#183 Behind the Scenes: The 5-Step System I Use to Lead a Scaling Business with 60+ Clients (While Having Dinner on the Table at 5pm for My Kids)”

Lucy Gernon (00:04.366)

If you’re a female leader, listen up. On today’s episode, we’ll start again.

 

Lucy Gernon (00:16.64)

If you’re a female leader and you want to know how I know… fuck, sorry.

 

Lucy Gernon (00:28.054)

If you’re a busy female leader juggling it all, today’s episode of the 360 Leadership Podcast is one you don’t want to miss. In this episode of the show, I’m sharing the five-step system I use to lead a scaling company at executive level with 60 plus clients while having dinner on the table at 5 p.m. for my kids for the most part. I’m going to be sharing my routines, my rituals, the things that I do to set myself up for success that I did when I worked in the corporate world and also now as CEO of my own company.

 

If you find like you never have enough time that you don’t have time to prioritize yourself, this is an episode of the show you absolutely don’t want to miss. really hope that you enjoy.

 

Lucy Gernon (01:15.246)

Hi there and welcome back to another episode of the 360 Leadership Podcast. I am your host, Lucy Gernon. I am CEO and founder of 360 Leadership Training and Development Limited and 360 Leaders Club. And I am also a mom of three. My eldest is 17, my youngest is nine. So let me tell you that I know what it’s like to juggle all of the balls. And so what prompted me to record this episode for you today on the show is that last Tuesday at literally seven minutes past five,

 

I was serving a lasagna to my three kids just after closing a major deal with a corporate client 20 minutes earlier. And it got me thinking about how I kind of thought to myself, God, I’m so lucky that I’m able to do this. And I realized that luck is nothing got to do with it. Every single thing I do is highly strategic. Every single thing I do is planned and thought through. And so one thing I notice is

 

with a lot of women is there’s a lot of reactivity. There’s a lot of, you know, I wish I had more time to do this. I wish I had more time to do that. But time is not something that happens, guys. Time is something that you create and you only create time by getting intentional about what you want. And that’s exactly what this episode of the show was about. And today I’m going to pull back the curtain on my exact five step system that allows me to lead executive level in my company.

 

while prioritizing my family, my health and my wellness. Okay, so let’s dig into it. Let’s talk about what I said a second ago about being strategic and intentional because the myth of having it all is you can have it all, the reality is you’ve got to make strategic choices. one of the biggest things that I see, like I said, is that

 

A lot of people are not intentional with their time. They wake up, they check their emails, they get straight into reactive mode. They may not plan what’s happening for dinner. They are on the hamster wheel going so fast, they feel dizzy Monday to Friday and then spend Saturday either recuperating on the couch or for some of my clients racing around after children and

 

Lucy Gernon (03:40.108)

visiting sick family and all of those things. And what’s really important that you remember is that like a couple of the common pitfalls that I see, number one is you prioritize other people first. I’m not saying you shouldn’t. I’m saying my whole philosophy, which I’ve learned is when I fill my own cup, I can pour into others. When I don’t fill my own cup, I don’t have the same amount to give.

 

And so what most time management advice fails for women in leadership like you is that, you know, we talk a lot about the Eisenhower matrix, for example, the urgent and important matrix. And while that works for a lot of people, it didn’t work for me because I was going, this is urgent, this is urgent, this is important, this is urgent. So I’ve developed my own matrix called the more time prioritization matrix.

 

which you can grab in my work life balance guide. If you go to lucygarden.com forward slash balance that brings in the human psychology behind how we prioritize because a lot of people don’t actually know what’s urgent or important. They’re responding a lot of the time to dominant energy as opposed to actually, you know, what I call results focused thinking. So I think what’s really important for you as you begin to, we go on this journey today when I start to tell you my five steps.

 

is to remember that your time is your most valuable asset and you get to choose how you use your time. You do not have to be a slave to your time. But the first thing is you’ve got to learn how to use your time properly. So please go over to my website, lucieguirn.com forward slash balance. You can grab the free guide. There’s lots of reflective exercises. There’s other tools in there and delegation boundaries, the whole shoot and shebang, but go over and definitely grab the matrix.

 

People have it printed on their desks. They’ve shared it with their teams. It’s really, really good, okay? So my five step system is, I’m gonna give you the first step right now. And the first step is, I’ve talked about it before and I’ll say it over again until I die, which is results-focused thinking. So I had to make a huge shift from activity-based tasks to results-based work because…

 

Lucy Gernon (06:00.426)

This happened, the way, back when I was in my corporate days, for sure, I was doing this. I didn’t understand how so many people needed to work so late. I knew what I was juggling. knew, like, for example, in the pharmaceutical company I worked in, we were doing a lot of what’s called a technical transfer. So we were transferring in lots of different products and there was loads of different variations of the product. So I worked in the labs and while the operations team had to deal with like one

 

like one or two processes because we were doing all these different tests and all these different variants and different containers and all these different things. I mean, I’m not even joking when I say we had 20 times the workload of the people who were, say, in the operations department, but it’s not something that was really visible. But yes, I still always felt like I was fairly on top of things. I would say a good 80 percent of the time because I was very clear on.

 

the results I was trying to create. OK, I got very clear on that and all of my decisions would have been made around that. So it’s the same right now as well for me and my business is I always think in results, not in tasks. So I’m giving you like like my best tips here is think about every month. If you only delivered on these top three to five things, make them tangible that would actually move the needle, i.e. close a project.

 

close a deal, increase revenue, whatever those things are, they’re things you need to be focusing on. And what happens is all this other stuff comes into you and you end up being sidetracked. And then you wonder why at the end of the year, you’re sitting there in your performance review and you’re either number one, being told you’re outperformed, but you have literally sold your soul to the devil and work 70 hours a week to do it. Or number two, you’re being told you’re not strategic enough, you’re not ready for the next level.

 

OK, so results, focus, thinking gets you back time. It actually it makes you be seen as more strategic because you are and is going to absolutely amplify your leadership. OK, so what I do is I take a look at my every week. I look at my calendar versus my priorities. And if things in my calendar are not moving me towards my priorities, I’m not even talking about short term. I’m talking about, yes, the immediate priorities. But obviously, I have strategic priorities as well.

 

Lucy Gernon (08:24.47)

I get to choose what I do with them based on my time. OK. The second thing, then, is the 80 percent delegation framework. So I was a perfectionist and I have a rule right now that I’ll tell you the rule in a second, but just back up. I would have overanalyzed things, rewritten things because I didn’t like how it was was phrased. You know, things would come to me for review and I wasn’t happy.

 

And so perfectionism really is the enemy of executive presence. It is the enemy of leadership because we know that when you spend time, you know, wordsmithing, formatting presentations, making sure things are perfect, you’re not doing needle moving tasks. You’re not focused on results. You’re focused on perfection. So I train myself to accept that 80 percent is good enough.

 

because I know for sure that a perfectionist 80 % is everybody else’s 100%. And the, you know, sometimes even now I let content go out and I’ll see, oh God, there’s a mistake. I’ll beat myself up. I might have spelled something wrong if I was on the fly sharing something from my heart, but I remind myself, well, first of all, I’m human. And second of all, does it really matter if my message was more powerful than my mistake? So I think that’s an important one.

 

The third one then is ruthless application of Pareto’s law. So Pareto’s law states that 20 % of your efforts deliver 80 % of your results and 80 % of your efforts deliver just 20 % of your results. So it’s really, for example, my role in my company, obviously a CEO is to, you know, set the vision, get the strategy in place with my team.

 

to drive revenue for my company, to serve my clients at really high level. And so when I look at sometimes what I’m doing, when I take a step back and I’m like, wait a minute, this is not serving my clients on a deeper level. This thing is not increasing revenue in my business. So really they’re the two main things that as a CEO, I need to be focused on at the moment. So why am I doing this other stuff like having coffee chats with people who want to pick my brain on something?

 

Lucy Gernon (10:49.708)

To be honest, I’ve stopped all of that, guys, because, you know, I only have calls of people who are seriously thinking about working with me. I decline ones that I that I know somebody is just kind of maybe wants a coffee chat or is not really committed. And it’s not because I don’t care. It’s because I don’t have the space to do it. It’s because as much as I would love to give up my time for anybody who wants 15 minutes with me.

 

if I do that, it means I’m not going to get to my, priorities. I’m going to get burned out. I’m not going to be available for my children on my, on my family. So that’s, that’s why I do it. Right. So I just, I constantly try to challenge myself to go back to my priorities, my results, and really focus on those that 20%. That’s really going to move the needle in the business. Okay. The fourth step then is strategic self investment. So.

 

If you’re multitasking, come back to me. There’s five areas that I prioritize. And again, this would have been an alien concept to me a few years ago. And now I realize it’s the foundation of success, balance and happiness. The first one is mindset. So I work on my mindset like every single day. There is affirmations, there’s reading books, there’s listening to meditations, there’s, you know,

 

Everything I’m watching videos on neuroscience. I really love trying to understand my mindset from a limiting belief perspective. What are the things that are blocking me? How can I leverage the power of my mind to create the life of abundance and joy and wealth and health and happiness that I want? So I prioritize that. I also prioritize my nutrition. Again, I’ve hired a nutritionist to support me with this journey and

 

The reason I did that is because if you want to be a peak performer in leadership and life, you are the you are the car, like you are the engine, you’re you’re the thing that’s fueling all of the results. So if you’re putting substandard fuel into your body, you are not going to be able to perform at the level that you know you’re capable of, both in a business perspective and at home. So I think that’s really important. And that’s why I brought in my personal nutritionist into 360Liters Club.

 

Lucy Gernon (13:13.656)

to support our members because again, I like to be generous that if I’m learning something or I’m getting a benefit, even if it’s outside the core program, which is obviously professional development, I’ll definitely bring people in on nutrition and menopause and anything I can do to help just as a little surprise and delight bonus for my members. The third area I focus on is fitness. So I have a personal trainer now. And the reason I got a personal trainer, guys, is because I just couldn’t hold myself accountable to go to the gym.

 

Quite frankly, I tried many times, I fell off the wagon. And again, I’ve realized that investing in yourself to hire support is it’s not selfish. It is essential if you are the kind of person who wants to unlock her potential, who wants to be the best she can possibly be. And that’s who I’m speaking to here, right? I’m not talking to the people who are happy to coast in life and to stay stuck. I’m talking to the people who are ready for change.

 

who are ready for growth, right? You deserve to work on your mindset, your nutrition, your fitness. The fourth area that I prioritize, excuse me, is my business growth. So I’m very intentional about mapping out my business strategy and do I like sitting down doing strategic work sometimes? No, I don’t because it takes a lot of effort, right? Being strategic takes time and effort, but I know it pays dividends. So…

 

I have a monthly CEO power hour in my diary every single month where I sit down. I have shared this with my 360 leaders club members as well. My whole step by step system for my reflection as a CEO and not just as a CEO of my business, but also the CEO of my life. And it’s the same for you, whether you are running a department or a region or whatever it is, you are the CEO of your business area.

 

You are the CEO of your life. And if you’re not doing the reflective practices and the strategic work that I always recommend, it’s probably why you are stuck where you are. OK. And then the fifth area I prioritize is self-care. So, man, do I take good care of myself now. think Lucy five years ago would not believe how much I take care of myself. I would go to the spa, I get my nails done, I treat myself to nice, nice things.

 

Lucy Gernon (15:37.058)

because for so long I didn’t. And since I have started to do that, it has those those five things. It has really helped me to increase my self-worth. My coaches, I would just I just wouldn’t be where I am without them, my coaches and mentors. And it’s it’s about allowing yourself to support. And then that that kind of trickles in them with my team as well. I’m better a delegation because I’m used to not being the one doing everything, you know. So, yeah.

 

So I want to just share them like, you know, how I maybe block them in, how I schedule these. So they’re non-negotiables. I had a little realization a while back that I needed to get up earlier in the morning to do my morning routine because I have three children. And when I looked at my priorities, I realized that like, I still want to be there for my kids in the morning. It’s just something that’s important for me. I want to be able to get them their breakfast and drop them to school.

 

But my routine was all wrong and I was trying to fit the gym in after school runs. So what I’ve decided to do is get up earlier now. And it’s been a game changer. I get up at six. I have that hour to myself with my coffee. I journal. I do my affirmations. I do my mindset work, my visualization, read a few pages of a book and it gets scheduled in as part of my time for myself. I look at my calendar every month and I schedule in something for me.

 

Whether that’s a massage or it might be what I call an abundance shopping trip where I might go shopping or it might be a coffee with a friend. But I’m very intentional about scheduling that stuff in. OK. And the return on investment that I get from doing these small things is immense. People say to me all the time that I’m very high energy and I’m very positive. Guys, I was not like this before I started investing in me, because how could you be like when you’re giving

 

everything to everybody else and you’re not pouring into yourself. Like, how can you be the best? Like, you just can’t. So I’m just so grateful that I’ve had that mindset shift and I’m giving you full permission today to do whatever the hell it is that you need, OK, to be make just make life easier for yourself.

 

Lucy Gernon (17:55.374)

Step five then, and this is an important one, so if you’re multitasking, come back to me. I really leverage AI and automation systems very heavily in my business. For example, we use a tool called Zapier, and those workflows save me at least, I would say, at least 10 hours a week because all of my systems are talking to each other. for example, if one of you guys

 

submits a lucygarnet.com forward slash contact and you contact me. I automatically get a task assigned to me in my Asana to review the request. also, my team also get a Slack message, which is all automated to let them know that there is a request in the inbox that needs to be followed up on. And then my team’s job is to hold me accountable, like to, you know, review it if they haven’t reviewed it or something like that. Very simple example. Or.

 

When my another example is when my 360 leaders club members join, we always give our members a discovery pack and the goal of it’s a it’s a it’s a form with lots of reflective questions to help you to get really clear on, you know, your goals for working together. What might be stopping you? What’s getting in your way? And it’s to help you to get really clear on what you’re trying to achieve when we work together.

 

And so I read every single one of those personally. I love to read the goals and what’s what’s happening with you. And so when anytime anyone submits a form, well, it automatically goes into a protected spreadsheet that only I have access to. And one other person on my team who has obviously signed a NDA and all that good stuff. And it is all in there for me. I’ll get an automated task as well to tell me that this stuff is there or.

 

I can do it in groups that I can have a task that’s assigned to me to do it in groups. Again, I’m always trying to make things more efficient. So that’s one thing that’s really helped. The other thing is I have email templates for everything. have, you know, I have an SOP for my team on how to manage my inbox, common questions we get with the responses to give.

 

Lucy Gernon (20:06.068)

scenarios that may occur. So I’ve really been intentional and strategic about trying to set myself and my team up for success so that we’re not reinventing the wheel every single time. Another thing that’s been an absolute game changer is creating custom GPTs. So I’ve created a custom GPT, sorry, just so in case you don’t know.

 

A lot of you who are listening might be using Microsoft Copilot. It is not the best AI out there for sure. But if you’re stuck with it, you’re stuck with it. But I use ChatGPT as my one of my main AI tools. I’ll share the other one in second. And in ChatGPT, you can create what’s called a custom GPT, which is where you you have a customized like robot for a specific task and you train it. You give it information.

 

So I have created a custom GPT for my 360 Leaders Club members. So if they’ve got any questions or they need an answer quick, or they want to know where resources is, or what would Lucy say to this, or what advice would it be, they go into that custom GPT and they can ask it any questions that they want. And I’ve got some fantastic feedback. And what that does is it frees me and my team up from like common ask questions. And also, like instead of having a big long FAQ,

 

which is quite frustrating. I hate when I get those like, have you checked your FAQs? No, I don’t have time to read all your FAQs. The custom GPT will actually answer my clients, my members questions in real time. So that’s been really useful. I’m in the middle of creating other GPTs as well for different things. And I recently did an AI training where I really realized that I’m leveraging AI way heavier than a lot of people. It’s crazy.

 

But I’m going to have custom GPT’s per department in my business. So sales, operations, marketing, the whole shoot and bang. And I’m very excited. One of my team members is working on that project. So if you’re not on that, the A.I. bandwagon at the moment, like you’ve got to get this this going in your organization because, you know, A.I. is just is where the future is, guys. And don’t shy away from it because. People who can use A.I. are going to be.

 

Lucy Gernon (22:21.4)

further ahead than people who can’t. OK. And then the final thing just in that in that step around AI and automation is I have a mantra in my business for my team with any new process, with anything they come across. The question is, can AI or automation do this for us? Can AI do this for us? Or how can we automate this so we don’t have to do it again?

 

And it’s been a game changer and it’s not even that complex. So it’s just about getting into that kind of results. And so finally, then just to kind of share then there are the kind of the five things that I do. All right. And then from a family perspective, I’m I’m very like having my kids dinner ready for them is just something that’s important to me. And so I try my best to kind of break my day and have dinner on the table when they come in. And look.

 

I’m being really honest. Recently, I’ve noticed that I’ve been serving in their dinner, but I’m going back up to the office. And what I realized is I need support as well. So I’m about to hire a personal assistant as well to support me because juggling at all is just too much. So I think sometimes, you know, I cook on a Sunday, I back cook a lot of, you know, a lot of people don’t like cooking. I just personally it’s just something I like to do for my family. And so how I do that is by back cooking and is by

 

breaking and making sure that my kids have it for the most part when they come home from school and just having that time with them. But like I said, recently, I realized as my business is scaling, I need to hire more people to support me and my growth. So that’s it for this week’s episode of the podcast. I really think that I hope you found some of the tips useful. If you did, let me know. I’d love to hear from you. And if you haven’t already got my work life balance guide.

 

which has that more time prioritization matrix, please go and grab it. LucyGarnon.com forward slash balance. Some great tools and reflective questions in there for you as well that I think you’ll really, really enjoy. And as always, if you want to come to join 360 Leaders Club, the next time we open spots so you can become a more confident strategic leader, work on your executive presence, work on your mindset, your health, your wellness, showing up and being the best leader you can be.

 

Lucy Gernon (24:43.118)

I’m just making leadership in life 100 times easier. Come and join our wait list. Go to 360LitresClub.com forward slash wait list and you will be first in line to know when a spot opens up again soon. All right, lovely lady. Let me know what you thought of the episode. Send me a DM. What tips will you try? Will you try the AI part? Will you try the results focused thinking? Come over and let me know. Come into my LinkedIn. Just send me a message.

 

or send me message on Instagram. I’d love to hear from you because sometimes I feel like I’m speaking into a black hole. And when I get messages from my podcast listeners, it just makes me really happy. So send me an email either. Hello at lucygarland.com. All right. With that being said, my kids are going to be home from school in 10 minutes, so I better go downstairs and be there to welcome them. Until next week. Remember, success, balance and happiness are possible with the right mindset.

 

the right strategy, the right tools and the right support and you deserve it. See you then.