Episode #21 - Dr Becky Sage

Identifying and overcoming entrepreneurial burnout

This week Nic and Nat sit down with Dr Becky Sage (Director of Acceleration at EDUCATE and former CEO of Interactive Scientific) to share their personal experiences with identifying and overcoming entrepreneurial burnout.

The symptoms of burnout can include energy depletion and exhaustion, increased negativity at work and reduced productivity. It’s the result of exposure to prolonged and intense periods of stress and can go hand in hand with deeper mental health issues such as anxiety and depression.

Due to the very nature of their roles, entrepreneurs are particularly susceptible to burnout and often push themselves right to the limits of their mental wellbeing. Often they can struggle to detach their own identity from the business and suffer chronic stress as a result. When you feel that you are your business, you absorb everything that happens within that business – good or bad.

One particular step in the entrepreneurial journey that leaves individuals vulnerable to burnout is growing a team – while bringing in those first few employees can take pressure off your day-to-day workload, the process adds another layer of pressure and responsibility on to founders. Becky discusses this paradox and shares her tips for recruiting in a slower, steadier and more mindful way.

Becky and Nic talk about how they first identified that they were suffering from burnout and the steps they were forced to take to alleviate some of the pressure on them, and how recognising it was the first big step toward relief.

They talk about the steps they took to overcome burnout – realising as individuals they can’t do everything themselves, and need to relax their grip on the reigns in order to truly do the best by their business. Making time for micro-breaks and finding more of a balance in the day-to-day has been vital for their recoveries.

In being forced to distinguish life at work and life outside of it, Becky has found great solace in gymnastics, yoga and gratitude journaling. She shares her vision for the new journey she has found herself on as a result of overcoming burnout.

If you are struggling with feelings of overwhelm, stress or burnout please see the NHS Working Well resources and reach out to a mental health professional.

Join the conversation on CookiesHQ Twitter. Head over to LinkedIn to find out more about Becky.

Read the transcript

Becky:

For me, the real driving force behind that is…

Nic:

I’m really sorry, can I stop you here? I forgot to press record.

Becky:

I was being concise as well, I was quite quick.

Nic:

Sorry, shall we go again?

Becky:

Yeah.

Nic:

I’m really sorry. Hello, and welcome to a new episode of the Tough Cookies Podcast. Today with me is Nathalie.

Nathalie:

Hello.

Nic:

Hello. And Becky Sage. Hello, Becky, hiya. Becky is the CEO of a company called Interactive Scientific in Bristol. We’ve probably met 10 years ago. We met doing a project for Science City Bristol and since then we kind of followed each other and grew in our own space. And when I wanted to have a chat with you on the podcast; we normally do a pre-run talk meeting to see what would be interesting to talk about; I think we had a 45-minutes video meeting planned and we went on to rambling for two-and-a-half hours, which was great.

Nic:

We talked a lot about personal stuff, for both you and I, and we talked about experience with burnout and burning out and how we recovered from it, and what we’ve done in order to make ourselves; mind and body; better. So, I think I want today to be the line of the episode today, was to actually share both our experience about burnout and how we’ve managed to overcome it. But before, in order to understand, I guess, how you got to experience it, it would be nice to get your background and everything that you had to do and why you felt under pressure.

Becky:

Yeah, absolutely. So, as you said, I’ve been CEO of a company called Interactive Scientific for the last, about five years. Interactive Scientific is about using digital tools to visualize atoms and molecules. For me, the motivating factor behind that, is all about being able to get more people involved. So, whether that be in school or people communicating around science and understanding what goes on in this invisible scientific space, which of course, is so prevalent in the news right now with these invisible scientific forces changing all our lives. Probably not for the better right now with the virus going around.

Becky:

So, that’s where I am now. My scientific journey began way back when I was in school and I really got on well with science and I ended up doing a Ph.D. in chemistry, which I graduated from Dur in 2008. Now, when I got to the end of my Ph.D., I very much knew I didn’t want to stay in the science lab anymore and we’ll come back to that later in the conversation because the burnout conversation comes into that a little bit as well.

Becky:

And so I started working in the public sector doing support for Science and Technology businesses, R&D businesses, and other innovative businesses and really got to know that space and that’s where we first met each other, like you said, I think seems way… It’s a long time ago but it seems like even longer ago in terms of the world that we live in, how digital tools are used and we were kind of building… I was project managing; you were doing the building at the time, Nic. This was early CookiesHQ but pre the real CookiesHQ cookies

Nic:

You were the first CookiesHQ client, technically. Yeah, yeah. It was like very early on

Nathalie:

remember, think it was you finishing freelancing and just starting CookiesHQ t was in between, yeah.

Becky:

We actually did two projects, didn’t we? I wonder if they bridge?

Nic:

Maybe that’s where they bridge, yeah. It was the LEP and the Science City Bristol.

Becky:

And Science City Yes, Bristol Enterprise Network. At the time, however, I think lots of people saw me as quite an early adopter to digital tools, which started… Like I said, looking back, it still seems like, “Why, really? Was that early adoption?” But yeah, I’ve always embraced digital and how it can help us in what we do. Like I said, I’ve always been in these scientific and technical fields but at the same time knowing that my strengths already sat in the communication and the leadership space in science and technology.

Becky:

So, I did about five years of a portfolio career, mixing up all sorts of different things. I think when you talked before, Nic; I was acting some of that time, working in the theater, as well as working for some small businesses who were in the innovative space and doing some of this public sector work. So, that all kind of lead up to me meeting the founders of Interactive Scientific and then eventually getting on board as CEO.

Nic:

So, what was your… For the people that don’t know what the role of a CEO is, can you describe your… if you can, even describe the responsibilities of a CEO? How would you describe the role of a CEO?

Becky:

I’ve heard somebody say Chief Enabling Officer and I really like that because ultimately, if things are going well as a CEO, I think that’s what it’s about. You’re bringing in the things that are going to enable everyone else to do their jobs the best they can. When you are in very early startup phases, of course, you don’t necessarily have lots of resources and it’s not just about managing other people. You’ve really got to do…

Nathalie:

A lot of stuff.

Becky:

So much, so much stuff, yeah. And I think, Nat, like you, I wasn’t the one doing the technical building, I had somebody who was doing that, but really other than that, it was… And I’m thinking back obviously a little bit, before we’d really established a bigger team. Yeah, you’re trying to get the money in, but you’re still trying to figure out what the business model is.

Becky:

You’re still trying to figure out what the real benefits are, who your market is, how that market’s going to evolve and grow. How do you sell this opportunity into the right people, whether that be investors or customers or even your team members as you’re building your team? So, there’s certainly that… there’s a lot of things that go on, that are harder to put into a box and to explain, than many startup books try to do.

Nathalie:

Yeah, it’s all linked together, isn’t it, because especially when you’re quite a small company? Yes, you have the technical side and the actual building and doing the tools, but other than that, you need to build the relationships, understand your market, and therefore go out there, get investments. You work on the business plan because you somehow need to make money. And so again, it’s all interlinked. And then you also need to find people to support you and people to work with you, and not one thing can work without the rest. You basically try and juggle all of these things so that the business actually works.

Becky:

Mm-hmm (affirmative), and it is tough because you have this big picture view and you can see how everything’s tied together and how everything’s kind of dependent on holding this thing up and then holding this thing up. And you just, in that CEO role, you can see that if this thing over here slips, that’s going to have a real knock-on effect to something that’s completely on the other side of the business, where I think other people don’t necessarily see that. That in itself is a lot of the role, is a lot of what you are there to do.

Becky:

You’re there to hold things together. But that also means that you don’t always get that satisfaction of, “I’ve completed this one task, so great, that’s done, I can have a chill-out now and go and celebrate”, because it’s like, “Okay, well, that one’s held up and that plate’s spinning, so now let’s go over there and spin that plate.” And that certainly was my experience. I mean, having really gone through a lot of that journey and figured a lot of things out, failed at a lot of things, succeeded at some other things and also having a peer group of other entrepreneurs, I’ve of course, learned along the way.

Becky:

You can look back in hindsight and say, “Well, it’s really clear what the journey is”, and how you would do that in hindsight. But even simple things for me, I don’t think I’ve really appreciated until this year how immature the EdTech market was. So we were very much positioning ourselves for scientific tools within the EdTech market. There were different parts of that market that we’d potentially be in. As well as looking, “Okay, how can we potentially use this in the corporate sector?”

Becky:

And like I said, only this year, whereby all schools have had to embrace EdTech or online learning, one way or another, you realize what a journey. Five years ago I was staying out for our business, so there was a lot of, I think, let’s say optimism rather than naivety, about how the market might mature over time. And this wasn’t just me, this is in all the reports and everything else that’s out there. So those things like that where you’re kind of planning the one future but you know that that’s not really going to happen as well. You’ve got to constantly be iterating on not only the product but also where are you positioning yourselves, and what is that model.

Nathalie:

Yeah, and if it’s not going quick enough or as quick as you expected it to be then, yeah. You still need to get money in or find investors or somehow again make it work. And get it longer for until you actually get there.

Becky:

Yeah. Or pivot. And that was a real thing, a decision we had to make, was quite a pivot and that had a real impact because it was different expertise that were required, so we’re having to think about downsizing the team, of course, you’re talking to different… If you’re talking about education versus say, the pharmaceutical industry, totally different investors, totally different networks you need to be part of, totally different customer groups. You’re essentially starting from scratch to some extent when you have to do a pivot like that.

Becky:

So, those were the kind of questions and the kind of things that we were working with. And as I just mentioned, you’re then doing all of that whilst you’re growing your team, whilst you’re bringing other people on that journey with you and hoping to live up to some values that are positive and helpful for those other people that are on the journey with you.

Nathalie:

Yeah. And I don’t know about you, but there’s two sides to growing a team. On one hand, it’s great because it means you have more people to support you and to help you in actually doing the things and growing the business, so it feels like you can delegate some of the tasks that you have to do. But on the other hand, a bigger team needs more time for it to be actually managed, and managing two or three people is very different from managing 10 or 15. So, yeah. There’s two sides to it, isn’t there? You’re like, “Yay, great, I could help.” And then you’re like, “Oh, I need time, more time to manage this.”

Nic:

It needs more time and it needs more money as well, which is where I think a lot more pressure comes in. Yeah.

Becky:

Oh, big time.

Nic:

That’s why the pressure kicks in.

Becky:

Yeah, because then you’re trying to sustain a much higher burn rate. You’ve also got more personalities in the mix then too, and that in itself is a challenging thing because it’s not just their interaction with you and their interaction with the company or their particular task load, it’s their interaction with the rest of the team and the dynamic across the team and the cultures that are starting to form. I love hiring. Because you really get to see the people putting their positive selves forward and you really do get to see, “Oh, wow, yeah this is great. Look at the opportunities and the potential here.” There’s that real buzz of potential when you hire.

Becky:

But of course, like you said, you then end up more and more on the… That’s what’s putting you on that treadmill. Every person that you’re bringing into the team, that treadmill goes faster and faster. And I know when I do coaching or mentoring with other businesses now, I really help them to question whether it’s the right time. You know, can you automate, can you outsource, are there other ways in which you can do this, can you hire a little bit more slowly and a little bit more mindfully when you hire, because it’s going to help out the business, it’s going to help out you? And of course, that’s not always the same in every case, but that’s at least something I would be more mindful of if I was going back on my journey.

Nathalie:

Yeah, it’s not the first time, I think we discussed that last time with Dave and Piers from Atomic Smash where… Yes; we needed to hire but at the same time once you’ve started you can’t stop and you are on that treadmill and that’s it. And then basically you need to keep running. There’s no way out.

Nic:

There’s no way back. There’s no way back I think until you reach a certain stage. And I think at some point you may reach, and that’s completely different in every industry, completely different if we’re in a VC-backed kind of company compared to we run an agency. But in the agency world, you can’t stay being 12 to 17, 20 people. You have to choose if you want to be under 12 and you want to stay there, which is completely valid, like just have this kind of company or do you want to be a 25, 30 people kind of agency?

Nic:

But staying in the middle you just have the wrong numbers, the wrong levers going around. You have all the expense of the overheads but you don’t have enough really people to make it always a smooth ride. You don’t. It’s always like you have that middle and then it’s probably the same in your company, at some point, you had a point where it’s like, “Okay, now we need to pass, we need to cross that bridge because if we don’t cross that bridge or if we don’t stay away from the bridge, we’re going to stay in the middle and we’re going to go nowhere, basically.”

Becky:

Yeah, and that was a big pressure because I think even very early on you’re thinking… Well, certainly I was very aware, even bringing the first person on. This is a workplace for that person. This is a place they have to be able to come and thrive. So, even if it’s one other person that you’re responsible for, that’s a person that you… It’s not a motherly thing, but as a business, you have to look after that person.

Becky:

In theory, you should also be looking after yourself and the other co-founders, but that’s a big deal. And so, as soon as you’re doing that you are creating some of that overhead that you discussed, which actually is not going to scale linearly with people. It is, like you said, if you get over a certain number, well, you don’t need another health and safety policy, or you don’t need another whatever else it might be. Your HR system’s in there, everything else.

Becky:

And even thinking about culture, thinking about communication, thinking about the things that need to exist across the team. Yeah, I completely agree with what you just said. It’s like you’re sitting there thinking, “Oh, when I get over this bit, it’s going to be easier.” And I’m yet to get to the point when things get easier. Oh no, that’s not entirely true, but we’ll, I’m sure, come back to that in the burnout conversation.

Nic:

Well, I think that’s where you’ve pointed to something very interesting here, which is when you hire that first person, you have to look after them and you also. And that’s what I think a lot of founders, certainly can raise my hand here, forget is you have to look after yourself. And you tend to prioritize your company, let alone talking about the team members. It’s literally… As much as I would like to say it’s all about the team members, and that I love them to bits, but really it’s like you’re putting forward the company over yourself sometime. Regardless where you consider the company.

Nic:

And it’s certainly something that in the early days when Nat didn’t even have the role that she has today because I was more on the forefront, I was more like the… for good or wrong, I was trying to do everything and, I think, and Nat had more like a backseat kind of role in the company. That’s where I really felt that kind of pressure, that pressure of I’m putting all in like this is my baby, this is my company or whatever, and this is the most important things.

Nic:

And now obviously, major respect, please if any founders listen to this, don’t do that because that’s the most stupid thing you can do. This is actually the most damaging thing you can do for your company, is to put your company over everything else because that’s not the right way to look at it.

Becky:

Yeah, and I think it’s certainly something that resonates with me, what you just said, which is the… So what happened for me was I put my entire self into the company. I put my reputation, I put my time, my energy, my everything, my ideas, and you couldn’t really see where I ended and the company began and vice versa. And I almost… I describe it a bit like a co-dependent relationship, in those bad times, because you’re doing everything you can… It feels like the business is just taking, taking, taking from you, because you’re running and you have no time for anything really.

Becky:

And all your joy is in business, all your success is in the business and that feels like a great thing and that’s what you’re trying to feed, that’s what you’re trying to keep going. But there’s nothing outside of that and the same goes therefore for the business because you then get to a point and this… Burnout is this point when you’ve got chronic stress, going on for a long eon. Yeah, it’s chronic, it means a long time, right? So, it’s a chronic stress type situation, which is what these co-dependency builds up and so you end up in this position where you don’t feel like you’re giving your best and you feel like you need the business to hold you up.

Becky:

So, it’s all about… There’s a big ego part in that, which is the success of the business is making me feel better about myself and everyone recognizes me for the role in the business and I’m a valid person because of this business. And like I said because you get to this point where you’re not performing at your best because you’re in this chronic stress or burnout type of situation. You’re not giving back what the business needs either. And so, for me, it did get to that point, probably about two years ago now, two-and-a-half years ago. And that was exactly that: everything was tied up, everything was in that business and the business was me.

Becky:

It’s not a healthy place to be, as you just said, Nic. For all the founders who are going, “Yeah but I just need to do this one more thing, I just have to do this, and the business needs me to do this, I have to do this”. If you get on that slope and don’t check it, it doesn’t stop. There’s no way to stop that. It goes on forever. So you have to be able to reign yourself back in, you have to be able to get to that point where you go, “Oh, okay, no I can kind of get some perspective here.” That’s what you’re looking for, I think.

Nathalie:

It’s quite a lonely place as well. And it’s also hard to recognize and I think you don’t actually get there until you’ve gone quite, “Ah” down until you recognize actually you can’t keep on going. But before that happens it’s a slow burn and until you get there and then you’re like, “Yes, I need help, I need support.” And then you turn to, well, whether it’s friends, family, support at work, or anything else that will help you get out of it. It’s hard to recognize especially if it’s the first time because for a long time you think it’s normal and it’s how it should be and it only feels wrong when it’s really, really wrong.

Nic:

Yeah. I mean for me, my experience with this was that… So, that was probably four years ago now I would say. And again, I mean in one way, it was difficult but it’s almost like it was a really good thing actually. It’s a good thing in disguise that has happened because a lot of things have changed afterwards and I made the business what it is today. So, as I said, four years ago, I can’t remember whether that was right or wrong but basically, I felt between ego and actually truthness of whatever was happening in a time that I was at the forefront of the company, therefore I was the one having to take most of the responsibilities and everything that was going in the business, whether that was good or wrong was my fault.

Nic:

And we were reaching a point where we were not in financial troubles, in fact completely the opposite, we just had at that time, one of the best, if I remember well, but somehow I was feeling extremely drained because I felt we were not going anywhere. We were not growing. Yeah, we were making money, but that’s it, basically. And there was no other fulfillment, and it was a time in early December where I would always remember being sat on the sofa, talking to Nat and say, “Look I’m not enjoying myself anymore, I really struggle to make any kind of decisions and I don’t know if I’m made for that. I’m not made to be a boss, an entrepreneur, whatever you want to call it. I’m not made for that thing. Maybe I should just go back freelancing, or maybe I should just go back, I don’t know, working for somebody else, or like being a good number two, number three. That’s fine by me.”

Nic:

And I think when I said that to Nat, I was kind of expecting her because we were working together on the business obviously, and I was expecting her to shake me by the collar and be like, “No, no, no, what are you saying? No, we need to go, we need to do things, we need to. This is our business, this is our lifeline, whatever.” And she went completely the opposite. She was like, “Yeah, if you don’t feel good, we’re going to close the company, okay?” And she went, “Just give yourself 30 days. If in 30 days you haven’t changed your mind, we close the company. We have enough money to actually make it really good for the people. We could have paid everybody three months and still have money out of it, basically.”

Nic:

So we could have made really, I mean, not a huge amount of money but we would have made decent for everybody that has worked for us really hard for those past few years and be like. “Look, you have a bonus of two or three-month worth of pay, we all have that shared equally between us, and you know that in the technology sector in Bristol you’re going to find a job tomorrow anyway, so you have a little bit of bonus and life goes on.” And that’s the plan we actually devised. We talked about that plan of this is what’s going to happen after 30 days, but she said, “We don’t act on it, you wait 30 days and if you still feel like that after 30 days, we’ll do it.” And that was dangerous.

Nathalie:

It was, but I think it’s the difference between you and me because we started the business and we had children at basically the same time. Within 12 months we started the business and had the first child so the difference between you and me was one I’ve never worked full time in CookiesHQ ever, it’s always been part-time more or less depending on pregnancies and children, a lot of that. And also, I’ve always had, while you work full time and basically your whole mind and everything was in CookiesHQ, I had children to look after. And you looked after them too but it’s slightly different because I was with them sometimes almost full time, sometimes two, three days a week. So, I always had that where I couldn’t work and there’s no way, you can think about work full time and have a baby next to you. I don’t know who does it, it’s just not possible.

Nathalie:

So, I had to actually have time to reflect and to think and to not do anything on the business. And I think that’s the difference because, for me, the business has always been less important than family life and has been just a business. It’s work. And if tomorrow is not going, then we’ll go find another job, and that’s fine too. So there was no pressure I think for me on that side. We knew that you’d been freelancing for years, so I knew you could always go back to that. So, yes, maybe it was dangerous but I think if it doesn’t make you happy, don’t do it.

Nic:

And I think that’s what was important at the time, is the recognition of there was something missing which was the happiness of running a business. Do you remember the very first time you were talking about having a business? You felt proud. And at some point, that proudness wears out, and it’s just like, “Yeah, it’s just a job, basically.” This is my day-to-day now. We’ve been doing that and now… just before that call, we’re saying it’s been 10 years now that we’ve been running this business and it feels like another day-to-day but you need to carve your own happiness sometime into it.

Nic:

And going back to these moments where I said to Nat, “Look, I want to close the company”, what I’ve realized as well is and realized during those couple of months afterwards was one, I was not looking after myself properly, in everything, whether that’s health, foods, hobby, wherever you want. There was no myself. There was me as a dad to my kids and there was me as a founder of CookiesHQ and that’s it. There was nothing else out of it, not that there is a lot today more, but somehow it feels a bit better.

Becky:

Your mindset has changed though, the way you’re looking at it has changed.

Nic:

The mindset has changed. But also, we… And that’s where I can pinpoint the time where Nat went into the forefront and be like, “Look, I did bring the business to where it could be. I don’t think I’m the right person to move it forwards, and this is not for me.” We were just hitting that seven, eight people mark and it’s like, “Look, this is not for me, to run a business that’s going to grow is not for me.” And that’s when Nats took over all that side of the business and I went back to being a tech guy. And it’s what I like, and it’s me and it works so much better and it was much more enjoyable because I don’t have to deal with the complexity. I nearly said a swear word!

Nathalie:

I think you let go of some stuff. And at that point, you were happy that you couldn’t actually deal with everything and you just had to let go of some of the stuff.

Nic:

That’s exactly it. I did let go. And you take them

Nathalie:

No, but I didn’t want to do them before but you’d be freelancing, and when you freelance you do everything at a smaller scale but you deal with everything. And I think you stayed in that mindset that you had to do everything, especially because I wasn’t working full time, is probably stayed in there up until it wasn’t sustainable anymore.

Nic:

Yeah

Becky:

And I think it’s hard to see that until you do hit those points sometimes. I think it’s really great to listen to your story. Not great that you went through that but the fact that you did have Nat there to give you that perspective but also to be able to then go, “Right.” You can loosen your hands on the reigns and pass some things over and you still play this really instrumental growth in… sorry, part of the team in CookiesHQ. So, it’s not like you’re still not part of leadership in the company but it’s just you’ve allowed Nat to step in and take on some of that because of course, we as individuals, we can’t do everything ourself and we do have to let other people in, which is not always easy.

Nic:

We do so much better than other people, isn’t it? That’s the problem.

Becky:

It’s not easy, for sure, to do that. Some of it is also really about recognizing yourself and recognizing what are your tendencies and what are the signals and signs for you that you are running; it’s not even running too fast because sometimes running fast is good; what are the signs that you’re not being healthy as you’re doing it? And I think that is different for different people, and like I said, it’s really nice to hear your story because you were able to tap that perspective.

Becky:

I think the other interesting thing to come back to is what you were saying about… There’s something about your expectations and physical reality not matching because you started to set these expectations that no longer were looking at the success in right now. You were saying to yourself, “How am I going to grow this bigger, how am I going to get to this next bit?” And I know that we’re all guilty of doing that and that’s great because that’s what ambition is right? But it’s also trying to bridge that gap and be able to be like, “Well, this is where I’m in the moment right now. Yes, I might want to get over here somewhere but life has strange ways of taking us from A to B.”

Becky:

And I think if we try too hard to go, “Well I need to be here now because otherwise I won’t be there tomorrow and I’m not doing good enough and it’s not growing fast enough.” I’m very guilty of this. I have to tell myself, “Step back, slow down. Be happy with where you are right now and be happy with just that day-to-day.” And especially right now when what, the third national lockdown here in the UK and every… We don’t get all these outside things going on. We can’t do all the things we want to do. And there is a sense of, “Okay, let’s just take it day by day” and still have the ambition, still have things we want to aim for but also being able to be okay with where we are right now is part of something that I think can help against that stress and the running towards burnout.

Nic:

That’s one of the difficulties of running a company is you have other companies around and those other companies are doing much better than you and you want to be doing as well as them or even better. Or they’re doing something different that looks to be working and flashy and you want to do your own flashy things. And I find it extremely difficult not to compare myself or at least not to compare my company versus other companies in the same space. It’s personally almost impossible to me to not compare. I’m just…

Becky:

You have comparisonitis there, Nic.

Nic:

If that’s a word.

Becky:

Treat your comparisonitis.

Nic:

I’m just learning myself to not, I’m just teaching myself, sorry, to not let that lead my decisions and actions.

Becky:

Yeah, because at the end of the day if you ended up burnt out, that’s when you’re really going to end up… And again, not that I’m saying continue to compare because it isn’t very helpful but we all do it and there are uses for the comparison as well. But the way I look at it now, which I couldn’t look at it necessarily previously was, “Oh, well if I’m ground to a halt, I’m not going anywhere, I’m not hitting any of my goals, I don’t get to do any of those things.” So, I think that that’s the way that I think of it now in terms of sustainable growth and healthy growth.

Becky:

And then the other thing as I just said, I think that we forget that things aren’t as linear as they seem, so we see somebody else doing something and we’re like, “Well, we’re never catch up with that.” Or, “If they go and do that, they’re going to end up with all of our clients as well.” I don’t know, it’s probably harder for you because you have these very… There’s other agencies around and there’s other people doing other things. So, I’m sure it’s incredibly easy to just compare.

Becky:

But at the same time, it is a case of going… Well, just because they’re making that progress right now, you just don’t know what’s round the corner, you don’t know how things are going to develop and grow and what opportunity; if you’ve got the space for it and you’re ready for it; what opportunities are going to be able to come in and develop within your company.

Nathalie:

So, Becky, when you actually acknowledged that you were burnt out, and you were doing too much too quickly and there was no way to go, how did you get out of it and what were you… basically, how did you look after yourself a bit better?

Becky:

I should, first of all, say it wasn’t the first time it’s happened in iSci. The first time I experienced burnout was the first year of my Ph.D. and that was particularly… I just had no clue what was going on there and I was working outside of the Ph.D. as well as doing the Ph.D., and there were all sorts of things going on. My self-esteem was really low, and every day felt so stressful and so difficult. And that time around I just crashed completely and then hobbled through the rest of the Ph.D. Then I think I experienced quite a serious bout of burnout a few years after that as well.

Becky:

So, it wasn’t new to me but in some way; I don’t know if that made it easier or harder; because in some ways I was also carrying a lot of the baggage from previously with me. So again, self esteem and the more emotional and mental side of what was going on and what was triggering me to be stressed, that kind of came a little bit more easily maybe than it would’ve done for people who hadn’t experienced it before.

Becky:

Really what happened was, in very quick succession, two people that had been working closely with the business, one person, one of our investors, and one of the mentors that we had, came up to me and said, “Are you okay?” Quite out of the blue really. And I was like, “Yeah, everything’s great, this is happening, that’s happening.” I was very much in that space of I’m really busy, I’m working, I’m getting up at five, I keep going till 10 or whatever in the evening and I’m dashing around all over the place, I’m traveling around the world. It was that kind of time, and some of that was really exciting. But also, I was so running on adrenalin. I think back to it now and just that feeling of always being super hyped up…

Becky:

So, both of them in pretty quick succession, within about a week or so of each other, had said this to me and I honestly didn’t think there was anything wrong. And then I stopped and paused and had a look and had a conversation with this mentor who said to me, “So, tell me about what’s happening outside of the business.” And I was like, “Well, nothing’s happening outside of the business. Everything’s the business.” And they were like, “Or what do you do at the weekend?” And I was like, “Well, I work or I’m so exhausted I don’t do anything, I just binge watch something on the TV all day or I fall asleep.” So, it was… There was nothing else.

Becky:

And then as I was examining it a bit more, I was a bit like, “Oh yeah, I’m kind of having panic attacks quite a lot and there’s days when I just come home and cry.” So, on closer inspection, it was like, “Yeah.” Definitely not fine, but just holding everything together and just keeping going. It really started from that meeting with the mentor and we had started to do some exercises around things like your wheel of life and which way you just separate what are the different areas of your life, what other things are important to you.

Becky:

Gymnastics has always been something important to me and that ticks a lot of boxes, so it was about prioritizing going to gymnastics and when those sessions started at half-past seven in the evening it’s like, “Okay, that’s your gymnastics time, now you can switch off and it could be a social time and it’s physical activity, and it’s something you enjoy.” So, it was a really good like, “Okay that takes me away and helps me look at things with a slightly different perspective.” But there was also this whole self-worth/validation, self-esteem side of things as well, which I think the gymnastics helped with a bit because it was taking me away from the business, away from myself worth just being in that one thing.

Becky:

But I also just had to start doing a lot of work on myself in that regard. Doing a gratitude diary, like said, doing the wheel of life and really looking at, “Hang on, let’s separate some of these things out. What kind of impacts is it I want to make versus how do I want to make money and how do I…?” And figuring out different ways to do that. And then yoga and walking and all of those kind of things as well as building in micro-breaks and getting a bit more of a balance in the day-to-day. I kind of had to go through all that before I could then be on a bit more of a solid foundation in terms of the business. And being able to look at the business a little bit more objectively than I had been.

Becky:

It was kind of like, “Okay, get well again really, rejuvenate yourself.” I didn’t really take masses of time off. I don’t think at that point. But it was just find these ways to rejuvenate and then look a bit more objectively at the business and go, “Right, hang on a second, is this…? What are you getting out of it? What is it getting from you? Is it doing what it needs to do?” And really starting to look at what were the things that… How could we prioritize things? How could we clean things up in the business a little bit more so that it wasn’t as draining as it had been? How can we have that objective viewpoint over it? Then I had to make some changes in the business as well and so went kind of those wellness changes, but also some real changes that weren’t necessarily easy to make but were necessary at that point in time.

Nathalie:

Yeah, and that can only happen when you’re a bit more objective. And when you’re too much in it and running after everything you just don’t look at it the same way. You need that time to reflect and that time to pause and even if it’s just, as you said, you’re having a time in the evening where that’s it, there’s no… Your brain needs to stop working at some point so that you can come back the following day with a slightly different perspective.

Nathalie:

Or even just stop doing so you can actually think better and reflect on it, is really great. But sometimes you need to make that effort and say, “No, you know what, I’m too tired, I’m not working this evening”, or “No, I need half a day off”, or “I need to not do anything” or “I need to go out for lunch”. Not that we can go anywhere right now but just having a break, even if it’s not a long break, like two weeks’ holiday, but having a little break here and there is essential.

Nic:

Sorry, the problem that personally I have is that I can’t do that. I don’t know how you get mindful about those things because I personally; I have to talk. I have to talk with someone in order to process the information.

Becky:

I was just going to say that actually. So, coaching and mentoring were also really important to me. Both of those things in fact. I guess they’re slightly different but that was also the other thing that I did during that period of time. I was just realizing that that’s kind of what took me through… in fact, I still have the coach that I work with all the time now as well as doing podcasts alongside a coach as well. That helps me with that talking. And then I think the other thing, with processing, writing becomes really important for me around that sometimes. Just getting things written down instead of them spiraling around in your head. That also helps me.

Nic:

One of the, not issue but… One of the problem I have with coaching, and it’s not about any of the coach, mentors that we have, is that I always feel somehow judged because they are professionals in their own ways and they’ve either run agencies before or they had successful businesses before, whatever. And there’s always a part of me that kind of feels judged. Whether it’s saying what we do is great or not or we should do that, there is always a part of me that is ego.

Nic:

There’s one thing I’ve always… I never did it and I really want at some point to try it to see if it works or not and it makes Nathalie laugh that I say that, is I want to just find therapy where I just sit down, speak to someone that’s not in our profession, that doesn’t run a business, whatever and don’t say anything. I just want to speak for half an hour. I don’t have to have-

Becky:

I mean, there are therapists that will do that with you, Nic.

Nic:

I don’t have to have a bounce-back, I just need to speak and I get out, everything’s out of the bag, I don’t feel judged because; I don’t know why, there’s no reply, and then I get on with my life and I see you next week again. That I think would be great.

Becky:

I do understand what you’re talking about, and I certainly… In the earlier days of the business, whoever I talked to, I felt like I was trying to prove myself and I felt like there was judgment there and I felt it was very much the right and the wrong. And I think the person who changed that for me more than anything else was… Well, it took going through a really horrible situation to change that a little bit because it went way further than I thought I could possibly fail at, in some ways, where it was like, “Okay.” It wasn’t really on my head, that situation, but what happened was we as a board ended up having to really have each other’s backs and come together.

Becky:

And the Chair of iSci, he really shifted things around for me from that perspective because I… Like said, we had to deal with this really horrible situation and it was very stressful, very time-consuming, a lot of personal judgment put on me. And he was the one who, really… I think by coming together as a team, that was something that made me go, “Oh, okay, yeah.” I couldn’t even have imagined as I was building a business that this was a thing I’d have had to have gone through and, sorry, I can’t be that specific about what it is at this point in time, but by having somebody who came in and worked through all of that with us as a board and went through this journey and what I saw from that was… Where there was external judgment it was not helpful and actually, it was quite malicious at times, this external judgment.

Becky:

And I think when you have that and then you have somebody else come in and then have your back and really work through things with you that was something that really helped me and stripped me down. I know you’ve talked about failure before or was going through some of these difficult things but I think there is this sense of, “Oh, I just…” All the armor had to come off because there was nothing, there was just nothing left. And maybe this was coinciding with some of this burnout as well, where it was just like I don’t have a choice. I’m literally at this point in my life where I’m so defeated and unhappy and I need to be able to lean into other people and I need to be able to…

Becky:

I think it was being around people who were sort of… the terminology they would use would be something like dispassionately passionate, so it’s this actual dispassion, which of course I think for people like us, we’re not like that, we’re driven by our passion, the passion’s what matters. It is the excitement and the impact and the meaning behind what we do that drives us, and so sometimes having those people who are dispassionate around us, because this thing just isn’t as important to them as it is to you, that was really helpful. And so I guess that long rambling rant was about saying for me that was about finding the right person and then gradually working on myself through that as well. I also had clinical hypnotherapy, Nic. But you don’t get to talk when you’re doing that, they talk at you, so you might not like that one.

Nathalie:

Probably not, no.

Nic:

I need to hear the sound of my own voice, yeah.

Becky:

It’s not your voice, it’s a different voice.

Nic:

I did once, a long, long time ago. It was not hypnosis. What was it? It’s like mind suggestion kind of thing, imagining your next to the river, whatever it was.

Becky:

I mean, this was similar to this. Like an NLP…

Nic:

Yes, it was that kind of thing. And yeah, it worked. It was strange. I don’t know if it worked because I wanted it to work or I don’t know if it worked because the person was really good. I don’t know. It was a bit bizarre. But talking about the mind and the mindfulness of all that, I know that now obviously you’re out of the woods, we could say?

Becky:

Yes.

Nic:

And you’re on a new journey. I presume that new journey that you are going on is actually results from that experience that you had. Can you tell us a bit more about this new journey?

Becky:

Yeah, it’s exactly from that. During 2020, we launched this podcast called MindStyling and it came from about two years prior to launching it, so this time that we’re talking about here, was when I started working with the coach, and then I was going and… I’d go out and do quite a lot of talks and I’m talking to maybe young women who are aspiring to work in the tech sector or being entrepreneurs and we started to do lots of these panels and presentations and then get questions that were the same every time, which were about how do we build more confidence, how do we be resilient, how as for example, as women if we need to… if we know the investors are still biased against us, how do we walk in and be confident in what we do?

Becky:

All of these kind of questions. And what occurred to me was that I had some perspectives and some answers but I knew that there were all these peers around me that also had their own journeys, their own perspectives, their own stories, and I could really see the value in telling more of those stories. But at the same time knowing that this actual coaching practice was something that had already helped me along the way. And actually, it says a lot about my level of confidence at that point because I think if I was to do this again now, it wouldn’t necessarily even occur to me to ask somebody else to do it with me, which is I think it’s probably a good thing that I did. But actually, at the time I was like, “Well, nobody’s going to want to hear… What have I got to say about any of this stuff?”

Becky:

So I came together with Amy Armstrong who was coaching me at the time; who’s a leadership coach and a clinical hypnotherapist as I was just talking about; and said I’m really keen to do a podcast because it’s a longer form, we can actually have full conversations, we can tell stories and then we can, of course, do all sort of other things around that and she said, “Well, I was going to suggest something similar too.” And so, we started to talk about it and it wasn’t until I’ve cleared up some space and started to look at what are my priorities, who do I want to serve in this world, how do I want to really show up and help people, that I thought I need to make this podcast more of a priority. So we had the lovely Nat on, this year back in the summer. Well, we actually record… you were the last interview before…

Nathalie:

Before lockdown, wasn’t it, the first one?

Becky:

Before lockdown, yeah. So, we recorded a few before we really got it going, so it was like, “Okay, we’ll do a few interviews” and then of course once you’ve got a few interviews under your belt you have to go live because those people have already given their time. So we did. And that was something that 2020 kind of allowed us. But as you said the real motivation behind that is a response to those things that I went through. I wanted just to be able to tell our stories. I knew that my experience was only one experience, and I really wanted to be able to tell other stories but also get practical.

Becky:

So I guess that was the other thing that for me when I was… the first time I went through burnout, like I said, way back in my Ph.D. I honestly just thought, “I’m not good enough, I shouldn’t be doing this.” It was a very closed-minded response to the problem. This was pre-YouTube days, pre-podcast days, well, certainly in the form that they are now. And so I think that’s why I sort of got okay again but then fell back into the same trap, the same behaviors, the same mindset, and whereas this next time or the time I went through it when I was in iSci, there were so many tools available to me.

Becky:

We kind of need to think about this in terms of the tools that are available to us and being really open about the fact that we do have power over the way we respond to situations. We don’t have power over the situations, I think we all know that all too well at this point. And as an entrepreneur, we know this. Yes, we happen to had to deal with 2020 lockdown, COVID, everything else that’s gone on in the past year but we do have to deal with uncertainty all the time. And I think that therefore in some ways we’re better ready, our minds are better ready for being able to deal with the challenges that come along. That’s really what I wanted the podcast for as well. It was really about… Look, we can get practical, there are things we can do as individuals.

Becky:

As we live our lives, we’re making choices all the time. We start to get to decide what those choices are and if we’ve got some good role models out there who have kind of dealt with things along their own journey and in a relatable way, so it’s not just super privileged people who’ve ended up with businesses, people who really are working and going through the challenges and finding ways to overcome them and that’s the important stories that we want to tell and I think that that becomes even more important now.

Becky:

It’s tough. I’m not going to pretend that things are really easy. And we’ve lost a lot of our tools, we’ve lost a lot of our tactics. Like I said, gymnastics, one of mine, I can’t do that at the moment. So I’ve got to find new ways but I think now I know that I can find new ways and I can find different ways to keep myself healthy and recognize when I need to do those things as well. Recognize when I need to say no to things and to get rid of toxic things as well as when I need to maybe enhance something or add something new into my life. That’s what the podcast was all about, as well as just being an excuse to talk to all the people that we want to talk to, which we’ve been very successful at. Yeah. Getting some great people onto the podcast, I’ve been very excited about that.

Nic:

I think one other thing that is getting better over time is, there’s a huge emphasis at looking at other people. Let’s face it, we all look at what other people are doing and there’s a lot of spotlight, obviously, on the big successes, like how he’s… Like the CEO of Twitter during his day or what he’s doing to overcome burnout, or what is these successful entrepreneurs, whatever, doing. And more and more I think the voice of the more little entrepreneurs, people like us, and the ones that are not like superstars and the ones that have just, as you said relatable lives. They’re becoming a bit more heard, and there’s a bit more sharing and openness around us because there was I think up until a few years ago, there was still a… almost a stigma, around the burnout, around just having difficulties, basically.

Nic:

Why are we even complaining? We’re running a business. Why are you complaining kind of thing? But those voices are getting out there and it’s being helped by a lot of other voices, whether you’re championing women in tech, whether you’re championing disability in tech, whatever there is, accessibility, inclusivity. We are now championing the voice that were not probably, not heard a couple of years ago. And hopefully, it will make it easier for the next round coming after us, to be like, “Oh, hang on, actually there is struggle ahead but I just need to recognize it and maybe next time…” I think I relay to you what you said like, to me in these episodes. When my friend ask me, “How are you?” If my next 30 minutes are about talking how my business is great, there is a problem because I was certainly having that as well.

Becky:

Like a mirror.

Nic:

Yes. When you said that example, I can remember a friend called Adam. And we were going for a pub lunch and I had this exact experience, like “Ha, how are you?” And then I went to saying how great it was, what the business was doing and everything, and then after 15 minutes, 20 minutes, he said like, “Yeah, but how are you, not how is CookiesHQ? It’s like, “Oh, I don’t know how I am. Haven’t thought about that.”

Becky:

It’s a pretty scary question. To really stop and ask yourself that can be scary at times, especially when you have thrown everything into this business, your identity in the business, and even like you said because everybody else sees you as that as well. So you’re almost starting to be… Yeah. Who are you? It’s not even how are you, it’s like are you even a person anymore, you’re just this avatar that runs this business? That’s a good sign.

Nathalie:

It’s the same as being a new parent. All of a sudden you’re not you anymore, you’re just parent with a child. It’s like, “How are you?” And then you’ll talk about your child for 30 minutes. And then like, “No, you are someone.” And it takes time to get to that point where you’re like, “Yes, I am someone, I’m someone’s mother, but I’m also… I’m a company director, but also me.” You need time to go back to you and to do stuff that’s just for you. And it’s, yes, it’s selfish but it’s necessary because you can’t be someone’s mother or you can’t be a company director if you’re not well in yourself and if you’re completely too tired or too overwhelmed or too of anything. You need to look after yourself before you can look after someone else or a company. That feels like a someone.

Becky:

It’s such a sign to me I think when I get to that point and I’m… Even when I’ve got more self-doubt. There’s lots of voices saying no or the decisions just get really tricky or easy tasks get harder and I’m just like… I know that that’s starting to move towards that place where I need to go, “Okay, there’s something going on here, I need to pull it back, I need to look after myself.” We all say it and as corny as it sounds, putting your own oxygen mask on first is necessary. You can’t be there for the business, you can’t be there for the people you employ, you can’t be there for your children if you’re not well.

Becky:

And I think there is, thinking about it in those terms, we say there’s no stigma but I think the reality is we still don’t look at these things and say, “You’re just not well right now”. If you had, let’s call if the flue, we won’t talk about other viruses right, but you know, if you’re that burnt out, you’re in bed, we don’t go and infect other people with those things and we rest ourselves until we’re ready to get out again. I think we all know that’s what we should do now even if we didn’t before. And I think that really starting to think about this is your health. Your health is not maximized right now and once it hits below a certain level, take that time off, have a bit of a rest and be ready to go again well. And that’s going to be a much more sustainable way to approach the business or your life as a whole.

Nic:

Cool. Well, I think we’re getting towards the end of that podcast. Thank you very much, Becky, for recording that with us.

Becky:

No problem. Thank you for having me.

Nic:

If people wants to learn more about you, where do they go?

Becky:

You’ll find me on Instagram @drbeckysage and the MindStyling podcast on there as well @mindstylingpodcast. Probably the best place to come first, it’s the real me over there. And then come say hi on messages and we can go from there.

Nic:

Wow. Thank you very much. Thank you, Nats. And we’ll see you probably in another week because we’ve decided to start again recording another weekly episode just Nat and I, so that’s gonna be interesting. Thank you very much, Becky and we will see you very soon when COVID and when we’re allowed to hug each other.

Becky:

I hope so. See you soon. Bye.

Nathalie:

Bye.

Nic:

Bye.

This podcast was brought to you buy CookiesHQ, a Bristol based software agency who builds apps and websites for early stage founders and growing startups. If you’ve enjoyed this podcast, you can drop us a message @thecookieshq on Twitter or head to www.cookieshq.co.uk/podcast for more episodes.