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4 Tips on How I Successfully Prepared My Business For Maternity Leave
A few months ago I was needed everywhere in my business. Over the past 3 months, I’ve done a lot of work behind the scenes to NOT be needed everywhere. Preparing for maternity leave is always the most productive I have ever been. So here are my four tips for you:
1. Set your dates for maternity leave.
I knew I needed help to transform my business into a machine so I could take maternity leave. So I hired an individual coach and met with her weekly to help me set up the right systems to have a little more freedom by the time my baby arrived. My coach asked me in the beginning, “When do you start maternity leave?”
In the past, I’ve had 2-3 months of maternity leaves from my business. But, I really didn’t think it was possible this time around because I have grown my business so much over the last 3 years. It’s just not the same business as it was when my last daughter was born in 2018. So I made a goal of setting my business up for success for a 3-month maternity leave. I put a sticky note in front of my computer so I could remind myself of the goal every day. When you have your own business, it’s not like you just ask your boss for time off, etc. You create your own paycheck so I am not getting maternity pay or anything during my maternity leave. I also communicated to my team months in advance what the dates of my maternity leave would be so they knew what needed to get done when. I also scheduled my leave to start a few weeks early just in case my baby arrived early.
2. Create systems and processes to set up your business like a machine.
I learned so much about systems and processes to set your business up as a machine before I took my maternity leave. I learned that your business CAN operate without you. You can create marketing campaigns that don’t involve you. You can create sales without being the salesperson. You can serve clients without being there. You may have to do some hiring or set up better systems which is what I did. I didn’t hire anyone new but I worked with my coach to just optimize our current team so we could grow our business and serve our customers better without me. The truth is the team is actually even better than me at things and everything actually gets done so I am no longer the roadblock. I recommend starting with a Virtual Assistant or a Project Manager. Start creating systems and start handing things off. I was forced to because I was going on leave and I am so glad that this forced me to get systematized! Your team can go through the system. If a process isn’t working how you want it to, record a video and share what could be improved, etc. Set up a routine of regularly assigning tasks for the week to your team instead of daily managing them. I am not daily managing my team any more like I used to because the team has systems in place and knows how to manage the business without me.
3. Create an asset you can sell while you are not there.
How can you still serve your audience and make sales while you are out on maternity leave? I created a live planning workshop 4 months before my due date. After the live workshop, I took the recorded training content and Q&A’s and turned them into an evergreen product to sell the next month. Since then, I have sold hundreds of these products already and I will continue selling them while I am on maternity leave. I’m gaining organic traffic through my blog, podcast and social media pages plus generating Facebook ad traffic to the sales page which doesn’t require me to be there. I’m also bringing in leads and sales which eventually upsells into my group coaching programs and memberships…all while I am not there. If you continue to believe you have to be involved in every sale, you’ll be tied to your computer and really stress yourself out with a new baby. Don’t do it! Spend some time thinking about what you love to teach about and turn it into an Ebook or mini-course that you can sell while you are on maternity leave.
4. Batch content ahead of time.
I’m a huge fan of batching content ahead of time. Before my maternity leave, I batched 3 months of social media content and 3 months of blog content ahead of time. My virtual assistant helped me get this scheduled on the site and then I reviewed the final posts before I left. I recommend blocking out days in your calendar to record content and write content ahead of time. Don’t do anything else on those days but prepare your content. You’ll be amazed at how much you get done in 8 hours of content creation!!
I hope these 4 tips help you create an incredible maternity leave so you can have some good quality time off with your new baby! I’ll see you when I return from my maternity leave! 🙂
