From Chaos to Calm: How Letting Go Boosts Your Productivity with Chloe Weatherhead

 Hey and, welcome to Productivity With Zest, the podcast that helps you get the important stuff done without burning out. I’m Jasmine and I live and breathe productivity strategy, the kind that gives you life and helps you get the important things done in a way that works for you. Here. I like to keep it real and practical.

No fluff, all zest and no piff. Just simple doable strategies that help you focus, get organized, and actually move forward. If you want to figure out what area of productivity is holding you back, take my quiz at www.zestproductivity.com/quiz now onto today’s result.

 Hello everyone and welcome to Productivity with Zest. Today I’m joined by the lovely Chloe, who is the founder of Andy amo Business Assistance. Chloe’s one of those people who just gets how to make your life easier behind the scenes, whether that’s sorting your systems, wrangling your task list, or helping you breathe a little easier in your business.

She’s got 15 years of experience in ops and customer experience, and now she brings that magic to small business owners through her VA services. I really wanted to get her on the podcast to explore her practical wisdom and no fluff advice, which is right of my street.

We are diving into productivity tips, managing client tasks, and what to do when you’re avoiding the stuff that you really don’t want to do. So let’s get into it. Hey Chloe, what inspired you to launch your own business, supporting other business owners behind the scenes? 

I think it was a mixture of different things.

I have been considering self-employment. For quite a long time now. My partner’s self-employed. He’s been self-employed for about 15 years. I was going into it with very open eyes, but I just wanted to give it a go. You get to a certain age and you think, well, to be honest, what have I got to lose?

I might as well try it. There is no point having regrets. So about this time last year, summer last year, I decided to go into it full Pel. And if I’m honest, it is gone much better than I thought it would. I was definitely going into it with a bit of a doomsday attitude, um, with my eyes completely wide open, but it’s, it has gone much better and I think.

For me, the joy I get from seeing that I can actually help people, especi, especially self-employed and small business owners who have a lot on the plate, and being able to help those individuals and make their life a bit easier and actually have an immediate impact on them makes everything else worthwhile.

Really 

fantastic. And tell me about the name. What does Andy Ammo mean? Where’s it from? So, and d AMO 

is Italian for Let’s go, which se seemed quite fitting, for my attitude to life really. Um, I absolutely love Italy. We’ve got friends who live in Italy. They’ve got an agro TMO in Italy. So we used to go quite often pre pandemic.

We used to go very often. Um, I love the language. I am much better at understanding it than I am speaking it. But when we were looking for business names. Chris helped me and we were trying to think of a name that summed up what I did that began with a letter A that was quite succinct and could be used in different ways, and Andy Ammo seemed to fit all of those things.

Ooh, why did it need to begin with an A? 

It is from years ago, so I’ve, I’ve worked in, software and, for startups for a very long time, longer than I care to think about, to be honest, and. When those businesses were looking at marketing, when they were looking at websites, when they’re looking at social media, there was a.

Common thought process, that having a name with the letter A puts you right at the top of people’s thinking when they were looking because people don’t have a huge amount of time. They want their lives to be as easy as possible and a’s at the start of the alphabet. So whenever you’re looking at branding, whenever you’re looking at renames, whenever you’re looking at anything like that, if you can get the letter A at the start of your name.

The belief is that you’re unsu a winner. Whether that’s still the case now, I don’t know, but it’s so ingrained into my thought process mm-hmm. That I wanted to go with an A wherever possible. I think the other thing is my surname’s Weatherhead. So for my whole life I’ve been right at the bottom of the list, so it’s quite refreshing to be at the top.

I love that. It does definitely shake me a little bit with the fact that mine zest, which is a Zed, which is right at the bottom of the list, but hopefully I’m zesty enough to remain in people’s memories. 

Exactly. Exactly. And to be honest, I don’t know how true it is anymore, but I’ve been involved in so many rebrands at so many different organizations and categorically that was always part of the thought process and the discussion, and I think it’s just got stuck in my head.

I 

love it and it works. Let’s go. Yeah. I love it. So you’ve alluded to different work that you’ve done in the past. You’ve got lots of experience in ops, customer experience, all that kind of stuff. Yeah. How has what you’ve done in the past shaped your approach to productivity and getting stuff done for your clients now?

I think for me, because I’ve worked in technology and in startups for a very long time, I don’t know if you’ve worked in those sectors yourself. It is incredibly fast-paced. You have to just throw yourself in and hope for the best. In most organizations, you are lucky if you’ve got a job title, nevermind a job description, and it’s all hands to the deck.

And if you are the sort of person that loves to get involved, that loves to help out, that likes to try new things, that likes to develop new skills, it is categorically the best sector for you because you just get stuff thrown at you for your entire working day. No two days are the same. The only constant is change, basically, and that’s the mindset that I have had for unfortunately, nearly 20 years.

So bringing that mindset into having your own business, it helps. That you sort of learn to trust your own judgment. You are very used to changing focus at a moment’s notice. You are very used to just trying things and hoping for the best rather than looking for perfection consistently. It just works really well.

So it works well when you are going, when you’re considering being self-employed. But it also works well when you working with other businesses as well because. I’ve always thought, well, I want to be generalist. And I think the reason that I’m so comfortable with being generalist is because actually I’ve been a generalist for a really long time.

I just happen to have worked for organizations and being a generalist. So I’m very used to people saying, can you just, can you give it a try? Let’s see what happens. And just going for it. I think for me it means that I have a mindset where I just go at things full throttle and by the time I’ve made a decision to do it, I’ve typically done it and just moved on to the next thing.

But I think that helps my customers as well because. No job’s too small and no job’s too big. And I am brutally honest with people. I’m incredibly transparent ’cause I think it’s really important. So I will tell people my thought process in a very nice way. I’ll tell them my thoughts and I’ll tell ’em my thinking.

I’ll tell ’em what I think will work and what won’t work. And then we’ll try it together and we’ll support each other along the way. And I think people find that helpful and quite reassuring as well. 

Some real good nuggets there. So you’ve kind of had to be brutally. Keeping going, kind of focused.

Move on. You can’t ponder on this. Let’s just make a decision and move on. That momentum, you’ve got to work quickly and you’ve also got to be comfortable with not being perfection, not well. You also have to be comfortable with not having perfection and just striving for good enough for excellence, which that is a massive blocker for productivity when we get so hung up on that perfection and.

It can really stop us because it doesn’t exist. However, going for good enough, going for excellent is something you can still do while still keeping that progress. Yeah. And just before we move on, Chloe, what you’ve described yourself as a generalist, but I’ve never, I’ve never heard that term, and I might have had my head stuck in the ground, so just if I’m asking it, other people might be asking it too.

So, what is a generalist? 

A generalist is. Basically, I generally see someone who doesn’t specialize. So quite often you will hear about virtual assistants who, um, only work with women or only work with the self-employed, or only work with people in the healthcare sector. Or there is something that. That encompasses their model in some way, so they become very focused in their target market.

I don’t do that. I, I haven’t got a target market in that respect. So I work with self-employed, I work with small businesses. I work with tech startups, I work with men, I work with women. I work with any sort of business that needs my help. I can, because I can still bring that skillset. I enjoy the diversity and I enjoy the challenge that comes with it.

And that’s why I describe myself as a generalist. 

That makes perfect sense. Which is, it’s the decision we all make when we are going self-employed. ’cause lots of the thinking out there. The teaching is niche, niche, niche, niche, niche, niche, and. My regular listeners, those that were listening from the start will have seen me go on a little niching journey where I started off this podcast for mums who run a business.

Yeah. Very, very niched. And after about two or three episodes, I knew that wasn’t right. So I, I literally inched out of the niche tunnel and became a little bit more general. And now it’s productivity tips for people who are self-employed, but also those that are busy professionals. And you don’t have to be a mom.

So I have been there niching and then unleashed, and who knows what I’ll do in the future. But that’s really interesting. So with your kind of clients, all these different general clients, I imagine that you’ve seen all kinds of stuff, all kinds of chaos behind the curtain. What are your most common challenges that people come to you with when it comes to productivity or managing their workload?

I think for me the, the two biggest challenges are. Actually both to do with mindset as opposed to tasks. So the first is, imposter syndrome and a huge amount of individuals, regardless of whether they’re self-employed or they work for another organization, really struggle with imposter syndrome and the general feeling that everyone else knows what they’re doing and, and they just make it up as they go along.

And that can be a massive blocker when it comes to productivity because whatever you do, you’re doubting. Whether you’re doing the right thing. Um, comparison is, is a terrible habit and it doesn’t help. You have to be able to trust your own judgment and imposter syndrome stops people from trusting their own judgment.

The other of productivity that I see on a fairly regular basis, if not daily to be honest, is the belief that you have to be able to do everything yourself. So if you, are a small business owner or if you’re self-employed, or again, if you work for an organization, you should be able to do it all, and that isn’t practical.

Even if you can do it all, there’s not enough hours in the day. You just pile in a huge amount of pressure on yourself and that will stop you from going any further. So I think. Bringing other people in either to take the load or to bring in into different, bring in different levels of expertise or different skill sets into your business.

Yes, it will cost you money, but what it will also do is free up your time to do what you are good at and if you can focus on what you’re good at, your business will grow if you continue to try and do all of it. Then you are gonna stop yourself from progressing. You’re gonna stop your business from growing.

It’s really interesting that, that I almost expected you to say time management or boundary, you know, something like that. But actually both mindset things that, it’s that imposter syndrome that. Oh, who am I to even be doing this? ’cause that can stall you massively because if you think I’m not good enough, what do I have to say?

You end up overthinking everything and that can really stop you from moving forward. And similarly, what was the other thing you said? My mind’s gone blank. Imposter syndrome and thinking you have to do it all yourself. That’s it. Similarly thinking that you have to do it all yourself, which is hilarious that I almost forgot.

That’s that. That’s that. That was what you said, because that is a hundred percent me. Yeah. I’m such a control freak when it comes to my own work, and I actually really like admin. I’m good at it. I get it done quick. There’s certain things I would definitely outsource. A hundred percent social media probably doesn’t come as a bit of a surprise, but.

Yeah, I’m such a control freak, and it’s not that I think that I have to do it all. It’s almost, I don’t feel like I trust people to do it all. 

Yeah. And I, I get that. And a lot of people are like that. And especially if you are self-employed or you have your own business because it’s, it’s yours and it’s your face, and it’s your name and it’s your voice out into the world.

So bringing someone into that to represent you is a really. Big decision. It has to be someone that you trust. It has to be someone that will do a good job. It has to be someone that you have a positive working relationship with, and those things take time as well. So finding the right person is incredibly important as well.

Um, I think, again, going back to my experience. I had, I’ve always had a bit of a reputation as a fixer. So if I see a problem, I solve the problem. If I see something that’s not right, I fix it. If I see a piece of litter on the floor, I pick it up. If I see a house plan that desperately needs water, I will water it.

And I’m that sort of person. I’m very proactive. So I enjoy finding problems and solving problems. And then. Moving on really quickly. I can at times be a control freak. It’s not, it’s not something that I go, oh yeah, I’m nothing like that at all. Categorically, I’m a control freak about certain things, but I think that’s where the trust element comes in.

I think if you can find your tribe, if you can find your people and surround yourself by those people and those positive influences, then you will be a success. It will work out for you and your business will be success. If you try and clinging on for their life and hold everything close to your chest and do everything yourself, it might be a success.

You also might. Work yourself to exhaustion in the meantime. And it is likely that it won’t happen as quickly as you would like it to because there isn’t enough hours in the day and you don’t have all those skill sets. We can’t all be great at everything. 

Yeah. Oh, that’s a, that’s a hard hitting truth. I feel like I like to be really good at everything or, but yeah, I know I’m not perfect and I’m not great at lots of things.

You said a really interesting kind of productivity hack there about if you see something, you do it, you fix it. Yeah. So you said if you see a bit of litter on the ground, you pick it up. If you see something that needs doing, you do it. And I think that’s a really good rule that we can have in terms of our businesses and life.

If something needs doing, do it. I have a bit of a role that. If I think of something that needs doing for my business and I’m not deeply focused on something else, so I’m not, right. I’m focused for half an hour on this particular task, I’ll just do it. Mm-hmm. As long as I then doesn’t make me procrastinate on things, so.

If it’s just that one little five minute task, I’ll get it done. If it’s bigger than five minutes, I’ll probably put it down on a to-do list. But I have that as a bit of a rule. It helps me filter out things, particularly if I’m sorting out my emails. If something’s gonna take five minutes due, just do it.

Get it off your plate, get it done, because somehow having that task open. It just adds to the workload and the overwhelm even in the house today, I was doing a few other things. My kids were around this morning. My sister and my nieces arrived and my, my sister’s got a 7-year-old and a just a little baby who’s three months old.

So I think I was holding my niece and I realized that the plants needed watering because I’d not watered them. And I thought, oh, I’ll do it later. But actually. I can just literally fill up the water can and just do it, and the plants are done and my plants are thriving and they give me so much joy, but it’s because I see it and I do it.

Mm-hmm. There is that fine balance between see it and do it, and then actually you just procrastinating over the big things. So what do you do? How do you strike that balance? 

I think that there’s a few different. Tools that I use. So I’m a massive list maker. I’ve, in my desk, I’ve always got a notepad and I always have a post-it pad as well.

So if I can’t do it straight away, it goes on the list. And then at the start of the day, and at the end of the day, I’ll go through that list and prioritize what needs to happen immediately and what can go. Um, for medium term and what is a long term job? Um, if it’s a medium term or a long term job, I’ll put it on my diary on the day it’s gonna happen.

So I always have an a five page per day diary that has the things that need to happen that day. But also it means that if I’m in a call or if I’m a meeting, I can scribble my notes on that day and I can always find them. So I’m never scribbling, scrambling around looking for notes from meetings and things like that.

I think. Another tool that I use is I. Don’t procrastinate with things. So I, I use social media. I’ll scroll through social media when I’m eating my breakfast. Um, and I, I might scroll through while I’m cooking tea in the evening, and that’s pretty much it. I don’t pick up my phone and put it down and pick up and put it down because it wastes a huge amount of time.

You’d, before you know it, you’ve lost an hour and you’ve got absolutely nothing to show for it. So I think there’s an element of routine. That helps me to manage my day and manage my time effectively. I think the other tip for me that works really well for me is I’m a massive advocate of exercise and getting outside and going for a run or going for a walk, or going for a swim or whatever works for you.

Without holding your phone in front of you while you’re doing those things, because it’s really important to let your head work its magic and let your brain mull over things and you’ll be surprised how many ideas you have while you’re having to work or how many times you solve that problem that was winding you up the date before because you’ve stopped thinking about it and just.

Exercise your legs a little bit, exercise your body. So I think incorporating exercise into your daily routine is really helpful for productivity as well. I know people think that if you sit at your desk for 12 hours straight, you’re gonna get a huge amount done. I disagree completely. I think you need to have work time and you need to have social time.

You need to make time to exercise if you’ve got a problem. Walk away from the computer. Don’t sit there forcing yourself to think about it. Just walk away and turn your head off. Go make a cup of tea. Go for a walk. Hang the washing out. Whatever it is you need to do, what are your house plans? And by the time you come back, you’ll feel much better.

You’ll be in a much better position to solve it. And nine times outta day, you’ll have the solution to hand. Oh 

yes, that moving thing is so key. I am pretty bad at. Being focused and not doing those things. I love it when I get out and walk and I’ll go through a habit of, well, I, it doesn’t quite become a habit, but I’ll go through a few days of going out every day feeling amazing.

I’m getting those ideas. I have to get my best ideas when I’m on holiday or when I’m not working because that’s when your brain has that space to think and being creative. And it is also really down to our biology, the way we’re wired because, we have evolved slower than our. Sorry. Our brains have evolved slower than we have as people.

So in our brains we are still people wandering the savanna. And you need your brain to be working at its best when you’re moving because you’re hunting, you might be being hunted. You need to be sharp. So our brains actually perform better when we are moving around, and that lasts for afterwards. So one of my tips is if anyone’s ever got an interview or a meeting or a really big thing that they’re wrestling with.

Go for a walk beforehand, because when you’re then actually working on that task, your brain is working better. So I think that’s a bit of a to-do list for me, actually move my body every single day. So thank you for that reminder. 

Yeah. I think as well, that’s also where the routine comes in because I mean, I’ve got a dog, so the dog gets walked every morning and every evening, I run, I swim, I go to yoga classes and I tend to, I swim in the mornings.

I tend to do the rest in the evenings, and I tend to do it with other people, and I do that purposefully so that I know that I have to log off. From the computer at a certain point in order to make sure that I’ve worked the dog eating tea and I can get to meet those individuals at time on time. And that’s, I think that’s important as well.

Because again, it forces you away from the computer, but it gives some structure to your day and it means that you’re not constantly trying to force yourself to work. Which, especially if you’re self-employed, there is no one saying You have to go home now ’cause I’m locking up the office, for example.

So you have to, you have to force yourself to do those things. 

Mm. There’s some good rules like boundaries there that you’re like, these are what I’m doing certain times. You’ve got the accountability with people. Are there any other rules or boundaries that you’ve got in place that help you stay productive and avoid burnout?

Not really. I think it’s important to talk to other people, and to have, have people that can trust that you can have conversations with, who will give you honest opinions. I think actually my main role is just, just try it. And see what happens. There’s, it’s very rare that you have an idea and try it, and it’s absolutely disastrous.

You will, it’ll either fly, um, and you’ll be really proud of it, or you’ll learn something from it or someone else will benefit from it. It’s, it’s rare that it just falls completely flat and you go, well. There was absolutely no impact to that whatsoever. So it’s always worth having a go. So that one of my rules is probably just try it and see what happens, what’s worse that’s gonna happen if you’re honest with yourself.

Love that rule. So if someone is sat there today feeling completely overwhelmed by their task list, where would you tell them to start? 

I think the first thing you should do is. Be very honest with yourself. Go down the list and identify anything that you either can’t do, you won’t do or you really shouldn’t do, and highlight those things and then try and group them into categories.

If you’ve got. Bookkeeping and tax returns on there, and it’s freaking you out finding an accountant. There’s loads of really good, really reliable, really sensible people out there who can help with that. It’ll disappear off your list. It’ll be done really well, and you’ll feel much better as a result if you really hate doing your social media.

Then ask someone like me to get involved and I’ll do it for you. It doesn’t, it’s not a cop out. It’s not you getting rid of a responsibility that it should really be yours. It’s you freeing up your time so that you can concentrate your efforts in other areas, which will be much more beneficial to your business.

So I think write everything down in a list and then be brutally honest with yourself, and then find the people that can help you, that you can trust. That will do a really good job so that you can concentrate on their areas. 

What if someone is just starting out, maybe being in business a little while, doesn’t quite have the cash flow to be able to employ people.

What would you do then about the tasks that they would rather outsource to somebody else? 

I think if you can’t afford to, then another way to improve your efficiencies and get things done, go down the same route. So go through your to-do list, but instead of categorizing in the way that you can, won’t or shouldn’t do.

Try and categorize them in two sections. So everything to do with marketing, for example, everything to do with your website, everything to do with your social media, and instead of doing them on an ad hoc scatter gun. Basis, put time aside in your diary and blitz ’em all at the same time. So on a Monday morning between nine and 12, you’ve got your marketing hat on, and you write all your social media posts for the week.

You pull all your images together, you check your websites SEO, and make sure it’s up to date. You do a couple of emails for your, um, lead generation or something like that. You do it all at the same time. And then you move on to the next category, which might be your finances and your budgets and things like that.

Grouping them together makes you much more efficient than thinking about your social media. And then halfway through your social media thinking, I’ve gotta do that budget thing. And then halfway through that thinking I forgot to ring that person. And various different things. ’cause you’ll, you’ll keep switching and you’ll never actually finish anything off.

So if you can’t afford to bring in the expertise that you need. Make sure that you are putting that focus time in your diary to get things done properly. Again, you’ll feel the pressure and you’ll feel the absolute panic decreasing. And it will actually free up some time for other things as well.

But my recommendation would always be if you can afford it, bring someone in who, who can help. Because you’ll get much better value for money that way. 

Fantastic. One thing that I’ve also done in my early stages of business is do some really good skill swapping. Mm-hmm. So I have a great accountant I work with.

She gives me amazing rates because I coached her. So I used my executive coaching skills and I did some coaching with her. I’ve done it with lots of other things where you can actually do a really good skill swap. I’ve done it with, um, my beautician a little while ago. I did some coaching with her and exchanged it for the equivalent in monetary value of getting my nails done.

That was an amazing one. So if anyone is out there and they want to offer me a lovely swap for some coaching, please do get in touch honestly, and particularly would love people who could clean my house. Honestly, that would be amazing. Social media outsourcing. Um. I’m doing a really good swap with a friend who is an incredible fitness, health, amazing source of knowledge.

She’s amazing. She’s actually coming on the podcast later on in the year and we’re doing a swap where I’m gonna help her start her podcast and do some coaching with her, and she’s gonna help me focus my health and fitness activities. So do some skill swapping as well if you’re out there. 

Yeah. The other thing I’d recommend is actually, and I know it’s really scary for a lot of people, so I don’t, I don’t say this lightly, but looking for networking groups and finding networking groups in your area and building those connections is really beneficial because people are very happy to help you out.

And that’s again, I suppose that sort of crosses into the idea of skill swapping, but it’s in on a less formal basis. Mm-hmm. Um. There are loads of free networking groups available. You don’t have to pay for them. You can try them and see which ones you like. You don’t have to go. You can go once and then disappear.

No one’s gonna judge you for it. But I think especially when you’re starting out, it’s important to find that community and networking groups from a great way to do that. But people will help and offer advice and mentor and be a be a listing there for you as well. 

Great tip. I think every single person I’ve had on the podcast so far have been people I’ve met networking groups as well.

Yeah. I love having people on this podcast to help them with their businesses and also hear from them and their amazing tips. Another person I met recently, she’s a, well, I’ve, I’ve known her for a little while, but she’s a HR consultant and I thought, actually I’m trying to work more with corporate and enterprises.

Yeah. I’m trying to work more with businesses, with my executive coaching, and she’s in a lot of businesses, so she was interested in coaching, would quite have liked it with me potentially. We had a good chat about it. She was really interested, so I said to her if she was happy to promote me to her network, the businesses she works with, as long as she thinks I’m good enough.

If I get work through that, then I’d coach her for free. Yes. So there’s things like that you can do, you can be creative, with how you use the network that you are in and how you also support people. I give away free coaching sessions. I’m always trying to kind of support people in that way, in networking events and usually it’s, it’s about what you give as well as what you can get.

Yeah. So if you can give a lot, which you will have a lot to give, you’ll get a lot back. 

Exactly. 

Great. So is there a task that you personally used to hit that now you’ve outsourced it, systemized it, or made peace with it? 

I, um, I have an excellent accountant. And I made that decision really early on, so I probably made that decision earlier than most people would.

But for me. Doing figures, it’s fine and I can do it, but I don’t enjoy it. I always worry that I’ve missed something and actually the risk associated with getting it wrong is really high. You could get yourself in real trouble without realizing, um, what you’ve done. So I made a decision very early on to bring in an accountant.

I spoke to a few people. Um, ask for recommendations from various different people as well. I found this person who doesn’t advertise, she only goes through word of mouth recommendations. You won’t find her at networking groups or anything like that, and she’s lovely. I can just send her a text if I get any a letter that I don’t understand with a picture of the letter and she just sorts out for me.

She’ll send me an email once a month saying, make sure you send me this. I send her, everything started. I don’t have to think about it anymore. And I think for me that was huge. And as I say, it was probably too, no, it wasn’t too early on. It was probably earlier on in my business journey than most people would choose to go down that route.

But for me, it took a massive weight off my shoulders and meant I just don’t have to think about it anymore. And that was huge.

Yeah. It’s that weight off, isn’t it? It’s not just the tasks, but it’s the responsibility. It’s that feeling if you hate something. So if there’s any tasks that are weighing on my lovely listeners’ minds at the moment, definitely write them down and there’s.

Tackle them head on, whether that is figuring out how you are gonna do them and when you are gonna do them, and in what way are you gonna do them, schedule it, get it done, get some help, whether that’s through networking groups, friends of friends, skill swaps, or employ somebody to do it. Just hire out that time.

It’d be well worth it. Just get it done. Don’t hide it. Don’t bury it in your desk where you can’t see it because it’s gonna be niggling at the back of your head. 

It is. Just get it done and, and quite often, what will take someone three hours or half a day or whatever, will take someone who’s used to doing it, who enjoys doing it.

15 minutes, half an hour. And that’s how you’ve gotta look at the cost. If it’s gonna take you half a day to do, that’s half a day that you’re not spending on things that are gonna help you grow your business. It’s gonna take someone else half an hour to do the cost, the value ratio, there’s, it’s not even a consideration.

Mm-hmm. So you, you don’t think about it in how much it costs you per hour. Think about how much it’s saving you in your time so that you can concentrate on the things you could add. 

Brilliant. There’s been some real gold in what you’ve been sharing, Chloe, so thank you. Before we wrap up, have you got any more productivity tips that you think more business owners and busy professionals need to hear?

I think for me, um, there’s huge amounts of information available. The internet is a gold mine. Um, it can also very quickly drown you in information, so I think. Find your tribe is my biggest tip. I think be brutally honest with yourself when you are looking at your to-do list and you are looking at the time available as to what is possible and what isn’t possible, and then think about the best way to get things done.

There’s loads of different. Tools available. So there’s must, could, should, is one of the tools that people use for organizing the to-do list. It could be. Blocking out time in your diary or in your day to get things done. There’s loads of different tools and you’ll find the one that works for you.

There’s one called Eating the Frog, which basically means get the worst thing done first in the day, and then you can, you don’t have to think about it anymore. So there’s loads of different tools out there. You’ve gotta find the one that works for you, but there is, there is nothing better than finding a community of people than finding your tribe of people that you trust who will give you good advice, and then leaning on them when you need to.

Brilliant advice. I love eating the frog. Not literally. I love that book. I love that concept. Yeah. It’s so simple. Sometimes the simple things are the best. Yeah. So where can people find you, Chloe? 

Um, to be honest, I’m everywhere. It’s hard to avoid me most of the time. So, I have a website, which is andy moist.co uk.

You can find me on LinkedIn, on Facebook, on Instagram. I have a podcast called Strings to Your Bow, which is available on YouTube on the, and DMO Assist YouTube channel. And that’s where self-employed people, small business owners come on and talk about how their experiences have helped ’em to develop superpowers that they then use in their business.

And I’m about to launch a new product actually, which hopefully. People will be able to make use of, which is called Hustle and Heart. I know you hate the term hustle, um, but it’s called hustle and heart. And that a bit like the podcast actually has come from me talking to so many different self-employed people and small business owners who think that everyone else knows what they’re doing and they’re just making it up as they go along, and they’re just overwhelmed with all the information and all the things you need to do.

So the idea behind Hustling Heart is we. Are able to. Do training for individuals both online and in person. They can come along and practice and develop their skills before they go out into the wide world. There’s a newsletter there for people so that they are being told about the networking events and opportunities in their area.

Rather than trying to find it for themselves, we’re gonna have a concept called Have your Cake and Eat it. Where they can meet for a coffee and a chat and sort of go down the informal mentoring route. So I’m hopeful it will be really helpful for a lot of people who are either starting out and they’re slightly overwhelmed or just need a little bit of a confidence boost.

Sounds amazing. So if people find you on socials, I’ll put all the links in the show notes. So connect with Chloe and if you are after a va, maybe. Send her a quick message, see if it’s something that she could help you with. And the only reason I don’t like the word hustle is because there’s such a hustle culture when it comes to productivity.

Yeah. You’ve got lots of people spouting that you can do three six hour workdays before the sun’s up and it just doesn’t fit with a lot of people. A lot of the time it’s men who are talking about these ways of working, and I know this is very stereotypical, but lots of men don’t have the ties of. Being the primary caregiver for children.

They’re not trying to operate a business in school hours. They’re not maybe having children waking them up in the night. They’re, they have, it’s a very different world, I think, for a lot of people. So my version of productivity is figuring out ways that work for you. Yeah. So whether that is eating the frog, whether that is muscu should, whether that is doing the Eisenhower prioritization, quadrants matrix, whether that is like one of my beautiful clients who.

She. Of creative and she just didn’t want to fit into the normal, do it this way, do it that way. And we figured out ways that she could remember what she needed to do. Tagged onto things like when she puts the dishwasher on at the end of the day, yeah, she can figure out her diary for the next day. She’s got a lovely little thing on the inside of her cupboard, which has pictures of planets rotating around the sun.

And those planets represent different things in her life and she sticks post-it notes on those to remind her what to do. So productivity is not one size fits all, is it? And that is the only reason why the word hustle is not my favorite because it just, oh, it just makes me think of those hustle, culture, productivity people.

Yeah. Which is not what you are doing. ’cause hustle with heart is very, very different than just hustle, hustle. 

Yeah, and I’m, I’m really keen, I think starting out on your own, it’s scary. There’s a lot to think about. It’s really difficult trying to describe to people what you do for a living. You constantly think that people are gonna criticize you.

You have to be able to put yourself out there for your business to grow. So if we can support people in doing that. And help them to find the information they need and help them to grow the confidence that will help them be a success in the business, um, all for 

1. Amazing. Yeah. Describing what you do is a really interesting one.

I did a little. Careers fair for my daughters, my and my son’s primary school with year fives and year sixes. And I had to try and explain to them what I did. And I asked my kids, I was like, kids, can you tell me what I do? And they know I’m a podcast host and that’s the thing that they tag onto.

But they have no idea how to explain the coaching, the productivity stuff. To be honest, half the time I don’t feel like I do. So getting that clarity is really key. Yeah. So Chloe, that has been wonderful. Thank you. It’s. So much for being on the podcast. There’s some lovely little nuggets of gold hints and tips about getting stuff done, and particularly thinking about what you can delegate out.

And even if that is delegate to the future or do it in a different way, there’s ways that we can really approach our to-do lists proactively without hiding from them or being scared of them. The work’s not gonna go away, so let’s figure out a way to do it that helps you keep moving forward. Lovely.

Thank you so much. I’ll share you links on socials and see you all next time on productivity We exist. Thank you for having me.  

 And that’s all for today. Thank you for joining me on Productivity with Zest. If you want to figure out what area of productivity is holding you back, take my quiz at www.zestproductivity.com/quiz and I’ll give you some tips to help you along the way. If you’ve enjoyed this, hit follow so you never miss an episode.

And if you’re feeling generous, please leave a review because it really helps. If you want to hear more, head to www.zestproductivity.com. Until next time, stay focused, stay balanced, and keep bringing the zest to your productivity activity.