In this episode you'll learn 3 techniques to achieve a more simplified and streamlined daily workflow in business
Download the freebie Melanie created to accompany this episode at https://melaniescroggins.ck.page/10a130de4a
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Transcript
Meg Brunson
Hey. Hey. FamilyPreneurs. I'm excited to have you here with me again today. We are going to be talking about simplifying and streamlining your daily workflow. And of course, I've got a guest with me today. Melanie Scroggins. Melanie is a voice actor, podcast host, content creator. She has had the opportunity to voice projects for companies like Google, Subaru, Hyatt Hotels, AT&T, Duolingo, NerdWallet, Target and more. She also runs the Work From Home Voice Actor, a comprehensive platform designed for aspiring and beginner voice actors who want to learn how to build successful voice over our businesses from home. Melanie is a proud wife and a mom in a family that practices family first entrepreneurship. I am so happy to have you with me today. And thanks for scheduling time with me.
Melanie Scroggins
Thank you. I'm really excited to be here.
Meg Brunson
I am, too. I want to dive right into this topic because as FamilyPreneurs, as parents and entrepreneurs, there are always 50 million things requiring our attention between business, your own life, your kids, your family, your spouse, whatever it is, you're being pulled in a million directions. And so simplifying and streamlining anything is helpful. Right? So obviously there's little we can do about those emergency situations that pop up. But the normal day to day stuff, the easier we can make that, the better. So what's the first thing we need to do when we're feeling overwhelmed and ready to start simplifying and streamlining?
Melanie Scroggins
Yeah. So this is a question I literally ask myself almost every day. It's like, okay, where am I at? Where can I start? How do we kind of get this ball rolling? Right? And this is a concept, really. It is. It's a concept of theory that we're kind of working on in our own lives. My husband designed it, and so we've been implementing it in my business. So the first thing I will say is that there needs to be an understanding. And this is something I talked to with Dr. Donna Ballard of UT Austin a few years ago. She was on a podcast that I had back then, and we were talking about time. And one thing that she kept saying over and over again, she studies time. She's a PhD in chronemics, which is the study of time. So she does time all the time. And so she would say time is a construct. It's something that we create. Your definition of time is not my definition of time. And I think very similarly to how we work as entrepreneurs is that my schedule is not going to look like your schedule. And we specifically work for ourselves, at least a lot of us, because we don't want to work nine to five, we don't want to work in an office.
Melanie Scroggins
We don't want someone telling us when or where or how we have to do something. We want to be the ones to create that. And so one of the biggest not pitfalls, but sometimes, I guess, issues that arises is this idea of what do I do with my time? How do I take control of that time when I'm able to actually get away and do my work, or however that's set up for each individual or anyone who's listening? And then what do I do if I can't quite seem to like, what if I don't feel organized? Basically, how do I organize my time and get what I need done, in a timely manner? I mean, it all comes back to okay time, and our time is so precious, and it's something that is a limited resource. In each day. We only have 24 hours, and a lot of that time is spent sleeping and trying to do other things that aren't work. Right. That's kind of the idea, especially as family-first entrepreneurs, which I credit you to finally helping me define that for who I am and how we run our business. Family-first.
Melanie Scroggins
So for those of us who are doing that, it is even more important that we look at the time that's set out in front of us while we're working and say, okay. And like Dr. Donna Ballard would say is don't think of work life balance. Think of it as alignment. So the first thing is to think of, okay, how can I get myself aligned to this day, this moment, and get done what I need done? So that's a very long winded way of saying the Mindset piece is probably the most important and definitely what we need to start with when we kind of step into that moment of all right, I'm ready to accomplish what I'm here to do today, and then I'm getting out, right? That's very much how I approach my business.
Meg Brunson
And I love that you brought up balance versus alignment. I'm big on redefining balance, so I use that word all the time. But I also make it clear that balance does not mean 50-50. That's not balance in my life. It may be balanced in someone else's life, but that's not balance in my life.
Melanie Scroggins
I don't know, who.
Meg Brunson
So for me, that feeling of balance is more of a feeling and not like what you would actually see if you were looking at a scale. Being balanced and balanced, for me, is disproportionate amounts of time with my family. And part of the way I do that is by blending family and business together. The fact that I'm recording, like, yes, I'm away from my family right now, but, I mean, they're just in the other room having quiet time, while I do this? And then when I'm not right being recorded on a call, they're next to me coloring a book or dancing to the Encanto soundtrack or whatever it is that we're doing, we're able to blend it together in a way that makes sense for us. But also, like you talked about, it's not going to look the same for everybody. And that's okay. We have to stop comparing ourselves to other people. Right? Like get ideas from other people, but you've got to do your own thing.
Melanie Scroggins
You've got to do your own thing. And that's a really good point. And this is something that I kind of wanted to bring up later, but I think that was a great segue. One of the things that I personally and I know is a huge hurdle to a lot of people is social media. So how do we use it? How do we make it work and not work against us? And there is a super fine line. And like, we're talking about balance or alignment. That's different for everyone, right? How big is that line? What does it look like? I can't handle very much. That's what I've learned. I cannot handle very much, whether it's input or trying to create and post. I'll say I'm pretty bad about it. And so I try to eliminate the amount of time I'm there because it doesn't fit into a lot of what we'll talk about today for my business. Can I utilize it? Does it help in some way? Sure. But because it doesn't- it's not a driving force of my business. It doesn't get a front seat, and I have to be very aware of that. Anyway, that's one of those things that I've noticed that if I'm not aware of it, I don't go into it thinking, is this a tool? Am I using it like the tool I've decided it is? If not, it could be controlling me. So that's a hard one.
Meg Brunson
And I've mentioned this before, one of my favorite things I have is a Google Chrome extension that blocks the newsfeed. Because for me, social media is my business. I probably spend six to 8 hours a day on social media. And I know how awful that sounds. But, once you understand that I'm in the marketing space and specifically, that's where I have to be. But if I don't have that absolutely blocker that blinder on, then I'll just get stuck and sucked into the vortex of scrolling forever. But with that, and I can turn it off.
Melanie Scroggins
It's designed to do that, right?
Meg Brunson
And I can turn it off in time segments. So I can say I am curious what's going on. So I can turn it off for ten minutes or 30 minutes, and then it gives me that time to scroll and then it goes blank and forces me to go back and do some other work. So I love that there are tools like that, too. Once you identify what the problem areas are or you can find tools that will help you focus. Because I don't have the willpower. Absolutely, yeah.
Melanie Scroggins
And I would say most of us don't. And that's why especially we're talking about time and simplifying to streamline our workflow essentially today, that's all it is. It's figuring out what works for us. And then even before that, pulling back and saying, okay, what's important, what do I need to do? What am I actually trying to accomplish? And then how do I make that happen each day and then really getting rid of the fluff, being honest with ourselves, saying what is filler what is busy work. Right. And unfortunately, with the generality of work, kind of at least here in the US with again, the nine to five, the office, whatever that looks like for most of the population, it's so ingrained in us. I mean, I'm still struggling with it, to be totally honest. And I've been a full time entrepreneur for three years from home. So it's a daily struggle to figure out what you're saying of here's this tool and then utilizing the tool to the best we can that helps us with what we're actually trying to accomplish.
Meg Brunson
And I think what you just kind of touched on is figuring out what you actually need to accomplish. I think that kind of brings us into output goals. Right. That's one of the things we have to do is figure out what is the output that we need to see happening on a daily basis. Can you talk a little bit more about that?
Melanie Scroggins
Absolutely. And so it's really important to first define what an output goal is. So looking at your own business and defining what you can control is the first step because I feel like when we set goals for our business and this is a conversation my husband and I come back to all the time. So he helps me in my business. We very much are team players. He's the main caregiver of our son right now, and I work, but we very much work together, especially when it comes to mindset and just overall, looking at the business, he's a huge asset to me. And one of the things that we always talk about is, okay, what can we control? Right. I can't control how much money I make this quarter. I can't control how much money I make this year. Right. But I can do my best to put my foot forward and say, I have this data and I keep track of a bunch of different points in my business, and everyone should. I would highly encourage people, if you're not already kind of keeping track of what's bringing in money, sit with yourself and say, okay, what actually made me money the last few months/last year.
Melanie Scroggins
And that's not the only key indicator of success. But for us to be able to live our lives the way we want to, it's important for sure. So as an output goal, I wouldn't say I want to make $20,000 because I have no control over that unless they go and steal $20,000. Right. I mean, truly, that's the only way that would even happen or force someone to give it to us, which that probably won't go over very well. But what if I say, well, yes- but what if I say, well, last month, the month before that, and the month before that? I can see in this last quarter that when I sent 200 pitch emails. I got ten new clients from that and each client represented X amount of money, which was able to bring me in X amount for that quarter. Right. I can control how many emails I send out to tell people about my business and what I offer and what I do. I can't control who responds. But that's why I keep sending those emails. That's why I keep showing up and doing my work and understanding what brings back the most.
Melanie Scroggins
I hate to say the word, but it's so true, ROI. What is the best return on investment I can do in my business? Because it allows me to keep doing what I want to do, which in our case is run a family-first business how I want, when I want, where I want. So determining what goals you can control is the best way to define an output goal. And most of us have probably one or two main ones that we're always kind of looking for. And then everything on top of that is possibly extra. But, my first piece of advice would be to sit down with yourself and really ask yourself what brings in money? What brings in that level of success I've defined for myself. And I would encourage people to set business and personal goals, whether it's I want to walk 2 miles a day and then I want to send this many emails, that kind of thing, as an example and just be honest. What are those things? Because this is an example in my business. I do voiceover again. She had introduced me. I'm a voice actor. When I sat down and looked at everything I was doing, I realized there was a lot of fluff.
Melanie Scroggins
And my issue at the time was I wasn't being super clear on what those output goals were. I had a bunch of different things I wanted to do I thought I wanted to accomplish. But to be honest, those were more for fun or hobbies, but I was trying to make them a part of my work day and it was really clogging up my pipeline. It was keeping me from being able to accomplish what I actually wanted to accomplish in my business. It's just that if I set output goals, it may take me a little longer to do those other things. But guess what? I'm streamlining what I'm doing every day and I don't have a question of what I'm supposed to be doing at any given moment. That's the power of being able to set those because you can show up, especially in our chaotic schedules, because they are- there's this ebb and flow. There's this flux all the time to be able to sit down, go into your office or wherever your space is that you work and say, this is all I need to do today, because that's what I'm trying to achieve.
Melanie Scroggins
And one or two, maybe three things is kind of the golden sweet spot, I would say.
Meg Brunson
I love that. And I think part of the reason I definitely had a point, and I can't remember exactly when it was where I discovered that difference between setting just income goals without and you think you have a plan to get there, but you really don't. And I think part of that reason that's so problematic is because what you fall into doing is looking at what other people in your space are doing, and you look at somebody else, like another voice actor and what they're doing. And you're like, oh, shoot, they wrote a book and they are on these podcasts, and maybe they have their own podcasts and they're on TikTok doing these cool dances, and suddenly you feel like you have to do all those things and you forget what works for one person doesn't work for another. And also the likelihood that you're following somebody who started at the same time as you or less is slim. You're following somebody who's been in the game at least a year. That's to say longer than you. And so they've been able to build up those things.
Meg Brunson
Obviously, we're not even halfway through this conversation, but I feel like a big takeaway that listeners should have right now is to evaluate what your goals are. And I love, love that focus on figuring out what your output goals should be and letting everything else kind of just be extra until they prove themselves that they're worth it.
Melanie Scroggins
Yes. And to be totally honest, this is how we approach every day. And it is very hard for me. Again, it is a conscious effort that is being made. That's why mindset is so important. And I struggle with that, too. I struggle with getting myself in the zone and say, okay, this is all you have to do. But to be honest, it gives each of us so much grace and freedom because if we look at our output goals and if we can remind ourselves of what that is, and then we'll get into kind of the next couple of pieces here of how to do that. If I just see what it is I need to do for the day and there's only one or two or three things that's pretty empowering, because then all of a sudden all that chaos, those hundreds of things that are floating in our head at any given time, can be reduced down to a few things, and then we can remind ourselves, that's right. That's all I have to do today. That's powerful.
Meg Brunson
Yeah. Now, do you happen to have, like, off the top of your head. I hate to put people on that fast, but do you happen to have an output well related to family that you can share? I feel like it's easy with business to think like you use the email example.
Melanie Scroggins
Absolutely.
Meg Brunson
With family. Do you have an example? I feel like I have something in my head that might fit, but I don't know if it actually does.
Melanie Scroggins
Sure. So that's interesting. You say that because when I was creating the kind of activity that I have for your audience, I did put an example of business and life on there, family. But one of the things personally for me would be just as an example, in the evenings, phone goes away, email goes away, whatever the case may be. And this isn't so much of like a number thing, but of, okay, when I'm done with work, one of my goals for the day is I'm going to have family, I'm going to have dinner with my family, we're going to have all evening together, and there's not going to be even a chance that work blends in unless there's some outlying circumstance and it's already been planned, that phone goes away. And then it's purely family time, which I think is pretty normal for most people. I mean, I would like to think that people who have nine to five jobs also do that when they get home and it's like they're home. It's been time with their family. But when we work from home, that's still a struggle, too, because it's like, well, I've got things I could do.
Melanie Scroggins
That's one of my taglines. My husband always asks me, well, what else do you have to do today? I was like, well, I can do 100 things, but I'm not going to do any of them. Right. We're done. I did my main things I'm done. So that's one of mine. And then another personal life, one just as an example, if this helps listeners kind of relate it to their lives, is one of the new things I'm doing is around lunchtime or after lunchtime, I go and walk for 30 minutes. So I get out outside whatever I need to be moving my body for 30 minutes. I'm currently seven months postpartum, and that has been a very difficult one to kind of get back into. And so I've made it a priority to say, okay, this is really important to me. Let's go do it. And then I look at my watch, we get going, and then I come home and I did it. Right. That's accomplished. Let's move on.
Meg Brunson
And is there a process that you have for figuring out for prioritizing what needs to get done? What's more of a want? How do you figure out what's the most important thing that you should be starting with?
Melanie Scroggins
This is a hard one, because again, like we mentioned earlier, all of our definitions for success are different, but that's where you start? What actually helps me to be successful? What helps me to pay my bills every month? I mean, whatever question you ask yourself to think of these particular action items, how do I do these things? How am I going to be able to - they're very much like real world grounded items into whatever your life situation is, whatever your work situation is. So those would be probably the first two questions I'd ask myself is what pays the bills and what's my definition of success and what helps me to be successful in the way that I have defined it for myself and my business. So the way my husband and I talk about it is it's not those pie in the sky items. What's going to help me become an influencer? What's going to help me get 100 podcast guests this year? They're great goals and there's nothing wrong with them. But let's take that back a bit. What are the bite size pieces that I can do every day that helped me get to those places that are relevant to my business?
Melanie Scroggins
That's the big one for me. It's the relevancy for my business. Because again, I don't know if you struggle with this, but I am constantly thinking of different ideas and ways to reach out to people and things I could do with my show. And constantly I feel like that is the plight of entrepreneurship. People are like, oh, it's cool being an entrepreneur. That's so neat. It sometimes can be a personal hell. Not in a bad way. Just your mind is always on fire with all these different ideas and not to mention the world we've lived in for the past few years of all of us being at home or being somewhat like a balance of being at work, being at home, whatever your situation is, your mind is just constantly running around. And so it's important to just truly take a step back, take a few breaths, literally and metaphorically, and just ask yourself, what is it that truly, truly matters in my business? What matters? What do I do, right? I get lost in that sometimes. I'm like, wait, no, I'm not these other things. I am a voice actor. I am these things.
Melanie Scroggins
And again, identity is wide and broad and beautiful. But when we're talking about these things with what we do, it is so important to be specific because that helps us come back to okay, here's all this chaos, here's all these things I could be doing, what do I need to be doing right? So the next part of it is and I think I put it out of order when I sent you this, but it's to prioritize those things is to say, what are the pieces that get priority? What brings in? Again, I keep going back to this question, but this is something I have to do my business, what actually brings in the money so I can pay for my life that I so desperately want to have and have grown and built right in the way that we want it. And so those things get written down. So for me, as an example, auditioning is huge for me. You think that would be a given because I'm a voice actor. But that is a huge pull for my business because it gets more people hearing me, gets more people understanding what I do, what I sound like.
Melanie Scroggins
And even if they don't hire me, they can say, okay, we can't use her for this project, but maybe we'll use it for another. So as many people that can hear me as possible is the best thing for my business. The second thing is to answer emails so people who are reaching out and saying, hey, what do you do? All this kind of stuff, answering questions from voice actors who reach out through the platform and that kind of thing. And then the very last thing is just general correspondence. It could be a plethora of things. But my main two things, obviously, outside of working on active projects and stuff like that, is auditioning. That is my main thing. And so if I don't do anything else during the day, I have to do that because that's my bread and butter. So just as an example, in the realm of what I do, that's how I prioritize. But again, it's just asking yourself those questions. What's my definition of success? How can I keep showing up and doing that thing to help me be even more successful? And then the money piece, that's something I constantly have to come back to.
Melanie Scroggins
Okay? And it's more of a mindset shift. It's more of what's actually making me money. Because if I'm not spending time doing those things, there's a really good chance I'm falling outside of my priorities and I'm wasting my time. And that's the worst place you can be in, especially when you're trying to work so hard to. I mean, the word maximize isn't my favorite, but truly maximize your time and make it work for you so you can get back to your life. Right. And this is life. We talked about work and life. But to be able to get out there and to be able to spend time, that's what we really want to do. That's at the heart of family-first entrepreneurship. So that's kind of why I make that distinction.
Meg Brunson
And there's so much surrounding money. It's like you hate to make everything about money. And I know that I already know because we're the same. And most of the people listening are in the same boat where it's like we're really not entrepreneurs because we want to be the next Bezos or whatever. We're not in it to be the Zuckerberg, to be a billionaire. That's not why we're here. We're here to help people. But the problem is you need money to help people.
Melanie Scroggins
You need money. Exactly.
Meg Brunson
We've got to feed our kids. We've got to feed ourselves. We have to buy systems and things to serve people. And so there is- I feel like- it's like that little bit needs to be said that we are people first. We put people before profits. We are not going to take a trip to space when we could solve world hunger. We're the world hunger people, not the trip to space people, but we still need money. And so I think that really is a problem that I feel like I've fallen into before. I think most people where they're like, oh, shoot, I'm helping all these people, but I'm not making money. It's like you have to prioritize that stuff. You can also do like philanthropic things, but you can't let philanthropy and kindness and stuff take over and not do what you need to do to make money. Like, I don't need to do auditions, but for me, sending those emails, posting content, getting my podcast out, getting out solo content, not just interview content, because it's different. So it's like figuring out what it is, but I don't need to do all of those things at once.
Meg Brunson
I need to figure out what is the income goals that I have, what are the services or products that I'm focused on selling? And then what does that customer journey look like? What can I do to actually keep people flowing through there? So hopefully between those two examples, people are really clear on that. And I loved your family example of putting the phone away. I feel like that's something that we struggle with in this house and it probably shouldn't be as big of a struggle as it is.
Melanie Scroggins
No, we constantly struggle with that. I feel like that again, I talk about all these plights, but it is. It's just a reality that we have. And frankly, it just exhausts me to even think about it because it's so hard. It literally almost is a part of our beings now, which is unfortunate, but it's a hard relationship, right? Like, it's hard to define, it's hard to understand. But at the same time, we do, we use them all the time. And so it can be a source of good. It can be a source of not so good- moderation, most likely not so much moderation. It's a back and forth. And all we can do is practice. And that's where I'm at. I can be really hard on myself as I know a lot of people, a lot of women specifically, we can be very hard on ourselves for the different things and goals that we have, like putting our phone away and saying no certain things. So, yeah, it's a practice. And with everything we're talking about, just giving ourselves grace is a big deal.
Meg Brunson
Say that again. I feel like that's my biggest- got to give 'em grace, give myself grace, give other people grace, grace-grace-grace, I feel like we've really gone over some really meaty action steps. One thing, you might have to go back and listen to it again in order to get it all straight, jot it all down. But I know you also have a resource that you put together. Can you talk a little bit about that and how that resource will support this episode?
Melanie Scroggins
Yes, absolutely. I'm just going to pull it up real quick. So one of the things that I've done to make it as simple as possible, because again, I'm all about simplifying, or at least I'm trying to be about simplifying is I've gone back through and kind of outlined the steps of what we're talking about, or at least the steps that we take here in my house, my business to be able to make these things a reality or start practicing them. And I've defined what we talked about. So I've gone over kind of these examples again and giving you real life examples of what this could possibly look like in your life and business. Then from there, I have different sheets that are about each of those topics as you're going through brainstorming what your output goals are, brainstorming how you would categorize what you need to do, brainstorming at the very end, your priorities. And one thing that I forgot that I'm going to add in, which we literally do here, I've got it on my board is I take note cards and I write out my priorities, my daily tasks, and I number them based on the priority order.
Melanie Scroggins
And I put them up. And so it's a reference. It's, I think, helpful, too, when you're first getting going of just a physical reminder when you can look over at your board or sticky note on your computer, wherever you are, that kind of helps you with your kind of grounding/center where you're working your command central is to look at it and say, okay, I've done that today. Okay. I didn't have any jobs today or whatever the case may be, and you kind of move on to the next step. That has been extremely helpful for me. And so I'll put that in there as well. But to define it and then they can define it, listeners, you can define it for yourself, and then from there putting it in action in a physical way that works best for you.
Meg Brunson
I love that. And I'm a big Trello user. I use Trello for my daily checklist. And then I love being able to check it off and it's gone. Check it off and it's gone.
Melanie Scroggins
We use the app called Todoist.
Meg Brunson
Okay, I've heard of that.
Melanie Scroggins
Yeah. I really enjoy it. We both use it, and you can put shared projects on there. So if I have to share something, like a honey-do list, essentially that we each need to be aware of, or like this call for instance, is on our list just to let him know that during this time, I need you to watch baby, that kind of thing. And so that's a really helpful one as well. I feel like Trello is extremely helpful as well. So there are tools that you don't have to use as a physical note card or sticky note reminder. But yeah, whatever way it takes for you to feel successful in what you're trying to accomplish, that's the way to go for sure. Like we've talked about, no comparison. No, this is how they do it. What works for you. And maybe it takes a little bit. Maybe you're like, I did the note card thing and I forget they're there. But you know what? I downloaded Trello and I really like it. Or I tell so and so, as my business buddy or my entrepreneurial counterpart to remind me in our weekly meetings or whatever that looks like it can take on many different forms.
Melanie Scroggins
The whole point is to design something that works best for you.
Meg Brunson
And I started with using just my Google calendar and putting reminders every day. But then for me, that got overwhelming. And I discovered Trello. And like you with Todoist, I've pulled my husband on a Trello. We have a home management board.
Melanie Scroggins
Awesome.
Meg Brunson
One of the ways that we use that. He makes the shopping list, and then I go do the shopping, and so he'll let me know the shopping list is on Trello.
Melanie Scroggins
I love that.
Meg Brunson
And it's so silly, but I feel like it really makes it so much easier. I can check off my little list. I have, like, a card that breaks it up by what Department it is in the grocery store. And I feel like you find those little tips and tricks that help streamline simple things like getting food to feed your family. But if that can save us ten minutes a day, that's ten minutes a day.
Melanie Scroggins
Absolutely. Well, and really more than that, it's how you are able to feel about it, because then not all of the responsibilities on you. You don't have the responsibility to make the list and go get it. That's something we very much struggle with because I have this control freak nature about the list. And so I'm like, well, I'll do the list, and then I'll go get it, don't worry. And it's like, okay, no, I need to be better about allowing for the different parts because we're a team. So I love hearing that. That's actually a really good insight and encouragement for me. So thank you.
Meg Brunson
Awesome. Well, I will put the link for all the things I'll put a link for Trello and Todoist in there in case you're looking for an app or program that will help you with this process. The link for the freebie from Melanie will be in there as well. And then before we go, where is the best place for people to connect with you, whether it's on social media or your website. How do you want people to connect with you?
Melanie Scroggins
Yeah, so I am on Instagram @MelanieScrogginsVO so feel free to just go there. I'd love to see kind of what everyone else is doing, where you're from, what you're up to. And then if you want to reach out and chat, you can just email me and I'll give Meg my email and I'm kind of old school that way. I like a good email conversation so feel free to reach out.
Meg Brunson
Awesome. Well, thank you so much. Thank you so much for spending time with us today. I feel like this was a real juicy conversation and I appreciate your willingness to be here and have it with me, with us.
Melanie Scroggins
Thank you so much. Yes.