As the leader of your company, you should control your calendar - not the other way around! In this episode, Melissa Swink discusses the first step of the “Make Space for More” framework, which is redesigning your role as the CEO of your company. She emphasizes the importance of dividing your time between working IN your business and working ON your business. Melissa guides listeners through three steps to redesign their role: identifying personal non-negotiables, sorting and prioritizing tasks, and structuring their calendars with these priorities in mind. This is a must-listen episode for any entrepreneur who feels overwhelmed and wants to gain control of their time! 

Key Highlights:

• Redesigning your role as CEO is crucial for business growth and scalability.
• Identify your personal non-negotiables to set boundaries and prioritize self-care.
• Sort and prioritize tasks into categories: generates new business soon, generates new business eventually, business management, and other miscellaneous tasks.
• Structure your calendar with your highest priority tasks in mind, then designate times for email and meetings, and leave open space for miscellaneous work time.

About Melissa:

Melissa Swink, Founder & CEO of Melissa Swink & Co., has a team of virtual assistants who provide administrative and marketing support for small businesses and non-profits.

Since 2012, Melissa and her team have helped more than 100 businesses grow through the services they offer, and she is dedicated to helping entrepreneurs create profitable, scalable businesses they love.

Her work is all about doing what works (and eliminating what doesn’t) and driving real, measurable results. Visit www.melissaswink.com to learn more! 

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Hi everyone. Welcome to the Make Space for More podcast where we talk strategies for growing and scaling your business in a way that's authentic and aligned for you. I'm your host, Melissa Swink, and in today's episode, we are going to be breaking down the first step of the Make Space for More framework, which is redesigning your role as the CEO of your company. This one is going to be full of practical, actionable steps. So get ready to...

do this along with us. This is really going to be kind of a workshop mode today, if you will. But before we dive into all of the goods and all the details on redesigning your role, I wanna ask you a question and I want you to take a minute and really consider how you're currently spending your time in your business. So think about this, approximately what percentage of your time is spent on busy work? When you think about the course of your work week,

And I don't know if you're working 20 hours, if you're working 40 hours or 60 hours, 100 hours, how much of that time approximately are you spending on busy work? And when I mean busy work, I mean, how often do you get to the end of a day where you're like, I don't even know what I accomplished. Like today just flew by, I've been running around, putting out fires, responding to emails, meeting with clients and doing all these things. But how much of your time can you think?

have you spent on actually working on the big picture, big growth items in your business or are you just kind of running around and managing the day to day? That would be considered working in your business versus on it. So when you think about that percentage of your time, is it 50 -50? Like do you feel like you have a pretty good divide between working on some of the big picture goals and projects that you have for your business, maybe your...

developing a new course or you're going to be launching a new product or something and you're working on that diligently. Or maybe you are just kind of in it where you are working on emails, you are meeting, you are networking, you are doing some marketing, you're doing some sales and you're doing a lot of the deliverables that you're ultimately selling. Maybe you have a retail store and you spend the majority of the time on the sales floor and meeting with your customers.

Think about it for a minute. How much of your time are you working in your business and versus on it? And then I want you to think about as a next step, imagine a day in the life of a CEO that you admire, or maybe you have a business coach or a business bestie where you're like, you know, I feel like they really have a good handle on their business, or this is a person who has a business or is at the level that I would ultimately like to be at.

Or maybe we zoom out a little bit and we start thinking about, okay, big picture. When I think of a CEO, what do I think of that person doing? When I think of maybe your stereotypical CEO, I'm picturing maybe a boardroom or a conference room where we're having big conversations about projections in the quarters or the years ahead. Maybe we're looking at new joint ventures with other referral partners that we could be building. Maybe we're looking at new revenue streams.

That's what I'm thinking of when I picture your stereotypical CEO. What are they not doing is another important question to think about here. So when I think of a CEO, I don't think of that person as being the one answering the phones at their company, right? They're not sitting at the front desk and answering the phones. They're not sitting in a customer service cubicle and answering questions that are coming in. I'm not thinking about them in that way. I'm not thinking about them.

sending out invoices to their customers or calling and following up on late payments and things like that. I'm not thinking of the CEO doing some of the day -to -day more mundane things that are important and need to get done in the business. Let's be clear, but the role of the CEO is really the visionary and they are really setting the vision and the tone for the future success of the company. So when you think about a CEO,

and then you can cross -reference that to what does your day -to -day look like, there are probably some opportunities to make some shifts. And so today, we are going to be breaking down how do we redesign your role as the CEO of your company? And I can tell you that that is going to be a little bit different for every person listening to this podcast. This looks different for every client I've ever worked with on the Make Space for More framework.

this is going to be unique to you. And there's a couple of factors. Number one, it depends on what type of a business that you have, obviously. And it also depends on what are the things that are most important to you and what you're working on. And it's also going to depend on the stage that you're at in your business, because the MakeSpace for More framework is designed to be repeatable based on each new stage and each new level of business that you're at.

as I've shared in the first episode of this podcast, I wanted you to get an understanding of how I got started in my business, what that first version of my business looked like, and then what did it look like when I started building the team? What does it look like now? Because this is always growing and evolving and changing. So now is a great time to revisit exactly what your role entails. And we are going to play around with, you know, how else can we structure the business?

ultimately to become more scalable, again, in a way that makes sense for you and what really excites you. And then after a while, once we get to that point, then it's time to repeat this process and take a look again. Okay, what else am I currently doing? What does my day to day look like? What are the opportunities that are in front of me right now? So this is the...

Step one of Make Space for More Framework, and then we're gonna go through in future episodes what the next steps are, what do we do with all of the things that don't necessarily fit into our CEO role. So today we're gonna walk through the three steps that I personally follow when I'm taking a look at what do I need to be doing in my company based on our goals and the structure for today. And...

This is something that I've taught my clients and I want to help you determine what your role should look like at this stage as well. So when you can go ahead and grab two sheets of paper. Of course, if you're listening to this, when you're out for a walk or on a run or maybe you're getting ready for the day when you can grab two sheets of paper and walk through these steps with us because this is going to be more of a workshop kind of a basis for today. So.

The three steps to redesign your role as the CEO of your company at the stage that you're at. Step number one is to identify your personal non -negotiables. Why are we starting with personal? Because I have found and I have seen in many of our clients' situations as well is that because our business is so important to us and because we're so...

deeply ingrained in it as the founders of our companies. And this often determines what the rest of our life looks like. The health of our business depends on can we put food on the table? What does our stress level look like and all of those things? I wanna start with the personal side first because the business can always kinda creep in. So we are going to set the business side of this other side for a moment here and we're gonna look at just the personal stuff.

So when we look at our non -negotiables, wanna make sure that we are setting ourselves up for success in our businesses every day, and that starts before we start work. So some of the things to consider here are sleep. Number one, are you getting enough sleep? Are you staying up too late because you are relaxing after the kids go to bed and you're streaming Netflix or maybe you're scrolling social media? Are you prioritizing your sleep?

and starting to take a look at, when do I need to go to bed? When do I need to get up? And also consider, am I getting up at a reasonable time? Am I feeling rushed and stressed in the morning or do I need to give myself a little bit of extra time? Now is a great way to take a look at when do we need to be going to bed? When do we need to be getting up for the day? To set ourselves up for success and making sure that we're recharging. Okay, this another thing for non -negotiables.

morning routines, maybe even evening routines, taking a look at those details. When you get up in the morning, are you hitting the ground running where you're making kids breakfast, making lunches, getting them off to school? Maybe you're drinking your coffee and you're trying to get ready to go to a meeting. What do your mornings look like? Are you giving yourself time to wake up? Maybe you're taking some time to do some prayer, meditation, maybe journaling.

Maybe you're doing some exercising in the morning, just giving yourself time to really get your head on straight and get grounded and centered before the craziness of the day just continues to pick up. So think about your morning routine. Also think about your evening routine. Again, as I mentioned, what does that wind down process look like? Are you getting to bed on time? There's nothing wrong with taking some time to...

scroll through your Instagram feed or certainly watching a favorite show on Netflix, things like that. But taking a look at, am I satisfied with the way that my wind down at the end of the day looks like? Or is it taking me a long time to fall asleep because I've been spending too much time on screens where maybe I just need to read a book and kind of unplug, put the phone away, that sort of thing. Look at what your evening routine looks like. Another thing to take a look at for your non -negotiables to make sure that

you are setting yourself up for success. Movement. I didn't want to say exercise. I didn't want to say working out because sometimes we think of, that's just one more thing that I should be doing. Let's just reframe it a little bit and take a step back and let's just call it movement. Are you moving your body every day? I know for me personally, I spend a lot of time working with my team remotely, meeting with clients, directing projects.

delivering workshops and events and things. And I spend a lot of time sitting in front of a computer. So I know that I need, in order for me to feel good, I need to make sure that I am working out each day, getting walks in. I live in Wisconsin, so of course on beautiful sunny days, I want to make sure that I'm getting outside and getting some fresh air and some vitamin D. Prioritizing those things, very, very important. Other things to think about here that might not be so obvious.

She is regularly saving and setting aside money to go on trips on a regular basis, making sure that you are putting time on your calendar and blocking time for that. That's really, really important. Other things, time with your loved ones, certainly time with spouse, partner, children, pets. I know plenty of people who...

don't necessarily have kids, but they have their pets and they have their dogs and they love them and they take them on walks. They take them to the dog park, making sure that you are blocking time and planning on time for those things that you really, really love. And then what I want you to do when you start making this list, take out that sheet of paper, start making a list. What are my personal non -negotiables? Because we want to make sure again that we put some boundaries around the business.

and that can look like what are your start times of the day? What are your end times each day? Now certainly exceptions can occur where there's maybe an evening event that you want to attend or there's a conference that you're gonna attend on a weekend. That's not really what I'm talking about here. I'm talking about on an average day, 80 % of the time, I want to start work say around 8 .30, nine o 'clock in the morning after my kids get on the bus and they are at school.

And then I want to wrap up by 3, 3 .30 in the afternoon before they come home and we have all their activities and things like that. I say that schedule because that seems to be very, very common among not only myself, but a lot of my team members and my clients as well. That may resonate with you. We want to make sure that we're setting that container up for here's when I have time to focus and work on my business. Okay. Step number two, now that we have

identify your personal non -negotiables and kind of set that container in your mind for these are the things that are happening outside of work and here's the time that I have reserved for my work. We're gonna sort through your to -dos and determine your priorities. So this is going to also be a lead in to the next episodes of where we're looking at the next steps for the Make Space for More framework. But today, again, we're trying to...

really determine what are the most important things that you need to be doing in order to grow and scale your company. So if you have not already downloaded My Priority Planner, this would be a great tool to use for this exercise. You can download that at melissaswink .com slash more. So -E -L -I -S -S -A -S -W -I -N -K dot com slash -O -R -E.

and you'll see that download there for the priority planner. It's just a sheet where there's basically four quadrants. And even if you don't download that, if you just want to take out on your sheet of paper that you have in front of you and just kind of divide your sheet into four squares, what we want to do is we want to divide up all of your miscellaneous to -dos that you have. I know you probably have a running list, whether it be in a project management system, which is my personal choice, a

physical written to -do list, maybe all the things that are kind of scrambling around in your mind. We want to organize the to -dos into these four categories. So this is really sorting. If you think about like home organizing, if you've ever seen tips or Marie Kondo, where it's, you know, we're putting things in these four piles, if you will. So these four piles, when it comes to the work that we're doing in our business are generates new business soon.

generates new business eventually, business management, and other miscellaneous tasks. So those are the four key areas that we wanna separate your to -dos. So let's give a few examples of each. Generates new business soon. This can look like sending a quote to a potential customer. It can look like,

having a sales call or having a sales meeting. Maybe it is pitching a new potential referral partner, things like that, where these are things that are ultimately going to bring money and revenue into the business sooner rather than later. Generates new business eventually, these are things that maybe look more like marketing. So maybe this is,

creating a new outreach campaign to potential customers. Maybe this is creating a new course that's going to be launching. These are things that will be bringing money into the business, but not immediately. I would say this is probably something that's maybe a month or more out at this point, give or take, kind of where you're at in that process. Generates new business eventually.

Then we have business management. Maybe these are things like paying your vendors. Maybe it is having meetings with your current team members. This could also look like doing some of your weekly planning, things like that. These are just kind of managing the day -to -day of the business where they are important and need to get done, but they're not necessarily activities that are going to directly generate

new revenue into the business, if that makes sense. Other miscellaneous tasks. These are things like respond to that email, call so -and -so back, send that information to this person over here, just all the miscellaneous things, and you probably can fill this square, but it's just all those tasks that need to be done, and they're not necessarily directly related to...

revenue generating things in the business, they might not necessarily fuel the overall management of the company, but there's still things that are on your plate that ultimately need to get done. So we're gonna divide up all of your to -dos into those four categories. So from there, what we wanna do is we wanna start to look and identify and prioritize the items that directly impact your business growth and revenue.

the items that only you can do. So for example, for me and my company, one of the things that I prioritize is having regular sales conversations with potential clients. Now, I also have a team who helps me put together those quotes and prepare some of those contracts and things that's happening behind the scenes. And then I am presenting that information to the potential client and then

talking to them about next steps, what does it look like to get started with us, and ultimately closing that new business. That is something that is high priority for me. Another example of maybe generates new business eventually or helps boost our overall visibility is speaking engagements and events. That's something that we do, I would say about three to four times per year. That's something that I...

only can do and it's important for me and it helps make an impact and it helps encourage and it helps build up other entrepreneurs and teach them some of the ways that have been helpful for me for growing my business. Love those opportunities. That's something that is a high priority for me. So just to give you a couple of examples there. Okay.

Step number three is that we are going to structure your calendar with these priorities in mind. So we're looking at our personal non -negotiables and we're also looking at what are the most important things that we need to be doing in our business. Now you might be wondering, wait a second, what about all these other things that don't necessarily generate new business or they don't necessarily boost the overall.

visibility of my company. They don't build trust credibility, but they still need to get done. We are going to get to that in some next steps in the Make Space for More framework. Right now, this is about clarifying what you need to be doing with your time as a CEO and how we can best structure that time so that you are as productive and focused as you possibly can be. Hold on to your four piles that you've just made of your to -dos.

because we are going to revisit those in upcoming episodes. But if you take another sheet of paper, I want you, you can keep this really, really simple. Maybe this is taking that sheet of paper and just kind of putting across the long way, like Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, if you work a traditional five -day work week, and then going through and maybe you just even start by dividing those up between like a and p

Or maybe you're like me and like to get really, really detailed and granular with this. And maybe you print off a spreadsheet where you have your whole weekly calendar, where you have Sunday through Saturday, and then you have, you know, your time blocked off in like 30 minute increments where you have like 7 a 7 .30 a and 8 a and so on. You can get as detailed or as general as you'd like at this stage, whatever works best for you. But what we want to do ultimately is we want to structure.

your time and ultimately your calendar with the priorities in mind. And there's a couple of things that I want you to focus on here as you're building your ultimate CEO calendar. Now that we have a good idea of what are your most important things that you need to be doing, we want to make sure that your calendar and the way that you spend your time supports that because ultimately the way you spend your time is going to determine your results.

So, we wanna think about these things when we're structuring our calendar. We wanna think about what are your highest priorities in your tasks, in your projects. So another word for this is needle movers. A lot of us have been hearing that phrase for many, many years. And before I had a hard time like, what are my needle movers? Because everything feels like it's important or everything feels like it needs to get done. Like, of course, clients, if I sell a service, I need to deliver that.

because if I don't, I'm gonna ultimately lose that client and we could have a whole lot of other negative things happen as a result of that. Needle movers can be a little bit challenging to think about when you are very involved in working in your business. But when we think about, but needle movers are actually the things that bring in new business. So those are our highest priority tasks and projects. What are those things?

The other thing that we want to take a look at when we are designing what our day to day needs to look like is we want to look at designated times for email. And you're like, wait a second, we just went from highest priority items to times that we check our email. Yes, because I find that email can be the most distracting place on earth and is often what causes us to fall into reactive mode. So every time we see a new message pop up or

the phone goes ding or you go into your email to find the information that so -and -so sent you and you get super distracted. I want to designate certain times of the day to be an email. So for example, I usually log in in the morning and I start off by prepping for my meetings. That's usually the first thing that I do. If I'm being perfectly honest, I want to take a look at who am I meeting with today? What are some of the things that we need to discuss or what are some of my goals for that conversation? And that's what I do first in order to feel most prepared for my day. The second thing that I'll do,

is I'll triage my email, I'll take a look, I'll log in and take a look and see if there are any questions that need answering so that I don't ultimately become the bottleneck on somebody else moving forward on something or what are some urgent things that need to be taken care of right away. And then what I do, and this is a tip, I use an app called Boomerang to pause my inbox. So after I do that quick email triage,

I click pause to pause my email so that even if I have to go in and find something or even if I need to send some information out to somebody, I'm not getting distracted by the new messages that are coming in. So that is a tip. And then I also check my email. Usually like the last half hour of the day is when I will go in and more thoroughly respond to emails and try to clear out my inbox as best as I can before the start of the next day.

I like to designate times for my email because it is important for me to get back to people. Or maybe for you it's not so much email, maybe it's Slack, or maybe there's some other communication methods that you use with your team, your clients. Checking those things at designated times is gonna help you stay focused on, again, those highest priority tasks. The other thing is meetings. Leaving some open space in for meetings. So maybe we wanna say,

Monday mornings, I just want to be able to work on some projects, but I'm open for meetings in the afternoon and you can leave some time in for afternoons. I recommend having designated times for meetings so that you avoid having kind of a choppy day where you are working on something and then you have to go to a meeting or make a phone call and then you're working on some things and you've got to stop what you're doing and go off and have another meeting.

I like to consolidate my meeting time so that I have my uninterrupted work time and then I have several back -to -back meetings and kind of alter that up a little bit. That's just personally how I work best. And then certainly I'm blocking time for miscellaneous work time because there are inevitably going to be things that I need to do that aren't necessarily directly related to my most important needle movers, but I want to build in time for some of those things. And again,

that daily and weekly wrap up. So each day, Monday through Thursday, my last half hour is just kind of tying up all the loose ends, clearing out my inbox. And then on Fridays, I extend that time to about an hour. So if there's any other lingering tasks and things that I'd like to wrap up before the weekend, I can do that. And that way I can be accepting of where I have left things, even when it's super busy and there's a lot going on and there's a lot of moving parts and pieces.

I have taken the time to wrap up as much as I can before I ultimately log out of the business for the day and go off and live the rest of my life with my loved ones and with friends and things like that. So that is generally speaking, kind of how I look at the way that I spend my time, how I encourage my clients to build their own dreams, CEO calendars, and some of the exercises and questions that I go through.

and walk others through in order to determine what are the most important things that we need to be doing. So with that being said, in our next episodes, we are going to revisit that list that you sorted and take a look at what do we do with the rest of the things that need to get done, but don't necessarily fit into our role as the CEO as we are continuing to grow and scale our companies with where we're at. So hang on to that list and...

You don't want to miss the upcoming episodes because we're going to continue on. So go ahead and click follow or subscribe depending on where you're listening. That button might look a little bit different, but what we want to do is we want you to raise your hand and say, yes, please let me know when the next episodes are available because we want you to continue working through this framework. And in future episodes, we're going to be talking to clients of mine who are just like you and me and growing their companies and scaling.

putting systems in place, building teams and lessons they've learned along the way. How are they structuring their time? How are they getting the results that they're getting? We're gonna be having more of those conversations. I'm also going to be bringing in team members because maybe you're wondering, hey, how do I work with a virtual assistant or how do I work best with virtual team members? We are gonna share all of those tips and more in future episodes. So go ahead, follow, subscribe.

And thank you so much for taking the time to listen today. I hope that this was helpful for you and I will see you in the next episode. Bye everyone.