Episode 94: Lessons in Entrepreneurial Spirit for Professional Organizers

What does it take to have a professional organizing business? When do you know it's the right time to launch a business? What does entrepreneurship look like for a professional organizer? Jen and Melissa answer all of these questions and many more in this episode. 

Here's a quote from Jen as a sample of what is in this podcast--

"When someone's asking, so how do I just start? It's almost like the underlying question is how do I know when I know enough? How do I know when I'm ready enough? How do I know when I've done enough research and listened to enough of your podcast to actually just, you know, try this? That's the, that's the answer though, is that there's never going to be a time when you're not learning something new. So when you're used to that, then it doesn't matter where you start. And when."

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That is all that we have for you today on this episode of the Pro Organizer Studio podcast, if you have not yet joined Jen Obermeier for our free workshop, your four-part plan for landing your dream clients in 2021, hop over to www.poroadmap.com and we will get you that workshop on demand. It's a great way to spend an hour of your time.

Thank you so much for listening in to the pro organizer studio podcast. If you'd like to get our roadmap for success as a pro organizer, head straight to www.poroadmap.com.

FULL TRANSCRIPT

Jen Obermeier: [00:00:00] when someone's asking, so how do I just start? It's almost like the underlying question is how do I know when I know enough? How do I know when I'm ready? Enough? How do I know when I've done enough research and listened to enough of your podcast to actually just, you know, try this? That's the, that's the answer though, is that there's never going to be a time when you're not learning something new.

So when you're used to that, then it doesn't matter where you start. And when.

Melissa Klug: Hey pro organizers. It's your co-host Melissa Klug. And today we are bringing you another episode of Jen and Melissa chats. Jen came to visit me at my house in Minnesota, and we just pressed record and we recorded everything that we talked about. So you guys can get a view of what it's like.

We get together and talk about organizing. This conversation today is really near and dear to my heart because we are talking about what does it take to be ready to have an organizing business? What is the entrepreneurial spirit? What does it really, really take to be a business person? And we really get deep. 

And the nice thing is whether you are brand new to an organizing business, whether you are just thinking about starting an organizing business or whether you've been a business for a while, there are things you can take out of this conversation. I know I had things that I listened to Jen and said, oh man, I need you to take that into my own organizing business.

We're talking about what does it take to actually have your own business? And a lot of people struggle with this because they say I've never been in business before. I don't know how to do the things.

I know I can tell you and I talk about it in the podcast. I never envisioned myself being an entrepreneur ever. And what I discovered was. I now never don't want to be an entrepreneur at any point in my life. I love it so much. I love having my own business, but there are blocks to that. And we talk about that today in the podcast. 

I am excited to give you this bird's eye view of what it is like when Jen and I get together and talk organizing. This is also a super [00:02:00] quick reminder that we have a free workshop. It is called “Your 4-Part Plan for Landing Your Dream Clients in 2021.” This workshop is going to be going away forever in a very short time. So we'd really love for you to see it before it goes away. You can hop over to www.poroadmap.com and get that free workshop.

It is on demand. Anytime that works in your schedule, we would absolutely love to see you there.

You're listening to the Pro Organizer Studio podcast with Melissa Klug and Jen Obermeier. Thank you so much for joining in our mission is to broaden the horizons of savvy business women in the organizing industry by instilling confidence and inspiring authenticity. You'll gain new insight into strategies designed specifically for professional organizers. So now let's get started.

Melissa Klug: A lot of people ask us the basic question, which is the hardest question to answer. How do I get started? Oh, I know sometimes the simplest question is the hardest question. Part of my answer to this question is. Just get started because I actually think one of the reasons I have been successful is because I did not give, I really gave almost no thought whatsoever to starting a business and just doing it.

Someone who like never wanted to be an entrepreneur, never like being an entrepreneur. Was one of the scariest things that I could've ever imagined. I had to take an entrepreneurship class in grad school. And we had to present an entrepreneurial idea. We didn't even have to do it. I had like the cold sweats.

I remember I had like hives coming up my neck when I had to present this idea. Yeah. And so being an entrepreneur was something that was [00:04:00] very scary to me. And so when I decided to become a professional organizer, I just said, I'm just going to do it. And I think sometimes we can overthink things so much that then you give all these reasons as to why I can't do it.

Yeah. Well, I don't know how to build a website. Neither did. I, I didn't know how to organize in someone's home. I didn't know how to get an LLC set up. I didn't know how, I didn't know how to do any thing. Yeah. But I just said, I want to do this. And other people figured out how to do this, so I must be able to figure out how to do this.

Right. So I think part of that answer is just have the confidence that you'll be able to figure it out, but thinking about it and thinking about it and thinking about it and never doing anything. Or thinking about, well, I have to make a list of all the things I need to do, right. Sometimes can feel overwhelming.

Jen Obermeier: I think, you know, there are a lot of reasons, like there's a lot of reasons why somebody would be asking, like I get it, they have all the information, but how do I get started? And, and probably this is one of the reasons why I felt very compelled about telling people or sharing that my experience, which is you can do this as a side hustle.

It does not have to be your full-time business right on day one or day ever. Yes. Or it can be a side hustle part-time business for. And then later it can be a full-time thing or never. I mean, it's, it's okay for it to look like, whatever it has to look like for you. And that is still an especially true.

In 2020 and 2021, you know, you have, I know we've heard recently for people who stepped away from their business for a while, they want to kind of ramp back up and get back into it. And, and what being your own boss allows you to do, and especially with a business like this, where [00:06:00] you can take it with you, like maybe your, your spouse is relocating and you want to start over somewhere else.

Or maybe now you're about to have twins and you're not going to work for a while, but you kind of like want to have like some clients that you keep seeing, like you have a lot of flexibility to have it mold and shape along with like your life circumstances. I do think, and maybe I'm overgeneralizing, I could be wrong, but I think this business would not appeal to people who also did not really value their home life and home. Yes. Because again, if you're the type of person who is really attracted to this and really cares about working with people and helping people, I think you also probably, I would guess, or just have a person that wants to have balance and wants to not be working a hundred hour work weeks because of.

You'd probably be perfectly happy in some other type of high powered job or career or something where you could make tons more money and way less time. I mean like this is, this is a special T sort of calling a little bit, I think. Absolutely. So, so when we're talking about getting started, it's like, okay, if your goal is just because you want to make a thousand dollars by next Monday the answer is a little different than if this is like, okay, you know that this is the type of business you want to slow down and be able to set your own schedule.

You want to be able to be your own boss. This is not a, you know, two week project. And then now. A full-time right. Entrepreneurial venture, I guess some people get that, but maybe that's not their first entrepreneurial venture. I think that there's, you know, there's a lot of, I think there's a lot of lessons about being your own boss, that along the way that you cannot quite rush.

Yes. Right? Like, I mean, getting a client and you know, making some money and getting the website started. I mean, we talk a lot about these things that your doing at the beginning to set your up, set yourself up for success down the road, but you can't necessarily come up against all of the obstacles and all of the growth lessons like and say, okay, I'm going to have those done [00:08:00] six weeks into it.

And I'll be like, ready to go. Don't do everything scaling and building a team. I mean, these it's like it's personal growth, which does not come on a schedule. Correct. I mean the personal growth of accepting that. Are the one who's in charge and that you are making your own rules. I mean, that takes a few months, if not years, to kind of get used to, and to kind of settle into your confidence of I'm the one who is designing my business plan and business model around what works for me.

And it's okay for it to not look exactly like someone else's and it's okay for me to. Invest time and energy into maybe even reworking things that are not working for you and figure out how to improve those things, because you probably won't get the recipe correct. Right out of the gate for like how this business is going to work for you forever.

So getting comfortable with that process of like continuous improvement, I think is something that. For people who are perfectionist they, it's a hard lesson of entrepreneurial life that you don't have. All of those things set for you. And that you're going to have to continually adapt to circumstances as you go forward.

So COVID has certainly brought out some of those challenges for certain people. People who thought, I mean, Melissa, and I've talked about this on the podcast a few times, you know, people who thought, oh, well, everybody else who's growing a big business is growing a big team and hiring these employees.

And then I thought that's what I needed to do. And so I started doing that and I found out I can't stand managing people. Right. And Melissa. And I both agree that is not the path for everybody. And that that's okay. And so when you start to compare yourself to other people, it's going to eventually slow you down because you're not listening to what is working for you and for the types of clients that you want to have.

And again, Becoming a, if you do want to grow a team and become a leader of a company or franchise your business, I mean, people have a lot of dreams of how to expand this and once it gets going, because I would say this industry is still very much. Growing and [00:10:00] expanding and becoming more mainstream, you know, that's, that is its own business path where you have leadership, personal growth, milestones that are going to come to you at unexpected times.

That does not happen all in one, you know, module or course not just of ours, but of anybody like you, you don't wake up the next day and you're like ready to do it if you've never done it before. So. So your, your timeline might be different than somebody else's and that is a hundred percent fine. I think that's something that really needs to be said over and over again is no matter what your goal is.

Due to individual factors due to your own motivation, due to how many, you know, the right things happen at the right time 

Melissa Klug: due to where you live, what kinds of clients are around you? How people find you, 

Jen Obermeier: there's no guarantees of any of this. And so part of being a business owner is being a risk taker and not just being a risk taker, but adjusting and adapting to the things that you learn along the way while you're taking those risks and learning those lessons and applying them to you and to your clients, into what the, you want the next five or 10 years of your life to look like.

Not that you have to have it perfectly planned out, but having a better vision of like, what would make you happy? Like the more, you know, the better, right? And sometimes you don't know those things at the beginning. So it's kind of like with your client you've got to adjust and give it give it the time that it needs and the time that it deserves for you to process those lessons and to actually apply them to yourself. Yeah. Gosh, that was like a little mini SIGMOD what do you think going, cause don't you think,

when someone's asking, so how do I just start? It's almost like the underlying question is how do I know when I know enough? How do I know when I'm ready? Enough? How do I know when I've done enough research and listened to enough of your podcast? You actually just, you know, try this. That's the, that's the answer though, is that there's never going to be a time when you're not learning something new.

So when you're used to that, then it doesn't matter where you start. [00:12:00] And when 

Melissa Klug: also I had someone say this to me and this is not a personal statement. You can decide that you like kids and want to have kids, or you never want to have kids or whatever. But I remember when I was in that phase of my life, when you might be starting to think about having a family and someone said, there's never a perfect time to.

Have a family. Yeah. If you wait for the perfect time for you to be like making the exact perfect amount of money and have the perfect job and have the, you know, it's the right weather outside or whatever, like you wait for a perfect time to do anything. You're not going to get like a major sign from the universe of like, there's not going to be a, an airplane that flies by and says it's time to start a business.

The perfect time is when you realize I want something different. This is a dream that I cannot stop thinking about. I've always wanted to be an entrepreneur, or I have always wanted to be a professional organizer or every one of my life has told me I should be a professional organizer or I'm in a job transition.

That's the story that happened to me. It, it doesn't matter. What the scenario is that scenario is going to be different for every person. The reason I started my business is different than the reason Jen started her business. Every single organizer has a different start to their business. So you're never going to get a formula of a plus B equals C and C is the perfect time to start your business.

Jen Obermeier: Yeah. And you know what else is not going to happen? They won't suddenly be. Six people that heard that you love organizing that, or your call you all at the same time and say, I just, I don't know how this crazy idea can, like, can you just come to my house and like pay you to like, make it look like, I mean, if that were to happen to everybody, then we would be like, this is a sign, right?

I mean, yes. But like, unfortunately nobody knows about that until you start talking about it. So how do you start is you have to start talking about it now, Melissa and I have shared about a million ways. You can either talk to a crowd of a thousand people [00:14:00] or you can talk to one person. Yes. But you've got to be in the habit of talking about it in a way where you're just sharing what you do.

It's not about selling them on it. It's just kind of like, Hey, you know, that show Marie Kondo, you know, show them that it, yeah. I help people organize their house, like yeah. 

Melissa Klug: This thing, and yes, that's the thing. And yes, I get paid for it. And all those other questions that people ask you, like, wait, people pay you to do that.

Yes they do. And I will also tell you in my experience. I have had multiple different careers and I have never had a career that when someone is making small talk with you and say, what do you do when I say I'm a professional organizer, I have never had anyone go well, that's, that's boring.

I need to go get a drink and I need a new appetizer. I got to go. People love talking to me about my job. And I will tell you like, to the point that sometimes I'm at a party or an event. And I'm like, I'm kinda tired of talking about work right now. Cause I like I work all week. So like, I don't really maybe want to talk about it.

Now, people talk to me about it, eagerly and excitedly. And it's not because they're trying to be nice. They are fascinated by what we do. So when you start talking about, this is what I do, you are not annoying people and you don't have to do it in a salesy way. You don't have to say, Hey well, can I schedule a consult at your house?

That's not what we're doing. Yeah. People are obsessed with talking to me about my job. 

Jen Obermeier: And I found that people, once they understand, I'm like, you know organizing houses and they're not like, oh, you're an event organizer or something. Right. They will either say one or two things, they'll say, oh my gosh, I should totally do what you do.

Yes. Because they either love it. Or they're like, oh my. I need you, or I know somebody and you're like, oh my God, you need to come to my closet or whatever. And I'm like, yeah. Ha ha. 

Melissa Klug: Well, we can actually do, we can actually do a whole thing of like the series of events that happen when you tell someone you're a professional organizer.

So it is all of those things that you just said, then it becomes, so have you worked with [00:16:00] any hoarders and then what's the worst thing you've ever seen in someone's house? Then they'll ask you, have you ever found weird things in someone's house? Like they, they want to know like all those, 

Jen Obermeier: oh, I have a funny story for you.

I don't think I've ever shared on certainly not on the podcast if this isn't I love this because I do have little things like in my pocket that I'm like one day, I'm going to say that on the pod. Today's the day I have. So one time a guy said to me, a friend of my husband's he's like you're a professional organizer.

He's like, how much do you charge? And you know, of course he's like not, we're not thinking ideal client here. Right? And I'm like, well, it's a hundred dollars an hour, but you know, I do like. The sessions or whatever. And he's like, okay, great. He's like, so here's what I want to happen. I will pay you a hundred dollars to just approach my wife in a social setting.

And just, tell her, she kind of is probably has too much stuff and she needs to downsize. And I was like, and that'll take me 15 minutes. Yeah. Now that didn't actually happen. But it just goes to show you that people are always thinking that. Would I necessarily hire you? Probably not, but I need that.

What he was saying to me was I need the words or I needed the motivation to talk to my wife because now we need to go through the downsizing process. And I get that. And you know what I said to him, I said, I will talk to your wife for free. I was like, but it sounds like if she needs help, I said, at least, you know, that that exists.

And he's like, you're exactly right. Yep. And I do think that that was kind of funny because I was like, okay, there's a whole nother, when you talk about a little side angle, you're like, I could also just be the wing man for. For the spouse that just needs somebody who does this as a business to just sort of motivate I'm like, oh, well, I'll get paid a hundred dollars per 15 minutes to be a wind, man.

Yeah. I love that. That actually would be fashion wing, wing organizer. 

Melissa Klug: What do you think is the entrepreneurial [00:18:00] mindset that you need to do? What we do? Cause I think there's an entrepreneurial mindset. That's easy for me to say there is an entrepreneurial mindset.

That's kind of like. For anyone, who's an entrepreneur, no matter what the industry is, but you know, there's a difference between what Elon Musk does and what we do true. And I think so when I said I was always afraid of entrepreneurship, I remember when I was in business school, there was a very specific moment where we were taking an entrepreneurship class.

And I remember the man that was teaching the class was a serial entrepreneur. He had started a ton of businesses and he was telling us stories about things that had happened to him in his entrepreneurial career. And the things that he was talking about were giving me super anxiety, deals that had happened at the last minute.

And he had a shipment that was supposed to be coming from China and it didn't arrive on time. So we had to pretend like he had a shipment. Do you know what I mean? Like there were these stories where I go, oh no, I couldn't do that, but that's not the kind of entrepreneurship that we do. So what do you believe.

You know, sometimes I think people are intimidated by, oh, I don't know how to be an entrepreneur because I don't know business or I have been a social worker or I've been a stay at home mom. So what do you think the keys are to be an entrepreneur as a professional organizer?

Jen Obermeier: Well, no, I love that because I'm like, I have like 15 answers come to me and then like one made. Okay. So let me get the one major answer. You need to be the kind of person who Googles stuff. Because absolutely nothing out there, whether it's organizing or any other business that you can run.

A complete mystery. Yeah. Let's be honest. It is well documented. There is a reason why the university of YouTube is where people learn how to do stuff. I mean, there is no reason why, I mean, short of raising actual capital that you would have to do for maybe any like say want to open a traditional like [00:20:00] retail business.

Right. I want to open a open a skincare store skincare. I want to sell skincare products. Okay. There is a known there's known research, documentation, business plans, everything out there is out there basically for free. Now, are you going to, you're not going to get the best mentorship in the skincare business for free, but like you can do research and come up with basic business plans.

Literally anything there, if you were waiting on someone to bless you with the information. And I do mean literally, like in a miraculous sort of, it came to me in a dream yeah. That's not going to happen. Right. But if you feel inspired, take that inspiration to Google and then fill in the blanks of what you don't know.

Now, when you're talking about an entrepreneurial mindset, there is something else that you said that rings true to me. And I say this not in a derogatory way towards you or me or any of our audience, but to put it in perspective, there's Elon Musk, entrepreneurship, like I'm disrupting an entire industry.

Yes. We're going to go to space. Right. We're gonna make a new cryptocurrency and then there's baby entrepreneurship, which is at the level that we are at. And I'm not saying that because it, you know, our job is predominantly a female industry. I'm not saying. Because of any other reason other than the fact of this is not that mind blowing world disruptive stuff.

No. We're talking about forming an LLC, getting business insurance, picking a business name. I mean, when it comes down to the hard adulting, things of entrepreneurship, professional organizing is just about as easy as it gets, because you don't even have to be certified to do it. 

Melissa Klug: So you don't have to be certified.

You do not have to have a business space to operate in. You do not have to have inventory. You do not have to buy anything to start your business. You can start your business with [00:22:00] $0, 

Jen Obermeier: literally a game of confidence. Yes. And which you cannot buy. Obviously you have to actually care about people. But if all of those things are given, which I think.

I've always assumed that on this podcast and in other, all other places that I've talked about, this business, what we're talking about is the baby level of, of entrepreneurship. So like let's not get it twisted. We're not talking about the stressful hundred hour startups. Organizing business is this, I mean, honestly, one of the easiest things to start a business around as a service. So if you were somebody who was very passionate about graphic design, you could start a graphic design service business, like a service that someone else cannot do for themselves or does not want to.

You're like sweet. That's what I do. Yep. Chart. I mean, you invoice, you pay like that is really it. Absolutely. So I think that a lot of maybe the intimidation and mystery around. The business world is probably because you're comparing yourself to someone that isn't an entirely different league industry.

Like you don't need to subscribe to some special podcast or, or, or read everything about, you know, Google's acquisitions to understand the business world. Like you just need to be able to communicate with people about what you do. And I think too, that about that entrepreneur entrepreneurial mindset is if you are serious about being profitable, that math is your.

And is your friend that's not scary. Yeah. So, so whether, and that's a much bigger conversation, which this is why we kind of have the business course of inspired organizer is it's not just about organizing people, that's organizing essentials and how you communicate and how you help people. But the business part of it is math and making some money.

And most of those decisions are not irreversible either. So it's like making a decision about like, okay, this is who I serve, what I'm going to like, my name, that I'm going to go by what I'm going to put on my business card. All of those things are upgradeable [00:24:00] and, and able to be a process and not a forever decision.

I tell them that, go ahead. 

Melissa Klug: God's going to say, I tell people sometimes this is kind of an aside, but people put so much energy. Sometimes they're like, oh my gosh, I have to find the perfect name. And I'm like, you are not building Coca-Cola right. You are not building a T and T and by the way, those businesses sometimes change their names too.

Like, can use your name. You can just say, I'm, Melissa's personal organizing. Boom. You're done. Like you do not have. And not none of your changes are irreversible or you're, it just don't, don't get married to it. But anyway, 

Jen Obermeier: and I understand why people feel married to it because I think that on some level.

When you have a business, it does feel like a part of you as a person. And you're like, I can't possibly put myself out there and represent myself unless it's the ultimate thing. And it's like, well, when do we ever present ourselves as the ultimate version of ourselves? Never. I grew up with a name even on your wedding day.

You're like, like, whoa, that was, that was interesting. 

Melissa Klug: What I was going to say is I grew up with a name that was my name for 27 years of my life. And then one day in one hour, that name that I rebranded to a name that was a lot less attractive than the one I started with. And I still took it. Click the, I

Jen Obermeier: want to touch back on the math thing.

The, the same the same concept of there are people who want to have a hobby. And there are people who want to replace a corporate career. Correct? I mean, you know, there's a spectrum. The difference between all those things really does just come down to math. So if you are serious, when, when, again, coming back to Melissa's question, which is what is the entrepreneurial mindset?

What is the entrepreneurial mindset of someone. Serious about the profit is embracing the math rather than running away from it. Like, oh, I don't want to look at that. And I'm not saying you have to do all of your own accounting. I'm just saying that you do have to make sure that your pricing makes you actually profitable [00:26:00] and that you treat marketing as an actual serious business activity.

And not just something that you're like, oh, I did that a little bit when I first started and now I'm just waiting to be blessed with clients. You know, it's like, no, it's like, well, the way that I see it is you make a schedule for yourself for the week. If you don't have a session during one of your session blocks, then sweet.

You get a marketing block, you get to work. Yeah. Marketing. Yes. So, so the goal would be anytime I would not have a client, is that I'm doing my chosen marketing activities. And then I'm planting seeds for the future. And that's okay. I mean, that's what, and then when you have a full client list with a waiting list, then you're like sweet.

You've reached, you've reached your entrepreneurial dreams for that moment. And in the future, they may change and evolve to where you want to have a bigger team or fewer clients. I mean, you, you can still change. I think that's the most important thing is to be flexible. Google, what you don't know, embrace the math.

Like, this is not, this is not the hardest thing in the world. Yes. 

Melissa Klug: I want to touch on something you just said. So the other day I did a hot seat. So sometimes we do coaching with people that are in our inspired organizer group when they're having a very specific problem that they need to have solved.

So I did a hot seat with a woman in our group who she was giving away too much in a consultation. So she, she would say, I only want to work with people for five hours, but she would leave a consultation and she'd be like, I told them I would come for just an hour because that's, that's what they wanted.

Yeah. So here's the point of the story though? So one of the things I talked to her about is her mindset was. Well, I didn't have a client that day. So I decided that doing an organizing client for one hour, at least I would still make some money and, you know, I would have a client that day and I said, okay, I just want to flip it around a little bit.

What if you had spent three hours? Working on your website or working on your, you know, [00:28:00] Instagram or working on YouTube or like working on your business. So she felt like if she wasn't at a client that that wasn't work. And so setting aside those blocks of time to say, I am working, even if I'm sitting at my kitchen counter with my laptop, right?

Because that three hours, you spend that three hours that you spend working on your website or working on marketing or reaching out for networking and for referrals, we'll end up giving you business that might be worth a thousand dollars or $2,000 or $3,000 versus the a hundred dollars that she made go into that client for an hour.

Yeah. Right. I completely agree with that. I agree with that. But I think for us, part of the entrepreneurial mindset, Has to be also flexibility, flexibility, adaptability, and creativity. 

Jen Obermeier: Okay. Tell me more about creativity. 

Melissa Klug: So creativity to me in our business, and I think sometimes people think that they hear the word creativity and they think, well, I don't want to paint a picture and I don't, I'm not a graphic designer.

That's not what I mean, creativity to me an hour job means I can think differently about. Clients job, or they might hire me to organize their pantry. But then I see that like, Hey, does your toy room also, is that frustrating to you? Like, is there something I could do to help you in your toy room or it is saying like, Hey, I noticed that you have this problem over here.

Here are some solutions that I would think about for that. Do you want to talk about that? It is thinking differently about how can I go find clients or how can I go market myself? It's about being creative about solving problems, whether they're for your own business or for your client. I agree. And I wouldn't consider myself a creative person from like a, you know, an artistic standpoint or anything.

But I do like to think that I'm creative about what are four different ways we can solve that problem. So if a client says to me [00:30:00] we were talking earlier about how we organize our own personal closets and we do things very differently. But if I went into a client and I said, there's only one way to organize a closet, and this is how we're going to do it.

And if you don't like to organize your closet this way, then you're never going to be organized. I have to be creative when I go to every single client to know, okay, the way I organize my closet, doesn't work for her the way Jen organizes her closet. Doesn't work for this client.

This third idea that I have, doesn't work for my client. What's the fourth and fifth and sixth idea I can give them. So they go, yeah. Yeah. Yes. And that's creativity to me. Yes. 

Jen Obermeier: That like the questions that you ask and like the sort of the exploration of their thinking that is really the crux of what coaching actually is, is it's not telling people what to do is helping them discover, oh, this is my personal blueprint for how I want to succeed at this particular thing.

And now that's true if I'm coaching you in business or you're coaching a client on on closet organizing or any of those other things is it's not actually about knowing all the answers in advance. And I think that that's a big thing that holds up a lot of organizers is, oh, I'm not ready because they don't know all the answers in advance.

It's like, no, the people in your area. That are not being served by you right now are waiting for you to feel ready, because all you need to do is help them see their stuff. You do not need to have your own house perfectly organized from top to bottom X, Y, and Z. All the other things we've ever said that you don't need.

They need you to be there and show up and listen to them and help them see solutions to their problems that they cannot see. 

Melissa Klug: And by the way, in my experience, which stretches thousands of hours and hundreds of different homes in like 10 different states, far more than mine, by the way, she's highly qualified.

I'm telling you one of the most [00:32:00] glorious things I haven't to you in an organizing career is when you go into a client's house and they'll be like, I cannot solve this problem. This is, I just, I can't do it. And you look at it and by the way, in your head, you go, it can't possibly be this simple. And you give them the simplest suggestion you could ever think of like, Hey, the clothes that are on the floor?

What if we just hung those up instead of putting them on the floor and they will be like, you are a genius. Yes. I have been told I was a genius. So many times that you would think that I was an actual genius, which I am not like you can give a client the simplest solution that is right in front of them, but they can write.

See it, they are blocked from seeing it. That's true. That's true. And you don't even have to be that gifted to be able to come up with those solutions, to have a client think you're the best person that they have ever hired in their entire life. 

Jen Obermeier: I can vouch for that in my own experience. I'm like, I'm not even that great at this, but I'm really happy that they love me that much and need me forever.

Melissa Klug: Right? So you seeing their space and being an impartial third party is the most valuable thing you can bring and having a few things in the back of your head to be creative, to think about solution. You do not have to be experienced or gifted, or 

Jen Obermeier: you don't have to have the containers store memorized. No, you do not know.

You don't have time to figure that out in between sessions. Yep. 

Melissa Klug: The other valuable thing you can do is sometimes say, I don't know, I'm going to have to, I'm going to have to research that or, you know what, I need to think about that a little bit, or I'm going to have to Google solutions for a three inch wide drawer. Yeah, no. 

Jen Obermeier: Or I'll say my brain just sorta needs process and sleep on it because I can totally, like sometimes [00:34:00] we have literally like a space sort of puzzle problem solving, and one thing leads to another.

I'm going to come up with something. And I really do. I know that I will, but that's not going to be on the spot. And I don't set the expectation that I know everything on the spot. Right. Cause that's insane for anybody. So 

Melissa Klug: your clients are not looking for you to be that genius with an SKU level of like, they don't need you to come in and be like on the container store has a three ranger and it's in the aisle 17 and it is 29.

Jen Obermeier: I'd bring it with me and my car. Right. No, they're not looking for you to do that. Yeah. So with that being said, yes, it's if we're, if it's just a game of confidence and, and it's, it's using a skill that, you know, you already have in that, you're passionate about it, the more that you use it and flex it, the more confident that you will be, and it is going to like, your success is going to start to build on itself.

And I truly believe that the thing that you do get blessed without a nowhere in a dream or while you're taking a shower is like, you know, ideas and ways for you to continue meeting new people and asking for like, asking for help or asking for referrals, like things that are, that you do feel comfortable with will start to occur to you along the way where you're like, oh, I can do this because I did this other thing.

If that makes sense, like, you start to build that confidence by just doing which is unfortunately an answer. Sometimes we don't always like, I mean, I don't always like that answer in all areas of my life either. Is, is you just have to start with the cards that you have been dealt and then see what happens. Go from there, right? Yeah. Yeah. 

Thank you so much for listening into the pro organizer studio podcast. If you'd like to get our roadmap for success as a pro organizer, [00:36:00] head straight to www.poroadmap.com.