In today’s episode, we sit down with Sarah Peck while she shares what it means to “do half” and why it is essential for moms (especially working moms) to put this into routine. She also shares her best tips for setting boundaries and how to say NO earlier and more often. We discuss Sarah’s new book, Do Half: Why Doing It All Is Not A Strategy and why it’s a MUST READ for all working mothers everywhere. You can find Sarah HERE.
Boundary Setting and Saying “No” with Sarah Peck
Sarah is the Founder and CEO of Startup Parent, a company and virtual community that connects parents who want to reimagine and build a new future of work. She believes all new mothers deserve an honorary MBA, and that working parents have the leadership skills and insights that can transform the way we work and live that’s better for everyone. In addition to doubling her company’s revenue year over year, Sarah has also created a leadership incubator for professional women navigating career and family, and her work has been featured in Forbes, Inc, The New York Times, and Harvard Business Review.
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BULLET POINTS FROM THIS EPISODE:
- Tell me what hustle like a mother means to you.
- I saw this phrase and I love the title of your podcast. It means work your fricking tush off. And for me, it’s like this acknowledgement that moms do so much, parents do so much. I don’t love the word hustle. Like I’ll be totally honest, but I don’t love the word hustle because mothers already hustle. Like that’s already what we’re doing. When I go out into the world and people are like, oh, you should hustle harder. I’m like, excuse me, you should see what we do. Wait a second. Like, I’m already hustling hard.
- Tell us about this book. What led you there and what kind of things do you talk about?
- The company I run is called Startup Parent, you mentioned it in the beginning. We help parents navigate entrepreneurial business leadership ventures. I work specifically with executive moms and entrepreneurial moms and people that are in big business roles and that are new parents and they were like, well, okay, how do we do this?
- In this book Do Half, I talk a little bit about how productivity and strategy are completely different things. One is making things more efficient and one is being smart about what you do in the first place.
- The premise is that I want you to cut your to-do list in half. That’s what the “do half” is about. Now you can cut everything by half. Like you can say, I’m going to do 50% of social media. Instead of every day, I’m going to do it twice a week. Or you can wholesale cut things fully from what you do. I recommend that rather than trying to do Instagram, TikToK, Twitter, LinkedIn, and every single place. Pick one or two places that you think are really well-suited to you and well-matched in your business. Focus on the one or two things that you do really, really well and double down on those.
- So, one of the other things you talk about is saying no. And what does that mean? Why should we be saying no more and how can we do that without the guilt?
- First, what are my priorities and where do I need to focus my time and energy? Well, that’s the frustrating part. Once you make that decision, you have to say no to things. And so the next thing people ask me is like, how do you say no? And it’s really hard because women are cultured to say yes. We’re cultured to make it look easy. But I think that as a leader and a business owner and as a parent, one of the most important things you can do is learn how to say no.
- The first kind of piece of advice that I have is to claim being a C student and an F student. A lot of people are type A overachievers, or even if we weren’t, we learned that we needed to get A’s and B’s in school. And so we’ve got 20 years of education telling us to do great at everything. I’ve got to be a great cook. I’ve got to have a clean house. My kids have to look good. I have to sew my own clothes. Instead I want you to look at your five or six categories of your life. I do this in parenting and I do this in business and I do this for my personal life. Pick two that you want to be an A student at and pick two that you want to be a C student and then own the fact that you’re like, I am never going to try to be a good cook.
- Tell us where we can find you on the internet. What are some ways that they can learn more about what you have to offer?
- Well, www.startupparent.com is our hub.
- I do have a podcast too – Startup Parent Podcast. I love talking to other women entrepreneurs and I run the Wise Women’s Council every year.
- Instagram: @sarahkpeck
