Client breakups: Choosing yourself over money

Sometimes the hardest part of running a business is knowing when to walk away from clients. In this episode, we open up about our experiences of breaking up with clients for a bunch from reasons, like escaping challenging clients or re-focusing your business priorities.

We dive into the factors to help make the decision, how to handle the exit professionally, and why documenting everything is your best friend. Plus, we share practical strategies for breaking up with clients without burning bridges.

Whether you're currently thinking about breaking up with a client, or want to be prepared for future situations, this episode is all about protecting yourself and your business. Because sometimes breaking up with a client is the best business decision you can make.

Number of fucks given in this episode: 9

You can also listen on your favourite podcast apps, including Amazon Music, Apple Podcasts and Spotify.

Episode transcript

Rah: Welcome to fuck around and find out a podcast for finding your way through owning your own business. I'm Ra. I'm 

Emily: Chris. And I'm Emily. Welcome to the show. Good morning. We're 

Rah: in 

Emily: a fancy little location today. Mobile studio 

Rah: today. Dining table of an Airbnb. It's the beauty of having some fancier equipment that we can take on the road.

Yes. It is. And we're all very tired. Very tired. Gotta love it when we gotta do things. Yes, exactly. But we're recording from the lovely Bathurst in the Central West. Oh my 

Christine: gosh, we certainly are. And the The sun is shining, the sky is blue, but I believe it's a bit drizzly wet in Sydney Town. Oh no. Really? Is that what we're going back to?

Yes, we are certainly going back to the, uh, southern impact of Cyclone Alfred. Oh, 

Emily: bloody Alfred. Oh, delightful. Mm hmm. Yep. I'm loving the lack of humidity out here. It is really nice. 

Rah: Yeah. It's very nice. So maybe we should just delay going home. Yes, we will. If only we didn't have other responsibilities. Yes.

Yes. Yes. Yes. So today we are talking about a tricky topic that comes up a lot when we are pausing for a photo. Oh, God. 

Emily: Sorry. I wasn't even looking at the camera. Look natural. True. I always forget to do this and I think things just make us look nice. We 

Rah: had a difficult topic today, very difficult one. And it's around knowing when to break up with your client.

Or quitting your client. That was the alliteration I came up with when I was brushing my teeth this morning. But, the, that line of having to make that call of whether working with a client who's not an ideal match, um, or the work that they I'm getting you to do is no longer aligned with what you're doing.

Yeah. Yeah. Call it mental health versus money. Correct. Um, and I've done it a couple of times in the last year or so, sorry, I thought you were taking a photo of me. Just myself. Just myself. That's fine. Um, so I think we've all been there and done that at one point or another. Yeah. Um. And this year already, when I've been talking to clients and other people who I know who have their own businesses, it seems to already be a year of needing to clear out the muck, for lack of a better term.

Yeah. And just refocus and get your ducks in a row and, you know, remove the clutter. I'm sort of using different analogies for the same thing, but to really just set yourself on the right path for a better end of 2025. And, um, yeah, absolutely. Ditching a client is a scary factor. 

Christine: Well, you know, a small, well anyone in business, but I feel that when we are talking about people in small business, so you are either a, you know, a solopreneur, you are a micro mini business or your small business with, you know, your 15, 20 odd people.

But the smaller ones that we represent and are, it's scary. Because money, 

Emily: money 

Christine: is king, you know, cashflow is so incredibly important. So it's that, but what's it worth? Well, exactly, because it's that fight of cashflow or destroy your mental health and well being. Or destroy something else about you and your 

Rah: business.

And it can also impact the work that you do for your other clients. Absolutely. It impacts everything. 

Emily: You take it home with you even if you don't want to. It's the same as, you know, the corporate culture where we've all been with bad managers. It's, you know, narcissism is prevalent everywhere. And just because we have our own businesses, the only difference it makes for us is we get the ability to walk away.

Rah: When 

Emily: we need to, when you can't really do that so much in a corporate, corporate world. But yeah, it's a hard choice as you say, cause of, cause of cashflow. 

Rah: Yeah. 

Emily: Cause you're, you're 

Rah: effectively resigning without finding another job in a lot of, in a lot of ways. 

Christine: Yeah. Absolutely. And I mean, you know, there's lots of reasons why you make the decision, um, that a client is not one that you want to keep.

We, you know, we've had a very recent um, experience of not just around narcissism, um, and abusive relationship which it essentially, um, was, but I mean there's pretty much like you know, resource drains, you know, the out of scope, you know, what the expectation or what the client really wanted was not what they really see.

Emily: I mean, that's a natural, um, situation though for our type of work with the contracting and the scope of work. Like, I mean, a lot of people come to us, we've had that often that they come to us and they don't know exactly what they want and it turns into something different, but it's made worse. When, again, narcissistic personalities are in play.

Christine: So when we're talking, uh, you know, narcissistic and, and, and stuff like that, you know, totally misalignment of values, toxic communications, gaslighting, um, gaslighting.

Disrespectful, um, treatment of team member, um, kind of thing. And, you know, for us, it was. It, it, it had such a ramification across our business. It really ricocheted. Yeah. It really, really did. But it also, you 

Emily: know, for, for Chris and I too, to run a business where we have team members, you know, one of the things I've been so adamant on just with my crappy experiences in corporate land was to always.

Protect and put team first and look after them above all else. And it was really hard for both of us to see that also to find out that she was being treated as badly as she was. Um, and it was, it's not, you know, all out screaming abuse. It's the, the little snide comments, the passive aggressive tone. It's all of those little things that just scratch away at your sense of self and your confidence.

And to see, you know, that happening to her, we could see. C the stress levels and the things like that and not, and for us to not be able to immediately fix that problem was really hard because it had to be a more finessed plan in place in order to protect all of us. Yeah, that's right. Um, to get through that.

And that was really, really hard. And one thing, I think both of us never really wanted to ever put anyone into that position. Oh, no. And it's hard when you do take on a client because. You know, was there red flags for us in the beginning? Probably. Yeah. That we, you know, but again, money becomes an overruler.

Yeah. Having the ability to have a well playing client or a just a consistently paying client. We all need to put food on the table still. So it becomes that. And even our team member on the few times we'd like originally in the beginning when we brought it up, she was in the same boat of, I need money.

Yeah. That's right. And, and you are 

Christine: willing to do. 

Emily: Yeah, you push 

Christine: your 

Rah: boundaries. Yeah, you do. Thanks. And also, um, Yeah. You can only make the best decision possible with the information that you have at that point. Oh, absolutely. You can't, you literally can't go back and change it. So, you just have to go with what you know and also what you've experienced.

So, you guys are going to be a lot more cautious, 

Christine: I reckon. I think, um, the most important thing that we, you know, Can take away and anybody can take away from a bad situation, whether it was of your, your making or not. Um, and, and in this case it wasn't ours, but what we had to and have taken away from is, you know, like.

Being more mindful in those initial discussions and everything. Um, it's also about how we communicate, how we work. So it's that real consistency of the message of how we work in our industry, how we deliver our. services that were not available 24 7 at the beck and call and kind of just because we're remote and virtual doesn't mean you 

Emily: have access to us constantly.

Yeah, absolutely. So it comes back to your word of the year of boundaries as well. Yeah, absolutely. It's been a bit of a, I 

Christine: think a foreshadow, that word, but I, but I think, and not that we were doing this. We didn't break up with the client for us to look good, you know, yes, we've got everyone's back But the this is important and very central to what we do Was it was very important the message that we would have given by Even though we did try to, because we are problem solvers.

That's what people pleasers and problem solvers and all of that sort of stuff. So we did try to find an alternate solution. Um, but I'm so thankful that we didn't, um, yeah, because therefore we walked our talk. We, we, we, we lived up, supported our ethics, we supported our team. You put the values in the business.

We did at the point of decision making. 

Emily: We also had the. You know, I'm going to use the word unfortunate situation where we were actually in person for some things and, and witnessed some things and it wasn't just directed at us. It was at other support staff as well that were there that were not associated with our company in any way, shape or form.

And that kind of left us both going, no, we can't, we can't do this any like this is a hard line. 

Rah: Selfishly. Oh yeah. Absolutely. No, no, no. Absolutely. Absolutely. Very validating. You 

Christine: know, did we learn from it? Absolutely. Have we put some things in place to try not? To have a similar situation? Absolutely.

There's no guarantees in life or, um, business. Um, but we certainly know that we were not, not the cause. 

Rah: Yeah. 

Emily: Is that in that instance, but it was, yeah, that was very validating. And that was really, um, and also though having conversations with these other support team that were on, they had the same thing.

Like it felt validating for them too, to also realize that we were going through the same thing. And it's just, you know, it. It's that whole concept of don't ever treat people like that because it's just not all right for one, it's not all right, but you know, and with me, I always come back to when it comes to running your own business and it's the same concept I have when I talk about being paid properly as well.

If you're not being paid properly and you're getting paid less than minimum wage, go find a job that's going to pay you properly. And then you'll at least have superannuation. You'll have tax and you'll have, and you'll leave. You'll not be killing yourself to make peanuts. Like there are people out there that charge so little or ask for so little money that they may as well go stack shelves at Woolies.

You'll get more money for it. And then it's this concept of like, if you're getting treated and your mental health is being hit. So hard from a client again, at least go get a proper salary from that. Yeah. Like if you're gonna have it happen, go back annual, annual leave and your Yeah. Take advantage of like a better salary and all of the benefits that come with that.

If you're gonna be dealing with these kind of people mm-hmm. It is not ever worth having it in a small business situation. And yeah. And you know, we are at the point where. Yes, we cry a little bit at our bank account, but a little bit. Yeah. It's putting it mildly. However, you know, the weight that, you know, the metaphorical weight of our shoulders has been really like, I mean, I instantly, my anxiety was peaked quite a bit throughout all of this and I'm finding that I'm still like riding that wave of it going back down to nothing, but I'm not as.

I'm not as highly triggered as I was, and I'm not as, you know, sensitive to the way in which people talk to me, you know, little things like that. So I'm finding like my anxiety is settling back down again, which to me is like, okay, well that was a clear indicator that this wasn't right 

Rah: as well. The part from my perspective is I've thankfully not had a terrible client to that level, but I have broken up with clients.

And, you know, for varying reasons, um, you know, but more often than not, that's just that it wasn't filling my cup in the way that it was, or I had grown in what I was offering and it didn't, um, sort of match where I was planning on going with the business and how I've kept going. And with one, um, client, the way that I explained it to them was cause they're massively into art.

Um, so what I said was. I'm looking at my, the logos of the clients and the businesses that I've got on my client board and I've got all of these moneys. And they're all, you know, all beautiful and amazing. I also have some Picassos. They're also amazing. Yep. Incredibly talented. Like, deserve recognition.

But they just don't go with the moneys. Yes. And I have more of the moneys. So I'm just gonna, I'm going with this. Yeah. And that, you know, I was very lucky that they completely understood the way I was going with it. And they didn't take it, well, not to me anyway, personally. Yeah, 

Emily: yeah. 

Rah: Like, to think they were a bit upset.

But, you know, it's. You know, sometimes it's not. as clean cut as having a nasty piece of shit. 

Christine: Oh gosh. No, no, no. And it's about, it's about, it's a professional thing. It's not, even if you say, even if the true thing is it's, it's a personality issue or something like that, you know, you're always. find a professional reason of why this is happening, you know, not alignment or business direction.

We completely said our business did not fit. No. Yeah. It was absolutely not. We were falling on our sword in a professional business way. Um, and that was a truthful thing for us to say, but because none, none of us in. Life can afford to burn a bridge in this world that we live in six degrees of separation Whatever you can't you need to be politically correct.

You 

Emily: need to be political. 

Christine: Yeah, yeah Absolutely, so it was around us, you know, we tried to find a solution that did not work But, it was like, no, sorry, and we've done it before, we've broken up with like the Hillary 

Rah: Clinton, the old adage that she used to say at the previous, when she was running for president.

If they go low, we go high. Yeah. And you just have to, even if it means. People may not necessarily know how shit it was, but at least you can, you know 

Emily: what we really did attempt to find a solution to it. And I think that also was a bit of an eye opener for us as well, because we put out feelers. We got a lot of response, which is really nice.

And then when we gave a bit more of an in depth, this is what the job entails. When you 

Rah: were looking for more subbies to come on board or team members to work with. Yeah. 

Emily: And then when we gave the description of what the client was requiring, almost every single one of them, like half of them didn't even bother responding, which told me it was immediately off of it.

And then the ones that did every single one of them was like, I can't, I can't work like that. Yeah. And that was asking me 

Rah: like 20, 40 potentials out of it. Yeah. Yeah. So that's a big, 

Emily: it was a big jump. Um, and we were like, cool. I think this says it all, you know, and it was one of those, look in, and we wrote our politically nice email just saying, look, this is not suited for you.

We, we think we're not suited for you. We do actually think you might be better off with a full time employee, like that might be better suited for what you need. Um, we got a nice response back. There was still the passive aggressive and ignoring certain points that we, yeah. And it was one of those, like, there's no point.

No, we weren't going to, our new 

Christine: coin of phrase is keyboard war, uh, so we certainly weren't going to get into a cube. And as Chris has got tattooed on her arm, let them, and 

Emily: it was just, you know, and I did, you know, there was an argument, a slight, I won't say argument, it's probably not the right word, push back on a chunk of ours that, Had it been authorized to be done and it was that gaslighting again and it was that we just go in.

You know what? It's not even worth it. Like we'll take the hit here because we need 

Rah: to walk away 

Emily: from this. 

Rah: Yep. Yep. And the, you know, it could end up costing more, you know, in some cases I'm sure there will be people who, you know, have had the, the contracts challenged or, you know, like in that 

Christine: Absolutely.

And again, I think this is just, it's just one big piece of education. 

Rah: And I think the thing that I learned when I was breaking up with clients in the last couple of years and some of them, it was relatively quick. Like I had one that finished within like a week. Yes. Um, and another one, it took six months to do what I thought was fair because even if it wasn't, the right job for me to be working with them anymore.

I wanted to make sure that it was, I left them in good hands because I'd been, and you've been part of that other end of the situation of you get handed a shit pile and it's all a big mess. 

Emily: Yeah. So, you know, and that's also, you know, it's who we are and who, what our integrity states too. And, you know, we were also very much happy to do that.

Um, but just like, you know, this client made some decisions without. Talking to us about it first, so that she took that option off by our hands. So we couldn't have done it. But we're the same thing. Like we would more than happily ride SOPs. We would help set it all up in a really lovely place so you can just hand it over to someone else.

Because we, like you said, we've all walked into things that are fucking chaotic. Yep. Um, and we don't wanna ever leave anyone 

Rah: in that same situation. No. Yeah. And the, the scary part for me when I was walking away from these clients was. You know, I was losing a good chunk of my monthly income, which is erratic anyway, because that's just the way that I'm currently set up.

Um, but I had coaches telling me and mentors saying, look, just trust. That this is going to be an energetic change for you and it's going to make room for bigger and better things. Yeah. And I laughed in their face because I'm not that sort of person. I'm very, if I can see it, I can see it. Like if I, if it's not right in front of me, hitting me in the head, I don't believe it.

Like I'm not a woo woo girl, but you know, I'd been around enough people where I was like, okay, look, I'm willing to give it a shot. Yes. And give you the benefit of the doubt to give that a go. And fuck me, it totally worked. Yeah. 

Emily: See, I'm, look, I'm a big believer in the universe provides, and, um, I mean, it has proven on multiple occasions that things have worked when we need them to work.

And that was the belief that I think helped string us through is, you know, but it also it for us too, it was, it was a combination of, we know this will be, we will figure it out. Like we have figured out. so much in our business so far, and we will continue to figure out as we go. But it was also the fact that it was taking us away from the things that we actually were really passionate about.

And those things that I'm really passionate about will hopefully inadvertently create clients. So it was kind of nice to feel that freeing ability to go, all right, well, now I can actually spend my time going out and networking or, you know, doing those things that we need to do because we haven't been able to do that's what you need to do.

Yep. 

Rah: And the other part as well is that you have learned this just becomes another notch in the, you know, of the story of just going, thank fuck that happened because we don't have to go through that ever again. I imagine you guys now will have. The different view of what is brought to you for future discovery calls, so much from it.

Emily: It's been not a fun situation, but we have learned so much from it. It's also helped us shape what we think our ideal client is. We have also, you know, learned what we need to put as Chris said, what to put in our contracts and, and how to properly articulate, um, the ways in which we work and the boundaries that we have set in place.

It's to help look after us and our team. It's we've, we've learned a lot from it. Like it's been a very learning and painful experience. 

Rah: And that's what hopefully we all learn from anything that's not fantastic with running our businesses. Because even with, like I had clients. Um, I had one last year who I thought was going to be a fantastic fit and it just wasn't working and I was just going, Oh, I don't know this, this isn't quite what I had thought.

And then she broke up with me and I was like, Oh, she made the choice for me. I think 

Emily: like, I think in those situations. The writing is on the wall. Like if you're not feeling 100 percent with something, the likelihood is the other person's not feeling it either. Like we, we vibe with each other very well.

And I think like, you know, I feel like there was for us, we could tell pretty early on that this was perhaps going to end this way. And we made all the attempts we could under the sun to try and rectify and make it work because of the potential it held. But then. You know, obviously it landed the way it did, but the key being it's okay to put your mental health first.

And as scary as that might be with finances and needing money, you can't earn money if you're not in a good headspace. 

Christine: You can't focus. I mean, I'm not a, you know, that whole thing about multitasking and everything. I like to focus. And so I feel like if, you know, this week we're out in Bathurst and I know that if we still had this client in the background, we would be not enjoying us.

Can't I can't hundred percent focus and be in the moment? Yep. Because it's like, oh, what's the email inbox gonna surprise us with? Or, and what Passive aggressive Absolutely. Shit. Do we have to interpret if the name popped up on my phone, the kick in the guts that I would've experienced. So, um, yeah. No, it's, it's been a.

It's been good. It's good to have come through. 

Emily: It has been a baptism of fire into 2025, I will say. I'm pretty sure it's just now January for Chris and I. 2024 can be finished now. Yeah, yeah, well, I do feel a little bit tired. Getting ready for the second quarter 

Rah: is going to be great. Yeah, that's right. But in terms of, um, based on what you're currently recovering from, what are sort of the big ticket things that you're Going to either change in your own systems or SOPs or Um, flags that you're going to look out for is like, have you got any sort of things relatively thought out yet?

Or are you still recovering enough? 

Emily: We've talked about not getting, trying to taper our excitement at the initial stages of a client coming on, because you know, we all get very excited, measure out 

Rah: your expectations because we got very 

Emily: excited. We get very excited anytime we have any client come to us, like, you know, everyone does, but I think Like a first date.

You're like, it is, but in all honesty, there was flags for us both at the beginning that we just thought, Oh, maybe we're not, maybe this is, we're just overthinking it or maybe, you know, maybe she's deliberately, I don't know, whatever, you know, it could be, she's having a bad day. Cause that's, you know, that happens with everybody.

So there was, there was that I think is a big one. 

Christine: And I think it's that communication piece too. And I'm going all the way back to, you know, the quote. So, I took, you know, we take lots of notes from the initial conversation, so that's why I've gone back and had a look and go, yeah, what it became is not what was described in that first meeting.

So, realistically, it was more information. From my side, going back to clarify would, 

Emily: yeah, and it's maybe how we gather our information. Like maybe there's a better way we could do that. You know? Is there a survey we could put together to get them to fill out, to really 'cause to, I mean, regardless of whether it's a bad situation or not.

PE cu you know, as you would know too, as anyone else in a service based business would know CU customers come to you thinking they want. X, but they might actually need X and Y or, you know, they don't really know exactly what they want. They just know they need some kind of help in this kind of place.

Rah: Okay. And 

Emily: so maybe there's a way in which we could put together a survey that might help us ascertain a bit better what they're looking for, but also them too, 

Rah: as well. 

Emily: We were talking about this yesterday on a panel. In a networking event about how to, what advice would give people if they were looking to engage in outsourcing.

And it's along those lines of, um, really, really identify what you need done, um, in this instance. Or be open to 

Rah: be, to having that discussion to help work out what the priority is. 

Emily: And in the instance that we've just walked away from, the initial discussion was more along the lines of, I need an EA. 

Rah: Yeah.

Emily: Whereas the reality was, was I actually need someone who can be at EA, who can do travel management, who can do social media marketing, who can be tech savvy and edit websites, which is not a reality. 

Rah: That's the unicorn role, which I've had experience in recruiting and had some success when I was working, you know, full time, um, had some incredible people on our team, but a lot of the time.

It's not successful, some of the time, I'll be fair, um, because you. You can be like the jack of all trades and master of none. 

Christine: Well, and that's right. And when you are the jack of all trades, you 

Rah: know, it's, sorry, it is, we are recording this the day before, two days before. So when you are 

Christine: the jewel of all trades, yes, you can tick all of those boxes, but with this client, especially and other clients to come, you know, they've, they've got a set amount of money to spend.

So they do want to see productivity. So if you, in. You engage a Jill of all trades, you'll get the work done, but you won't necessarily get it done as fast as somebody who specializes in those areas. Um, so, you know, I always joke around, you know, what would take me 10 hours in social media a week would take an expert less than five, you know, that kind of thing.

So. And, and when you've got a client who has the expectation of a unicorn, but also one of the, the, the messaging from this client constantly was, Oh, if I knew it was going to take that amount of time, I could have just done it myself or, Oh, I've done this. And so it was like, which is the gas lighting.

Yeah. But 

Rah: that also irks me in the sense of, yes, it does take you time to brief work. And, um, quality check it, make sure it's been done to your standard, et cetera. But you, as the subject matter expert, the business owner, you cannot be replicated because it's your, it's your brain that is, and you're, I'm pointing at my face here, like it's you that is un replicatable.

That's correct. But the bits that you can, you have to outsource. And then once you procedurize it and have that documented, then when you have a rotation of a team, you've got, you've got that sorted. 

Christine: Oh, true. And that's the thing we've often in conversations like in our networking panel session yesterday and throughout our time together is the importance of an SOP.

Yes. Um, and, and an SOP will let somebody coming into that task brand new, have a better. I'm not sure what the hell the task is. There may or may not be more questions required. But I know for myself like, I feel like I often have my big girl CEO pants on in this business. But there, I felt that there was a need for me to put an even bigger pair of pants on in this case, didn't, didn't do it.

But I know that it's like, there would be a hell of a lot more pushback. Yep. In a kind way. 

Rah: Yeah. 

Christine: But push back next time. This client did not want to regroup, summarize, and, and that was half of the downfall. And, and if we want to be in an education space. Yes. Then we needed to educate this client better, and that's our, one of the takeaways is to educate better.

Though, I will 

Emily: say, this client wouldn't have been receptive to it. No, no, no. Not at all. There was no way we could've, we were, no matter, and this was what we were trying to Yes. Make sure our team member knew that no matter who it was, or it wasn't have mattered if it was her or anyone else, no one would have been good enough.

There will have been fault found in everything. And it's demoralizing as F as well, to be feeling like that as well. But it is, yeah, it's the education piece and it's the clear communication and it's the So what is your ways of working and the methods in which, um, you, do you do communicate to your team or, and it's hard for people who are solo, who have never really worked with a team before, because you obviously internalize a lot of that and then trying to communicate that out.

And yes, there is an element of. I could just do it myself in the time it takes me to teach 

Rah: you. I've done that so much, even when I was working full time. You know, I would just, 

Emily: I had people, but also there's a power in it, in a corporate space to be the holder of all the knowledge. Yes, I used to call that the martyrism.

And for me, 

Rah: it wasn't, I mean, it was probably a little bit of the martyrism, but also because I was such a perfectionist and I wanted things done a particular way. Yeah. Yeah. And. You know, if the font wasn't correct first round, I was like, fuck it. I'm just going to do it myself next time. And I learned.

Long and hard, you know, that I had to learn to let go, but put the effort into creating the SAPs, the tutorials, the checking ins, do the first, do this first, do the first of three or first of 10 and let's go through it. And then I'll give you the markup or record my screen and give you the, the feedback on what to do.

And then it makes sure that, and then say, and make sure that's included in the. Procedure when you're updating the procedure to make sure it's clearer. Cause clearly I wasn't clear enough. Um, you know, and then, you know, it just becomes, I used to say this all the time, it'd make me vomit. It's a living, breathing document, you guys.

So, you know, it can only be as good as the people who. Is it and maintain it? Yep. That's right. Um, 

Emily: the thing I kept coming back to though, cause I, I mean, we've all worked in corporate spaces, right? Well, we've been the holder of all the knowledge, but it's that the flip side to that is you then can't take a break.

You can't stop. You can't turn off. You can't have a balance in your life because you are the holder of all the knowledge and And other people don't know it, so they have to come to you all the time. So, like, I kept trying to shift my thinking that way, being like, well, the more I educate other people to be able to do this stuff, the more I can actually have a better balance of my life.

And the same goes for, you know, all of us as small businesses. If, you know, Chris and I obviously do different things, we have different sets of skills, but if Chris, you know, God forbid, hit by a bus tomorrow, there are things that I'm going to need to step in to know what to do and how to pick that up. So, you know, whilst Chris and I talk, obviously, at Nauseam, probably more than I talk to my husband.

Rah: She's my true 

Christine: life partner, 

Emily: we're the true life partners in Israel, um, but I, you know, I know a lot of it, but there's things that I'd still draw a blank on because, and that's just, you know. Uh, this is how we work. That's how it is. And likewise, you know, I imagine Chris having to pick up the websites if I wasn't around.

Christine: Oh, 

Emily: Chris, 

Christine: I'll help you darling. I'll be finding other ways to outsource now. I'm selling the business. I've got some great words, but just look out for those Canva graphics. 

Rah: Yeah. 

Christine: So funny. 

Rah: Now, how do I install TikTok? 

Christine: What do you, oh God, I don't even want to think about all 

Rah: of that. And so at, um, sort of the learnings based on what you guys have gone through and what I've been through as well.

Um, and Chris, you've done some, um, you've put some thoughts together that I thought I would. Yes. Yeah. What you've, what you've, um, put together of the, like at least the top five tips on how to walk away. 

Christine: Yeah. Well, I think, you know, there's probably lots and lots. who wants to keep going on? And of course everybody's got, you know, most people have access to, you know, research platforms.

Um, but you know, my top five realistically, you know, it's documenting everything. Um, whether you go back and put it in an email to a client as part of your breaking up. thing, which I'm, I'm, I'm habitually would do, you know, on such and such a day, you said this or we did that. I literally heard you on the phone yesterday.

Yeah. Here are the receipts of all the times I sent you emails and you responded to them and you did not take any action. And sometimes that's actually really necessary. I was hiding behind you on that call. Aside from like 

Emily: listening to Chris on the call and being like, yeah, Ra's sitting here doing like fucking jigs and dances, being like, listen 

Rah: to her, 

Christine: yo, bring in the receipts.

And there is places for that. to be, you know, needing all of that, but have it documented. Um, so every touch point, like for your client, if it needs to be documented, whether that's, um, you know, on your hashtag remarkable, um, or it's your emails or your CRM, like, you know, everything you do needs to be documented.

Um, and it's, and it's just that, you know, when clients want to push back, I asked you to do such and such and on such and such a date, you know, you need to go back and say, well, no, you didn't or, or whatever. Um, so yeah. Uh, documenting everything because that can help resolve some issues. It's about professional communication.

Emily: But I think also too, just sorry to jump in there, but I think, um, if you have a client who is, you've noticed behaviorally is actively trying to not have things in writing. That's a red flag. 

Christine: Oh, absolutely. 

Emily: We've all had people, we've all had, I had a manager many a year ago who anytime I'd put something in an email, you get a phone call back and it was deliberately to not have things in writing.

Yeah. And I mean, you've been through enough of it. You learn how to avoid it if you need to, but I think that the something is worth keeping note of because it is a red flag. That's what you 

Rah: can say. I'm just going to circle back to what we discussed earlier and just. Making sure we've all absolutely, and that is a great way that you can 

Christine: do.

Rah: Here's what we talked about when we're in the queue at the coffee shop. Yeah, 

Christine: yeah. And we've all done that because that recapping is very important. And a 

Rah: massive wanker putting, you know, formalizing in an email. But it 

Christine: protects you. If whatever conversation happens is about an expectation or I didn't say that or whatever, you know, again, it comes down.

Just have a paper trail, you know. Yep. a virtual paper trail. Um, the thing about communicating, like, you know, besides the fact that you need to write some form of termination letter, um, to, to end the relationship, remind me to send me, send me yours so that if I ever need it, I've got it. Absolutely. But you know, you, it's about facts.

And not emotion. So we really tried to keep ours really, um, It's hard when you're really, you have to like the first six drafts with a winner. It's where you want to say, dear fucking client, you fuck, fuck off, you know? Can I just say though, in 

Emily: this, in this last instance, like anyone that listens, should know that I'm the one that's a bit hot headed.

But in this instance, I was giggling my head off because Like, Chris is the sensible one out of the two of us, but the emails, drafts that Chris was sending me, I was like, Ooh, our roles have reversed. I'm being the sensible one now and having to clean this up, given that we both like, which also to me is an indicator of how far gone Chris was with, you know, you were with it all because you don't often get, 

Christine: and it was because.

They just took up so much space. Oh yeah, the mental 

Emily: space was phenomenal. 

Christine: Um, in a perfect situation, you're going to provide some transition support. So you're going to say, you know, that you could try RaGardener. Yes. You know, but obviously that is going to be who you recommend. Thanks for flicking them to me.

Yeah, the transition that you offer. You're welcome. Um, alternate support. It's really dependent on what the situation is, obviously, because, you know, we wouldn't wish this person on our worst enemy. You know what's great? If you've got a worst enemy. Well, no, that's very, very true. Very true. Um, but yes, so, you know, we had attempted.

And we could demonstrate we attempted and it failed dismally to find a solution. Um, so we didn't, um, offer transition, um, support, um, we offered, you know, a handover document. Now that was one of the things that was going to happen. Um, but. through the nature of this client and what they did to our team member.

It was our team member who was going to provide the handover document, but the client withdrew all her credentials to systems. Right, so she's out of the blue. 

Emily: She basically sacked her before we had the opportunity to do anything. Yeah, 

Christine: so there went the handover document that was going to be provided.

But, you know, in a. And that's what you should do, you know, because you're not, you're not, the end result is you're not burning bridges, you're getting out of a bad situation, but you're not, you're not destroying your reputation. That's the key. Even if they talk shit about you, but at least you know you've done the right thing.

Maintaining your integrity. Yeah, absolutely. So the end dates is around establishing very defined timeline for the project completion, last day of service or whatever it is. Um, if there's money owed. You know, when is that due? And that's a tricky thing when you're breaking up with a client who owes you money.

That is difficult. 

Emily: And it's fraught with risk as well. It really is. Yeah. Our 

Christine: situation was that we owed her three hours. Yeah. She disputed more, which we've talked about earlier in this conversation, but we actually owed her three hours. So we were in a very comfortable space in this regard. Yeah. Um, and really above all, just maintain professionalism.

Um, we don't talk negatively about the client as in, we don't name names, business. Um, because that is just for all to 

Emily: enjoy. 

Christine: Um, yeah. And basically it's about leaving the door open. Yeah. 

Rah: I want to sing the Bruno Mars song called Silksonic song. I think that's about it. 

Christine: Even if you never want to walk back through it again.

Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. Um, and yeah, really. And, and be brave. Like it's, it's a big thing. We were at another networking event a couple of weeks ago when this had just happened and you know, talk about your wins and I sort of started off saying, Oh, I think it's an anti win. Because it's not really a traditional win, but the census in that group was, Oh my God, that is a big win.

Yep. And, and really, yes. And I think 

Rah: I wasn't in the room, um, but I've been in similar rooms when something equally as difficult has been. It's noted as a, you know, as a positive and it makes such a difference to the room because people go, shit, I can do that, you know? So even if you're not giving the specifics, talking about that stuff, you know, with you, you know, your community colleagues, you know.

I think that's a big part of how being involved in a community can help the people around you. And 

Emily: it's just the, the, you know, the reminder that your mental health is worth more. And yes, money rules the world and it is a painful thing to not have, but you need to make. Your boundary is clear and you need to make sure that you are looking after yourself.

And if we're working for ourselves, have faith that something will come along by making the decision to walk away. And it's not an easy one, but you can do it. And it's not worth, it's not worth yourself. It's not worth your happiness. Yeah, it's not worth your, you know, you don't want to wake up every morning and feel physically ill at the thought of having to go to work or sit like, you know, we've all been there.

And if the moment you start waking up and dreading what you have to do, you need to stop doing it and 

Rah: you kind of get the slate because you just feel sick. Yes. The night before, it affects 

Emily: every inch of your life, whether you think it does or doesn't like, you know, as a parent for me, it makes a huge big change because my kids can pick up on it.

My kids are very intuitive to my own moods and abilities. God knows both, you know, my husband and your son were like, let me out. I'm like, they were getting angry on our behalf. And there's 

Rah: also the, um, impacts of stress. being, um, you know, a hand in cancer diagnostics, like it's, you know, if you hold onto stuff, it starts to have that physical.

It 

Emily: has a huge impact. And, you know, one of the things that it's always on the forefront of my mind is, is making sure we're doing things that make us happy. And there's nothing in the world worth feeling that sick about all the time. Yeah. 

Rah: Yeah, exactly. And if you do the right things. In terms of, you know, you could explore changing the scope of the work or, you know, and if you, you know, try and do those things, or I've had discussions with people who have had this situation when it was in a full time job.

And I've tried to help them, you know, decide whether it was worth staying in saying, is it the type of thing where it's like you're, you're in the trenches and you just go and fight on the frontline and you get to go home and see your family, you know, do you take it in that perspective and you know, it's probably now called quiet quitting where you just stop.

Caring quite so much and just get the job done, you know, and, you know, sort of silo that. But then also the discussion of how long that's viable for. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But then you can use that time to go and find more work or find the next, next client or take on more discovery calls, that kind of thing. Um, but it's, you know, you've gotta put that, um, put all of that into, you know, a perspective, talk to someone else.

That's right.

Emily: Which is also, you know, why it's really important to have a business coach or a mentor or someone that you can, someone that you trust bounce off. Yeah. And, and the third party perspective is really important because we get very good at justifying and the. I justify smoking to smokers if they're really struggling to 

Rah: give up the darts.

Emily: The thing that I find is the hard part is I kept equating this situation with our client as an abusive relationship because it is essentially that. It's the love bombing, it's the gaslighting, it's the ghosting, it's the, you know, pushing you away from other people, which in this instance was our other clients and you know, and it's that whole, like leaving you out to dry and making you feel like you're worthless at the end of the day.

And also feeling like you need to, um, you need to be better to do better to make them happy. Yeah. And it's. That realization and having that third person can actually break you out of that. Yes. You know, and we were lucky that, you know, Chris and I and our team member got deep in it, but we have a fabulous OBM in our business too, who was able to be like, no, no, no.

Take a step back guys. Look at how much this is dominating your conversation effectively. Which 

Rah: was, I remember that from the news reader. No, not the newsreader, the newsroom. Yes. Oh yes, yes. I find that really interesting, where they had someone who knew absolutely nothing about the story that they were working on.

So that they could do the full logic check to make sure that there were no flaws in the you know Allegedly disastrous story that they were going to 

Christine: publish. Well, that's right. And that's what we needed and it was really helpful there So yeah, so we've come we've come through it's opened us up and But yeah, so we'll put some um, you know top some some of those tips in the show notes and um Um, and yeah, give us a shout out, you know, we'd love to know, you know, if anybody else says, um, come through some breaking up and nasty breakup or a really good breakup, you know, examples of, you know, because it's, everyone needs to know how to do it at some point in their business life and 

Rah: what they did, whether it was asking this particular question in the discovery call or the onboarding process.

What the red flags are. Yep. 

Emily: Absolutely. And even what it might be for those that are not just service based like us, like if you're a product base or if you are, you know, again, I go to my usual cake maker or hairdresser, like you'll all have clients that are red flags in some way or another. You know, did they, how did you politely walk away from, I mean, that might be a bit easier in the sense of just not taking balking.

She 

Rah: steals all the toilet paper from the room whenever she goes to get it. Oh wow, 

Christine: that's hectic. Wow, yes. How hard is it for that client to get an appointment just to save the toilet paper? Yep. Um, thanks. Thanks for listening to us have a three way, you know, chat today. Um, it's always a pleasure. Thanks.

Yes, ladies. Time for us to drive back to the Big Spec. Oh, absolutely. To the rain, apparently. Yes, kick 

Rah: ourselves out of our accommodation. 

Christine: But let's go get a coffee. Yes. Coffee. Oh my gosh. Coffee first. All right. Brilliant. Catch you on the flip side. Peace out. Okay. 

Bye.