10: Let's flip this shit

Today's guest is Emma Wright, graphic designer and face of EM Designs.

Look, we're just going to call this early: We LOVE Emma. We love what she shares in this episode about experience in brand marketing and strategy, as well as her thoughts on flexibility, collaboration, and understanding client needs in marketing. We move on to personal growth, the evolution of business practices, and the value of building connections. Emma also reflects on her entrepreneurial inspirations and the balance between professional and personal life.

ChatGPT said that it's an engaging discussion highlighting the unique challenges and rewards of running a woman-led business. Who are we to disagree with the bots?

Number of fucks given in this episode: 17

Mentioned in this episode:
* Emma's website
* Connect with Emma on LinkedIn
* Listen to Emma and her husband talk about persona finances on the Finance Burrito podcast

Episode transcript

Christine: Welcome to the Fuck Around and Find Out Podcast, where your hosts Rah, Emily and Christine. We're three women who have built and run our own businesses. And I'm here to shoot the shit on everything about women in business and running your own business. So, Rah, who are you? Hello,

Rah: I'm Rah and I'm dressed as a rainbow today, which is great for the audio version of this podcast.

But, uh, use your imagination. Yes, that's right. Uh, so I do digital marketing and systems for women in

Christine: business. Fibulous. Yeah. And Emily, who are you?

Emily: And maybe who are we? I don't know. I don't know who we are. Um, I am Emily, clearly. Um, you are Christine. We are Juniper Road. We are Operational Support Services.

And, um, I'm going to say we're a one stop shop. Oh, she has to. She spends a grand every episode. If you want to know about us, just Google.

Christine: Google, Google, Google. Excellent. And, um, for those playing along today, we have the absolutely fabulous Emma Wright from EM Designs joining us in the Bella Vista podcast studio.

so much. Welcome. Now we've, uh, not given you any questions, any preparation. No preparation. 45 minutes beforehand, goes back, didn't do that, no, no, definitely not. But, um, Emma, tell us just a

Emma: little bit about you. Okay, so I run EM Design and Marketing. I offer brand marketing and strategy services for businesses of all sizes, scales, modalities, whatever it is that you do, I can probably help you make it.

You know, better, better, look good, appear places where it should appear and people find out what it is that you do. Um, I've been in marketing and design for more than 15 years now, which is horrifying to think about. Um, cause I am still a spring chicken. Absolutely. No

Emily: more than 21. Obviously no more than 21.

Yeah.

Emma: Um, been doing this since the womb. Um, And as I'm sure all of you've experienced, my business has evolved a lot over the years. It's changed, you know, everyone starts out, you know, doing a bit of contra for someone. I think the first logo design I did, I traded for a dress to wear to my cousin's wedding.

Oh, that's cool. It was a good one. It was a good one with my housemate at the time who could sew and I could not. Um, But then it's, you know, it evolved into a side hustle and moved into being a full time business but I've done all sorts of different things. So I come from a marketing background, I've always been a graphic designer and now I get to blend the two of those things together to create really sustainable outcomes and really impactful outcomes.

I think the best part of both design and marketing is when they come together. Yeah. Oh, absolutely. So that gives you a bit of an insight into my ethos as well. So that's a bit fun, right? I know, I know it's

Emily: funny how graphic design and people don't realize how much they mesh with marketing. Like it's how, cause they sit in silos.

They're just can't,

Emma: but it's the same conversation I was having with a client yesterday about when you're a junior marketer, you think marketing exists in a silo. You're just there to create outputs and do things for the business. But marketing and the systems that we work within and operate within, you're Stretching to every part of the business.

And if you're not sitting there being client focused, which junior marketers typically aren't, they're more trend focused and they're more, um, output focused. But if you're not client focused in the middle, you've missed the point. So if you're not thinking about every touch point of the customer from, from the first time they hear about your brand through to the moment they terminate your services, if you're not thinking about all of those, Touch points.

You've missed the point.

Emily: Yeah. Very much so. It's, it's also fascinating to me that I've been in so many businesses that are so siloed and they're not like marketing to me, such a collaborative piece. You have to be so collaborative. You touch on every different area of the business naturally, don't silo that shit.

Well no, all that does is create friction. All that does is create

Emma: conflict between, and your outputs suffer. Absolutely. And it creates a demand on the business from the marketing side that does create that resistance and that resentment to a degree. You know, if you're sitting there banging on about content and, you know, yelling at your salespeople or your lawyers or your, your hairdressers to be making content, making content, making content.

And they don't understand why, or they don't understand the value you bring to their day to day business or why you're trying to bring leads into the business or how that increases the profitability of the business, which means they can continue to pay you. If they don't understand that, then what's the point?

What are you

Emily: doing? I've been in businesses that That have, you know, gone through massive restructures and marketing is the first to get cut. Oh God. Always. Just, but it's, you need marketing to market what you sell, what you're selling, what you're servicing. Like you need, it's such a vital tool to get the overall income coming through and it's just, it's gobsmacking hell.

And yeah, there's a whole, there's a whole piece about that. I used to work across the road at the Harbourworks Group. Oh really? That's where that happens. We're in the Bella Vista Hotel. I know. Yeah, it's, it's gobsmacking to me how people just don't get it and don't collaborate properly with it. Like, but also I've found I've jumped a lot of industries over my life and it's like, I can market whatever you throw at me, but I don't understand the content of what you're trying.

Like I used to work for the podiatry association. I don't know a damn thing about pods. I do know a hell of a lot now, but like, I'm like, I'm going to rely on all of you to teach me. Subject matter

Christine: experts. Exactly.

Emily: Like I will, tell me what I need to know so then I can formulate that into something that we can put out.

And it's funny how I don't, you don't see that sometimes in businesses, well, I know how to market, therefore I'm going to do it my way. Which might not suit the industry that you're in.

Emma: I so firmly agree. And this is part of the breakdown of the agency model that we're now seeing. Oh, I hate the agency model.

Everyone hates the agency model. I say that. We

Emily: are an agency as operational support services, but it's different. Yeah, it is

Emma: different. And knowing your business as I do it at a surface level, I think it is different. And it's Flexibility that you guys offer and what you guys do that, that makes it adaptable to different industries.

But when we start talking about big agencies, I did, I did time in big agencies, you know, like, um, communications agencies in Sydney and, and those sorts of things, there isn't a lot of time or any time dedicated to understanding the businesses in which you operate, how they function, how their lead process functions, you know, what's the right language to be using.

Yeah. Yeah. It was, it was. It's always very top down driven. We know marketing. We know what we're doing and we're going to tell you how to go to market. And it's like, but what if you're using the wrong words?

Christine: Exactly. And you've got, um, businesses, you know, small people, they, they think they know what they want and they want you to market, but they don't.

So you've got to learn the customer. You've got to start to understand the outcome that they're looking for is different, sometimes different to what they're, they're visualizing. Um, and if you don't do that, the marketing is set up to fail from the beginning, isn't it? Yeah, absolutely.

Emma: When I come into a business and I prefer longer engagements.

So I prefer to come into a business, do an intensive, say six months and then, and then run a tail. That's my ideal client. Um, but I like to spend that first six months. It's not the only thing I do in that time that would be a bit shit, but I like to spend a lot of time in that first six months dedicated to learning about the business.

I love to sit next to every person in the business and go, okay, so tell me about what you do. Tell me about what you think about marketing. What's working. What's not working, how can we do it better? Where are we missing the point and use that to then inform strategy, use that to then inform content plans and how we're going about bringing a product to market, whatever that looks like, professional services, products, startups, software, name it.

I've probably worked in it at this point, your greatest resources in any business or in your team and exactly in your staff. And so. Those who ignore that do it at their own peril. Oh, so much so. And you see it all the time. Yeah.

Emily: It's, it's also like it, but those agencies models to feel like a bit of a rinse and repeat as well.

Like they've decided that this is what works, therefore we'll do it for everyone. And then they also, I've found, I've been, I've worked with an agency as like my counterpart before, and it feels very, very different. undermined. As a full time employee, I felt undermined by this agency because they kind of came in with that, well, we're an agency, we know better.

Yeah. And it's kind of like, well,

Emma: I'm literally close to the customer. I'm close to the business. You need to understand the value that I bring to this relationship as well.

Emily: And then I've also worked for places that, um, there siloed situations going on, but like the silo between Like marketing and comms and social media to the design team has become quite apparent and no matter how many times the, like, you know, I do social media for this one and they would hand me a whole bunch of assets and fuck's

Emma: sake.

This doesn't make sense as a collective. This doesn't make sense as a whole. They're just horrible. They're just

Emily: typical agency style graphics that have been given to me that are covered in words that batshit on a social platform. And I will say straight away. You're not going to get engagement that you want from this.

I'll tell you straight up, so you've got your expectations set, this will not engage people. If you want to go ahead with it, we'll go ahead with it. I'm not going to, you But I need to deliver my expertise

Emma: to you. But I'm telling

Emily: you, yeah, that this is not going to do what you want it to do. Yeah. And, um, it's funny, and then, no, no, no, no, we got to do it.

We got to do it. And then next minute, I'm like, told you. How satisfying,

Rah: as awful as it is, like, you don't want to be right, but when you're right, I'm very. Oh, I know.

Emily: And it's kind of nice because just then they kind of start going, Oh, she doesn't actually know what she's talking about. People, I think, social media think, Oh, I post on Instagram a couple of times.

I can do it. Like, it's fine. Let me run it for I did social

Emma: media marketing for years. I started doing it in a large multinational building company. Shocking. Oh, that would have been interesting. Interesting in its own way, different, different facets and then moved into offering it as a service. I offered it as a service.

for six years. And I very much, when I had my baby, my baby's now 18 months old or our baby as my husband would say, it is our baby, um, he's not present, but

Rah: I just want to. So when

Emma: we had our child, I made a very conscious decision. From a business perspective to move out of the nitty gritty of implementation and those sorts of things.

So moving out of website updates and, um, you know, website forms and social media marketing and those sorts of things. And when I think there's an opportunity here to change the way that I deliver value to a business. Especially when we start talking about the longevity in, in the industry. I think there's room as a sole provider at this time in my business, my business, as I indicated earlier, has evolved and changed.

I've had staff and teams and those sorts of things and waxed and waned and scaled as I've gone. But at this time in the business, moving away from the nitty gritties of implementation allows me to deliver more value at the top and manage those who then can deliver the nitty gritties. Yes. Um, I don't think that's an important distinction at this time in the world.

Some people love social media marketing and they want to do it all day, every day. And that's awesome. It's not for me in an all day, every day sense. No, I feel that

Emily: too. In this one, particularly driving

Emma: strategy,

Emily: I do it for them, but it's one of those things like with our businesses, the beauty of, Not having to do the nitty gritty because it's, it's, it's exhausting and people undermine and second guess you constantly.

And that's a massive hit to your own self confidence and what you're doing. Also, it's just shitty when people just stop listening to you. It's like, well, why am I here? Yeah. What am I here to do? Am I just a guest? And you can only advise. Yeah. You can only

Emma: advise. And, and there are always going to be business owners who don't want to listen or don't want to agree.

And that's absolutely their prerogative, but it does present a different challenge when you then have to go and justify your expense or go and, and, um, explain why the numbers didn't hit the targets that they were trying to achieve or whatever it might be. And it's like, well. This was the advice I gave you about, say, landing pages that you went, no, we don't have any budget to build landing pages.

Okay. Yep. How would you like me to track your conversions? Yeah. Anyway, we've gotten into a negative spin, ladies. Can we bring the positive up? Why are we grateful to be in business? Can I sit at the table? Can I ask some questions? Of course you can ask a question. It's fine. It's fine. Tell me about why you are grateful to be in business for yourselves.

One, one answer each, because otherwise we'll be here all day. Oh, God, yeah. Um,

Rah: Why are you making me go first? All right, I'll go. Okay.

Christine: All right, all right, right, right, right. Yes. Um, one thing I didn't think, She goes, no, it was time, that was a long pause. Contrary to what I thought at the beginning, it's about the connection.

What did you think of the beginning? Well, I thought I was going to put food on my table and you know, I was going to say, um, I thought, you know, flexible I could take Fridays off. I mean, I, you know, I knew it was hard work, but, um, but no, I think at the beginning it was around about replacing a job now. I look at it and it's about the people I meet and the growth from those connections for me personally.

I

Emily: think I'd probably second that with that was mine as well. Like for me, it was to have flexibility and the freedom to do what I need to do as a parent. Um, cause it like corporate world fucked me with kids was not flexible enough. And my, my last one, I had like four months before COVID hit. So COVID was an interesting timing with that one and the freedom to.

Figure out what I wanted to do, but grateful. Yeah. Yeah, I was, I got look out of everyone. I was very lucky through COVID cause I was covered on Matley for almost that full year. So I didn't have to worry, like we didn't stress and we were okay. And we were very, very lucky in comparison. Yes. Um, yeah, it's, it's also the connection, like, and, and, you know, one of the things that's become very important for Chris and I is to create a women led business that has a wonderful team of women.

In our business, a lot of whom are mums too and need that same flexibility, but we've all had horrendously bad experiences and we want to create a space where people don't have to go through that. And then also the connection piece has been, you know, paramount. Like we've met this beautiful woman over here, Rah, and like, we're literally going to be taking you.

Yeah, I'll take that any day. I

Rah: talk about Hamilton to you guys every day. Oh, she does.

Emily: I never really knew what it was until I met

Rah: you.

Emily: And I feel like every time we spend time with Rah, I'm like, more ways to take over the world. Like we're just, it's that like, The energy. Yeah. It's really, and it kind of gives me, I used to think, so we, Chris and I, and probably Rye a little bit too, we all started out as virtual assistants.

That's how we started. And as a solo VA, I was, I've said this to Chris a few times, like, I never could visualize how I could build something. Yeah. Aside from being more than what you were doing. Yeah, exactly. And then like, Joining us, joining together to become Juniper Road was like a step in the right direction.

Like it was a bit of a, why the fuck aren't we doing these? And then since then, every year almost, we've had these, fuck yeah, let's do that and let's pick up this slightly. Yeah. And it's like change and you know, and now I feel like we're in this lovely, really good spot where we've got this beautiful woman with, you know, extending our time for the podcast for things that are not quite work related.

But. It's just opening all these potential possibilities to, to do, do so much more and to create something amazing. And that kind of makes me get so fucking excited. Yeah, that is. So I will sit there and I don't mind sometimes working till two o'clock in the morning, not doing the work I'm supposed to do, but doing this fun stuff because I'm procrastinating being like, but it brings joy.

It does so much joy. Like, and it's, it's so fun. It's also right while the music, if you ask my children, what I do for work, cause they'll just be like, Oh, type it a computer. Yeah.

Emma: Mom does on the computer. Yeah.

Rah: No clue. Okay. So I've had time to think about my answer now. Lucky you. Um, so I had been working full time for other people or like my entire life.

Like I was working full time before my HSC, like finished the actual study. Started full-time work. 'cause the job I was working part-time at was like, oh my God, we need you. Yeah. I was like, but I need the time off to do my exams. So that worked out.

Emma: We have very similar stories in That's a super fun one.

Oh my god. Okay.

Rah: We'll need you back from the we'll come round. We'll come round. Um, so I've been working full-time since I was like 18 and a half basically. Yep. Um, my. Best friend, sister from another mister who now has like four businesses, like holy shit. And so she's been at me for the last few years.

You could be like doing this, like the work that you're doing, you could be doing it with more flexibility, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Yep. And helping more people. Yeah. Like, as opposed to just helping one business. And I was really lucky in the most recent full time job that I had, the company was full.

Fucking amazing. Wow. And the people I worked with were fucking amazing. And I could have kept going and, you know, like I was very, very close with the owners of the business. Yeah. And so, you know, I had a big part in how that business was growing.

Christine: Yeah.

Rah: But I could, there was no like progression in that whole, like I knew there was no, I couldn't take over.

I'm not buying a business off them. Mm-Hmm. That's, yeah. It was the tier that I was at. And so I thought, especially after COVID, there was that whole big, you know, great resignation that everyone was going through. So I inadvertently became part of that. That wasn't the plan. Um, but I basically just had a mental snap and I was like, I need to get out.

Like this is, I need to change things up. I need to do

Emma: something different.

Rah: Yeah. And, um, there had been some big things that had happened, um, you know, there'd been some big deaths in the circle around me and I needed to be more available by my choice. Even though I had great flexibility, I was really lucky.

Um, but I just needed to have it on my terms because even though my bosses were beautiful and amazing and really supportive and like they let me work remotely when it was still really not. A massive thing. How

Emily: nice to have somewhere that's that's so supportive though.

Rah: I know. Like, um. It's quite, I

Emily: feel like it's remarkable and yeah, and rare.

Like it's just, yeah, certainly not a situation I've ever found myself in, in full time employment. Yeah. Not once. And like, I was actually gobsmacked with the response after having children too, like that kind of caught me off guard. I never really thought that they wouldn't just give a fuck anymore.

Rah: I've had jobs where soon as someone got married, they were like, Oh, literally the conversation I had with my team leader was.

Oh, well, now that she's married, we're not going to teach her how to maintain the photocopier.

Christine: Why?

Rah: Because she's, because she's going to be having a baby shortly. Oh my God, because we're so 1950s, aren't we? I

Christine: got asked that question when I was getting married. My immediate, my manager asked me if I was coming back.

Somebody verbally slapped him around the face for asking me a question like that. Um, but it was, it was, it gobsmacked me. Mm. Yeah.

Rah: And the thing that I found Gobsmacking was that that team leader was a woman. Mm. You know what Hads had sometimes the worst Agreed. The absolute worst. Oh, they are. Yeah,

Christine: they are.

I've had a bitch of a boss, you know? Yeah. So we've all had that, but um, yeah, women are, women can be, yeah. Incredibly. Mm-Hmm. surprising in a negative way. Yes. Yeah, in this,

Rah: in this job that I keep raving on about, I had a really terrible experience, which was not they're doing, but it was the male manager owner of the business who cottoned onto it.

He had enough emotional intelligence to tweak and he called me at one day out of the blue and he's like, I feel like you're not all right. Are you not all right? And I fucking sobbed and I was so embarrassed because he's, you know, very straight 180, you know, and I was like, Oh my God, he's onto it, but it was game changing.

And I knew he had my back as much as he was able to do, you know, and I was like, yeah, exactly. So as much as I may shit on men, In a lot of elements of what I do, but honestly, the one that I had was in that moment, like was, you know, yeah, but anyway, had in the back of my mind, next thing I looked, I went job hunting.

I was like, Oh no,

Emma: everyone takes a little look, right? Yeah, exactly.

Rah: Um, and I was like, no, the idea of meeting and learning new people and trying to work out who everyone is. Sometimes

Emily: it's better the devil, you know? Well, yeah, exactly.

Rah: And that was the thing. And I knew that I wouldn't be able to do, my mind would not function with the go part time and have a side hustle or stay full time, have side hustle and then bring it on.

Yeah. Um, like, you know, kind of like what M's working on. I couldn't do it. I don't have that. that level of ADHD that's been diagnosed by TikTok. Um, yeah, it's not easy. No. Um, and so I just ripped the band aid and effectively rage quit and went, I'm fucking out.

Emily: It also comes down to your actual, your overall financial position.

Cause I would, I would just throw it all out the window if I could. Yeah.

Rah: I'm lucky that we've got some savings. I won 10, 000 in a magazine competition about 15 years ago. Nice. So that happens in

Emily: real life. It legit happened

Rah: in real life. And I only, and I was going to report the email as spam, except I used to work for that publisher.

And I knew the email address was the right parameters. And I knew the phone number in their email signature matched the directory when I had, when I worked there. And I was like, Oh wow, this is legit.

Emma: Wow.

Rah: Yeah. So thank you. ACP magazines now known as our media, ARE publishing name ever, but anyway, so, yeah, so I really wanted to have that flexibility in my life so that I can help my friends who are solo parents by their doing, um, and be available to the kids who are in boarding school in Sydney.

You know, so I, I'm, I can take them to their psych appointments if they can't get to them, get there themselves. That's lovely, Rah. That's a part of community,

Emma: being the village. Yeah, exactly.

Rah: And, um. We all need a Rah in our lives.

Emma: We all need a village. Oh my God. We need, yeah, we

Rah: need the village. And, and so even now, like my sister's not been well, you know, and so I've been able to, if I need to, I'm like, I can drop everything, like I can be out there.

When I was working for other people, I didn't have that, you Oh, we make you feel guilty for it, but I felt the guilt.

Emily: Yeah. Yeah, yeah, exactly. And that's past trauma. It is and

Rah: yeah, past trauma and also brought up Catholic, like that's what the Catholic upbringing is. The guilt. And part of it's also about

Emma: the standards that you set yourself in a work environment, right?

If your expectation of yourself is that you will give everything, you will do your best, you will show up with everything you've got and give that to the business. Then yeah, if you're not doing that, you're going to feel guilt like that's, that's a very natural response

Rah: now with each individual client when I'm like shit, I'm a little bit behind, sorry guys, you know,

Christine: I think I sent an apology email to somebody this morning, oops, sorry, it's on me like, you know, and again, ownership.

Yeah. Yeah. Responsibility. Radical responsibility. Absolutely. Yeah. Important. And we're always behind. I'm behind in the love of the kid and focusing on a child at some point. But I'd rather be busy. Yeah. I can't, I cannot twiddle my thumbs. I mean, I, I do look at my couch longingly and think I wouldn't mind having a bit of a Netflix binge.

Miss you. Um. So I literally

Emily: sent Chris a thing on Instagram last night that popped up and I'm going to find it. Cause it was just like, and she wrote back being like, Oh yes, this is, uh, you. And I'm like no, it's both of us. It is both of us. Um. And it literally says, it's got like me, and then it says, I need to take a day to relax.

Also me. I wonder if there's a way I could relax that is more productive. I have so many feelings about this. That doesn't sum me up in a nutshell. I don't know what does. Correct. Correct. I

Emma: wonder if mowing the lawn could be relaxing

Emily: or,

Emma: you know, insert. Productive task here. I'm at the point

Emily: where I like enjoy ironing because I feel like I'm achieving something and I get slight satisfaction out of seeing my clothes go really smooth.

Yeah, no, I mean that does seem to be me. I've

Christine: worn this, um, this t shirt again today that clearly needs to have an iron to get the thing reattached, but I get it out of the wardrobe to where clearly I don't pick up the iron and I think, Oh, I need to iron that. No, never, ever. No. I'd like

Emily: actually I mean, I'd probably get over it if people were paying me to do it because it'd be too much, but I really enjoy lining.

It's so weird. But I'm also like madly OCD about having a clean kitchen. So I find that like once it's clean, every time I walk into it, I'm like, yeah. Until, you know, my husband puts things on the table.

Emma: I can say just, you know, you guys talked a lot about, um, Connection. You talked about flexibility and those things.

And I can so distinctly remember when I decided that I wanted to be in business for myself. And I was 16, 17, sitting on my parents bed making, making, um, uni choices. Yeah. Right. And I remember sitting there looking at the, at the course outlines and going, well, I could go and be a teacher and teach design, you know, design tech.

Cause I loved that as a child and I loved food tech and all those sorts of things. And I was like, you go and do that lots of jobs. Good, cool. Or I could go and do graphic design, visual arts and graphic design, because I had to hedge my bets. Um, always. Always. And someday I could make a business out of that.

And that means I'll be flexible enough, like I'll have the flexibility I need in order to have kids.

Emily: God, I wish I thought about that when I was a kid. Isn't that disturbing though? Yeah. Like my

Emma: sister gets very up my ass about it, in that she's like

Emily: But what do your parents do?

Emma: So both my parents are in business and often have been so it's complicated.

So mum, mum ran a wildly successful plant high business, um, through the eighties and nineties down in Wollongong. So you know, the Novotel or whatever needs fiddly things on every balcony, they don't want to maintain them. They didn't have plastic plants. She'd go in and replace them and do all that sort of stuff

Emily: and the maintenance and all that.

Emma: Yeah. Yeah. And then, you know, she was doing, mum did all sorts of fun things. You know, she ran veggie boxes, which we as children would sell and make a mozza of money out of. You know, she was doing all sorts of things, um, through the, the 80s and the 90s. Dad has run, he was a partner in an accounting firm and then took that accounting firm out or took the financial planning part of that firm out and, and set up his own practice, um, which he continues to run down in Wollongong.

Um, and so, Lots of entrepreneurial spirit around me, and I certainly had small business running through my veins, you know, my uncles are builders and, or ran their own courier run or, you know, all sorts of different things like. So that makes more sense

Emily: why you might naturally think like that. Correct.

Like my husband decided straight off the bat, before he even finished high school, I'm going to be a mechanic. Yeah. Because his family were heavily traded and heavily mechanics. Yeah. And that was, you know, it's about the example that you

Emma: see in front of you or rebelling against the example. Some people, some people would go, well, those income streams can be quite varied.

Those income streams can be, you know, I get a lot of from my

Emily: mother. Like for us, it was, you finish school, you go to UD. You get a job in corporate and you work your way up. That's how you did it. Yep. Like there was no variation. My mother ran her own physio practice business and grew that something significant and was quite successful and ended up selling it and had multiple locations and stuff.

She did that really well when I was in primary school. And yeah, clearly she

Emma: was telling you to go to university and get a proper job. And

Emily: then she kind of got, um, over physio after a It's 20 something years and decided she retrained as a graphic designer. My dad's a programmer, so they ran their own web design business.

Beautiful. But got to the point where they couldn't, they had too much work for themselves and not enough to pay for someone else to come in and do it. Yep. And it kind of floundered. Everyone gets to that point. Yeah. That messy middle, growing pains. This is like high school years for me. And then they, that kind of floundered and they ended up shutting it down.

So I've been getting a lot of that commentary from my mother being like, just shut your businesses down and just go work full time properly. It's so much better. And I kind of like, um, I've kind of resigned to the point where like she's putting her own fears from her prolapse business onto me. And I know it's meant with good intent.

I know we just communicate very differently, but. I'm trying to explain that I don't want that. I would rather slog myself to death and have my own business where I can do what I want when I want and not be tied into people instead of working full time.

Emma: I think it depends on the balance of that, right?

So if I've gone into business in order to have the flexibility for my kid and my life and my family and, and whatever else, and I am not Doing that because I'm slogging myself to death.

Emily: Yeah,

Emma: I've missed the fucking point.

Emily: Yeah,

Emma: right But if I'm if I'm able to go pick my kid up from daycare at 3 30 in the afternoon

Emily: Yeah,

Emma: you know or I'm signing, you know signed a new big client and they're like well These are the this is what we would like you to work

Emily: Sorry,

Emma: that doesn't align with the values that I've got in this business, which is to be able to go pick my kid up.

And

Emily: that's, and that's the thing that I've found, like, you know, even with school, cause my son's a new one now. School fucking finishes at 3. 30 in the afternoon. You know, you're just hitting your

Emma: stride.

I'm a real morning person. So give me an 8 AM start and you know, we're okay. By four o'clock be cooked on the complete opposite. I'll wait

Emily: till four o'clock in the morning. As opposed to once the

Emma: sun has gone down, you don't make me work. It's one of the hardest things about when I was working in agency.

Cause I was doing, I was doing eight 30 to four 30 on, on agency work, you know, billable hours and whatever else. And then we were doing five to midnight on pitch, and I was just knackered. Yeah, And they're like, oh, we'll just send you home in a cab. And I'm like, yeah, but I've still got to be here at 8. 30 for the next run of agency work, because otherwise we don't have the money to fund the CD who's working on the pitch.

You know, it was,

Emily: It's not a fun model to live with.

Emma: It was exhausting. It was exhausting, and it was very typical. Of agency land in in those days? Um, I dunno how, I think it is still reasonably common, but yeah. I, I'm not suited for nighttime work. I can't think of a quicker way to

Christine: Yeah. Make myself work . And I think you kind of like, um, need to set your business up to go with the flow of how and where you work best.

Yeah. Yeah. And it also changes, like, so it changes when you, yeah. You know, you've got an 18 month old. So it changed when they were born. And, and I know for myself as getting, you know, slightly down, um, into the women of a certain age kind of spectrum. Um, but things change. Like I, I lose that three o'clock in the afternoon.

Um, I'm actually. Off in la la land mentally, I'm done. But at nine o'clock at night, I'm like, right, I'm going to go finish my day. And I do that. So I start early. I've lost the plot. Mid arvo. Is that an age thing? Is that what's happening to me? Yes. It's an age, yeah, yes, yeah, yeah. Sorry, Darl. Uh, yeah. Um, so, I mean, I signed off at, Um, half past 12 this morning, changed my alarm clock to give me six hours horizontal time to get up at 6.

30. I was at my desk by 7. 30 this morning. That's not enough sleep for me, frankly. Oh, it's not enough sleep, but there are days where I've just got to be running crazy stupid, um, like today. Um, she's regretting it this morning. I am. I am. I'm feeling like I could have stayed in bed. Um, but, um, you know, so, but, um, yeah.

But there are the days that it's like, it's midday and I'm finally getting my mojo going because it's just, I'm just having that morning and

Emma: I've worked through all the things I need to work through. I don't need to be a slave to the desk.

Emily: Yeah. I like that mentality. Like that works well for me too, but that takes a shift.

That takes a real shift in yourself. It's a real mental focus.

Christine: It's like, you've got to teach yourself and that's the, you know, that internal dialogue and that's what I struggle with at the moment. And I'm really focused on is like, I'll say to him, Oh, haven't even done my work yet. Well, no, I've been working all day.

What I'm talking about is I haven't done some client billable hours, but I've worked for the last eight hours doing other stuff. And for me, it's a real, I'm trying to teach myself and I think it's just a really long. process to go, I work the, the moment I'm awake, I'm working in some capacity and I've got to stop saying I haven't got to my work, M's forever.

Like even last night I said, I haven't done so and so and she goes, it'll be there tomorrow. And she's teaching me. It's like, yeah, it's a task and you're a signer list regardless of that's reconciling invoicing, then it's

Emma: work and you need to adjust the fee you're charging for the billable hours to cover all of that.

Those hours for each

Christine: and so that's what we're, we're in that, you know, we're growing and learning and it's a hard period of time because that's what, and it's, and it's that personal growth and mindset piece is so central to that as well. And that's where I'm at. Um, and trying to fit work my fit work around how my body.

Yeah, you have to do that. It's

Emily: taken me a long time to kind of get to the point where I will just ride with how I'm feeling because I know if I force it, it's not going to work. Like you need to just, but the amount of efficiency I can pull out what I am on it. Oh, it's ridiculous.

Emma: Well, this is, I think this is one of the things you learn in being a creative.

Um,

Is that you, you can't force things to come together. You can set precedents. You can set, um, style guides and, and, you know, ideas and about how something will look. Do the admin side of it. Yeah, yeah, but you can't do the actual work. And so sometimes you do have to just go, you know what, today is not the day to draw the logo design or to, um, come up with a creative campaign idea.

Today's not the day for that. No. Today's the day to sit and schedule 40 social media posts. Yes. Today's the day to sit and reconcile my accounts and do all my invoicing and whatever and moving with that flow and moving with that energy and accepting that, that creative energy that you need to do. The logo design will come if you give it space and time.

That's experience. That's just experience for

Emily: people too. Like I find that, I mean, Chris probably has noticed this over all our years together, but like, I feel. I get fueled by people around me, like I'm a very big collaborator. I like hearing ideas and then taking my own ideas, smushing it with what other people have said and creating something out of it, which is why every time we sit with Rara, I'm like, tell me things.

Yeah, we go here. And it, I, I will then be that person that's like, okay, up to midnight being like, good to get this out, got to get this out to my head. I'm like, here's the basic business plan. Like off we go.

Rah: She legit wrote sales page copy in like half an hour. It felt like yesterday or an idea.

Emily: Fuck. You know, it was annoying.

I wrote that and then I, my computer was being a dickhead and I had to Oreo do it all in an incognito window cause my cookies or something was being a dickhead and I lost it all. And then I sat there being like, what the fuck was I saying? Trying to like

Emma: rewrite it. We've all been there. We have all been there.

We have. Remember

Rah: in the olden days, it used to be Word didn't save. Computer crashed. Now it's the browser. Yeah. For illustrator or insert. Oh, an illustrator crash. There's nothing more frustrating. If I have

Emily: any of my Adobe's open, my computer just ceases to function. And I have a proper mark that is meant to.

Facilitate that, like I've got the RAM and everything in it to do it. I think it's because I have 65, 000. I mean, that's what it is. Too many tabs. Multiple profiles. All

Emma: that stuff. Oh yes.

Rah: Whereas I'm like, I want my nieces and nephews, whenever they use my phone, because I want to like hack my TikTok or play the games that I've got that I pay for or whatever.

The first thing they do every time they grab my phone is they go and kill all the apps because that's what kids do these days. And so I've kind of started doing that. Yeah. Preserve your battery life. But then I started doing that with my, with even just with my computer. So I'm like just incessantly going, Oh, kill

Emily: all the stuff.

Cause I do leave a lot of shit just floating open and for no reason. And I'm really funny about my Chrome windows. I don't like closing them cause I'm like, I will never remember what I had open and I need that stuff sometimes. And it just is anyway, we've

Christine: wildly

Emma: deviated, gone on a massive tangent.

Christine: I was um, I was looking at your, Oh, Your lovely website is currently in the

Emma: process of being redeveloped.

Isn't it always,

Christine: absolutely. And they must be continuous improvement, incredibly important. Absolutely. And, um, and you know, it doesn't surprise me when you say that, you know, you were looking at the UAC guide or whatever it was in the day and working out what you wanted to do and be in business and planning for that.

Because you know, you're, you know, you're about you kind of section, which I love. You don't call about me, you know, that kind of thing. Um, you know, and I, and I re I recognize someone who knew what they wanted to be very early on. My sister was like that. She's a queen of hairdressing, um, for me and, um, I grew up, she butchered my Barbie fashion phase.

The Barbies all had a haircut. Um, You know, before she even went and did her apprenticeship and she's been in business in the, um, the hair, um, dressing industry, um, for 35 plus years, because we'll say plus, we just, you know, she's 30. Well, we keep putting our age up slightly because the nieces and the nephews keep getting older.

So I think she's 39 now. Um, kind of thing. I think I finally had my 40th birthday because, um, You know, the, the eldest nephews, 34. Must be

Emily: 40. It's kind of my age, but okay, cool,

Emma: cool. Nevermind, nevermind, nevermind. No, no. I also recognize in hindsight that it was certainly always something I wanted to do.

Because I remember Standing in my grandparent's house, looking at my dad's business cards from his practice and going, Oh my God, that logo needs a redo. And I think I was about 18 years old and when he took, when he took his business out on his own, it's one of the joyful things in life was that I did get to redo his logo.

I've actually done it twice, so he changed the business name a couple of years into practice and I did get to redo his logo. And the latest iteration has actually stood up exceptionally well. I was talking to him about this over the weekend. Yeah, it's

Emily: so nice to have that. So surety of such a young age of what you want.

Emma: Some would call it opinionated. Some would call it, um, the grand plan. I've been working on a, on a 15 year plan for 15 years. Um, I wish I had that. Like I was one of those people, pluses and minuses. I

Emily: could do this. I could do that. I could do, I could fit into a bit of everything. Like I don't really

Rah: know

Emily: where I want to be and it's taken me into, I still don't know

Rah: what I want to be when I grow up.

Emily: No, other than just really rich.

Emma: Whereas I think, so when I, Left the corporate world. I'd been working as, as we've all iterated to a crappy job and, um, did a rage quit and went, you know what, I'm, I, I'm just, I'm so done here. I can't, I can't do this anymore. And I remember sitting outside my favorite coffee shop in the world, which is Circa in Parramatta.

And I remember sitting there going, so what am I going to do with my life? What, like, what am I going to do? Um, And I remember sitting there going and thinking about all the women that I really admire, Makers and creators and creatives and, um, you know, bloggers and influencers and interior design people and all this sort of stuff.

And I remember sitting there going, they all work for themselves. They've all got, you know, this really strong sense of personal style and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. But the underlying pinning thing was that they all work for themselves. And I remember sitting there going, I know that I've always wanted to do this, you know, Maybe now is the time because you never know you never know when you're gonna go into business until you know

Emily: And the smart thing about doing it so young is you're not in a financial dark hole potentially either So you've got like if you're in the early 20s and stuff, you're kind of living at home still Mom and dad are still paying for some stuff.

God bless. No

Emma: incorrect. I was no no, I moved out of home

Emily: at 17

Emma: Love my parents. I was just young and went to uni, right? And so I was still 17 when I left my parents house. I moved in with my

Emily: husband. Yeah. And then I married him. So Ben and I,

Emma: by that point, Ben and I were living together. We'd bought our first apartment.

We were on the precipice of buying a house. Because we had a plan. And I know that sounds, it's so boring and it's so old lady, but like we formulated a plan at 21 and we have just gotten to the point, you know, we were talking about the fact that we've just moved to, um, quote unquote the country, which is between Picton and Camden.

So not so country, but country enough.

Rah: Yeah.

Emma: Um, country to the people around the world. Beautiful landscape, much closer to my mum, we've got an 18 month old, so you know. It's important. All of those things are so important, but we've, we've gotten to that point in the plan, which is really exciting, but for some that would be very restrictive and would be very boring.

Emily: Me sitting here having been married, what, 11 years together, 13 years. Yeah, we're about the same. We're fucking kicking ourselves that we didn't have a plan. Yeah, like the idea of being able to buy a house for us is this is half the reason why I still juggle Secure employment and a business because I need that security in order to try and eventually buy a house

Emma: But these are important conversations to be having because people sit there

Emily: and go.

Well, how did you get there if we've

Emma: done this earlier? Oh, i'm very jealous. So so ben and I you know, and we're very open about Our money story and I can, I can send you a link. We told it all into a podcast a couple of years ago. I'll send you that. That's fine. We'll

Emily: link that in

Emma: our

Emily: show notes. Um,

Emma: we, we were both side hustling, you know, Ben was working overtime.

He was a, um, it's an electrical fitter. So he was working on high voltage motors, modifications to high voltage motors. So he was working outrageous overtime for years. I was in your bed. I get to get along. I know. Um, I was working a full time job and then side hustling on the weekends. That's not the only way to get ahead.

But it's certainly a very accessible way to get ahead. While you're young and you

Emily: have capacity, energy, time, and not a lot of responsibilities to worry about. Fucking do it. Yeah. And that was always the attitude

Emma: we took. Yeah. That was always the attitude we took. Was we'll work hard. Now we've, we've done travel and we've done lots of other things as well, but we were always very focused on property as an investment model, um, that is changing in the current landscape.

Let's be very honest. Interest rates are outrageous and it makes it very hard to hold back. property and very hard to maintain property with rents low that doesn't cover anything. So like that, that model that maybe our parents followed of you buy and you hold and you put a tenant in, it doesn't work anymore.

The numbers don't stack up. You have to be very aware of what, what it is that you want out of life. So if owning a home isn't your priority and travel is. Find a way to make money while you travel. Yes, that yeah traveling Traveling and working doesn't appeal to me So I've never done the freelancer on the beach in Bali thing as much as my career could facilitate

Emily: I'm Chris right now because someone decided to go to Fiji a year ago and worked the whole damn time Mmm, that might be slightly different.

It wasn't by choice

Christine: It was just a shitty time and it was one of those COVID canceled trips that had to be done or we lost all our money. It was stuck in Fiji. So we did it. And the last week before financial year end, and I had a client with a big deadline. And yes, it was just crap. Um, I would, I would have a do over because quite frankly since then, it's like, I'll never go back to Fiji because I've got a terrible memory.

Yeah. Based around work and holiday. Never Melbourne. So my holiday next year. for the husband's 60th is on a cruise ship and I know, A, I'm not paying for cruise ship Wi Fi. It's quite expensive to pay for it. It's dreadful. Outrageous. And so I'm taking, for the first time, I will be taking no computer with me.

Wow. I'll be taking. Good for you. You won't be able to track me down. Turn your phone off. Yeah, yeah. Um, there's a small worry there because we are going to be leaving the child. the country.

Emily: I will look after him. It's fine. I was just

Christine: gonna say the child is old enough to 18 by then. He's fine. Yeah, I'll take him to get tattooed.

It's cool. Yeah, thanks babe. Thanks. But yeah, but, but, but, but he, huge learning, learning curve. I want to travel. Uh, that's my big thing I need. We had a, we, we had a. Um, chose to get a house. We sacrificed travel and then we chose we're going to save for a house. Um, my kid is an IVF baby and we dropped essentially a house on that.

Um, and trying to give him a sibling. And so all of that went, so travel for us was, there was 21 years between one overseas trip and the next month. Um, but in my, you know, my next thing is I do want to happily travel, but work while traveling on my terms. On your terms, and I think working out what those terms are and establishing those before you go.

Yeah, and I haven't got that, I haven't got that sorted. Down. So, um, and that will be another work in progress. Yep. Um, and won't, won't worry about that today, but it is, it's a whole thing about just reiterations, you know, reiterations of your business and of yourself in your business. You'll

Emily: find Chris and I in Scotland in 2025 for work reasons that we have undetermined what they might be.

Christine: We're going to, all you got to do is get a Scottish client, right. And then the whole trio. And a conference. I might never come

Emily: back. We're thinking we might find a conference in like London and then we can like justify being there. Yeah, you can at least justify

Emma: three quarters of the flight, right? So I have like 15

Rah: friends in the UK, one of them is Scottish, so yeah, and she has her own business.

There you go. She does events. Oh, yeah. Let's do a whole podcast tour of the UK. I'm lining her up to be on the podcast as well. Excellent. No, this is

Emily: sick. Look, look at that face. You see, you talk to her. Yeah, it sounds like an idea. It sounds like an idea. Have I

Rah: spoken to you about Hamilton? No. No.

Christine: No. No. Oh my God, this, I feel that we could seriously talk.

I could be here for days. All day. Oh my God. You're very fascinating. Haven't even touched on burnout. Love to touch on burnout. But you know what? You know what? You're going to have to come back for part two. I think, I think you are, Emma, because this has been Excellent. This has been extraordinary. You've been very involved in leading some of the parts of this discussion.

You even interviewed us. You did, you did. And, and I'm loving that. And I think, yes, we're going to definitely be inviting, um, you back. Um, but I think I would like to, um, leave this with one question, my little secret squirrel question, um, for you to finish off. So if I had a glorious box, Very pretty. And I opened it and it had all the things that you had lost over your lifetime.

Is there one thing that you would hope to find in that box and take out?

Emma: I'm not a, I'm not a things person in general. Sorry, I should have said thing, person, memory. It can be anything. Absolutely. And so obviously if as, as a not so things person, I, I lean towards people. Right. Um, and I would, I'd give just about anything to be able to take my grandad out of that box and show him all the things that we have done since he's gone.

Emily: I feel that.

Emma: Um, We, the last, the last time I saw him, we gave him a save the date for our wedding and he sat there and he looked at me and he said, M I'm not going to make it to 2018. Is there any chance you could move it forward a year? And I said, granted, I can't, I can't do that for you. Um, I'm sure you'll be fine.

He obviously was not, and that's okay, but he would be. Um, so chuffed and proud and excited about all the things we've done from, from getting married is the only one of his grandbabies that has, has had a formal wedding, which he valued, um, as you know, the, the parents of his great grandchild and, and the house and what we're trying to achieve with all those things, he would have been so excited for us.

And I would love to show him what we've done and I'd love to just have him here to be part of it with us. And that's, that's the thing that I've lost that I would, I would love to have back just for a little bit. I've got goosebumps.

Christine: Yeah. Thank you. Thank you for being vulnerable there and sharing that.

Yes. I'm like a little bit in love with you. Yeah. That's a bit cute. Yeah, no,

Emily: it's like a very fascinating girl. I could talk to you all day. Good day. Yeah. Also lols that were both M and M and Ben. I am an M and Ben and Ben.

Rah: And then there's Chris and Rah over in the corner. I'm not feeling too left

Emily: out of that at all.

We're the square pegs in the round hole. What's your husband's name Ra? Dan. Oh, I did know that. And I was going to be like, lols if you two both have Stevens. Yeah, no. Or both have Dan's. I was like, yeah, no.

Rah: Good old Daniel. Bless. The calm centre of my universe. But anyway. So, Em. Yeah. Where can we find you online if we wanted to find out more about you?

Emma: Keep up with y'all. Oh my God. Come find me wherever you like. Come check out the website. Come find me on Instagram at emdesignsaus. Come connect with me on LinkedIn. Let's start an actual conversation and, um, you know, talk about business, talk about life and have more robust conversations. I mean, you know, Instagram is the portfolio, right?

It's the very pretty, it's the very front facing, LinkedIn, I tend to have more robust conversations about what's going on. So it depends on what you feel like engaging with, but I'd love to connect with anyone who wants to have a chat. Brilliant. Do it all.

Rah: Excellent. Thank you for coming. It's been a delight.

Thank you, ladies. Hashtag BellaVistaHotel, and yeah, love you girls. Love you too. And yeah, we'll see you guys. We need to come back

Emily: for part two. Yeah. You tell me

Rah: when you want me here and I'll be there for you. Yeah, bring it. And yeah, we'll see you guys in the next episode. All right. See ya.

Christine: See ya.