, I would sort of allow between anywhere from about six weeks to three months, depending on the role. If you’re hiring for a very high leadership role, even if they have deep experience, you can still expect about a six month kind of window of putting someone in and really getting them deep inside your business. But with a VA, I would say, eight to 12 weeks you need to allow as long as you have an onboarding and training process in place that you can roll out with that person. You can do it at the same time. You don’t necessarily have to be that organized. But give it time. 

Mario Fachini [10:26]

And that’s a great point you bring up because so many people, I’ve heard, they’re like, “Well, you know, it’s going to take so long, this, and that.” Like, with book publishing, I’ve condensed it down to eight weeks for people to publish their business books. Some people say six months, 12 months, 18 months. “Oh, it takes so long.” Well, the time is going by either way. I’d be excited you can aim for 12 months from now and know, “Hey, this will be off my plate.” Instead of think about it now and don’t do it. Think about it six months from now and don’t do it. Think about it a year from now and then whenever you do get around to it, it’s still going to be another 12 months from the time you decided to move forward with it. Right? 

Barbara Turley [11:05]

A hundred percent. And when people say to me, “I just don’t have time for that right now.” I go, “Well, that’s fine. I totally get that you’re overwhelmed. But I can guarantee you, if you don’t do this today, you’ll still be doing what you’re doing in 12 months-time.” You’ll be doing what you’re doing today, and you’ll still be overwhelmed. And you still won’t have delegated. And it will still be an uphill battle that you’re facing. So either you take the challenge today, or you continue to be overwhelmed, and you take the challenge in 12 months-time, or whatever. But at some stage, if you’re committing to a business, you’re going to have to climb the mountain and stop sitting at the bottom. 

Mario Fachini [11:39]

And how many people decide to move forward after that point? 

Barbara Turley [11:44]

After I say that? 

Mario Fachini [11:46]

Yeah. 

Barbara Turley [11:47]

Yeah. I think, you know, people – what I always advise is, the first thing you do is get the mindset right. Okay, so you’ve got to let all that sink in. You let all that percolate and go, “Yeah. Okay. I get that.” Then after that, the next step really is to think about, “Well, if I’m going to bring a person in – ” usually the mistake people make next is they go and hire someone before they’ve even thought about what role is this person going to play? What tasks do I actually want this person to do? And do I have any processes for them? And how am I going to onboard them? So usually, then what happens is you hire a VA, in the case of VA for example, and you find yourself waking up every morning and thinking, “Oh, my God. What am I going to give my VA to do today?” And that’s created a whole new job for yourself plus a new person on your payroll. So that’s a huge mistake. You need to try and plan this out and then delegate and bring someone in at the point where you’re ready with your processes, your systems, and you know what this person is going to be doing for you, so you can lead them.

Mario Fachini [12:51]

Yeah. That’s very smart because you don’t want to hire one person, let alone 5, 10, 15, 20. And now you – I’ve joked with people. I go, “You don’t want to stop doing the fun things that are taking up your time only to become a babysitter and project manager.” 

Barbara Turley [13:09]

Absolutely. And you will become a project manager. Like, if you hire a lot of VAs, it’s great. The first few VAs you get is great. But then after that – or even team members, it doesn’t really matter whether their Vas. But when you get past about five to seven people reporting to you, you’re now in a whole world of pain. Because now you need a project manager so badly because they’re all coming to you. They’re all reporting to you. And you can’t really have more than about five to seven people reporting to you effectively. After that time, you need to start either having project managers or encouraging those people to have team members under them. In which case, you need to teach them how to delegate as well. So it just kind of keeps going on and on this whole evolution. It doesn’t really stop if you’re growing. 

Mario Fachini [13:54]

That really does make sense. I just hired four new people and I’m thinking about going, “Yeah. You hit that spot on.” Because the total number I’m up to now, it’s nearly triple that. And I was thinking about this just a week or two ago for what I’m planning on doing over the next six to 12 months with people and freeing up my time even more, so I can focus on the show, and some other things. 

Barbara Turley [14:20]

Yeah. And look, you know, the reason I literally say this from the heart because I have felt this myself. So I just knew how to do all of this. I was good at delegation. But as I’ve grown the virtual hub, I’ve discovered – we have 150 staff now. So we’ve got 16 leaders, we’ve got a head of operations, head of HR, we’ve got a master trainer, and a learning and development manager. We’ve got the whole stack of the corporate structure. But I remember in the early days of having five, six, seven people and going, “Oh, man. I’m now overwhelmed again.” And even now I get overwhelmed because I’m trying to onboard new leadership members and stuff like that. So you know, it doesn’t end. But you grow the business at the same time. 

Mario Fachini [15:03]

Well, it’s an important skill to have. And it’s an important thing to do. Because I’ve seen some really great people, entrepreneur friends of mine, speaker friends of mine, other podcast hosts even, and authors that we came up together 5, 10 ,15 years ago and some of them are still stuck. And it’s why I did the “no one can do it as good as me.” And I joke about it. But the sad reality is, they might have a couple of people but if you never trust anyone other than yourself, you’re only going to be – you know, you’re you’re tied to yourself in 24 hours a day. And heaven forbid, you go speak somewhere or go travel or take a day off. What do you do? It’s like, they don’t have a business. They are the business. 

Barbara Turley [15:48]

Yeah. As well what I would say is when we go through big economic cycles, like big areas of the business cycle, for example, when recessions hit or a crisis hits or anything like that, what you’ll find is the companies that come out of that really strong are the ones that were built right beforehand. They’re not necessarily the ones that just got lucky. Sometimes there are a few that get lucky in those sorts of environments. But it’s important to remember that as long as if your company is built right in the first place – and I mean, we’re not even talking about VAs here. We’re talking about scaling businesses. But if it’s built right, and you have the right systems in place, and you’ve got a machine built that people can step in, you can delegate to run that machine, you can actually get back to the joy of building the company that you originally dreamed of. You didn’t dream of working seven days a week, 24 hours a day. You dreamt of building a scalable business or a lifestyle business or whatever it is. But usually people fall down by not not delegating. And the trust issue is a big one. So sometimes you will hire people that will be a mess, right? That they will be the wrong hire. But what typically happens then is entrepreneurs will say, “It doesn’t work for me. I tried and it didn’t work.” Well, that’s a mindset issue. You have to have sort of a commitment to say, “In order for me to realize the dream of the business that I want, I have to make a commitment to systems processes and teams, and slick delivery to the client or the customer.” In such a way that this whole machine actually works for me, rather than me constantly working for it. That’s s essentially what you’re looking to do. 

Mario Fachini [17:28]

Yeah. That’s a great Expert Authority insight. Because just because something is one way doesn’t mean you have to take it at face value. You can create and innovate. And I mean, cars never existed. And pretty much the entire world we see today didn’t exist 100 years ago. And we were like, “Well, we can’t change that.” You need to or you’re not going to be around three to five years from now. 

Barbara Turley [17:56]

We can do anything we want to do, actually. I mean, you know, at this time that we’re recording this, we’ve just shut the world down for the COVID situation. So that’s been pretty, pretty epic. So we can actually do whatever we want to do we think about it. 

Mario Fachini [18:10]

Yeah. It’s amazing. And I love that you keep saying mindset. So speaking of mindset, how did you start this? 

Barbara Turley [18:21]

Yes. That’s an interesting story. So basically, it’s my accidental business. I didn’t mean to start this business. So you would sort of think that I would have a background in HR management, or team building, or offshoring, or something to that, or recruiting. I had none of that experience. And I didn’t have a business plan or any – I literally started this by accident. I had been working in corporate for 15 years. I was in the investment banking end of the financial world. I had been an equity trader for 10 years. I worked in Asset Management sales. I was totally a corporate person. But I did always want to start my own business. And like many corporates coming up to start your own thing, I started doing some consulting to see sort of what would stick. And I found that the majority of the businesses I was helping, they were a lot of small businesses and they all had the same problem regardless of the industry that they were in. And it was that the business owner was doing all the work, everything in the business, they weren’t making enough money to hire staff. But if they didn’t hire staff, they were never going to make any money. So I was like, “Okay. We need to fix this.” So I started getting some VAs in the Philippines, because I had read Tim Ferriss’s Four Hour Workweek like everybody else. And I was only really doing it just to free up their time so that we could work on strategy together. And before I knew it, I was actually getting more demand for that than I was for business coaching. And I was like, “I wonder if there is business in this?” And I literally, like, in about the space of about a month, I was like, “Okay. I’m not doing that anymore. We’re going to do this now.” And then The Virtual Hub was born an about a few months out of nothing. So that was how it started. 

Mario Fachini [20:03]

I love hearing success stories. And that’s inspiring because so many – like we were just talking about, some people don’t want to let go or make those changes. And you were just like, “Let’s go for it.” And I found the best VIP guests I have on here, my best clients and the best people who succeed the fastest just colleagues, friends, other authors, they all have that same trait of let’s go for it. We’ll jump off the cliff and build the airplane on the way down like Richard Branson says. 

Barbara Turley [20:35]

Screw it. Let’s do it. Yeah. And I mean I look back on the early days of the virtual hub. And I sort of think compared to what it is today, it was a total mess back then. And if I had known then what I know now, I wouldn’t never have had the guts to launch it. Because you realize later how difficult it was to build it. It’s a people business at the end of the day. But we’re nearly six years into it now. And it’s 150 staff and still growing. And we’ve got great plans for the future. But I literally jumped in, we had no brand name, no logo, no concept, no website. But nobody said to me, “What’s your web address?” They were just like, “Can you get me one of those VAs? I’m desperate.” So I was like, “Sure. Okay.” So I sort of encourage people today to think about you’ve just got to find a problem that people are willing to pay money to solve right now. And don’t worry about branding and websites and all that stuff. Until such time as you make – you sell something and you figure out what people are going to buy. 

Mario Fachini [21:39]

That’s a great Expert Authority insight, because so many people think I need the business card. I need the website. I need the thing. I need the other thing. I need the other thing, thing, thing. And I’m like, “All you need is a client. And then another one.” 

Barbara Turley [21:53]

Yeah. The client doesn’t care about you actually. They don’t care about you. They just care about what problem you can solve for them. In the early stages – look, I made a mistake in the first business I started. It was consulting. But I did the whole – built the website, and I did a sort of a product launch online, and I did all this stuff, and spent a fortune. And actually, the virtual hope was cheapest chips. I didn’t actually spend anything. [Unintelligible] [00:22:20]. And there you go. 

Mario Fachini [22:24]

Well, I’ve done this at many of my presentations in real life. And my favorite thing is a pen and paper. 

Barbara Turley [22:33]

Yeah. Back to the envelope. 

Mario Fachini [22:35]

Just here you go napkin, envelope, whatever. Just write some ideas down and pick up the phone. All the other stuff is all well and good. And it’s kind of fun to talk about because, clearly, I like to do things like entry level. And everyone thinks you need all of this to get started. I’m like, “No. No, no, no, no.” Now, it doesn’t mean take a year to do it. You can grow fast. Set a goal. Here’s where I want to be. I’ve mapped out phase one, two, three, four, and five before I even launched the show. But I knew exactly where I was going. I go, I start where I’m at. And I go forward as fast as I can. And it was motivating because I was like, I don’t want 500 episodes that all look and sound bad. So I was like, how do I do this as quick as possible within the budget I have while growing and all that. And it’s just like with anything. It’s like don’t get ahead of yourself. Enjoy the journey. But that doesn’t mean be a slouch and take five years to do it either. If you’re thinking about starting a podcast and you don’t get a good mic for five years, that’s just insane. Like, I’m not even going off on that tangent because there’s people that still have a show with their intro mic from five years ago, but whatever. 

Barbara Turley [23:51]

They probably have a few listeners so – 

Mario Fachini [23:52]

They could what? 

Barbara Turley [23:54]

They probably have a few listeners. It’s still going. But yes, [unintelligible] [00:23:59] podcasting. I think you need a good mic. 

Mario Fachini [24:02]

Yeah. It’s like an artist, would you not invest in a brush? Or a designer with the right paper. You know what I mean? It’s like whatever you need, treat it like a professional. And, you know, maybe it’s a pair of shoes for someone who wants to go door to door. You won’t walk around barefoot doing that. But you set it, the mindset, the commitment, and knowing where you want to go with it. 

Barbara Turley [24:28]

I think as well, if I could just add to that, there is the mindset and the commitment. But also knowing that business is business at the end of the day. It doesn’t matter what you’re selling, whether it’s a product or a service. And I’ve seen this through like diverse businesses that we deal with. It doesn’t actually matter what it is that you’re selling. Building a business is the same. Building a business is the same skill in itself. And it is a separate skill from whatever your technician skill is. So if you’re a consultant or a coach or you make whatever you make, you know – 

Mario Fachini [25:02]

Widgets. 

Barbara Turley [25:03]

– shoes for kids, or widgets, or whatever it is that you do. At the end of the day, the structure of business and how to build a business is actually the same. It’s just a different thing that you’re selling. So remembering that and learning how to actually build a business properly is really valuable. It’s really valuable. I mean, everyone wants to learn how to do marketing and sales and all the cool stuff. But actually, operations is a really important part of any business. And that’s all systems processes and people. 

Mario Fachini [25:33]

Yeah. I mean, I’ve said this in presentations too. Do you want to scale a problem? I want 10,000 leads. Great. One, could you handle it? Two, what’s your conversion ratio? Three, let’s assume all of them convert. Could you handle it? 

Barbara Turley [25:48]

Yeah. So there’s a really good and interesting thing I used to talk about a lot years ago that you’ve just reminded me about. I used to talk about this concept of this external leverage and internal leverage. Everybody wants to go after the sexy stuff, which is the external leverage. Which is going out, being on podcasts, and advertising, and marketing, and sales, and leads, and funnels, and all this stuff. But the internal leverage is how efficient and cost effective is your delivery and your operations. And that’s where your profit is. That’s your profit margin right there. So people don’t focus. And what they do is they put loads of leads and loads of sales into a broken machine. And that tears of all their profits, because the machine – the actual business machine itself – is not efficient and it’s not cost effective to run. And that’s how people find, “I’m doing all these sales but I’m not actually making any money on the back end.” And that can happen for a number of reasons. But one of them is leaky operations. Really, really leaky operations. 

Mario Fachini [26:49]

That’s a great point you make. Because I find most people who want to talk about that, the leads, the conversions, the sales, the funnels, and all that aren’t willing to invest what it really would take to do a proper for a long enough time. And their expectations are so low to begin with. Nine times out of ten, they’re literally better just picking up the phone calling, reaching out via email, and taking a look at their existing customers.  And you can double or triple the profit margins just by doing that before you take three to six months to – like you’re talking about, building the business. The funnel is the same way, 30 to 60 days in most cases. And then you need to continually – you’re combating Facebook, Google, all those. And I have nothing against it. I got funnels running right now with ads and all kinds of stuff. They’re fantastic. But I also didn’t start last month or in the last year. Realize where you’re at. You don’t need to – enjoy the journey. Take a couple years and go, “Here’s where I want to be 12 months from now” and aim for that. Don’t [unintelligible] [00:27:49]. 

Barbara Turley [27:49]

Yeah. Plan it out. Plan it out and you can just – every day, you can change everything in a year. People, they overestimate what they can do in a day and they underestimate what they can do in a year. So if you just try to put one foot in front of the other and figure out your plan for the year. And then keep moving forward with those. And you’ll have days of total overwhelm. But you’ve just got one foot in front of the other. And you will build a machine very quickly if you do it that way. 

Mario Fachini [28:19]

Yeah. And enjoy the process. Because one day it might be good or bad. But overall, it’s like, “Look at what you did.” Most people wait for three to six or nine months to think about it. And they don’t even accomplish what they want in five years because they just hesitate. It’s like you know – 

Barbara Turley [28:36]

Well, people don’t plan. Because as well, people will say,” Oh, I need a VA. I need a VA yesterday.” Like, “Well, that’s okay.” But you need to take a step back. [Unintelligible] [00:28:49]. 

Mario Fachini [28:49]

[Unintelligible] [00:28:49] today and we’ll get you one. You’re what? 

Barbara Turley [28:54]

You need to slow down in order to speed up, sometimes. And you might have to slow down for a month or two so that you can speed up across the entire 12 months and actually hit your annual – you year long goal or your 12 month goal. Then your three and five year goals, it’s the same thing. 

Mario Fachini [29:12]

Yeah. And I’m glad you’re helping people with that. Because there’s so many people I started with that need it. And I remember when I went full time in business in ’08, I got a couple dozen clients in the first six weeks. And I’m like, “Okay. Things are going well from a sales perspective.” And you know, fulfillment was well. And it was only a couple of months, I’m like, “I need more help.” And so many people were like, “Well, you know, blah, blah, blah.” And I’m just like, “Maybe I don’t need a team. Maybe I should keep it.” But then I woke up in my own common sense and it was telling me there’s no way you can maintain this because when you extrapolate it out, what if you got ten new clients a day? Well, great. Who’s fulfilling them? How do you maintain them ongoing? Someone is taking up their time doing it. If it’s all on you, there’s a point where it’s going to break. 

Barbara Turley [30:08]

And you’ll break as well. And then like you said, you didn’t start your own thing to have a glorified job at the end of the day. You want to build something. So that’s what most business owners want to do, I think. So it’s important to be honest with yourself about that. 

Mario Fachini [30:24]

Yeah. And I would have to agree also. Because there’s so many people that want to do it and they just don’t. And I’d say you nailed that fear – 

Barbara Turley [30:35]

It’s all in here. It’s all here. 

Mario Fachini [30:38]

Yeah. The mindset. So I want to ask you, who’s your biggest success story? 

Barbara Turley [30:44]

As a client meaning? 

Mario Fachini [30:45]

Yes. 

Barbara Turley [30:47]

Yes. There’s an interesting story actually. There is an e commerce business that is one of our clients has been a client for a long time. And this person had a part time VA many years ago. And reached out to me on LinkedIn. And this was back in the beginning and had listened to one of my podcasts. I have a podcast called The Virtual Success Show, if you want to have a listen to how to get success with VAs. And he felt that he wasn’t really getting the return on investment or the success that I’ve been talking about in the podcast. So as it turned out, he was living in Sydney. And so was I in Australia at the time. So I said, “Look, I’ll come and see you.” So I actually went to see him. And to cut a long story short, we got rid of that original VA. I was like, “That’s not going to work.” But also his systems, his processes were very complicated. And like what you said back to the envelope, piece of paper, I just drew out like – I just asked him some questions and I just drew out a simpler version of his process. And today, he has 17 members with us and his business is a multimillion dollar business. I actually do still consult to him quite a lot on the build of his team. So yeah, they’re in the Philippines and he’s growing. He’s probably going to be putting on, like, to three people in the next few months again. So that’s been a really beautiful one to watch because he sort of listened and did everything I told him to do and then managed and delegate effectively. So he’s very, very happy. 

Mario Fachini [32:15]

I’m happy to hear that. That’s always fun. Because there’s a lot of people, I believe, that are hunkered down, whether they have a new business, middle business, or a huge business. If you don’t have it set up right, they don’t really get to enjoy it. And I love hearing those stories of how to enjoy it and just the transformation. 

Barbara Turley [32:36]

Well, here’s the thing, right? I mean, I’ve built a big business. It is a big business and it’s growing. And I’ve had two children at the same time. And I’ve managed to be a part time mom and a part time business owner. So now that’s really hard to do. But in order to do – people have asked me how did I do that? There have been times of extreme overwhelm, I will say, so it’s not easy. But the way to do that and to actually be present in your children’s life and not run yourself into the ground completely is to be a master delegator. Like, if I could just pick one thing, you know, you can be a master marketer. But if you can’t delegate, build systems and teams, you’re just going to market yourself into a black hole. Because the delivery will fall down. So to be able to delegate effectively is a seriously good skill to deeply learn about and deeply master. And the second one is probably recruiting. Because people don’t spend any energy on recruiting. And then they wonder why the people that are coming into their business are not really able to cope or it’s not working, and everything’s broken. Because we don’t invest any time in learning how to be amazing at that or amazing at delegating, that’s probably why. 

Mario Fachini [33:46]

Yeah. When you said people always ask you, I need someone yesterday and I need them to hit the ground running. It’s like – 

Barbara Turley [33:54]

Goodbye. 

Mario Fachini [33:54]

Do you even know what you’re selling? Or you just want to – like, are you going to even have –

Barbara Turley [33:58]

If you like, I’ll give you the name of a competitor. 

Mario Fachini [34:01]

Please. 

Barbara Turley [34:02]

[Unintelligible] [00:34:02]. No, not really. We do help people to figure that out. But sometimes if somebody is a bit of a chaotic mess, we don’t try and make a sale. We’re just like, “Look, honestly, if you want to take our advice – ” we’ll give them some master classes and some free stuff that will actually help them to figure this thing out. And we try to encourage them to slow down for a minute, even though it might be painful, but to think about the marathon and not the sprint, and that’s really important to remember that. 

Mario Fachini [34:32]

It’s a good point too. Life and attract me that’s a marathon. And you got to enjoy it. Which brings me to my last question before we thank our sponsor and go to the Imperfect Action Round, it is the Wheel of Whatever. And your whatever question is – oh, hold on. Here we go. It’s going to land on the one I want it to, this question right here. After you’ve delegated and outsourced this, what’s the best way to relax? 

Barbara Turley [35:02]

What’s the best way for me to relax or anyone? 

Mario Fachini [35:05]

Either/or. Both. 

Barbara Turley [35:07]

It depends what you’re into. So for me, I love when I’ve managed to delegate loads of things, the team are all on fire, everyone knows what they’re supposed to be doing, and is executing quite well. And I sit back and I think, “Wow. I can listen to a podcast. I can actually have a coffee.” Sometimes for me, personally, it’s like that sense of like you’ve planted the garden and all the flowers are coming up and you can just look at them and go, “Wow. I did that.” That’s so for me. I find that quite relaxing. You know, I do yoga and all the other sort of stuff that you’re supposed to be doing. I do love to go out and have a glass of wine as well. And 

Mario Fachini [35:47]

What kind? 

Barbara Turley [35:48]

Well, yeah sometimes to – Shiraz. Do you like the Shiraz? It’s Australian Shiraz actually, I quite like. But to be able to sit back and kind of congratulate yourself and enjoy the moment that you built this before the chaos of the next level starts again and all the overwhelm comes back. Just take a moment to watch your team as they work and watch them enjoy what they do as well. That’s really key.

Barbara Turley [36:16]

I like that that’s a great high note. To continue on, enjoy the moment. We’re going to thank the sponsor. Enjoy this moment. And we’re going to come back for the Imperfect Action Round. 

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Mario Fachini [37:42]

And we are back with the Imperfect Action Round. Barbara, are you ready to take imperfect action? 

Barbara Turley [37:49]

I am born ready. 

Mario Fachini [37:51]

Excellent. Great answer. So these are just 60 second quick answers. Rapid response. The first one is, what is the fastest path to the cash? 

Barbara Turley [38:03]

Find a problem that somebody was willing to pay you money to solve today and not in the future and solve the problem for them. 

Mario Fachini [38:09]

I like that you said pay you money? 

Barbara Turley [38:12]

Yes. Because lots of people have problems they’d like you to solve either for free or in the future. And that’s not going to make any money. But they will have something that they’ll pay you for. 

Mario Fachini [38:24]

I’ve joked with people before, I’m like, “I don’t like dealing with my own problems. Why do I want more of yours?” Number two, what is the biggest problem you see your prospects making and the fastest way they can fix it? 

Barbara Turley [38:39]

Yes. So hiring a virtual assistant because it’s cost effective. I’m not going to say cheap because it’s cost effective. And then expecting to get a strategist and complaining that the person can’t strategize or run your business for you. That’s a huge problem. It’s expectations management about what – just be clear about what you’re hiring, what role you’re hiring for. 

Mario Fachini [39:05]

That’s a very good point that a lot of people don’t touch on. 

Barbara Turley [39:09]

Yeah. I see it all the time. “I wish they show more initiative. I thought they would know that I wanted this.” And like, “You need a strategist for that.” You pay someone 500 bucks an hour for that. Not five, you know. 

Mario Fachini [39:24]

I totally can relate to that. And on the other side of the thing is, when you are doing coaching, consulting, and you say it is 500 to 1,000 an hour. And people are like, “Well, I thought it’d be 10 or 20.” It’s like, “Well, then go to McDonald’s and get them to give you a business growth strategy that’s going to increase your business six figures a year.” 

Barbara Turley [39:44]

Or just remember that if you delegate effectively and you do have cost effective team members in your business that can execute processes, you can bring in a very, very expensive consultant. But you only need them for a few hours a month. It’s called a high-low strategy because you’ve got the team members to actually implement. So that’s a really good strategy of getting both. That’s cost effective as well. And you get the best consultants you can. [Unintelligible] [00:40:07] and then you roll it out. 

Mario Fachini [40:07]

That’s a very good strategy. And on the other side, you could have the strategy. But if you have no implementation, now it’s costing you exponentially. Now, it’s costing you and it’s not an investment. 

Barbara Turley [40:21]

Exactly. So the most cost effective way is to have a really slick strategist that knows exactly what they’re doing. Pay up for them. And then have a cost effective offshore team that can implement and maybe have a project manager in the middle if you really want to go that route. But that’s kind of the strategy you want to be running. 

Mario Fachini [40:42]

That is gold right there. I think I just might clip that part out. That’s gold. There’s another really good question. What the heck is it? You got my wheels spinning. Thank you. It’s the same one I’ve asked like a couple hundred times. What is the best way to maximize customer lifetime value? Yes. 

Barbara Turley [41:09]

Yes. So this one, we’ve been playing with this at The Virtual Hub, actually, quite a lot. So I’ve been thinking about this for many years. And I truly believe that focusing on customer and client success, I know it’s a new thing. It’s a buzzword. Everyone’s got client success managers now. But if you make sure that your clients are not just looked after, because a client that’s looked after is happy. A client that’s getting success will rave about you. And those are the cheapest leads you’ll ever find in the market. It’s so worthwhile putting the effort into making sure that people actually get success with what it is that you’re doing. 

Mario Fachini [41:48]

That’s another great point. you should write a book on all this. 

Barbara Turley [41:53]

It’s in the plan. I had to have my kids first. I’m not ready for the book yet. 

Mario Fachini [42:02]

This is very good. They have a great mom. And you’re sharing some incredible insights here. So thank you for that. The last thing, speaking of books, is what would you recommend? What books have impacted your business and life? 

Barbara Turley [42:18]

Yeah. Look, this is maybe the one everyone says, I don’t know. But on my first – I think it was not the first time I went to the Philippines, but I had just had my daughter. She was about 11 months old and I went to the Philippines for a week for work. And I had this nine hour flight and it was like, “Wow. I have nine hours of no children.” So I read a book the whole way to the Philippines. And it was Verne Harnish’s Scaling Up. The most pivotal book. I completely rebuilt the business after reading that book. And I’ve gone on to do the live Scaling Up Program and I’m currently – not rebuilding. But I’m just taking this to another level. That’s book ever. It’s a real business book, but it did change everything for me from a business perspective. 

Mario Fachini [43:06]

Excellent. I’m really happy to hear that. Verne is awesome. Well, I have gotten a lot out of this. And I want to learn more. I know expert Authority World does, where would you like us to go to learn more? 

Barbara Turley [43:21]

Sure. So we’ve got some special stuff free for you guys listening and watching. So if you go to TheVirtualHub.com/ExpertAuthority, we have a couple of things over there. You can download, something we spoke about earlier, which is The Five Reasons People Fail With VAs And How To Fix It. There’s a little downloadable over there. And there’s also a scalable success formula e-course, which is based on some of the things I’ve been talking about. And you can also, if you feel ready to talk to us about getting a virtual assistant in your business, you can book a call to have a chat with us and see if we’re a fit over there. 

Mario Fachini [43:57]

Excellent. Well, thank you again so much, Barbara. 

Barbara Turley [44:00]

You’re very welcome. Thank you for having me. 

Mario Fachini [44:03]

All right. Expert Authority World, we have another great episode today. I’ll see you tomorrow. Have a great day and God bless. 

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www.EAInterviews.com [45:02]

Hey, thanks for listening to today’s episode. I hope you got a lot out of it. I know I sure did. If you haven’t done so already, I invite you to subscribe to the show. And also be sure to check out EAInterviews.com for complete show notes, the full interview video experience, links to the resources we mentioned, and more. Have a blessed day and I’ll see you tomorrow.