27: The one that wraps up year
Today's episode is our 2024 wrap-up where we spill the tea on everything that went down this year. From launching this podcast (and somehow not swearing TOO much) to putting on our first conference and watching our businesses grow - we're covering all the wins, fails, and "what the actual f*ck" moments of the year. Thank you SO much for being part of our first season of the F*ck Around and Find Out podcast, can't wait for the amazing year that 2025 is going to be!
Number of fucks given in this episode: 23
Mentioned in this episode:
Register for our planning day in Sydney on 13 January 2025
Register for our Melbourne conference on 23 May 2025
Sign up to our newsletter to be notified about our Central Coast conference on 11 September 2025 and webinars starting in February 2025.
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 are here to shoot the shit on everything about women in business and running your own business.
Emily: Welcome
Christine: to the
Emily: final episode of 2024.
Christine: Seriously, can you believe this is our end of year wrap up episode?
When did that
Emily: unorganized that we're actually legitimately recording it a week before the end of the year, or something like that.
Rah: Somewhere around that time, I don't know. It's December. Yep, that's all we need to know. And Yeah. Yep. We're just playing by the seat of our pants at this point, aren't we?
Christine: Oh yeah.
Absolutely. Fake it till you
Rah: make
Emily: it,
Rah: baby.
Christine: I actually said to a client and one of their people this morning, I said, I'm limping into the end of the year and that's how I'm actually feeling on hump day, Wednesday, I'm limping to Friday. I'm just done. Definitely a limp. Yep. And I'm sure there's plenty of people out there that are dumb.
Rah: And also our technology is failing us because we can't get microphones to work or internet to work properly. So, you know, it's all falling over.
Christine: Oh, absolutely.
Emily: You know, every, everything needs a break, including the internet.
Rah: Yeah. No,
Christine: totally. So we launched a podcast this year, ladies. Oh, what an amazing wild ride.
Yeah.
Emily: Holy crap. How did that happen?
Rah: I've no idea. I bullied you
Emily: into it, remember? Oh yeah.
Rah: Oh, that old thing. That way M works. Got it. Yeah, that's right. Emily peer pressure. Yeah.
Christine: And it's funny, like, how I felt at the beginning to how I feel now. Like, I know that I was wrong. really nervous about my recorded voice because I've never been partial to it.
And then, you know, while walking Hurley at night, listening to the episodes as they were published, seriously fell in love with my recorded voice.
Rah: So you should. It's a great voice.
Emily: You've got a great voice. You've got a really good voice for this kind of thing. Oh, thank you. The amount of compliments we've had from people too that have come through for your voice has been really interesting.
Christine: No. Well, that makes me feel good. At least you didn't say I've got a good face for radio, you know.
Rah: We would never say that to you. No, I know. Not to my face anyway.
Emily: Not even behind your face. No. Yeah.
Rah: Exactly. We don't work that way. No. I know. Exactly.
Christine: That's what I love. Yeah.
Rah: Isn't it funny to think we only started this, like we launched on the 1st of July.
So we've only been doing it this financial year. Which, I know, it makes you feel like it's been so much longer than that. I mean, we were recording for a couple of months beforehand, but yeah, it's. But still,
Emily: it's like, it's been crazy and so much has come from this podcast. Um, you know, we started off with just wanting to have a bit of a, well, at least I did a little bit of a soapbox to kind of talk about our experiences in business and, you know, working life.
And now we've got so much that's grown from it. You know, we had our first ever conference in September, which was fucking amazing. We did. Um, and I did the maths, you know, we only did that three months after launching
Rah: the podcast.
Emily: Well, no, that's pretty impressive. Yeah, it's, it's, it's kind of huge. Yeah. Um, and then we also have now created the Women in Business Collective, which is something we will definitely talk more about and share how with that, because that's just, um, so fucking amazeballs.
And we've got, all kinds of things on the slate for next year. And it's all come from this wonderful little podcast of
Christine: ours. I know. And God, we had some great speakers. We really did. Um, you know, it was just really interesting. Like, I mean, I particularly really loved Emma Wright's episode, like turning the tables on us, you know, here we are interviewing
Rah: people and she turned around and did it to us.
Yep. She took the reins. I loved it. That was such a fun episode.
Emily: It was. I enjoyed talking to, um, this is lovely Sam Eberwhite about her, her situation and, and her very, very different line of work to the stock standard businesses that we come across. Yeah.
Rah: Yeah.
Emily: The fact that it is actually a business, like it might be a bit different, but it's, it's still actually a business and some of the discrimination she's received, I guess, from being, you Her line of work and that's, oh, that was quite interesting too.
Rah: Yeah. Things that you think you wouldn't have to deal with quite so much in her line of work. Yeah.
Emily: And honestly, I got to say, I don't, I know I'm probably stealing other people's, but uh, talking to Jane about ADHD and business, lovely Jane from the Jane edit,
Rah: uh,
Emily: very good friend of ours. We adore her to death.
Um, but fascinating hearing about that. And I think it's so relevant to nowadays as well. Yeah. Everyone has either got it themselves or works with people with it. And when you're running your own business, it definitely hits different.
Rah: Oh, yeah. And it was so funny. I was messaging Jane the day that her episode came out to say that I started my ADHD medication three days before.
Her episode came out and I was like, this is my first day starting to do some work with my drugs. And she was like, Oh my God, I'm so excited. Yeah. She would have been
Christine: very,
Rah: very
Christine: excited. Proud of
Rah: you as well. Yeah. Yeah. So that was yeah. Interesting how the timing It's almost like manifestation level of how it all worked out.
Emily: Oh yeah. It's always the way, isn't it?
Rah: Yeah.
Emily: Always the way.
Rah: Yeah. I question manifestation, but fuck, it seems to happen. Nah, seriously. It happens. Like it, it, it really,
Christine: really happens. I think we just need to like, well, you know. Yes. It's a word for next year and, uh, totally put some belief behind it and see what it, if we manifest what 2025 can develop, deliver, um, for us as individuals, as individual businesses, and as the women in business collective, it's, I think it's the world is our oyster quite frankly.
Emily: Well, that's, you know, we we've got a planning day that's available for anyone who'd be interested in joining us. January the 17th, Chris and I did a planning day with Jane and Adrian from the wonderful Newcastle Virtual Assistants at the beginning of this current year. And I think if I reckon we should both pull out our notes from that, that session, cause I feel like just being able to have the headspace to sit down for a day and go, what do we actually want from our business?
What do we want to want from our personal life? You know, and then pulling some structure to that. I reckon that we'd actually have ticked off quite a lot of stuff that we put on our list. And some of it was probably more blue sky dreams than anything else, even when we've still managed to kind of get there.
And I think it is that manifestation. We put it out to the universe. We sat down, we took the time, we put it on paper and tada,
Rah: here we are, baby. Yeah. I keep looking back at the butcher's paper. I filled in just over a year ago when I went on a weekend. Away with Mary, who we had an episode two and we went through a business planning workbook and then use butcher's paper and Sharpies and all sorts of shit while, you know, in between sessions sitting in the spa and came up with what our, what we wanted to do and on it, I had all sorts of things that I thought.
Never going to happen. They've happened. So, you know, I've spoken at conferences, I have networking events and done webinars and those sorts of things as well. Um, but even things like I had envisaged, envisaged, is that? No, envisioned. Thank you. Um, the idea of having an office. That had brick and concrete and it had a cafe at the front and it had lots of natural light.
And while it's not my own office, I now rent a desk in someone's office that has that exact setup. So I'm like, well, I think that's technically still ticking off something. Oh yeah. Absolutely.
Emily: It absolutely is. And we've had the opposite experience almost, where we also wanted an office. And we manifested our office and we have also realized that this was something we really wanted to do.
And it's nice to have achieved that and have a mutual space that Chris and I can work together. It's not actually all it's cut out to be and actually has become more of a financial burden than we ever thought Yeah.
Christine: And I think, and, and I, you know, like learning curves are expensive in either your time, your mindset, your emotions and money, of course.
Um, and it has been an expensive learning curve in all of those areas and purely, you know, just, it's been, it's marvelous to be in the same space as him. Absolutely wonderful. But, you know, office space. School holidays, sick children, little kids, travel, you know, it's like, you know, you still got to pay your rent if you go on a holiday, you still got to pay everything, and it's just less, less convenient than we thought, but you know, we know what we're going to do.
Rah: Yeah, and if you didn't do it, you'd still be wondering, like it would still be in the way of you doing other things.
Christine: Yeah.
Emily: Absolutely. And we also know that maybe there's a different solution to it as well. Like there's other options that might also give us that ability and also to use what we want. It's that constant of changing and evolving pace, right?
That, but it was really nice to see, like we did manifest it. We manifested quite a lot of, yeah. Of what we've done, um, this year, which is, and even, you know, so much, so much more, so much more like than what we ever, ever expected anything to be like, you know, our conference, we decided at the buffet table at Star City.
Hashtag not
Rah: sponsored, but yes.
Emily: Yeah. And now look at us, you know, like we, we pulled that shit off and now we've got the Melbourne plans next year. Um, with our early bird tickets on sale and, uh, Central Coast, which is coming soon as well for next, uh, year. And that's just the tip of the iceberg of what we've got ready to go on got on the plan at least.
Yeah. It's, uh, it's been crazy.
Rah: And so seeing as we're doing sort of a reflection with this last episode of the year, I'm interested to hear from you guys. What's, what's it like for Juniper Road? Like what's 2024 been like?
Christine: Well, I think, um, I think the main thing to celebrate is just a couple of milestones in business.
I mean, hey, We're kind of still in business, like we're 18, 18 months in, um, and you know, we turned two years old in April, so we're closer. We're more than 18 months in. And the fact is that You know, we, we've beaten, um, you know, beaten the odds and we're part of that. You know, the a BS reports, only 76.5% of businesses survive past their first year.
So we are in excellent, that 75%. Um, and you know, if. We will be in business next year and come April, we've then beat the next set of stats and odds. And the fact is that two in four businesses don't go past their second birthday. So we want to be in, you know, in those stats of getting to number two.
Emily: We've had a massive year too, like, you know, we, I'm no people that have listened to probably heard me talk athndom stages about what I was doing, but I was working full time up until about halfway through this year or a bit more than halfway through this year. And we've. You know, I don't work full time anymore, and that's been an amazing thing for us to be able to sustain us both.
Not as much as we would like, but, you know, the fact that we've been able to do it has been a big achievement for us as well. And we've had quite a lot of growth in this last, um, quarter. As well, which has been a fun challenge from an operation standpoint and logistics standpoint as well. Um, and those kinds of things.
Rah: Yeah, and it's been interesting to see it from my perspective of not being in the weeds with you guys, but sort of being on the outside and seeing You know, you guys going sort of deer in the headlights and then just going, fuck, yep, great. Let's do it and make it happen. Like it's, yeah, you guys are amazing.
What about you Rah? Well, I was trying to look back, dot, dot, dot, I know, dot, dot, dot. I was trying to work out, you know, to some level, I feel like things haven't changed that much for me, but then, yeah,
Emily: they have, we've seen you change.
Rah: Well, they have. So, you know, I remember at, you know, A conference and awards night last year.
So individual events, I was like, well, at the next event, this is what's going to happen. And so I wanted an award and I wanted. The award in one particular category. And then I wanted to speak at this particular conference and that happened. So that's, I really, I really shouldn't sneeze at that. I do have a tendency to put myself down and do tall poppy.
Um, there are things that I can legitimately see as an item on my to do list and goals and
Christine: things that I'm not
Rah: used to. I'm not used to having a plan that I can execute and actually achieve. Because, you know, things will change. So it's weirdly uncomfortable, but I'm, I'm learning to get more comfortable with it of actually doing things and achieving them.
Even, you know, think so similar to you guys having an office space. Now I've been. You know, sort of looking for a home away from home. So then I'm not at my dining table most of the time. And after an attempt at an office space in the city that, you know, I'm sure by no coincidence of me turning up, then just folded, uh, I managed to find just a local business.
Um, that rents a desk out to me a few days a week, and it's got the bricks and it's got the concrete. So it's got what I was envisioning, you know, for my own office. It just means that I'm sharing it with other people, which is fine because the people are lovely. They've got great cafes out the front. I can smell the pastries being baked on the way home because there's a bakery in the building or a patisserie I think even, and the productivity boost of having an office to go to where.
You know, I can do my stand up at my desk thing like you two have witnessed me having fun, you know, making my laptop stand up on my desk before I stand up and it looks like I'm just sinking into a sinkhole. Um, And yeah, so it's, you know, things like that where it's just really changed my mindset. The legwork of other things as well, like having, I've had a mindset coach for just over a year now with Mel, um, Greenhouse from Canberra and having for the last, I think it's like six months now I've joined a weekly accountability group.
With a woman who swears she's not a business coach, but she coaches us. And, you know, she's helped me develop things like a business canvas. And I didn't even fucking know what a business canvas was. I still don't really understand it properly, but I've got one now. So I've got different things that I can look at to help me sort of form a better, more formal business structure, really laying some foundations.
It's kind of like the Rocky movie montage where he's running up and down the stairs and doing that, all the, all the working out and, you know, getting match fit. And so I feel like, yeah, next year it's going to be, but imagine me doing a mind blowing emoji. That's why
Christine: I, you totally had the sound effects spot on, so I totally, thank God.
So
Rah: yeah, it's, um, yeah, so it's, you know, I've got lots of things in play ready to start doing. You know, making happen for next year, like, um, going back to some services that I said I would never do again, but because there seems to be a need for it and I've got existing clients that desperately need it, you know, doing more technical website builds, as much as I try and rape you two into loving WordPress, you're not going to, but I will still love you.
For the complicated beast that she is. Um, and you know, my two year pipe dream of, um, having podcast services, you know, so they're coming next year and yeah. And even being asked to speak about podcasting already for next year. So that's, yeah, that's really fucking cool. So, yes. Yeah, Jesus Christ. I feel like one
Emily: could say that that was probably an unexpected opportunity that came from putting ourselves out there, hey?
Uh, yes. There's been a few of those unexpected opportunities,
Rah: I think, for
Emily: all of us.
Rah: Yeah, it's, yeah, it's just wild. I'm kind of sort of stumped in terms of like processing it all. I think that's what the Christmas prank will be handy for.
Emily: Yeah, and I think that also, you know, talks to the success that we've had from.
our podcast as well. Like, I think this has been more than we ever thought it was going to be initially. And we've received such wonderful feedback from those who do listen to our episodes and people who really feel like they can relate to what we do, what we talk about and what we're sharing and the guests that we're bringing on.
Um, and that's really, really good. You know, we want to try and help educate and make sure people don't feel alone and know that they're the same. In a safe space with us if they want to talk to us about their experiences, all of those things. We've all been there. We've all done that kind of thing. So, you know, it's been really nice to receive a lot of that feedback from people too, which it's always surprises me every time I see it, which is nice.
And also. You know, fills the desire to be like more, let's do more of this.
Rah: That whole podcasting is still cool. Like people think it's this magical thing, which it is when I think about it properly, but you know, having edited podcasts for almost 10 years now, I'm like, Oh, it's not that hard. But then realizing now that I'm in front of the microphone, like, Oh fuck. Yeah. Okay. Got it.
You know,
Christine: You know, it sounds all very simple. I don't even know what I thought was going to be involved, to be really honest. But you know, there's those things of like, you know, when do we get together to record, booking guests to come in and record, booking the spaces, working out that, please, let's not schedule anything at night time because we're all fucking tired of all that and we sound like shit.
So, you know, it's all that sort of stuff that you kind of, you know, Yeah, didn't it? Nothing was on my radar, to be honest, because seriously, Emily did make me do it. So I hadn't thought about what involved, but, um, but it's a whole shit ton of fun though.
Emily: Yeah, absolutely. And you know, we're also very chaotic.
I think that, I think that kind of adds to the appeal a little bit, to be honest, but it's, and cause we're very real in that way, but. It's just that working at the logistics of how it works too. And the tricky part has been trying to schedule three of us. You know, we were three people and even though Chris and I run a business together, we still have differing schedules in terms of availability, especially with the fact that Chris has got a teenager and I've got two small kids.
And then also with you Robyn, obviously in a different. area to us living wise as well, trying to factor that in and find locations that work and not make you drive us to us constantly. And those things like it just, and sometimes it's unavoidable and sometimes it's not. And, but that stuff, it's, it's like trying to herd cats sometimes, sometimes.
Rah: And sometimes there have been cats that have appeared. I'm just noticing that Dottie just walked past behind you in the background. Um, yeah. Um, he was with Sterling.
Christine: The amount of cat videos popping up on my Facebook feed these days, it's like, I'm not manifesting them, but I'm beginning to be overly surrounded by them.
It's a different form of manifesting
Rah: called the algorithm.
Christine: Yep. Yeah.
Rah: Yeah.
Christine: Yeah. Oh gosh, so here we are. It's almost the end of 2024. Almost the end of our, well, our first season. It's been great. And I'm loving doing it
Rah: with you ladies. Yeah, you two are awesome. I'm learning a lot by hanging out with you two.
This fiercely independent pain in the arse, she's learning how to play with others.
Emily: Um, that's just how I roll in general. I talk at people until they like me. It just seems to work. Well, I'm very glad that you don't like to talk at me enough. As soon as I saw that you had purple hair, I just knew you had to be my friend.
And that was, that was not going to be a negotiable.
Rah: Yeah, it does work as a very expensive, but also fun way to, um, stand out like dog's balls and make sure that people know the type of person that I am before they even talk to me.
Emily: But I think there's some, I do think there's some benefit to that really.
Cause I think you will weed out people that are not, That are not on the right vibe for you. And that's definitely a time saver, a time saver. I use my version of that to just be heavily tattooed. Yeah.
Rah: Yeah. Yeah. It's. It's yeah, it's a very, um, handy pre qualifier for people because if they're offended by my general vibe, I'm like, great, then we're not going to work.
So yeah. So it means the people who do approach me for work related things. They're usually fairly well converted before I talk to them, so it's a big help in that sense. It's a good thing to have. So Chris, Chris, we need you to tattoo your neck. That's next.
Christine: Tattoo my neck.
Emily: I am taking her for a tattoo soon, but when, you know, I don't know if we're going to do the neck.
Don't think the neck.
Christine: Okay. No. Look, I'm pretty sure I won't because I don't wear collars on my neck. I don't wear scarves. I don't wear necklaces. I don't put things on or around my neck. So I know a tattoo is different, but no, you know, it won't be happening anywhere else. Okay.
Rah: Fine. Up for negotiation.
Christine: Okay.
But yeah, the neck thing. Yeah. No. Thanks. Anyway, look, we would absolutely welcome any of our listeners to share their own fuck around and find out moments and tell us how it, you know, what they had planned for, did any of their plans come to fruition. Um, what happened, that kind of thing. What was your favorite
Emily: episode?
What was your favorite episode? What did you enjoy? Because we are at the process of, uh, we've, we have recorded some episodes for next year already. But if there's stuff that you'd like to hear about or people you think we'd be, um, interested in talking to or anything like that, definitely yell out. But I'm going to ask the two of you two questions.
What is the biggest lesson you've learned as a business owner, but also about the podcast this year? And I'm going to go to Chris first.
Christine: Well, I think, um, I think I might have already mentioned it or something. My, my thing is really just, you got to bring your best, right? Like, yeah, we, we are chaotic and we fuck around a lot and we live By, by our words, but there does have to be, you know, a level of energy and a level of, um, input and planning to be an audience member.
And you guys face on? Yeah. Um, yeah, absolutely. So my biggest thing really, it's about when we scheduled to do our recordings. So, um, you know, for anybody listening to us now, it's lunchtime. Perfect timing. I mean, I might not have had breakfast yet, but it's still, you know, it's daylight hours. Um, we don't do well at night time, or I personally don't do well at night time.
Um, We're just exhausted. Well, we're exhausted. I'm exhausted right now. But also, there's been some text fails because I live at home with a very deep voiced, Teenager. And so microphones pick up family noise, right? So the tech, the tech fail, the energy failure and the tech fail of nighttime recording doesn't make for a polished job.
So and we do want it and an element of polish to this as well. So that's
Rah: mine.
Christine: Wow. That's
Emily: fair.
Rah: Rah, what do you reckon yours is? Well, my first thought was don't shut your fucking laptop when it's your laptop that's recording an episode. That was the first thought. Jesus Christ, honestly. So for, for
Emily: anyone that doesn't know this yet, we actually have recorded the lovely Jane, um, from the Jane edit twice.
The first time was Uh, at my house as a makeshift podcast studio, and we got so indepthly interested in the conversation that Rah accidentally closed her laptop while we were mid recording and then didn't realize until we'd finished the full recording that It hadn't saved. Yep.
Rah: Yeah, that was not mortifying and embarrassing at all.
It was. Yep. But you know what? It was an interesting conversation. You were, but it meant we got to have a conversation again.
Emily: Yes. And we were very much outside of our comfort zone because we were at my house and we'd never done it like that before. So it was the first time. So that was a new. learning for us as well.
So there was a lot of factors in play with that one. So yeah, kindness is key with that.
Rah: Yes, very true. Um, and I think for me as. A business, the biggest thing for me has been letting go and saying yes to things without thinking of every step along the way first, because that's just the way I operate. I don't agree to projects, anything until I've thought through every option and every possibility of how things would work and whether or not it's going to work.
And part of. Why I jumped at the idea of starting the podcasts is for the same reasons of you just got to, sometimes you just got to say yes, because if your gut feels like it's right, don't listen to your head. You can work out the rest later. I've got a very good ick reactor. So, you know, I get the ick with people who might want to work with me and I'm like, ah, no, but then if I can get through the ick factor, then my brain takes over.
Um, and so I'd learning to put her to the side for a bit. And then go, we're just going to deal with you later. That's been a big thing. I was about to
Emily: say, I'm very honored that you said yes. I'm clearly thought this through enough that it was okay. Cause I was just like, fuck it. Let's do it. Cause I'm the, I'm almost a bit the opposite.
I need to actually think about it a little bit more than just saying yes all the fucking time. Cause I say yes a lot. And a lot to my detriment. The shiny object. Yeah. And it's also, I just want to help people and I put myself out there too much to try and help people. And I think that doesn't end well a lot of the time.
Rah: Yeah.
Emily: How about you, um, Em, answer your own question, please. Um, I think there's some definite power to getting out there. I think is one of the things that's probably a learning for business and podcasting is, you know, there is so much power in meeting people and the networking elements of the world. The more people, you know, the more that comes from it and, you know, taking the time.
I think one of the things Chris and I've talked about a little bit lately as well as trying to move the headset away from it's not money income, it's not income driven. And allowing yourself to put that time, yes, okay, it's not directly income driven, however, there is so much that could come from it, more than you could imagine if, sometimes as well, like you just don't know what's who you're meeting and who they might know and what they might need.
And the power in that is, is quite, um, amazing. And the, the reach as well. I think the reach of the podcast has been a bit of a mind boggle for me. Like, um, who didn't know a funny story to throw this in, but it turns out my little, uh, Just turned five year old daughter has been a quite an excellent PR manager for us.
Um, so I've been sharing with Chris and Rah for everyone listening that, uh, my little daughter has been going into preschool and telling all her preschool teachers that mommy has a podcast with a swear word in it. And then the teachers have been trying to get her to say the swear word and she won't say the swear word.
Cause she's like, no, it's a naughty word. I can't say it. Say it, it's an F word. And so every time I go into school, I get different teachers going, Oh, do you have a podcast? What's it called? And so I've had to talk to a lot of people about it, but then I laughed even more the other week because I went to one of the millions of birthday parties.
My very popular child gets invited to. And, um, one of the mums came up to me and was like, So my daughter came home and told me that Arabella's mummy has a naughty word podcast and we couldn't work out whether it meant that you were listening to a word, naughty word podcast or, and I was like, had to explain and she was like, Oh, okay.
So like she's spreading the word so hard, so hard and then it was a whole bunch of, a bunch of things. Like we've had. Um, my husband's had people he knows through other things breach, um, mentioned that their partners have been listening to this podcast and it's like, it's the weird where like the small world that it is like, it's a very small world.
And that's, um, it's, it's that double edged sword of it's quite a little bit intimidating knowing that we're so public and it's power in it, but it's also that like, Oh God, it's a bit of both. Like it's that intimidation piece as well. And, um, That's been quite an interesting lesson as well. And especially because anyone that knows me well enough knows that I get wildly raged about very weird things.
And I definitely nitpick on stuff that probably is irrelevant to other people, but it's stuff that really upsets me. Um, and triggers me quite a bit and I have always loved to have a soapbox per se to rant on. Um, but I have also become a bit more acutely aware of what I say and how I say it because of the fact that there are people listening and I, you never know who might be listening and you never know what you might say that might let something sleep or, or what else.
So it's been an interesting, um, experience. Mindset shift for me, just to rein myself in and probably analyze my rage a little bit, a little bit as well and how, and how I talk, like I have a lot of rage, so I'm just reining that in. The full rage comes through when we're not
Rah: recording, so it's fine. You've still got an outlet.
Yeah,
Emily: I still have that outlet. It's
Rah: very important
Emily: to have that outlet. I think YouTube have been
Rah: resistance of my rage as well. Cause I'll be typing it out to you
Emily: in the middle of the night on Slack going, fuck, fuck it. Yeah, we share, we share and care. God help anyone who gets a hold of our Slack chats.
Um, so back to Chris, what are you most grateful for? Um, I probably,
Christine: I probably say that I'm incredibly grateful for the Um, grateful to you too, but I, I don't want to sound too sucky, but it is, um, I'm grateful for you, Em. I think, um, you have, you push me and, um, Yeah, you're sick of me yet, which is a win. No, well, I'm not sick of you.
No, absolutely not yet. Um, but you push me and it's good. It's good. You know, we all need, sometimes we just don't need someone to egg us on, push us a little bit, um, get us out of our comfort zone or whatever. And I can do a bit of that myself, but sometimes you just need a little bit extra. And so you, you make me better in business.
So it's great. And I feel like I've become, I mean, I'm awesome. Don't get me wrong. You are fucking awesome. Um, but I do believe that I have, um, stepped up my game. You know, it's quadrupled. I really do think.
Rah: Yeah. So I'm grateful to you. I love it. Love you too. How about you, Em?
Emily: Well, I'd say the same thing, you know, Chris and I obviously deal with the fact that we're very different personalities and we work together.
And I think, um, Um, you helped me be more aware of myself as well because you have to cop the full brood of me. Um, and I know that's not easy. I know I'm not the easiest person to be, to deal with, but you also helped me keep, it does actually, it makes me be a bit more self aware because I am conscious of the level, the extreme of which I can be and that you shouldn't cop all of that.
And I also, I feel like I'm a bit more conscious of that, but you also, um, um, um, um, um, Yeah, he helped me be an adult. No, but like, in the sense of that, again, I'm very full of rage and I can get really annoyed by things. And also there are circumstances I am not really good at dealing with. You know, we all, there's a lot of us out there that don't like conflict and don't handle that very well.
But I think, um, Chris has got this absolutely fucking amazing way to be super professional when she needs to be. to be, but in a non emotional way. And that's what I struggle with when I'm very hyper emotional most of the time. And I don't, um, it's taken me a long time to even learn how to be as detached as I currently stand, but it's almost not enough.
And Chris has got this really good way of just being that person and doing it. That's not. Like, cause there'll be times where I'm so angry that my emails are basically just like, just tell them to fuck off or something. And I'm like, okay. She's like, well, we can't say that in an email, and I'm like, fine, you know, like, and that's why we balance well, because I am hot headed and Chris is very level headed and it kind of mellows each other out, but I think, and that's, you know, what Chris is saying too, she takes on a bit of my rage as well, which probably isn't always a bad thing.
Anyway. Um, And that's kind of balances us, but I wouldn't be anywhere where I am now if it wasn't for Chris. So it's very much a Chris and you know, we very much also adore the shit out of YouTube raw. Cause I think we've always. Chris and I have been two, it's been the two of us for a long time and you've blended so seamlessly into us as well that literally the other day we went to uh, we went to Bathurst as Juniper Road and when I, when I called my kids that night to say goodnight, I was Um, my youngest was like, so where's Rah?
Like, they're just so used to you, like the three of us going to do it all together. So she was like, but what do you mean Rah's not, I was like, Oh, she's somewhere else. I didn't even have the heart to tell her you weren't with us. Um, you know, cause you blend so you, you balance us out too. Cause I think you and I obviously have some.
Similarity traits, and you and Chris have similarity traits. You're a nice blend into us as well. And I think we, we both wouldn't have been able to even community and the collective is something that I think has been slowly manifesting with Chris and I for over a year now. And you've helped come in to give it that shape that we needed it to be.
Um, and. There's all the elements that all three of us bring make us such a lovely blend. And I think like that excites me because I'm like, this is watch what we can do next year if I can you know, make sure I bully you both into making some time to actually do it, but You know, there's so much potential.
Rah: At the risk of this sounding like a massive circle jerk, but yes, you two have been, we love each other. Yeah, exactly. God. Um, well might remove the word circle jerk. Um,
I do a count of how many fucks we say per episode, I might have to start including the count of circle jerk. Yeah. Add that in. Oh dear God. Okay. Right. I'm back on track. So yeah, because. Having gone from working as an employee after 25 however many years to then working on my own. It was really interesting, I'll say, cause you know, it was equal parts hard, fun, great, you know, like it was just, you know, the reality of it is a very different thing.
And then stepping into this space of working with you two, which was a no brainer. And I've said this to so many people that there are very few people who won't be willing to do things. To this level with, and to even like to go so far now as to be business partners. And, you know, I don't make those decisions lightly, but when, when the people are right, I'm like, well, the rest will sort itself out.
Emily: That's the same as us. We didn't like, it was such a natural, yeah, okay, we'll do this. Like we didn't even have to think about it. Like Chris and I don't enter into that lightly either. Like it was a big conversation and went through a lot of steps. It was a natural thing for us, but we went through a lot of steps to make sure it was right and we didn't even have to hesitate at the thought of doing it with you too.
It was just like, that's what I mean. You blend so perfectly with it. It's like, yes, you can have my first born children.
Rah: Um, I don't know. I love your kids, but I'm not having them. They're very much like the mother. Is it wildly intense? And I know I don't want anybody else's children either. I've got it now.
Okay. Oh, you turn. Okay. Well, shit. Okay. Sorry, I'll fog them off somewhere else. Yeah, exactly. Maybe blood relatives might have be able to help. Um, but yeah, so, you know, we've gone from people we, you know, I barely knew you to a year and a bit ago to podcast conference road trips, you know, and, and that's only the first year.
So yeah, I'm very, feeling very lucky that I've got you two on my team.
Emily: That also leads beautifully into perhaps we need to actually list out what is actually on the lineup for next year for those who are interested and might want to lock some dates away. Um, and then I might circle us back to some statistics of this podcast as a nice way to end this episode.
Cause I have noticed where we're chugging on the time here. So next year, first thing off the bat, we have a 2025 planning day. This is to be held in Norwest, which is in Northwest Sydney. Um, it is at Chris and Maya Juniper Road's office space. Um, and. And we are limiting this to 12 people cause we've not got a huge space, but it is going to be an excellent opportunity to put away some dedicated time, to really think about what you want to achieve out of this next year.
It is something that we have all formulated together. We will hopefully have a workbook for people to work through as well. There's some really kind of wonderful questions and, and little workshoppy kind of Things to go through to really get you thinking about what's, um, on the plate and what, what do you want to achieve with your business?
It's really good from a directions perspective too. We've Chris and I are actually going to be doing our own planning day after Chrissy and, um, doing it for ourselves as well, just to give us some direction and some goals to set because you can get really lost in down at the detail and sometimes you need to take a step back and do a bit of a Oh, yeah.
Um, And it's my biggest pet love. I love planning stuff out. I'm a big planner kind of girl. So that's the first one. Um, the second thing we have off the bat is our webinar series. We will be kicking that off in February. Once more, uh, we are working on locking down some amazing people. Our first one for the year will be a financial based webinar with the fabulous David Rosenthal from Ratoon
Christine: Accounting.
He was, he was a real, really, um, well received speaker at our September conference. Yeah. So
Emily: Dave is working with us to create a series of different financially based webinars. So there'll be more where he, where that comes from. And we've got a lot more in store. Um, one of the big things this coming year is the Melbourne conference.
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. 23rd of May, 2025. Uh, we are going to be at the cluster in Melbourne, which is in the CBD of Melbourne. Our early bird rates are available and will be available for a little bit longer. We have already started locking down some very amazing speakers and we'll have a Be leaking some more of that information in the new year about what's to come.
So keep in mind for that, it's going to be an amazing day. The three of us will actually be in Melbourne for pretty much the whole week. Um, and we're looking to actually do some podcast recording while we're down there with some amazing people, do some coworking, whatever time allows. We will try and do the most collaborating.
Whatever that word is. Collaborating is probably the better word than the correct word, um, of whatever we do. Oh, yeah, it's been a long fucking long week, long year. Um, what else we got? Well,
Rah: there's another
Emily: conference,
Christine: isn't there? There it is. Let's talk about that one. We're going to be up on the central coast in Terrigal specifically in September.
So, um, yes, we've got the 11th of September. We're going to be hanging out at the Crown Plaza Terrigal, um, for the day. Um, so, um, that's sure to not disappoint. It'll feel like a holiday. And a, and an absolutely fantastic conference as well.
Emily: It's going to be so nice. The location is just, oh, gold. Yep. It's such a great spot.
I can't wait to like just
Rah: nip across the road and stick my toes in the water. Oh,
Emily: gorgeous. Yeah. Just sit up. Now there's something so tranquil about just staring at water.
Rah: Exactly. And it's not that far from home either. Like it's, yeah.
Christine: No, that's right. And also we've got some, uh, we're in the planning works is, um, to do some in person co working around the traps of Sydney metropolitan area type of thing.
But, you know, Melbourneites might see us sneaking down there for a bit of a visit late. March and you know, we, you know, might be heading to another location later in the year as well. So lots of planning, lots of things to be revealed. Exactly. So if you're not already signed up to our
Rah: newsletter list, follow us on socials.
Yes. Sign up to our newsletter.
Emily: Absolutely. Links
Rah: in, links in show notes, et cetera, et cetera.
Emily: Let me throw some statistics at you. Oh yes. Yes. Because this was fascinating. So we got the fuck around and find out women in business podcasts was in the top 50 percent of all buzzsprout podcasts, which is pretty based on an average downloads for the first seven days.
So that's, that was awesome. Really cool.
Rah: And buzzsprouts are really big, big hosts. So it's like a big deal to be on their list. Like to be that high up that list as well. Yeah.
Emily: So we have, as of today, our most popular city was Sydney,
Rah: which is, is
Emily: to be expected, the three of us do live in Sydney. Um, but the, the interesting little city that popped up in here was Stockholm.
So that was, that was wildly fascinating because then it leads us, yeah, leads us into the next one, which is 23 countries. So obviously Australia is the top one because we are very Aussie girls. Um, then the United Kingdom, so shout out to our UK crowd, um, Sweden, obviously as well. We've got a bit of a call in Sweden, which is so funny.
Apparently we've also had some people listening from the United States and Norway. Bye. So we are technically an international podcast, which is so funny, so funny, um, gobsmacking. Our top episode was episode number two with the fabulous Mary from the Growth Collective. Let's fake everything until we make it.
Um, that was amazing episode. Mary is absolutely gorgeous. We adore her and it was also our second episode. So I think that's makes a lot of sense. It was wonderfully. Downloaded. But to wrap up our fabulous year, we have had 1. 91K downloads, 25 episodes, 23 countries, 972 minutes, and in the top 50 percent of all shows.
Christine: Wow. And don't forget, when we launched, we were
Emily: charting on Apple Podcasts as well. And we did, yes. So I think that's, um, one hell of an achievement that we have managed to, to do.
Christine: Well done, ladies. And to our listeners. Yeah. Yes. Thank you.
Emily: Thank you to everyone. We love everyone that listens. It's been so, so fun.
Such a wonderful journey. Stay tuned, tuned for season two because we got some already some really absolutely fucking amazeballs people lined up with so much more to come.
Rah: Yeah. See you guys. Merry Christmas, people. Happy holidays. Yeah. Have
Christine: a break. Yeah. See you on the other side of the new year.
Emily: 2025. Let's go.
