757. Scaling Your Product Business Shouldn’t Cost Your Life (Why Your Business Needs You LESS)

What if the reason your business feels heavy is not because you need to do more, but because you still carry too much? So let's start here. Because if you are a product-based business owner and you feel like your business cannot fully move without your eyes on it and your hands on it and your decisions behind it, and maybe your approval on it, your energy is carrying it. And then this episode is going to hit because I want to say something that might feel a little uncomfortable, but it's still also going to be incredibly freeing. Your business is waiting for you to become less necessary, right? It's not less valuable or less visionary or less important or less connected. It's just that you get to become less necessary in every task, in every decision, in every fire, right? You beget to become less necessary in every customer issue, in every operational detail, in every tiny little moving part. I know some of you're freaking out right now. Because if your business still feels like it needs you for everything, it can grow. Yes, but it's gonna grow heavy and it's gonna grow fragile and it's gonna grow expensive, and eventually it's gonna grow you to the edge of your current capacity and stop right there. And that's the part so many people are not realizing. Sometimes the business is not waiting on more marketing or waiting on another sales channel and not waiting on more products or a prettier website or another promotion. Sometimes it's waiting on you to stop being the operating system. I mentioned that in a previous episode and I wanna dig deeper in it today. So today I wanna talk to you about what it really means to become less necessary in your business and why that matters so much if you wanna grow. And the 3 biggest shifts that have to happen if you want to stop being the bottleneck without feeling like you're letting everything fall apart. Hi, I'm Jacqueline Snyder, and this is the Product Boss Podcast. I've helped launch and grow thousands of product-based businesses, even one of my own. And over the last 20 years, I've seen behind the scenes of businesses just like yours. Whether they are makers, manufacturers, artists, or food and beverage businesses, I have spent so many hours studying it all. I've discovered what makes them successful, what mistakes they could have avoided, how did they turn their ideas into successful business, and what are the strategies that they have used to make more sales and be discovered by more customers. And this is what this show is all about. Whether you're just starting out or you're looking to become a million-dollar product boss, I'm here to give you the permission to chase your dreams no matter how big or small. All you need is the right mindset, a little courage, strategy, and support, and you too can be the next million-dollar product boss. Let's do this. Hi, I'm Jacqueline Snyder, and this is the Product Boss Podcast. I've helped thousands of product-based business owners build stronger sales, cleaner and clearer brands, better systems, and businesses that can actually support their lives. And what I know to be true is this: a business that depends on you too much will eventually limit your own growth. So if you're ready, let's dig in. Let's talk about why this matters so much. So much, because I think for a lot of product business owners, especially women, especially people who feel like they've started making everything themselves, or maybe you did doing everything yourselves, figuring out as you went along, maybe you can feel noble about this, right? Noble to be needed. And it can feel like proof that you care and proof that you're responsible and that you're good at what you do and you have built something important. Maybe it's proof that you are holding high standards. Like, yeah, you can do a lot. I got it. And listen, a lot of that is true. You probably are the person who cares the most. You do know the most about the business inside and out. It's yours. And you've held things together through seasons where no one else could have done it the way you did. I got it. But here's the catch. The same habits that helped you build the business are often the exact habits that make it so hard to grow the business. You've heard me say it before, but I'll say it again. Your business will only grow as much as you do. Because being needed at the beginning makes sense. You are the one figuring it out, the product, you're making the sales, you're learning from your customers and building the foundation. But if years later the business still cannot move without your constant involvement, then what used to strengthen it has become your ceiling. And that ceiling looks like this. You cannot fully unplug or take real time off or stop checking on all the things You cannot scale cleanly and hire with confidence. You can't let your team own more. And maybe you're not thinking strategically because you're too deep in the weeds. I like to say you can't read the label from inside the bottle or the forest through the trees, because listen, you can't grow without feeling like every new level costs you more of your time, your energy, your nervous system, your family life, and your brain space. And so the business grows, but your life gets tighter, and that is not actually the goal. The goal is not to build a bigger business that needs more from you every single year. The goal is actually to build a stronger business that can hold more without requiring more of your personal involvement in every part of it. And that's the difference. And that's why this matters. And I'm just gonna share with you really quickly that I made this decision over a year ago. Everything was still running through me. I remember thinking and looking around and thinking, who else in my business has got this. If I'm not holding it and paying attention to the numbers and seeing if the launches are going right and all the things, I'm like, is it just me? Am I alone? So I literally burned it all down. And what does that mean? I burned it all down. I don't know if you all know this. A lot of my clients know this, but I let go of the majority of my team. I went all in on one thing and I said, how do I do less and make more money? In fact, my goal last year, and we do this inside the Collective, we call it our our 10-week Game Changer Sprints. And so my 10 weeks was how do I make more profit with less for me? It was actually 30% more profit, 30% less work, no new offers. And within 60 days, by holding myself to that and creating the plan beneath it, I was able to get there. And the craziest thing is I had made this decision almost, you know, it was kismet, and I didn't know this, but it was during the time that my mom, ended up in the hospital and then eventually died. I mean, it was only 2 weeks later, so now I was set into grief. And so I needed the company to function. I wanted the profit and I could not do more work. So if you want more profit and you want more freedom and you want more consistency and a company that feels like a real company and not just an extension of your personal labor, then at some point you have to become less necessary. And fortunately for me, I mean, I was already in the process. So I wasn't absent, discounted, or checked out. I was just less necessary where the places where the business should be able to stand on its own, I let them, let it do that. And it was forcing me into leadership of like, okay, I let a lot of the team go. I had the essential people so that I could just rebuild, restructure, and it felt lighter on me. So whether you're at a place where you're making a hire, you maybe it needs to be cleaner, Whatever the case, that is leadership. It's knowing what the business needs and actually really truthfully, my friends, knowing what you need. Really you first and then the business. So let's talk about the 3 shifts that will help you do that. So first, you have to stop confusing control with care. I'm like, wait, what? This one is so important because I think so many product-based business owners tell themselves that every reason that they should still touch everything because they care. No one else will care as much as you do, right? There's no one else. And listen, I know you care, I really do, but caring about and controlling are not the same thing. Caring says, "I want the business to be excellent. I want my customer experience to be strong and the quality to be there, my values to be reflected, and things done well." But control says, "So I have to check everything. I have to approve everything. I have to be copied on everything." I have to be the backup plan for everything, fix everything, and make the final call on everything. So do you hear the difference? One is leadership and one is fear dressed up as responsibility. And I say that lovingly. Listen, your business will only grow as much as you do. And a lot of it gets to be what are, what's actually getting in the way of that growth. And fear is huge because when you're used to being the one who catches the mistake and the one who remembers every detail, saves the day, the one who knows the customer best, or the one who can just do it faster herself. You know you're that one, right? It can start to feel like your involvement is what makes the business good. But if the business can only be good when you're personally holding it all together, then the business is not actually strong yet. It's just dependent. And that dependence is really frickin' expensive. It's expensive in your time, which is the most valuable resource, and speed of growth, in team ownership. Your team wants to own results. It's expensive in your growth. Like, how long are you gonna wait? So what does this look like in real life? It looks like reviewing every customer service message, and it looks like rewriting your team's emails and approving every social post. It looks like being the only one who can place purchase orders, or like you need to sign off on every discount, every refund, every customer request, every reorder, every design tweak, and every little thing. Oh my goodness, exhausting. And sometimes we justify that by saying things like, well, it's just faster if I do it, or no one else sees it the way I do, or I just wanna make sure it's right, or it only is gonna take me a minute. But all of those little minutes add up and all that hidden control adds up. I was just coaching someone in The Collective, actually she's in my Inner Circle. So my Inner Circle is for multimillion dollar brands and above. It's basically my mastermind within The Collective. So it's for my 7-figure brands that are 7 figures moving to 8 figures. And one of the things we talked about, and if you're listening, I love you so much and I see what you've, you've put into the business, is for the first 2 decades she took over a family business. She chose into work. And travel and growing the business. And now the business is a multimillion dollar brand, has a team, and she still doesn't take vacations. She's still exhausted because she still has herself in a lot of the decisions of the business and still holding it all like it's all hers. And that's the problem because why does she have this business if she's not also living her life? So in fact, that's her 10-week Game Changer goal. Is really a lot of what we're talking about here is like, what does she still need to do and what can we delegate? What can we outsource? What can we just stop doing? So if you wanna become less necessary, the first thing you have to look at is where am I using control to soothe my fear? Honestly, that's what's come up for her. And that's the real question. Where am I staying involved because it genuinely needs my leadership? And where am I staying involved because letting go feels uncomfortable? Oh my goodness, wait, I'm not gonna know everything that goes on because those are not the same. A lot of you do not need to care less. Trust me, I know. You just need to control less. And the way you do that is not by disappearing overnight. It's about building standards, systems, right? You're stepping into leadership and how you run your business. Standards are what let you release control without lowering the quality. So what does that mean? It means here's how we respond to this, or here's what a great customer experience looks like. Here's when we refund. Here's when we do not refund. Here's how we pack orders. Here's how we handle defects, right? How we post content, how we reorder inventory. Here's what to do when this happens. And especially, okay, ready for it? Here's what good looks like. That's what frees you. You get to be the leader. You get to lead the company and run the business. With standards, with operating systems, with standard operating procedures. It does not need your presence. It needs clear standards set by you. And eventually you'll have leadership that gets to then take it and even improve it, right? That is where the strength starts. So the second thing I wanna talk about is that you have to let people own more than tasks. Did you hear that? You have to let people own more than tasks. This is where a lot of business owners get stuck because they think they have delegated just because they've handed something off. But handing off tasks is not the same as creating ownership. That's the difference. And this matters so much because if your team is only doing assigned tasks, but they still need you to think about everything, decide, prioritize, catch, correct, coordinate all the things, then you have not actually created capacity. You've just created assistant dependency. And there's a difference here. You have help, but you do not have ownership, and it's their ownership. They get to be in ownership of the results they create. And I see this all the time. Someone says, I have a team, but I still like feel like everything is running through me. And I'm like, yeah, because your team may be helping you do the work, but they may not yet own the outcomes. And that's a different level. So ownership for a team member sounds like this. The person owns customer experience, or they own the fulfillment standards. The person owns the wholesale follow-up and the results from that. They might own inventory reconciliation or owning the content scheduling and even the content. They own reorders within parameters. They own the result. Do you hear the difference? So task delegation is send this email, pack these boxes, post this reel, update the spreadsheet. Ownership is make sure this area runs well. Now in the beginning, yes, you might need a task-based dele delegation first, of course. Okay? So especially if you're hiring for the first time or your business is still small. In fact, this is what I teach my members in The Collective or in the Inner Circle, cuz a lot of them are rapidly hiring, is how do we create standard operating procedures? And in Chicago at our event, and this is what The Collective members are doing, we're also going to look at what our KPIs are, key performance indicators, And who holds that? At first, maybe it's you and you hold all of it, but as you start to create team and know they do this task and they're in ownership of it, what are the indicators that it's working well? People get to be accountable and in ownership, they want to. So if you're building towards a stronger company, you cannot stop here because if everyone is waiting for tasks from you, then you're still the hub. You're still the air traffic controller and the bottleneck. So if you want the business to become less dependent on you, you have to start moving from task delegation to role ownership. That means giving people clear outcomes, clear expectations, boundaries, standards, and decision rights. In my business, I tell my team members they can spend up to $500. And let's say a refund were to come in. They have standards to follow, and if something is outside of that, they bring it to me. Otherwise, every time, let's just say there's an approval of something and another approval of something, and we're like, great, add that to the list. Now they get to look at the list and say, yes, yes, yes. Okay, this is outside of it. Now we bring it to the, the next person, which might be me, or I have leaders on my team, so they actually get to make decisions. I only look at stuff when it looks out of whack, which is reporting, which we can get into the other thing. But literally Mondays, my team shows me data. and I look at it and as the CEO and as the boss of my business, I look and I go, okay, this number seems weird. This is, this is off. Tell me about it. What's going on? Let's clean it up. So this is where a lot of owners get nervous because they want ownership from their team, but they do not want the discomfort of people learning. And that's the trade-off. I mean, literally one of the hardest things about growing a, a big business is running team, but it gets to happen because yes, people may not do it exactly like you, and yes, they need training and they may make mistakes. In fact, let's just guarantee I guarantee it. They're gonna make mistakes and there's always going to be a learning curve. But if every mistake pulls the work back to you permanently, then no one grows and nothing changes. And let's be honest, you've made mistakes too. So I wanna be clear right now. I'm not talking about tolerating bad performance forever. I'm talking about understanding that building ownership takes time. That's why systems matter and why SOPs matter and why feedback matters. Role clarity matters. Like, what are they in ownership of? Because if you want people to own more of their role, then you have to give them structure they can succeed inside of. And when you do that, sometimes powerful things happen. One, you stop being the person who has to carry every ball in the air, right? No, no, no, no, no more. You become the person who sets direction, reviews what matters, and leads the business. Leadership. That's what we're shifting into. That is a different role. And some of you are so ready for that role, but you're still living in the doer because it feels familiar. I'll just do it myself. Your business is waiting for you to leave that role behind. So the third shift is that you have to redesign your role inside of this business. This is the deepest one because becoming less necessary is not just about delegation or systems or about the team. It's about your identity. This is the work I've been doing over the past few years. Who are you inside this business now? Are you still acting like the maker, the fixer, the rescuer, the one who just says yes all the time, who jumps in wherever needed, the one who proves her value by being useful? Oh my gosh, you guys, I used to have a client, multimillion dollar business, team, all the things. She would come to the office and close the door and literally just sit there in the office doing nothing. She'd hop on calls for our mastermind and then she would, um, do busy work or like watch a show because she didn't want her team to judge her if she wasn't in the office. Like, what are you doing with your life? It's okay, you're the owner, you don't have to be there, but it's going to require a different way of being who you get to be, right? Be first, then do, then you have what you want. That's what's gonna get you there. So I talk about this a lot with my clients and the members in the Collective because what happens is that they build real businesses, but internally they're still operating from an earlier version of themselves. The one who had to do it all, or who had to hustle, or who had to prove it. I mean, this might even be like stories from our childhood that you had to stay close to everything, every sale, because it mattered so much and you couldn't afford the mistakes. It might be the version of you who thought rest met risk, or who believed being needed meant being valuable. Anyone there? If they don't need me, what am I, what am I even doing here? Right? The version who believed being needed meant being valuable. And now the business is just at a stage where what it really needs from you is not doing more and not more from you. It needs more leadership from you. It needs someone thinking about what are our priorities this quarter? What do we stop carrying? Where are margins leaking? What role do we need next? What is the strongest channel to double down on? What systems are breaking? What could be simplified? What standards are missing? Where do I need to stop rescuing? Ooh, that's a good one, right? And what does the next version of this company require? That is your role. That's the boss of your business. That is leadership, or at least that is increasing your role if you wanna keep growing. And this is the place where I want to lovingly challenge you. Some of you say you want a business that runs without you, but you're still structuring your day like a very expensive assistant to your own company. You're reacting, checking, answering, patching, coordinating, staying available, and then wondering why you have no time to lead. But leadership time does not magically appear. You just have to claim it. You have to redesign your role on purpose. Purpose. And that may look like not answering every message. In fact, I just hired an amazing assistant that I manifested, and I don't check my emails anymore. She'll let me know the ones I need to do or the things I need to sign, but she just either handles them, asks me the question. Like, I don't answer the messages. My husband sends me videos on Instagram. I'm like, babe, I'm not even in there anymore, right? Because I don't have to be. Like, I'm in for what I need to be in for. It's not being first in line for every issue or not sitting on every meeting. My team has meetings without me. Not being the backup plan for every breakdown. Figure it out. And not checking every order, not being available for every question. And I know that can feel scary because if you're not doing all of that, then what are you doing? You're leading, you're deciding, you're planning, you're building, you're reviewing. You're thinking ahead and you're protecting the health of the business. Also, my goal for you is that you're living, you're living and doing the things you want because you're creating the environment where the business can function more independently. And that's not less important work. It's actually the most important work because it does not always feel immediately productive as packing the order or fixing the issue or answering the email. And a lot of people undervalue it. So don't do that. The work that creates less dependence on you is some of the highest value work in the business. So let me say that one again. The work that creates less dependence on you is the highest value work in the business because that is the work that lets your business scale. It's the work that lets your team grow. It's the work that lets your profit improve, that gives you breathing room, and that matters because then your business is stronger than your current capacity, which is what you want. So I want you to start asking yourself, what parts of my current role should I no longer be in? Should I, should no longer belong to me? What work am I still doing because I'm used to doing it, not because I'm the best person for it? Trust me, I'm not. Where do I need to stop being the doer so I can become the leader? And that is where the shift begins. I wanna share with you that about 2 months ago, I was really hitting burnout and just a lot of things were happening and grief was very real for me after the holiday season. It was my first holidays without my mom. In fact, both my parents, right? So it was feeling really heavy and I just felt like, I looked at my husband and I said, I don't even have time to grieve. Like I wanna just break down and be in bed and not do anything and I don't even have time for it. And then I put myself on a stretch, something stretchy that would make me feel so uncomfortable. And what did I do? I decided that, you know what the craziest thing to do would be? It would be to actually tell my team I was taking off an entire week. Like, guys, I'm just, I'm pouring into myself and I'm just not showing up. And what did that mean? That mean they had to reschedule a ton of calls or have my advisors jump into calls and it not be me. It meant canceling some things. And I, I remember You know, calling Lauren who helps me run my company and I'm like, I think I'm gonna do this thing. I get to just like go get massages and facials and an IV and float therapy and just fricking chill for a week. And then I kept trying to build myself back in. I was like, hey, well maybe I'll go to that meeting or maybe I'll do that one thing. And she's like, no, I see why this is so hard for you. Just take the week. So I did. That month my business was the most profitable it had ever been because I proved to myself that I could be less necessary. Necessary, and I trusted the team that I had built. I wasn't less visionary, and neither will you be, right? You're not gonna be less visionary or less powerful or less valuable or less necessary in the places where your constant involvement is keeping the business dependent on you. For me, in fact, I'll, I'll just be honest and truthful. I did do a, um, a workshop that week that we already had been running ads to, and that was not something that I was yet ready to let go of. I did one thing. But everything else still functioned. And so here are the 3 shifts that helped and that I want you to do. Okay? First, stop confusing control with care. Let people own more of the tasks and redesign your role because your business can really grow, right? Redesign your role before your business can really grow. Because the truth is, is that a lot of product-based business owners are not stuck because they lack ideas or stuck because they're not hardworking. We know you work really hard. Or stuck because you don't care enough. They're stuck because they're still too central to everything. And if that's you, I want you to know this with so much love. You are not the problem, but your current way of operating may be. And that is actually great news because operating patterns can change and roles can change and standards can be built. Ownership can be developed. A business can get stronger. So I want you to journal on this. Where in my business am I still acting like the only person that this can run through? Okay, pause this, save it, come back to it, but sit with that. Where in my business am I still acting like the only person this can run through? Because whatever comes up there, that is likely one of your next growth edges. And if you know your business is in that season where you've built something real, this is the exact work that we do every single week. Right? This is what my members in The Collective are doing. This is what, um, students are doing. This is what we're doing every week when we host our, our Pathway to a Million Dollars. Because established product-based business owners who are ready to grow towards a million dollars, past a million dollars, they get to grow without staying the bottleneck in every part of the business. This is what we work on every single day. We work on focus, profitability, systems, leadership delegations, sales pathways, and building businesses that can scale with more strength and less owner dependence. We literally build the systems. So if you're like, okay, I want this, I need help, I need support, you can book a call with us at theproductboss.com/bookacall. And I want to leave you with this, you ready? Your value does not come from being needed everywhere. Your value grows when you build a business that is stronger because of your leadership, not your constant presence. Got it? All right, send this to a friend if they need to hear this episode, save it, follow the show, and I will see you in the next one. Thank you for being here and listening all the way through the Product Boss Podcast. If you love our show and it has helped you in any way in your business, would you mind doing two things for us? Subscribe to the show so you never miss an episode and leave us a review. Reviews help other product entrepreneurs know that this is the place to be to grow their businesses and realize that they're not alone. And we know that you all know that a 5-star and honest review helps you sell more products to more people. So you know that your reviews help us reach more listeners around the world. Remember, what we give is what we receive, and we are all about helping each other in the Product Boss community. We are all in this together. We would be so appreciative of you if you could take the time right now to subscribe, leave a review, and even share this episode on social or someone you know so we can impact more lives. And remember, subscribing means that you will get notified each time we release a new episode so you never miss a thing. You have helped us grow and climb into the top 10 of all marketing podcasts, and together we can keep climbing. Thank you, friends. And remember, there is room at the top for all of us.