What you will learn in this episode: 

•  Why you need to stack your projects

• How to correctly estimate your time for each project in advance

• Working ON your business, not just IN your business

Designers, you are not alone when you feel overwhelmed, stressed, lost or hopeless. Other designers are going through these same emotions with you. I heard from many before and even more after the release of Episode 106.

In today’s episode, I wanted to take a deeper dive into the emotions that so many designers go through and how we can manage them by stacking our projects and prioritizing our work ON our business as well as IN our business.

It’s the new year, so you are starting to get those prospective new client calls, and it’s a juggling act to try and figure out who to take, who not to take, and then, more importantly, when to take on another project. 

I never talk about what I haven’t personally been through. So today, I want to share my story with you – and maybe you’ve heard it before, but hopefully, it helps you understand that you really can’t be creative when you are physically exhausted, stressed out, or overwhelmed. 

There are so many components to running a business besides client work. You must consider the time for administrative tasks, marketing, and even your lunch! This is something I hope you all take away from today’s episode. Because what I realized a while ago is I was overbooking clients. 

So how do you avoid this? I’ve talked about this before in previous episodes, but you need to stack your projects. 

That means taking a deeper look into how much time you put into each client – not only the time spent at the project and meetings but also the time spent before and after. Things like the administrative tasks that you don’t factor in. All of this time adds up, and by tracking how much time you are investing, you can better decide when and if you are able to take the next project!

I want to talk today as well about the dedicated time you need to make for working ON your business. 

This is something I want you to really think about: Are working IN your business or ON your business? 

What does this mean? 

Well, I sent out an email last Friday that was spurred by me, kind of bitching and moaning to myself because I had dedicated two full work days to photographing projects. And what I realized was that, no, I wasn’t making money doing this, but this task was bringing in potential business for the coming months and years ahead. 

What I find is that the designers I talk to are so overwhelmed with getting the work done on the projects they have that they’re not working on getting projects in the future. By not taking the time to photograph your work, you are paying the price for that. That beautiful work that you’ve completed in your business can’t be seen by anyone! 

Taking time to do this is critical for designers! If you are stuck in overwhelm, if you have too many projects, then you don’t have the bandwidth, time, imagination, and creativity to be working on your business. 
We get into this business because we’re all about the creativity and A-game that goes into it. So scheduling your time so that you can bring your A-game into your business is critical. It will pay off because you will have the time, bandwidth, space, and creativity to be working ON your business at the same time you are working IN your business.

As always, please feel free to reach out to me at renee@devignierdesign.com or DM me on Instagram @devignierdesign

Like this Episode?

• Be sure to check out Episode #93: Not All Jobs Are a Good Fit – How to Filter Out the Best Ones for You

• Don’t miss an episode, listen on Spotify, and follow via Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, or RSS.

• Leave us a review on Apple Podcasts.