In this episode of Mind Your Wedding Business, Kevin Dennis sits down with Nata Salvatori, business coach, fractional COO, and the founder of Accidental CEO, to discuss why so many business owners become the biggest bottleneck in their own companies and how to break free from it.

Nata shares why lasting business growth requires more than better systems. From delegating ownership instead of just tasks to overcoming perfectionism and burnout, she explains what it really takes to transition from founder to CEO and build a business that can thrive without depending on you for every decision.

If you've ever struggled to unplug, felt guilty taking time off, or wondered why your business still feels overwhelming despite your success, this episode is filled with practical strategies to help you create a more sustainable business and a healthier relationship with it.

Nata Salvatori is a business coach, fractional COO, and the founder of Accidental CEO. Her work sits at the intersection of operations and identity, helping founders solve both the structural and leadership challenges that keep businesses stuck. With a doctorate, a background in psychology, and more than a decade in leadership, Nata now helps high-performing entrepreneurs create businesses that are sustainable, scalable, and no longer dependent on them for every decision. She also hosts the Accidental CEO podcast and speaks at conferences across the country.

Highlights:

• Making the transition from founder to CEO
• Why delegation means ownership, not just assigning tasks
• Building systems that reduce burnout and create freedom
• Breaking free from perfectionism and overwork
• Creating a business that can grow without depending on you
• Why leadership and operations must evolve together

Connect with Nata:

The Identity Shift Guide

CEO Delegation Method Course ($300 off!)

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Connect with Kevin:

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All right, folks, welcome to another episode of Mind Your Wedding Business. I'm here with now Nata Salvatori. she is the founder and CEO of Accidental CEO. And we're today we're gonna be talking about high standards, human pace, and a founder's reset. So I'm really excited to dive into that topic with you. But Nata, before we do, tell us a little bit about yourself and how we got you here today.

Yes, thanks for having me, Kevin. So I

Of course.

am a business coach, scaling coach, and I also do some fractional CEO work, multi-business owner myself. So I have businesses in the wedding industry, which is why we're here today. So I can

Of course.

definitely talk to the wedding industry peeps out there. And it just really been working in the last few years to help people understand this concept of.

high standards human pace in the sense of at some point we need to stop doing everything in our business and it's time to delegate, right? And we all struggle with that. So just trying to help my clients and everybody that I can reach out there understand what this process looks like and why do we struggle with it so much.

All right. And then can you give us a like a quick version of who you help and what led you to create accidental CEO?

Yes, absolutely. So I work with already established founders, so people who have a business.

Okay.

actually in in different industries of work with people in all kinds of industries. I have obviously a lot of background experience on the wedding industry, but you know, if you already have a business, you're making money, clients are coming in, but truthfully on the back end things are duct taped.

Yeah.

You know, there's not good processes in place and you feel like you're constantly trying to hold everything together.

There is no truly going on vacation and unplugging from the business, those are the people that I help. is really trying to help people understand the identity shift that it takes to go from a founder to an actual CEO. and all the structure that, you know, your business also needing combination of that. It's truly a combination of identity and structure and operations that I feel like you can't find very often out there. Like usually people focus on one.

Or the other end my work is an intersection of those two, so

Well, and it's kind of interesting too because I feel like so many of us in the wedding industry, that's what we struggle with. We can't shut it off even at night, or we can't shut it off, you know, like even on vacation, you know, like there's always

Yeah.

there's no shut off and it just it's extremely difficult. I I know I went on a cruise this last year with my family and I shut it off. You know, I didn't buy the Wi Fi on the cruise ship and I was like, I'm done.

And I'm not gonna look and I'm not gonna peek. And then the few times that we got cell service, I'm like, I'm still not gonna peek. I'm like I 'cause I told my staff I was gonna, you know, gonna gonna shut it off and I'm gonna do it and let's see what happens when I get back. But it was the hardest thing I ever done. So

a bat and then what happened? Nobody died, right?

No, everything was still yeah, I'm here I'm

still here today. Exactly what you said. Nobody died. Nothing. No.

Nobody died. It's not

emergency surgery. You know, that's that's not what we do. So yeah, it's just understanding what it takes to truly disconnect and and have people help you without feeling guilty, without feeling over controlling and all that. So it's it's not an easy thing to do. We've all been

No.

there, we've all worked more hours than we need, and and there's a there's a place and time for that in in as a business owner. You know, there's the the grind and the hustle in the beginning, and I think that's totally valuable to to go through that.

Yeah.

And understand all the parts of your business. But then there's a time where you need to let that go and

Yeah.

transition into being the true CEO of your company. And that means you're not the go-to person for everything. You don't hold the standards in your head. You actually have a team that you trust to support you. You understand what to delegate and what to keep. And you know, you understand that you have to change the way you think about your business. the next level of your business needs a different version of you.

Yeah, and I th there's probably so many of us that are so stuck in our ways that it's it's hard to to break that up. So yeah.

Yeah.

All right. So we're talking high standards, you know, human pace. why do you think so many founders feel like success eventually starts just like consuming their life?

I think when we start our businesses. If you started this from the ground up, you you put a lot of effort into it and

Mm-hmm.

you're very invested, right? This is your baby. This is your reputation in the line. And you really truly believe that your we see our value comes from being needed. That's that's the tricky part there.

Yeah. Yeah.

Like our identity is I'm the person that everybody goes to to solve the problem. I'm

Mm-hmm.

the one. So you you start finding your own value and self-worth.

in the identity of a problem solver, of the doer, right? you hold the knowledge and you're the go-to person for everything. And that is a useful skill set to build a business, but it's also the same thing that is choking your capacity right now and your ability to grow your business. So I think there's this attachment of the self worth and the value with the getting things done that usually is what catches us.

Yeah, that makes sense because again, like going back to the cruise when I was unplugging, I felt like, are they gonna make it or not? And they did, you know. So we don't have to be that person that is solving all the problems. So all right. So Nata, you work with people who are already successful. So what usually is actually broken when someone comes to you?

I think what a lot of people don't understand, like we all get the concept that yes, delegation is something useful. We should all do that. There's no rocket science. But then why if we understand that, why don't we do it? Right. So

Yeah.

I think what we the mistakes that I see very often is people delegating a task instead of delegating ownership and outcome. Right. So now

okay, yeah.

asking somebody to I want you to go and post three times a week.

on Instagram, it's you know just delegating a task. But

Yeah.

if you go into the actual, you know, help people understand the outcome that you're looking for, what does that picture of done look like? And really giving them the ownership of the task, you get a completely different outcome. So now we're talking about all right, Kevin, we're gonna post three times a week on Instagram. Our goal is we're launching a product at the end of August. So every single one of the posts are going to be connected to the product we're launching.

Mm.

You're going to use the brand colors and the brand voice and all the images that we create within the brand. I want to make sure that the posts are all scheduled on the Monday, but they're given to me by Thursday, the week before, so I can review it if I need to. We are going to look at these X, Y, and Z metrics for KPIs. And at the end of the day, what we're looking for is movement towards people signing up for the launch of the product. There's a whole different thing that I just said, right?

Yeah. Okay. I was gonna say, well that's

I was like that's two totally different things that you just said there. But it makes yeah,

Exactly.

but it makes sense. Ownership is a big thing.

And a lot of times we were trying to delegate something, we're trying to share this load and we are not sharing what the standards look like. What are the guardrails? What do I want you to actually do? What are the the the guidelines for you to complete this task successfully? And what done means to me is different than what done maybe means to you. What I think is good is different than what you think is good. So are these things well explained? Because a lot of times when I hear people saying, Well, I've tried to delegate, it didn't work out.

Most of the time the problem is us. We didn't

Yeah.

be we didn't truly communicate what we wanted to be done, when we want it to be done, how we want it to be done, and what was the purpose behind it. Like when people understand the purpose, I don't care if you take X, Y, and Z roads to get there. The getting there is the purpose, right? So how you got there doesn't matter to me. Unless I'm micromanaging you, then then

Yeah. Yeah. Well

I'm gonna be paying attention to those details.

Yeah, it's a good

So it's really understanding the true

value of delegating properly and in what that actually brings to you, that's a whole other level that I think people miss very often.

And it makes sense because, you know, it's you you if you're delegating, I just want one thing done and you think you're helping, but they're not. It like the ownership going back to that ownership, I think, is really important. So

Yeah.

all right. So what does it look like now when a founder becomes held hostage by their business that they built?

Yeah. So that is that case where, you know, if everything has to go through you for approval, for

Okay.

answering the questions, like you're holding all those standards in your own head. There is no SOPs creator for people to follow and you're going on vacation and you have no cell signal because you're on a cruise. There is no way for people to actually make decisions and have the ownership of making decisions without you. You know, if you have a decision-making ladder that is part of your

of your company and your business, people understand that at this level, I can make a decision without having to go to Kevin. Right. I don't

Yeah.

have to be constantly bugging him and be like, Can I do this, Kevin? Because I understand there is a structure, there is an SOP to be followed and I am allowed to make this decision of my own. So when you create the structure for people to be successful without you having to be part of everything, you start to create freedom for yourself and create that space for you to actually be

the CEO of your company because

Yeah.

your CEO is not answering emails and sending contracts and and getting Zoom links to people because they're too busy, you know, looking at the vision and where the business is going, ideating for the business, making the connections and the collaborations that actually bring money into the business. So when you're trapped on doing those low level tasks, you're taking away your opportunity to

do what you really are supposed to be doing, which is growing your business.

Yeah, and I think that's the problem with so many of us in the wedding industry. We get so stuck in the mundane day to day tasks instead of having, you know, I need this, this and this done and you know, like like you said, delegating and it I I'm stuck on the delegating and ownership. I keep you know, like that

Yeah.

it's very powerful. So anyway. So

Yeah,

it is. I mean it's such a big difference when you see what the two outcomes are and you're like, I get it now. Like that

Yeah.

is why maybe I've tried in the past and and didn't succeed, because I was just delegating the task.

Yeah. All right. so Nata, do you think like traditional business advice ever stops working? You know, like that thing that we've done day to day always, always, you know, is it do we get to a point in our business where that traditional stuff just stops?

I think there's a difference in what to focus on really. So I

Okay.

think there's a founder cannot be a CEO. So

let's let's let that sink in, right? A founder

Okay, I was the idea. Yeah.

cannot be a CEO. So a founder is again that person who is on the trenches of things. You're in a day to day. You're in the beginning. It's just you in the beginning a lot of times, right? Most of us

Mm-hmm.

start our company with just us.

we're solopreneurs for a long time. And maybe we start, you know, getting some contractors here and there to help us. but that's the grind. That is the day to day of the business. And the habits that need to be created for you to become a true business owner and a CEO are different habits. Those are skill sets that are amazing in the beginning. Right.

Yeah.

So understanding when it's time to transition your it make it look

in your schedule, like you're the actual CEO. Is there dedicated time on your schedule for you to work on your business and not in your business? Because most of us are really good at working in our business.

Yeah, that's so true.

And we neglect working on our business. And really that's how we grow. So if I'm spending all my time, if I'm looking at my schedule and it looks like a dumpster fire and everything in there is like me putting down fires and working on small tasks that can I mean they come at you.

fast like if you

Yeah.

just pay attention to that your time gets consumed very quickly so I think understanding the difference between those is very important and then creating that space for you to grow inside of your own company by dedicating that time to true CEO of time. Like are you picking up the phone and connecting with the important people that you need to be connecting? You know,

Mm-hmm.

are you taking the time to go visit that venue? You know,

Mm-hmm.

those people that are actually sending your clients all the time.

What are the connections that are really worth you that nobody else can do? You cannot send your VA to go do that. You should be the one doing that. That is true CEO work there.

No. Yeah. That's true. Cause

I think that's the biggest change I think in the wedding industry is like a lot of us have VAs now, but they should be the ones doing the mundane tasks while we're out doing, like you just said, the higher level connecting, developing relationships and all that kind of stuff. So yeah.

Yeah, absolutely.

All right. So you work at the intersection of mindset and operations. So why do both have to be addressed together?

Yeah, thanks for asking that.

Mm-hmm.

I truly believe that you cannot do one without the other and expect really good growth at the end of the day. So if you come to me with a problem and I don't really look into the true cause of that problem, I might be trying to solve an identity problem with operations and systems.

Mm.

And if I'm building systems operations and a foundation of that identity that's not gonna change when it should change, then it's gonna crumble. Like you're trying to build a house and a foundation that doesn't is not gonna sustain it. Because what's gonna happen is you're gonna be going back to the old habits of micromanaging everything. I have to jump into every task. I have to be the one that everybody goes to. I need to put my hands on everything. It's my reputation. I have to control it.

And again, while those characteristics were helpful in the beginning to get us to where we are now, they no longer serve us going forward. They're just choking our capacity. They're just taking away our ability to grow. And then when I just come in and try to, you know, just change your identity and work on mindset, but everything looks like a mess in the back end and you don't have a system to bring your clients through. There's no flow.

There is no consistency in how you bring people in from an inquiry to a booking standpoint, that's not gonna help you either. Right. So usually when people come to me, they usually bring in an operational or a system issue.

Okay.

Very few of us are are self aware of the identity gaps that we are dealing with. But the problem is whenever we are dealing with decision making in Teams.

in the things that are really important in our business, that's when your identity problems really start showing up. Right? That's when

wow. Yeah.

they reveal themselves. Cause it's really easy to camouflage things. Like I can be overthinking and just call that being thorough. I can be micromanaging

Yeah.

and controlling and just call that, you know, being being detail oriented. Like we're really good at masking these things.

Mm-hmm.

But whenever things really start to push, you know, whenever we have that volume and and a lot of things coming through from a from a work volume standpoint, that's when those identity things start to crack and really show up. So

Yeah.

I believe that if you don't really at least investigate if they're both sides involved in the problem, then you're doing your client a disservice. You're just trying to fix one thing with the wrong, you know, the wrong fix.

Yeah, I I keep going back to the whole time you were talking there, I keep thinking about the duct tape, what you said earlier with the duct tape everything's

Yeah, yeah.

held together with a duct tape on the back end, but no one knows it. yeah.

It's amazing how many

clients, you know, the front face of things, you're like, Man, these people really have a successful business. They're making I work with people that make six, seven figures, and you're like,

Yeah.

they they got it, they figure it out. And then I get in the back end of things and I'm like, oh gosh, no, we need to we need we need to create some structure here because this is about to crumble and crash

Yeah.

and burn. And they're all like holding all all the balls in a year and trying to still have a life and

and and step away from going on vacation. So it's you know, we're duct taping things on the back end and nobody nobody sees it until we just can't hold it all together anymore.

Yeah, so true. All right. So why or or what are some signs a wedding pro has built a business that depends too heavily on them personally?

Yeah. first of all is that inability to to take that time off, right? You can't go on that vacation because if you

Yeah.

cannot step away from your business for a week or two without things falling apart, you don't have a business. You have a job.

Yeah.

You did not build a business that is not sustainable. if you're having to approve everything before it it before it ships, right? Before it goes out to to the public.

you do not have good systems created to support you. If you are still the one doing everything after hours, or even if you try to delegate, you're like, I'm delegating, but then you go behind their back and either take that task back or you're like, let me just think. Yeah.

Yeah. Or do it for before they even get a chance to do it or yeah.

Yeah. And if you're finding yourself saying things like, it's just faster if I do it or nobody's gonna care as much as I do.

Nobody can do it the way I do it or yeah. Yeah.

You know. Yeah, nobody can do it the way I do it. Really?

Are you the best at sending emails? Grabbing that Zoom link? Are you? Or

No, no, no.

can your skill be used in a better way in a

Other places.

different part of your company? So whenever we see, you know, we hear ourselves repeating things and and kind of thriving on that feeling of being needed all the time, that's probably a red flag there.

Yeah. All right. So how how do high standards unintentionally turn into burnout or over control?

Yeah, I think again, when everything is centered on being dependent on you, right? So it's

Okay.

very easy for us to understand that overworking and overcommitting and things like that can lead to burnout. But whenever you are not communicating to your team and the people that are helping you, what are you looking for? How things should be done, what are the what are the values, what are the standards that you are looking for?

That's when everything keeps coming back to you, right? You're not sharing the load with everybody else. You're still carrying everything on your own. And it's heavy, like it's hard. That's

Yeah. Yeah.

when you started to look at whenever there's a growth opportunity. Your business is growing. Instead of feeling excited about it, you start feeling anxious.

Because with more opportunities come more responsibilities, with more money comes more risks, with more.

Yeah.

People having eyes on my business comes more opportunities for me to make a mistake. And all of a sudden, instead of being excited about the growth that you're seeing ahead of you, you're starting to feel unsafe. And this thing that you've wanted for so long, that you've been working so hard for, doesn't feel good. Right.

Yeah. Yeah.

And that's usually what is behind that.

That's too bad when that

Yeah.

ha you know, if you think about it, it really is too bad. So

It it

leaves there's a lot of stories that we tell ourselves that are really not true, especially when it comes to delegation, like some of the things that I mentioned early, like the well it's faster if I just do it.

Yeah.

Sure, it's faster at the moment, but every time you don't take the time to teach somebody how to do that task properly, you're robbing yourself of time in the future to be able to do things

Yeah.

business, right? You're taking away somebody's opportunity to to shine.

To learn something new and support you in the future. the yes. How would you feel if your boss

Yeah. And their value too. They probably don't feel valued at that point. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

came after you every single time and redid the work that you do? Would you even put an effort next time they ask? Right? You

Yeah, yeah. No. Yeah, you probably don't. Yeah. Ma

don't. Then then then that I didn't they don't care as much as I do, you know, comes around and be like, well, you don't let them care because you're just controlling everything all the time. You're not sharing that

Yeah, it's so true.

ownership.

and then the other thing I hear very often from people is the well, I don't have money to delegate right now. I'll delegate when I have money. And that's a huge trap.

Yeah, and that yeah,

and that's such a bunch of BS. So

Yeah, because at the end of the day, if you're waiting for wealth before you start delegating, you have it backwards.

Mm-hmm.

Delegating is gonna free up your time to go make that money, right? If you

Mm-hmm.

if you truly look at your cost of doing business, if you've calculated your cost of doing business and you know how much your own time costs every time that you serve a client. Let's say every time somebody comes to me for coaching, there's an X amount of dollars.

per hour, right? That I can be

Yeah, yeah.

charging them. Well, if I'm sitting here on my computer spending my hours, 10 hours a week answering emails that don't need to be answered, that could be automated, or you know, sending contracts to people, or following up on things that I don't need to, I am costing my business that amount of money. Let's say it's $100 an hour. Because we we are not cheap at this point in our business, right? We cost a lot of money.

Yeah. No. Yeah. No, true. Yeah.

So you are spending more money in, you know, you're costing more money to your business than you ever pay an assistant to take those tasks off your plate. And you don't see it because it's not coming out of your account every month, but it is not coming in your account every month because you're not giving yourself the opportunity to go work through on that professional development, go make those connections that are actually gonna bring money to your business. So

You cost more money to your business than you will ever will spend on somebody assisting you.

I don't think true business owners really understand that. You know, like they really are costing themselves money and and

Yeah.

and they get in I I think a lot of business owners get in the way of their business. And so it just you know, and and I I think once people get that and understand that, that's probably when their business really starts to take off. So

Yeah,

absolutely. And and truly like once you do that, once you get a little taste of the ... and having

Yeah. Yeah.

that free time, my gosh, it is amazing what it does. You like, what do you mean? I don't even know what to do with this time now. Like,

Yeah.

I can actually go and finish that course that I bought last year that I never had the time to go through, that is actually gonna give me the skills to take my business to the next level? Or

I actually have energy now to go to that networking event because I've

Yeah.

been missing that because I'm exhausted at the end of the day. I don't want to go and talk to people. But going and networking and talking to those people is actually what is gonna create the opportunity for your business, for more work. Right. So there's

For more work. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

so many opportunities and so many things that change when you get that little taste of delegating and you see what it can do.

Yeah. Well that yeah,

and even showing up to those networking events continues to develop relationships. And I think a lot of what we do is relationship driven in the wedding industry. So yeah, you gotta yeah. I like that you get the little taste and then all of a sudden it changes. So

Yes.

all right. All right. Now what's the difference between excellence and perfectionism in in a business?

yes, that's a good trap. I think yeah,

Sorry.

I think in the wedding industry, we probably see a lot of perfectionists out there. You know, it's it's a visual thing, right? There's a beauty

Yeah. Yeah.

in the visual visual aspect to the industry. And I started in the wedding business as a photographer and I still have two photography photo and video businesses and totally understand that. but it's my gosh, it can be such a trap.

And just drain the life out of you. Like we cannot

Mm-hmm.

aim for perfection. It's just not sustainable, right?

Yeah. Yeah.

looking for the excellence is when you're really putting the effort into, to me, is the relationship and the experience that you bring to your client versus trying to make everything perfect. Will will I aim for things to go well and everything? Yes, absolutely. I'm not trying to be sloppy, but I think putting your your energy into.

making sure everything is perfect is actually at the end of the day doing a disservice to you and your client because it's just gonna drain. It's gonna drain you. It's gonna take everything you can and it's never gonna be good enough. And you'd be constantly going after this unattainable perfection, right? And what for? What

Yeah.

is what is the end point of it? Like if it's my clients want want everything perfect.

We have to understand that what we see and what our clients see are two different things. Right. We understand

No, that's so true. So true.

a whole different level of and I'm not saying again that you shouldn't try to do things the best you can and then do them well. Like as a photographer, I want to make sure that people have amazing photos. Do I try to make sure every single photo that I take is perfect? I can't. I'm dealing with humans. I'm dealing with things that are out of my control.

Yeah.

I'm trying to capture a true authentic moment for them to remember what happened. And and that to me is excellence versus fabricating something that,

Yeah. Perfection. Yeah.

you know, looks like perfection.

Yeah. Well, and it just I mean, that's part of it. I remember some of the most memorable photos I have of of a kid growing up or the something silly happened in them or someone

Yeah.

looked had their eyes closed- you know, it just whatever it was, you know, the whatever the turn was, it just it those were I remember that moment or I remember when that happened and yeah, you go.

Yeah, I think if we focus on experience more than, you know, that visual perfection of things,

Mm-hmm.

we're gonna get we're just giving so much more to our clients. You know,

On

help them remember how they feel. That's so important. Like as a photographer,

Yeah.

this always blows people's minds. I get reveals from my couples before they even see their photos. They're going

Wow, that's amazing.

on they're going on Google and letting everybody know how amazing it is to work with us.

Yeah.

And how we made them feel

Yeah.

and w what kind of environment we created to them, they're not even talking about the photos. That is not even in their minds. And that's what I want everybody else to read.

Yeah. No. No. Yeah, I agree.

Yeah.

All right. So all right, Nata so what operational issues tend to create the most stress or like bottleneck for founders?

I feel like when people don't have a good flow of moving their clients through their business, right? So

Okay.

a lot of times there's too many manual pieces of things that you have to do. There's no automations and no systems

Okay.

to help you do things in a nice and smooth way. So, you know, for clients in the wedding industry, there's a people will go to your website, you know, how easy is that experience in your website? Can they find what they want very easily and right away?

Can they get in touch with you? How fast are you responding? You know, are you waiting too long? You just had a recent guest on your podcast talk about the importance of answering fast. You know, there's plus

Yeah.

80 plus 85% plus of people who hire somebody who answers them first.

Yeah.

Do you have a system in place to be that first person to answer? Because this is just how our brain works. If you are the person the first person to answer, you become the anchor to where everybody

Mm.

else gets compared to that first.

yeah. No, no, I do. Now that you say that I've like, yeah, I've like yeah. Yeah.

you know, think about when you get quotes from people to do work in your house. That's how it works, that's how our

brain does. So if you're getting quotes from people for to build something in your house, then that first person sets the anchor, and

Yeah.

then everybody else gets compared to that. And you know that doesn't mean they're gonna hire you necessarily, but you become

No.

the reference point. And when you become the reference point, you're more likely to be on people's minds, right?

Yeah, I was gonna say that probably percentages way higher.

Exactly. So making sure that you have a good system.

flow automations to move people through your business? You know, are they getting information on the points, the time points that are important for them to get information from you? Are you anticipating any worries or anxieties or questions they might have to show your expertise? Are you setting those boundaries? Are you communicating often? And is there an offboarding process too? So I think a lot of times people don't see the importance of having those very specific steps in place.

but on top of that, having things that are automated so you don't have to be manually moving people through your world, you know, step by step.

Yeah, that makes a lot of whole lot of sense. So

all right. So how can someone maintain quality and strong client experience without constantly operating at like a maximum capacity, you know?

Yeah. here's I have a good friend that says that you can do everything. You just can't do everything by yourself in all at once.

That's such good advice.

You know, so understanding that when you're giving a hundred percent at all times, you're gonna get depleted from your energy. Somebody's gonna suffer. If it's not your clients, it's your family and your personal life, right? So somebody's

Yeah.

gonna be missing something. because we just can't function at that level at all times. So

Understanding where is important to have your focused on and then where again we can share the load with somebody else is the best way to keep that high quality and high standards without letting things suffer. So and we can start small. I'm not telling you go out and and hire somebody full time right away. Like

Mm-hmm.

that is not what I'm telling you. What I'm telling you start

trying to delegate some tasks and see how that feels and see how much time that free up and what are the possibilities that that brings into you, you know, you growing your business. And there are things that are fairly easy for us to understand that we should delegate. A lot of us are not accountants and don't love numbers in the creative industry. You know, I'm a I'm a weird one that likes numbers and business

Yeah.

stuff and data, but most creatives don't.

Don't. Yeah.

and you'll you know you shouldn't be shouldn't be making doing your own taxes. I'm just gonna say it.

Well or your website. A lot of people in the wedding

you know, there should be a

industry do their own website. And I'm like, What?

Yeah, should be a CPA out there

Yeah.

that is taking care of things for you. And so it's very easy for us to understand that whenever I don't have that skill set that I should delegate, but it's when we can do things that we have trouble delegating. Just because you can do something doesn't mean you should. And just because a task requires a brain, it doesn't mean it requires your brain, right? It just needs

No. Yeah.

another person. So I think really trying to understand what

where requires your effort and your energy and your dedication and really focus on those things, really help us to not crash and burn and just be able to serve our clients long term.

Well, and so many of us in the wedding industry hate the words DIY. you know,

Yeah.

it's just that's such a bad word in the wedding industry. A

And then you do it in your business.

hundred percent. I go, but so many, there's such a big percentage of us that that DIY everything in our business, but yet the minute s one of the clients DIY something, oh my god, I can't believe they did you know, like it just you we really

Such hypocrites we are.

are. And so that's where I think we need to

Take that mindset

Yeah.

and, you know, like apply it to our business. So

And again, there there's a time and place for things like that. Like in the beginning, obviously if you're starting a business and there's no capital, I get it. I I I did my own website in the beginning too. We all do it, like you said,

Hundred percent, yes, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

right? But then there's at some point you start making money and you're like, okay, I need to hire an actual professional to do this because this is outside of my scope of practice and my skills. And you know, I I truly believe that you have to spend money to make money. And the

Yeah.

more you invest in support and people that actually know what they're doing.

the better you're gonna look, you know, for your clients and and the better service you're gonna be able to provide. Because now you're not trying to s you know, split your attention into ten different things.

Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. You're not squirrel. That's what I always say. Squirrel.

Yep. Squirrel.

Looking all over the place. So all right. So speaking of mind shift mindset, you know, patterns here. So what are some mindset patterns that keep people stuck in like overwork and even when they the like they're successful but they're still overworked?

Yeah, so one of the things is some of the things I mentioned earlier so that you're thinking that if you are sharing the load with a team or you know somebody else assisting you that you are losing control of

Mm.

things. Like you're you're giving away control of things. there's a really good quote by Elizabeth Gilbert that says, You were afraid of surrender because you didn't want to lose control, but you never had control. All you had was anxiety. And

how funny. Yeah, that's a good quote.

That is so true, right? You we

Yeah.

think we're controlling things by just holding it all, you know, on our own heads and our in our own schedules. But at the end of the day, you you're not losing control if you're properly delegating and sharing the load with with a team.

Yeah.

So understanding that you're not given control, that you're actually sharing the load and that as human we're not made to

Do it all by yourselves. Like we're made to sh to share that load.

Yeah.

But understanding, you know, who you bring onto your team and how do you onboard them, how do you train them, all of that is important and all that's gonna affect the outcome, right? So taking the time to really do it right so you don't feel like you're you're losing control. So there is a structure to how you transition into sharing that load. So I think that's one of the mindsets that I encounter very often.

The other one is, you know, the nobody can do it as well as I can.

Yeah.

I said that out loud myself. I remember

No.

very clearly in my mind saying that to my own business coach at some point and be like, but nobody can can do this. Like I I know my company better than anybody. And she's like, Mm-hmm. Sure.

Yeah.

And now I'm here telling you that is a lie.

Yeah. Yeah.

that is not true. Again, you can you can train people well if you really take the time to do that. and

And really understand how to how to share the load of growing this business. It's not something that we we should be doing alone. at the

Yeah.

end of the day, just you know, shifting your identity from that operator to being a true CEO is what you need to get to that next level. At some point you're gonna hit a ceiling and you're not gonna understand why. And

Yeah.

all the things that you've been doing so far that got you to this point are not gonna work anymore. And you're gonna be stomped, like, where why am I not growing anymore?

what's happening. And you're gonna find out that you yes, you wanna make more money, but you're at capacity. Like there is

Yeah.

no more hours in my day that I can put in to make more money. But I wanna make more money. So how do I do that? And

Yeah.

that's when those things come in.

Yeah. And then they probably spiral out of control and get it

Yeah.

gets worse. So all right. So let's let's talk about health being healthy. So what does a healthy, sustainable pace, actually look like for high performing business owners?

Yeah, so I'm gonna give that answer that everybody hates. it depends, right? For everybody. And I'm gonna say that because yeah, I'm gonna say,

Okay. No, and it no, but I think that's a good answer though. I mean, 'cause it's gonna be different for everyone.

yeah, and I'm gonna say that because I'm somebody who always hated when other people imposed their own limitations on me, right? Whenever I was

Yeah.

so like, you're doing too much, like that is just too much. I'm like, I can handle a law, and that's okay.

The difference is should you right and and are

Yeah.

you really handling or are you just over functioning and not realizing, right? Because a lot of us tend to overfunction. yeah, yeah.

I was gonna say a lot of us probably in the wood industry do that. So yeah.

So being very honest with yourself, you know, I think doing an audit task is a great thing to do. I I take a lot of my clients through that where

we just audit your tasks for a whole week, week or two, you know, make a list of everything and then help you understand what to keep, what to automate, what to delegate and what to eliminate is when you really realize how much you're actually doing. Right. So I think protecting some of that time for for yourself or for your family. If you have a family, it's important.

I have two girls and they are amazing and very smart. I actually interviewed them on my podcast. Yeah, because I know a lot of us, especially women and

I've had my daughter on my podcast. Yeah.

you know, who are business owners, we have this self-imposed guilt, right? The mom guilt of like owning a business and having kids, and how do I split my time and how do I make sure that I'm that this is a balance. There is no balance, guys. There

No.

is no balance. Let me tell you that right now.

But you know, there's there's a lot of things like that that if you don't take the time to be honest with yourself and understand that you get into this trap that, well, I just have to get it done and you ended up overfunctioning. So I'm not gonna sit here and say you should only work four hours a day. Cause that might not be what you need for your business. I think what you should do is have dedicated time for business growth to be a CEO and work on your business. How many total hours that is

in your work week at the end of the day, it's up to you and it

Gonna depend. Yeah.

works for you, but you should have dedicated time because that adds to the health of your business, to your personal health. because now you're actually using your mind in a way that is exciting and that brings that passion back of that business that you loved so much and now is just drowning you, right? And you like out of the sudden you're questioning, should I really be doing this? Do I want to continue to do doing this for another 10 years, right?

Yeah. I'm I'm burnt

out, all the above. Yeah.

Yeah, so I think, you know, taking time to to go outside and do whatever kind of exercise is good for you is amazing. I go through phases of that, you know. Do different things. I was a professional athlete, so I got paid to exercise for part of my life. So now paying to go to the gym sounds crazy to me. Like, what do you mean I have to pay you to exercise? You should be paying me to exercise.

Yeah. It's not a bad yig.

So I think just you know, I'm not gonna tell you an X amount of

hours a week is is healthy. I think is what is healthy is to dedicate some time for some thinking and growing, personal growth and development and business development on, you know, and then working in your business as well.

Yeah, I think that's some of the greatest advice you're probably gonna give anybody listening to this podcast right now is just is focus on the business growth, you know, that that is I think so important because I think so many of us in the wedding industry don't focus on that at all. So I think that's great advice not. All right. So we're coming up to the end here. And the your mic drop moment is for someone listening who feels successful but exhausted.

What is the first thing they should evaluate or change?

I think the first thing that is important is for them to understand that rest doesn't have to be earned.

Mm.

The rest should be part of your business strategy. It should be built in there, right? So

I love that. Yeah, yeah.

I think once we start understanding that and once you start understanding that we are gonna grow even faster when we're supported, I

Mm-hmm.

think those two things are huge mindset changes. Cause I can give you all the systems and operations help that you might want at the end of the day, if you're not working on.

how you're thinking and how you're showing up as a business owner, it's not gonna stick, right? Things are not gonna they're gonna break down. So understand that rest doesn't have to be earned. It is something that is already you you got it. You deserve it.

Yes.

Built it into it and that you should be supported to grow.

Yeah.

That's a good mic drop moment. I love it. That was yeah. And I wasn't expecting rest. So that yeah, yeah, that was really good. So

Okay.

all right, Nata, where where can our listeners learn more about you or connect with you?

Yeah, so accidentalceo.co is my website. same thing for Instagram. I'll be sharing something with you guys. So we're gonna put it on the show notes for you, which is a identity shift guide that kind of helps you identify where those patterns are keeping you stuck. So

No, I love that.

go ahead and download that, work through it. It's gonna really help you see maybe where to focus some of that CEO time when you carve it into your schedule.

All right. And we'll have all of Nata's information that she just spoke about. We'll have that in the show notes as well as the email blasts that goes out and we'll make it really easy and accessible for you as well. So I can't thank you enough. You gave a lot of great information for the listeners. I learned a little bit here that, you know, yeah, you're right. Sometimes it does look like you know, everything's being held by duct tape in the back of the s and that I'm not alone by that. So every once in a while.

You are not.

No.

But anyway, so all right, I can't thank you enough. And folks, thank you for listening to another episode of Mind Your Wedding Business. We'll see you next time. Bye.