Q2 Isn’t the Problem Your Strategy Is

Q2 has a different kind of pressure.

The year is no longer new. The goals you set in January have met reality, and for a lot of business owners, that reality feels heavy.

In this episode of Honest Brew, we talk about the tension between momentum and burnout and why they can feel almost identical in certain seasons of business. What looks like a lack of progress is sometimes a sign that something deeper needs to shift.

We get into what it means to navigate slower seasons without panic, how to recognize when you are operating from desperation, and why space in your business is not always a problem to fix.

If Q2 has you questioning your direction, feeling overwhelmed, or unsure what to focus on next, this conversation will help you reset how you’re thinking about growth.

Because not every season is meant for pushing forward. Some are meant for recalibrating what actually matters.

A candid conversation between three seasoned business women who've been in the trenches of entrepreneurship. We bridge the gap between the glamorous just market and sell advice and the reality of what it takes to build a sustainable business. While most business content focuses on marketing, branding, OR operations in isolation, we bring all three worlds together. Because your brand culture needs to live in every system you create, your operations need to support your brand promise, and your marketing needs the infrastructure to deliver on what it sells.

We're here for the solopreneurs ready to grow beyond themselves, the partnership survivors rebuilding stronger, and anyone tired of business advice that treats branding, marketing, and operations as separate planets when they're part of one ecosystem.

HOSTS

Cheale Villa, Visual Caffeine, visualcaffeine.com / Monique Johnson, MoJo Design, ...

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:03

It's Q2. The year is no longer new. The goals you set in December have officially met reality. And for most of us, reality has some notes. And welcome back. Welcome to Honna's Brew Podcast. I am Shelle from Visual Caffeine. I'm Onique from Mojo Design. I'm Sarah from Indigo Elephant. And Q2 is exactly why we're here. We're here because Q2 has a really specific energy. And I would say that that energy is different for every single one of us in this room. I guess that's what we call it. But also the energy is all different for you. So we hope we address at least nuances. But there is a momentum and there's also a pressure. There's the creeping feeling that if you don't catch your breath soon, something's going to break. And spoiler, for a lot of business owners, something does. It's okay. I've been doing this for 27 years. I definitely could say yes, it will. And I think it's better if we are realistic about things. But so today we are talking about momentum versus burnt out. What's fueling one? What's feeding the other? And how your brands, marketing, and your operations are all tangled up in it. Okay, ladies. Hi, Q2. A lot of business owners have drifted from the brand position they set in January. What does it actually look like when we get to this point? What kind of things are coming up for you when you think about January? You're now approaching Q2. I know both of you have a lot to say. Let's get into it.

SPEAKER_00 1:50

Usually it is one of the busiest times of the year. And as I we get closer to the summer, we kind of going into Q2, I am finding that a lot of projects are coming to an end. And I don't necessarily have a lot of business coming in right now. And I actually look at this like the ebb and flows of any business. I look at it as an opportunity to start working a little bit internally on like some back-end system updates and things that have been kind of in the hovering over me for a long time, and I just haven't had time to work on them. So I do have some new projects coming in that are smaller. And I think that I'm seeing that these smaller projects are the winning part of this year so far. It's really interesting. It's just been a strange year. Um, I don't know if it's related to like the economy or what, but I don't know. Well, we're gonna we're gonna ride this one out. And you know, as a small business owner, you just like go through these ups and down phases and um you work it out to be real.

SPEAKER_03 3:04

Yeah, no, I I totally resonate with that because Q1 was a lot of like personal growth for me. And so that meant I wasn't working how I wanted to work, in which the way I kind of felt was I had one foot on the gas, like I'm ready to go, but then my other foot's on the break, so I'm not getting anywhere, and it's the most frustrating feeling. And anytime I experience that, it's usually because I'm trying to force something or I'm trying to go through something too quickly, and it's like, no, girl, there are things you need to learn first or let go of first or get in place first. So I feel for me, now that it's finally through my head, is Q1 is when I hermit a bit, is when I get quiet. It's when I really want to think about the foundations of my business. And then usually around March, I become feral because the clocks change, it gets warmer, like I'm excited to show up and do it. Like do the marketing, do these opportunities, call these blessings in. And that's what I'm feeling now again, even though it feels like pure chaos right now because so much is happening and I'm grateful because I know I'm built for this. However, it's still also okay to acknowledge I'm really overwhelmed. I need to go cry about it and then move forward because that was me as of today when we were recording.

SPEAKER_01 4:30

No, I'm hearing in both your space, the space for different reasons, and also accessing that space in different ways, which I think is I think is always important. Embrace it or if you need it, get it. I know that I remember when I and for our audience, I know that we could have a lot of people who just are starting their businesses. So we're all like seasoned down the road. We've learned to appreciate the quiet moments in business. Like that person who cancels or reschedules, like, oh, I got an hour. Like, you know, you learn to celebrate that space, you know. And I remember when I was new in my business, I panicked about it. And that's when I had, but I also think I had so much context around it that it allowed it allowed me to pack my calendar with stuff that was so unnecessary. I had so many years of unnecessary packing of my calendar. And I do have to say, I all my clients that I coach, consult, that inevitably becomes a uh conversation. Because even if you are good about your calendar, there's always gonna be a moment that you need to reevaluate it. Like, and in those quiet moments, that's actually something you should be reevaluating. I just did a short on touch points. So go into shorts, look for what at a touch point and how to strategize with touch points. But the reason I bring that up is because it also is an exercise in your business of things that you can do. Because if anything, analyzing your touch points, strategizing around your touch points and auditing them, looking for what shouldn't be there and also looking for what's not there. Those are all good practices when you find this space. Like our, I think our natural lean is to go into panic of, oh my gosh. And guess what? Stop. Just stop. Because that's when you make the worst decisions about the clients you bring on, the avenues you choose to take, with like because you're in desperation mode. Desperation mode is the worst time to be looking for clients. It's the worst time to be making major decisions in your business. So if you're able to get out of that mode and say, oh, like I'm gonna look at this mode of looking forward in my business, what may, you know, what makes sense for my strategy or things of that nature. And I'm I want to make sure you check in with yourself and make sure you're not in desperation mode. Make sure that brain, what is that survival brain in the back? Make sure you're out of that. Executive, get yourself back to executive. Then take actions on these things when you have that space, because that is what is going to reduce these gaps from happening in your business. And you're actually going to be expanding and delegating so you can actually have these gaps back. But it's because you're growing, not because you're starving. Oh, out of my soapbox. We should be flashing shell soapbox moment um on my YouTube channel. But with that said, I'm gonna report in on my Q2, which is I have to say this because of this podcast, it's actually really bringing even more awareness to me of these quarters, which are truly a gift because the way my creative brain works, if I have structured breakouts made for me, it is wonderful. But with that said, I started the beginning of this year planting a lot of seeds, it's making a lot of shifts of where, not necessarily shifts away, but things I've added into to help me achieve a growth in my business this year. I wanted to see a significant growth. So I was doing a lot of action around relationship marketing and strategizing planning for things that we are putting in emotion. So that was a lot of, I feel on top of that, we had a lot of projects in. And like I've said before, that's the best time to be looking for more business with your business. Best helping you will ever have. So, with that said, I'm already seeing the fruits of that happening. And I'm also, and when I say fruits, I'm not necessarily talking about new business. We have had new business come in. It's awesome. Uh, we also have had new inquiries come in, which is awesome. But when I talk about fruits, I'm also talking about opportunities to expand my leadership in areas that give me and my business exposure, as well as first and foremost, a place that I can serve with entrepreneurs, with people that I would just love to lusciously serve in a in a volunteer capacity. But what that allows us to do is have just a gosh, a place of influence and to be able to make a stand, especially for women entrepreneurs, because as much as we are able to freely do what we do, there are things that just are happening in spaces. And when you push to more of a leadership role, you're able to advocate better, you know? And so I just think that by getting more involved, either in your own industries or in different niche type of organizations, getting more involved and getting more into leadership positions, I just think just uh allows us to have the impact in many different ways and not just in our business. And so that's what I'm seeing. And I just so moving into Q2, going, okay, now I have to look at my calendar and see how I'm strategizing my calendar. And also we had an additional team member added this season, I mean this last quarter, and she is amazing and she's working out beautifully. And she couldn't have had better timing because she's taking off a lot of things that I was keeping on my plate that I shouldn't have. And it's just creating more space, which I have to say, if I had the name of the movie of my transformation work in the last 27 years of working in business, it would be Shell Getting Space. That is thematically the underlining everything.

SPEAKER_03 10:45

I do want to touch on the desperation piece because I feel like it can show up in two different ways. And I wasn't fully aware of that until this year. Cause I would, if desperation came or scarcity, it more came from like avoiding. Like I really wanted to avoid certain things. If something happened, I just wanted to cut it off very quickly. And that was a me problem and not being able to regulate, be resilient, resilient, and acknowledge emotions around business or just in life. And then this year I felt I'm in a beautiful place where I'm not really operating from fear anymore. I'm operating from like what I want to do, what excites me and having that deeper trust in myself and the universe or whatever you believe in. And what kind of snuck up on me is that clinging can just be as destructive as being avoidant. So, like clinging to me was like clinging to opportunities that were so exciting and felt so good. I'm like, oh my God, I want to come through, I want to come through to where I would chronically check my inbox to see, I'm like, did they answer yet? And girl, that gave me the ick. I'm like, girl, why are you doing this? Like I had to step away because I'm like, if I'm getting the ick, even though they know I'm not doing this, they can feel it. There's also an ick energy. And I was just like, why is this happening? Sitting with myself and being like, oh, it's because I'm afraid this opportunity is gonna go. So I had to double down on like, you know what? Maybe this opportunity has come to teach me something and this is what I'm meant to learn, then so be it. So just being mindful of like these emotions or thoughts, they are normal. And the remedy for them is to have awareness around them so you can step away. Like as soon as I start feeling emotional in business, I have to do something else. And it's not always easy. Just so then I can process those emotions and then come back with a clear head and to just have acceptance. Like this thought came up, I know it's not true, and then you can move on. Cause if we try to like never have those thoughts, we're never gonna be happy. And life's not meant to be like that. So I really do hope you can give yourself grace as you reflect on how Q1 went for you and like what you want to do moving forward.

SPEAKER_01 12:58

I think that is an agree, a great thing to touch on. And I don't think we can touch on it too much because I think it's something, it's like a slithering little snake that comes into entrepreneurship pretty regularly. Just scarcity monster, just like the, you know, just the imposter monster. All of these things can be the death to joy. And we of course don't want that. When any of these things that come up for us, scarcity, desperation, like these moments. One thing that can be so amazing and supportive, and we have the perfect episode for you, as always. Like you guys seriously need to jump into our library. We have so many episodes where we talk about this, and it is networking because networking can be not only aspect to gain sales, but to gain relationships. And what I was pointing to earlier, to also gain leadership, to have voice. You know, there's so many motivations to be connecting. But I also want to point to the fact that what I was talking about earlier is that I am connecting in diverse circles. So I'm in BI. I am joining a different organization that's similar to BI, but solely for consultants. I'm in a Catholic networking organization. I am in a solely global women's organization, like very diverse circles. And if you're like me, who wants to lusciously support everybody else and connect to everybody else? The more diverse you can be, the more you're able to, you know, connect people that you love so much and you want to support, you can connect them with people. And you know, that's only gonna help you. And I'm not saying that is the motive to do it because that is not how I operate. I know some people do. And when you operate that way, it totally shows through. One of the fears around networking can be, oh my gosh, I'm joining this group and I want to lusciously support people, but where am I gonna get them from? And that's the other motivation to have that diversity. That said, what do you ladies have to say about it? Because I know that you have very similar actions as I do in networking.

SPEAKER_00 15:06

Yeah. So when there's sort of downtime, um I I think it's really important to connect to it different, like you were saying before, diversity and having different circles of your life and different reaching new audiences. And so I started also joining a bunch of different groups so that it's not only, not only like I'm not going in and like pitching all these groups every time, but it's like just the broader that the more opportunity you give yourself with these wider audiences, the more opportunity for new connections to be made and new relationships to be built. And that could totally lead to new work. And it might even happen. Sometimes I meet someone and like three years later they reach out to me and are like, I met you at this event, or I met you through so-and-so, and then and I I remembered you because I knew I was gonna be ready at some point to hire you. And so those those kinds of things are are it's really vital to include those things and also not feel like like sometimes when I have all these networking events planned, I feel like, you know, kind of exhausted by it. But I think once I get to the event, I like come to life. It's like I get energy from other people. And you know, so it's like it's almost like motivating yourself enough to to like get there and then having the conversations. It's I noticed that that's a cycle that I have personally, and to just get over that initial, you know, phase. And once I get there, that's when like the doors open.

SPEAKER_01 16:50

Absolutely. And I have to say that on that note, um, I've had the same thing where I've, you know, talked to people, um, and they have they've literally said to me, I can't wait till I can afford to hire you. Like or or I'm in that moment of hiring you. Uh, but also remember that everybody you talk to, you're talking to everybody they know. And sometimes we can focus a lot on that direct person when it's everybody they know as well. But I but I also want to say on that before I'm sure that Sarah has something to say, is that I have where people even ask me advice don't guard your cards, girls, men, ladies, males, whoever's out there, don't guard your cards because you, by answering their questions, by giving them advice, you are showing them not only, wow, you're a really generous person, but you're really knowledgeable. And when you guard your cards, you can give another impression you might not want. Also, the generous generosity I talked about connecting people with other people, that generosity is also in giving advice. I got an email from somebody in one of my groups today asking me about, you know, da-da-da-da-da-da. And I'm like, sure. And I just I answered him and gave him a detailed answer. And then he finished with, yeah, we've got to talk about hiring you because I really need to. So one of the mis, and I heard this so much in networking, people like, don't I'm not giving away things for free. And I'm like, seriously. If I had to say one of the things that has really uh like supported my business to continue to grow is being always an open book.

SPEAKER_03 18:37

Yeah. Anytime I do networking or coffee chats, I'm always very like, I'm relationship first. And my love language is active service. So it's like, I'm always transparent, like you can do what I do. It just gets to a point where you no longer have the time, capacity, or desire to do it because you did not start your business to do admin and operations. You did it to transform people's lives. And if I can be a part of that business journey, I am honored. If I'm not the right fit, then it was great meeting you. Like I'm just chill. Like that's how I want it to feel. I'm like, this is chill. This isn't serious. Let's just figure it out. And I feel like as we move into Q2, you can bring that energy to other aspects of your business, like your marketing, your sales. It doesn't have to be so serious. It doesn't have to be like this rigid thing. Like, have fun with it. Because I feel like the more fun you have, the more magnetic you become, the more open you are to blessings coming to you because you're not so focused on when will the next opportunity come. You're just excited to receive and then continue giving through however you want to. Absolutely.

SPEAKER_01 19:47

And I gotta have the quote, ladies. Are you ready for it? I gotta have the quote. Yes. I actually have two. Yeah, well, I'll I'll torture you guys. Momentum and burnout are not opposites, they are the same energy pointing in two different directions.

SPEAKER_00 20:04

Oh, jeez.

SPEAKER_01 20:08

That was heavy. Yeah, that one hit me for sure. And I do have to say that I love that this conversation has gone in a way that supports the burnout as well as as well as the momentum. So we didn't get in, go into two different directions with that. We all went to the same today. But with that said, consistency without strategy is just showing up and showing up tired for the wrong people with the wrong message is not marketing, that's noise. And we got a whole lot of that mic drop in the world right now. And with that said, the soups.

SPEAKER_03 21:28

You got so much data from Q1 on what felt good and what didn't. And now take that time to sit with yourself and be like, what did I really enjoy? What sucked the life out of me? Because that will help you figure out how you want to move forward in Q2. And the most beautiful thing about entrepreneurship is that there is no wrong decision. You just win or you learn. So just continue being open. Amazing.

SPEAKER_01 21:52

As always, and thank you for being here. Join us next time where we are brewing up truth.