Episode 5: burning the blueprint: women, power and the new metrics of success
What Does Success Really Mean? A Heartfelt Redefinition for Women Entrepreneurs
In this thought-provoking episode of Full of Ourselves, hosts Anna Campbell and Heidi Hinda Chadwick challenge the traditional, buttoned-up definitions of success - those familiar KPIs and corporate checkboxes - and invite you into a much more personal, empowering conversation.
What if your morning coffee by the river, a slow walk, or simply feeling alive was a more meaningful metric of success than your latest sales report? Anna and Heidi explore how societal and business norms shape our perception of achievement and how redefining success on our own terms can feel like a radical act of self-honour.
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Whether you’re growing a business, navigating burnout, or just craving a deeper connection to your work and life, this episode offers both practical insight and emotional resonance. Listen now to explore:
The surprising fears hidden behind both failure and success
How to use internal cues like pleasure, alignment, and presence as your compass
Why honouring your values is the most strategic move you can make
A downloadable exercise to help you uncover your own personal success metrics
Come for the wisdom, stay for the honesty and leave with a renewed sense of what thriving really looks like.
🎧 Listen now and start redefining success on your terms.
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How do we measure success?
Or rather, how do YOU measure success?
Though there are plenty of tools and resources to support in knowing what the corporate metrics of success are for you, this download is all about focusing on the following:
What does success look like for you?
What are your values? And what are you really valuing? And,
Scoring your personal success metrics to discover what you need to focus on right now.
Get the free download to score your personal success metrics. Email hello.fullofourselves@gmail.com with the subject SUCCESS and we’ll email it to you.
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https://www.goodgirlrebellion.com/
Instagram @annaccampbell
Anna’s book Good Girl Rebellion: Build the Business, Break the Rules, Be Limitless.
https://www.goodgirlrebellion.com/ggr-book
Connect with Heidi Hinda Chadwick
https://www.heidihindachadwick.com/
Instagram @heidihinda
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Also, we would LOVE to guest on podcasts and speak on stages all about women entrepreneurs. Get in touch! hello.fullofourselves@gmail.com
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
Anna Campbell (00:02.862)
Hello there and welcome to the Full of Ourselves podcast. We're here once again to talk about some juicy topics and today we're going to be talking about the metrics of success. And this is an interesting thing. It kind of came from coaching each other, which I'm sure we've mentioned many times before, and it came out of a coaching session that we were doing together and we're like, okay, like what are our metrics for success? And we're like, ooh, that's a good topic. Let's get into that. Because I think sometimes we can be quite one dimensional with our metrics and what we're measuring for our success. And if we don't meet up to that, even if we've achieved quite a lot, we can feel like we haven't achieved anything. And so I think today we want to talk a little bit about what are the kind of corporate metrics of success or say that in a deep voice of some sort there. What are the corporate metrics of success and then what would we add to our own metrics of success? What also is important for us? So before we get started, Heidi, what are your thoughts on this topic? Why was this something that you felt like we should talk about?
Heidi Hinda Chadwick (01:24.89)
It's just one of those, as soon as that came out and even that phrase, I mean, my silly brain was like, Metrics of Success, they were definitely an 80s band. We would have listened to them, I know we would have been bopping away at the discos to their top tunes. Yeah, totally. It's also making me think of, I know I'm slightly going off and starting off in a strange way, but there was a film as well. Was that an 80s film, The Secret of My Success? Do you remember that with Michael J. Fox?
Anna Campbell (01:35.564)
Yes. We would have. Electronic band. Yeah.
Heidi Hinda Chadwick (01:54.574)
Would have had some good soundtrack to that as well, but that's as far as I'm gonna go with that.
This I think is something that is not only one of the most important questions or things to reflect upon for any of us in business, absolutely, but also how then that also dovetails to our own personal life and especially again, if it's our own business, it's our own offerings, our products, our services that are born through us. It's not that we're working for anybody else. So there's a deep care for the things. So this question, it's quite loaded. And I think for me personally, and I'm loving, this is also part of, you're asking why this topic. It's one of those things that have we ever, or asking you as a listener, sat down and really gone, what does that even mean? What does it even mean? Yeah. So I think, getting started with the corporate, I'm to call that slash societies. It is a deep voice, isn't it? Meaning of what success looks like. So I would love to hear your thoughts about that.
Anna Campbell (03:00.62)
The corporate.
Anna Campbell (03:11.296)
Yeah, I'm trying to remember because you... Yes, because you haven't necessarily ever had that kind of corporate career. You've worked... You did for a bit. Okay. Okay.
Heidi Hinda Chadwick (03:20.346)
I have. I have a bit and I've also done freelance projects, kind of writing projects for corporate organisations and they have had that as something that's come up, you know, for us to align by as well. So I am familiar, but yes, I haven't had that full time working for corporate organisations. So, but you have. So you are the woman to tell us all about this.
Anna Campbell (03:26.498)
That's true. I was forgetting that side.
Anna Campbell (03:42.231)
Hahaha.
I have right at the beginning of my career only really and after that I've been in education which also had its own metrics of what success means as well and I think that's the thing is like whether you've worked in a corporate environment ever or not if you've worked for someone else, if you work for a bigger business there's always been some kind of metric of what shows that you have been successful in your job. I think that's what we're talking about here.
Heidi Hinda Chadwick (04:11.246)
Yeah.
Anna Campbell (04:11.906)
But when it comes to business, we're often, I think we can get stuck on those, the corporate, I say corporate way too many times today, aren't I? These corporate ideas, the corporate measures of success. And I remember being in a business where we had KPIs, key performance indicators, which, whew, even just saying that makes me go, ooh. It's not, it's not. But it is things like, of course, sales.
Heidi Hinda Chadwick (04:31.61)
Not sexy, is it?
Anna Campbell (04:40.302)
So sales is something I think we all need to talk about when it comes to business and it does need to be an important one, but it's not the only thing. But I have a whole list of other things that come in. So the amount that we innovate and change, the market share that we have, our reputation, our efficiency, it always sounds very exciting, our customer satisfaction. There's so many different things that could be in that.
Heidi Hinda Chadwick (04:47.098)
Mm.
Heidi Hinda Chadwick (04:56.058)
Yeah.
Anna Campbell (05:10.014)
And again, we're putting on a voice, not really on purpose, but also slightly because it feels kind of apart from me some of these things. And yet they are still important, you know, that my customers or my clients are happy is an important thing. But I'm not sure how I would want to try and measure that particularly apart from that gut feeling of, you know, that they're working with me and that they continue to work with me. Those two things.
Heidi Hinda Chadwick (05:25.548)
Mm. Mm.
Anna Campbell (05:39.31)
Seemed like a good measure to me.
Heidi Hinda Chadwick (05:42.066)
Yeah, you know what's interesting hearing you speak about that and it's really making me laugh. Immediately I feel dry, I've dried up. It's like my balls have shriveled as you say those things. But how I work with people and what really is the crossover for me as you know is how do we bring the sense of the erotic or pleasure into what we're doing. So it's not necessarily that those things are wrong, these kinds of very dry corporate KPIs, but is there perhaps a way that we can look at those, each of those things, and find a different language that turns us on? You know, and maybe it is kind of saying the same thing, but it is much more something pleasurable and enlivening rather than something that feels quite dull or, you know, it's making me think of, yeah, boardroom kind of stiff.
Stiff is such a word of our generation, isn't it? Boardroom kind of stiff mentality. So it's not about throwing everything out the window. Those things I think are important, particularly as we're talking about business. You know, we're not playing here. We're serious about the things that we're doing, but how do we perhaps use a different kind of language that works for us, that lights us up, that we can still retain some of those important measures or metrics and use the language of what this particular podcast is about in order to ascertain our success. What do you think about that?
Anna Campbell (07:17.836)
Yeah, I definitely agree because as you know, as I was reading through and looking at different kinds of KPIs, I was kind of glazing over slightly. But like you said, a lot of the core of it is important and it's as if it's more about how we look at it? What is important to us in our business? And I think for everyone, that's going to be different. And I also think, you know, with business, they tend to review these regularly, you know, they might be reviewing these quarterly, they might be reviewing these every year. And where you are in your business, are you in that kind of growth phase? And what are the key factors in the things that are going to help ensure it and be a measure that you have, you know, created that growth that you want to create? Are you, you know, in a phase where you're kind of bedding in? Are you in a phase where it's time to move out and find new people and new audiences? So I think we can take the lessons of the corporate world and then make it fun and make it work for us.
Heidi Hinda Chadwick (08:16.922)
Mmm.
Heidi Hinda Chadwick (08:22.914)
I love that. Do you know what, that's just coming to me as well as you're saying that. I love that being aware of what phase, and we've talked about this before, isn't it? The seasons of things. Because often I think growth in business can often just look like a kind of, you know, an incline going up, up, up, up, up, up the whole time. And we know that's not the case. There's going to be, and this feels like corporate language, times of plateauing, you know, or maybe there's a dip of something and it's like, no panic, we have to just change strategies here and so on. But if we look at that in that sense of the seasonal, then there's something that feels very exciting around, okay, we're in a growth phase, how do we measure that? And then what does that mean from there? But also in a development phase, our measure of success at that particular point might be around working with the right people in order to learn what we need to learn to go to next. So there's something what you're saying as well actually is really important that that kind of how we measure success is not a that's just not a one-time thing it will be changing constantly whether it's seasonal whether it's quarterly as a lot of businesses have their kind of quarterly goals and and so on but also in these different kind of sense of phases of how we connect with our business I really like that that's important I think to remember.
Anna Campbell (09:49.804)
Yeah, and I think what can happen is we start a business and we're just doing all the things, you know, all that, what I call the invisible architecture of a business, all the stuff that goes on behind it, underneath it, and the things that people don't really necessarily see. And there comes a point where, you know, we then need to start to be maybe a little bit more strategic, like you were just talking about, on specific things and specific ways of doing that.
And I think it can be a good step, taking a step backwards almost and going like, okay, so if I want to be more visible, if I want to make more sales, if I want to, like what are the things, what are the ways I'm gonna know that I've achieved that? You know, it's that bottom line, isn't it? Of like, how am I gonna know that I've achieved this? This is really what a metric of success is.
Heidi Hinda Chadwick (10:36.11)
Yeah. Yeah.
Yeah. Absolutely. And when you're speaking, I feel like it has got two, it's quite black and white, but two components in that. One is, are my strategies working? And the energetics, I think, is really important as well. If my strategies are working, but I'm exhausted all the time and burn out and I have no time for whatever, then something is wrong on that level. And more and more, I think these days, and probably those of you that are listening to us, that have been drawn to listen to us, probably more understanding on that level of the energetics being important as well. It's not something completely new. It is something much more common and spoken about these days, isn't it? From anyone talking about the soft girl era of business, which yeah, great. And also you need some of the, it's having bones, it's having a structure that supports, and then it's having that ability to allow what's flowing in that to be also supportive as well.
I want to speak to, you talked about corporate success. I think there's also society's measure of success. And that can be very insidious because it's strong. You know, what society says means your success will be in business. I know for me, and I'm just going to share this as a personal thing today, and I've spoken to you about this and I don't mind sharing this because I think it's important for us to be vulnerable in business. I'm looking at getting a part-time job at the moment to support myself and my business. I'm not taking my attention away, but just being aware of, actually in order for me to step forward into the next level of growth in my business, which is happening slowly, part of that is needing to be able to have, well, yeah, a little more of that stability, because as we know when we work on our own that stability is a bit of an enigma sometimes I think for self-employed or if you're an entrepreneur but sometimes like that might be seen as I know I have a thing and I spoke to Anna about this in my coaching session you know no I'm a failure I failed I've not been successful in this endeavor okay sure maybe in society's level but actually taking that away and going, what if that's actually successful in a sense of acknowledging a need for myself and for my business to support both of us in order to take another step forward? And it might be by the time this podcast actually, you're actually listening to this right now, maybe that's changed, you know, who knows? But society might go, no, you're not successful then. If you're in a business that's not just gone, taken off just like that, you've got to go and find other ways to support.
And I don't know if we've mentioned, maybe we have talked about that before, of the day job, do we give up the day job while we're growing a business? When do we do that? Is it okay still to have that? Does that mean I'm not an actual proper entrepreneur? And I know that for myself working with artists, this is a big thing as well. Almost like there can be a shame in that as opposed to going, well, maybe that just supports alongside, you know?
Anna Campbell (13:59.382)
Yeah, there's so much there, isn't there? And I think I wrote a bit about this in my book. Let's plug this now. The book's coming out soon. So I know I'm looking forward to sharing that with you at some point soon on the podcast. But so this is something I was thinking about quite a lot. And I think what can happen and be particularly for women is this.
Heidi Hinda Chadwick (14:07.342)
Yeah, go for it! Anna's book is coming!
Anna Campbell (14:25.44)
I think for everyone probably, maybe to take gender out of this, but it's around our feeling of safety and security, isn't it? And, you know, we can be in different spaces if we have some family money or we have somebody who is there who is able to be the breadwinner and support you while you're building, because we know everything takes time to build. You know, on average, it takes three years to build a profitable business. And that's just facts.
And that kind of also can depend on how much time you have within that to devote to that, because a lot of us do need to have the money to pay the bills. We all need to have that in some way, and many of us need to make that. And I think what is interesting around having the day job is, I think what can sometimes happen is there's the energetics of if you really, everything is on the business, then what we're putting out there is, we have to have those sales because I need to pay my rent and all of that. The energetics of it are completely off. And I think that's why it can be good, at least to start with, to have the day job and build up. Hopefully at some point, there will be a tipping point where it makes sense, where it's, and it's not a hard thing. can just be that it becomes exactly the right time to tip over and have the business as being your focus.
Heidi Hinda Chadwick (15:58.146)
Yeah, and no one can say when that is or whether it's the right time to do it or even whether you never give that up because actually maybe you get something else from that as well. What's coming to me as you're speaking is perhaps then the measure, the metric, I'm going to go back to using that word of this, the metric of success is am I still consistent even if I'm just showing up for half an hour a day when I've got like busy day job work days or I give myself half a day or I'm contemplating or reflecting upon something that's next for my business that I write some notes down in my phone or a voice note or something. There's something for me personally I'm really aware of is the consistency piece. That for me feels part of the success. It's the knowing that I am moving forwards and that my business is growing and alive, that makes me feel like, okay, I'm successful. That's a metric, that's important to me. It's a value. I think values, bottom line is, what are your values? What are your values? What are your business's values? Because they can be two different things. And am I living them and choosing actions that support the values that are embedded in who I am? And if you don't know what your values are, you've never thought about this before, then it's really good and really important, I think, to sit down and get really honest and clear about what your values are, both personally and for your business itself, knowing that they can change and will. So to do this kind of regularly and then going, okay, if I'm aligned with my values that is a massive metric of success as far as I feel. I don't know what your thoughts are on that.
Anna Campbell (17:56.544)
Yeah, I love that. And I also think alongside this, and I think it's a slightly different thing, but it's what are you valuing? Like what's most important? Like why are you starting this business in the first place? Because being a business is not necessarily the easiest path, but you know, maybe it's something to consider. Like what about the business? Why do you want this business?
Heidi Hinda Chadwick (18:22.488)
Yeah. Yeah.
Anna Campbell (18:24.142)
What is it going to bring for you? And that could be around your creative freedom, your freedom in terms of your autonomy, in terms of being able to do your work when you want to do it. I mean, I'm talking about me really here, but the ability to be more seasonal around busy times and fallow times. All of that is very important to me. But when you have the corporate job or even any job you don't get that because it's like, right, you got to show up and be here and do this, this work for this amount of hours, you know, every single week. That's, so I value that. That's something that's important for me. So I think both of those things, it's like, what are your values? What's important for you around who you are and what you're bringing to this business, but then also what are you valuing? Like what is important about what you're creating as a part of this business and a part of the holistic life that you're creating.
Heidi Hinda Chadwick (19:22.05)
Yeah. You know, what else as well around this? And I don't know if this is a, maybe it is a woman thing. So I just want to preface what I'm saying with that. Is it, you know, like as a question mark, but this, and I know this is a topic that's quite dear to your heart as well, Anna, that we've spoken about before. Around this, like, I'm allowed to make shit loads of money. You know, if your reason for your business is you want to make fucking loads of money.
That is okay, but how many of us allow ourselves to say that? Because we can be like all altruistic and go, no, this is a good thing and it's helping people with this and it makes people feel good and la la la. Sure, but if you are getting really honest about why it matters to you and that is about actually I want loads of money too, you have to be able to own that and there's nothing wrong with that. And that will then become, again, part of your metric of success. Is that happening? Is my bank account bulging? If not, what do I need to do strategically or energetically in order to realign with that and to keep moving forward? Same with like, I want to be famous in this. These are the things, aren't they? I think especially as women, we can be a bit coy around or it's not nice to, or if you're a creative entrepreneur or you're kind of more, I don't know, work in the healing fields or spiritual or whatever, my God, that is a huge shadow of, no, you're not allowed to make loads of money. And I think that can keep us in a bit of a, you know, our energy can be a little bit hijacked rather than just be really honest around it, you know? So it's a really good thing to reflect upon those who are listening. What am I really? What really matters? Why am I really? I love how you brought why in. It's the key. Why am I really doing this? And it can be all of the things, but if making lots of money or having lots of, I want to be able to go and have lots of hot tub holidays, like every month, just saying as an example, or beautiful lingerie as an example, all these things that might seem like, God, no, that's so, if that's honestly a thing that you're like, yeah, I want that, then that becomes part of your truth around what you value and what you are valuing.
Anna Campbell (21:17.581)
Yeah.
Anna Campbell (21:42.798)
I love that and what I think as well and this is something you’re always reminding me of when we're talking and that is that it doesn't have to be either or. It's not like I'm helping people and I'm altruistic or I make money. It can be both. Like let's stop this whole either or stuff going on because it doesn't have to be either or you can be bringing your A game you can be really helping people transform themselves and transform their lives if you're a coach like we are and you know you can be earning the money and people were happily spending because they know that they're going to get the result that they're looking for you know I love that thing, like, there's so often, you're right, there's that story of you're the healer and you're this and you're that and therefore, you should be scrabbling around in the dirt kind of thing and that’s just, it's not true and it's keeping people back.
Heidi Hinda Chadwick (22:38.468)
Thank you.
Heidi Hinda Chadwick (22:43.034)
And I think it's affecting, you know, if we look at this on a slightly woo-woo, though neither Anna and I are woo-woo, and we really, really, I'm sure, can speak for Anna that way, like, no to the woo-woo stuff in that. You know, if that's what we're, if that's going on as a blueprint, it's that running inside of us, we are going to be stopping opportunities coming in, we're going to be sabotaging our next steps and our growth, and we might not realise that's actually what's going on.
And actually, you know, this is just coming to my mind as well because it's a thing that's close to my heart that I'm really immersed in at the moment. It could also be a capacity thing, you know, this whole thing of why am I not more successful? And there's a lot of stuff about this at the moment out there. It could be a nervous system capacity. I literally cannot hold more than what I'm used to. This is my, you know, they call it the glass ceiling, don't they? This is my comfort level and I can't seem to go beyond that. I hit that, I'm about to go over and I collapse back or lose everything again. And it could literally simply be a nervous system level. This is where the inside out work comes from. Because for me, success is, it's the feeling inside. It's an inside job. I've been doing a lot of listening to stuff around money, but also around being in our queen energy, you know, as an archetype. And this sense of when we're our queen energy, we are full already. We're satisfied already. So we're not seeking from outside of us a sense that we're successful in either of, just being who we are or in our, you know, the business thing, is those elements of being able to measure how that is. But a lot of the time, I think success for us, especially these days can be like, how many likes did we get on social media today? How many people saw that post? How many sales did I make from this recent launch? And then if that's not aligned to what we want, it can really deflate us and make us go, well, I'm not successful then. And more and more these days, I'm hearing and reading posts and articles by people that I really admire that are in similar areas to what Anna and I are in the coaching world that are being really honest around no one signed up for my latest launch or that failed launch or…
Heidi Hinda Chadwick (25:05.881)
And there's something really refreshing about the vulnerability of when you're an entrepreneur, this happens. It doesn't mean you're a failure. It doesn't mean what you're doing isn't successful. It's just one of those things for that particular time. There'll be stuff to learn in that. But it doesn't mean that we're not successful. You know, it's interesting.
Anna Campbell (25:27.214)
Yeah, I think that's important. I mean, sales has always got to be a metric that we need to be on top of and we need to know where we want to be moving with that. But I think what's interesting is that I think we also need a metric that is around the actions that we're taking. And I think you were talking about the... So just, I've seen a butterfly just landing anyway. It just caught my eye and then just distracted me slightly. But the butterfly, feel it, let's say that, take that as a good sign. I think there's, sales are, you know, like you said, sales, a very important metric, but...
Heidi Hinda Chadwick (25:54.298)
I love that! Look, it's a sign! Let's go woo woo!
Anna Campbell (26:09.664)
In terms of what's important also is our actions that we are taking and your consistency piece that you were talking about before, because we can do all the things, all the right stuff, and then perhaps the sales aren't what we think they're gonna be or that we hope for. And then that doesn't mean that the work that we have done is wiped away.
You know, I feel like we need in some ways a metric of success around that consistency or that main thing of just doing the thing we said we were going to do, you know, of having a plan and implementing the plan. And sometimes the metric of measuring whether that plan was successful is, the sales and maybe we can't, we do all our best that we can do, but we can't necessarily control the sales, but we control that effort and that energy that we've put in. Does that make sense?
Heidi Hinda Chadwick (27:09.658)
I love that. It's made me have a sigh of relief as you said that, because it feels really important because we can be so hard on ourselves, you know, if stuff doesn't work. We’re really strongly, our own worst enemies. And obviously if it's just ourselves, if we are solopreneurs and we don't have a team yet, you know, then suddenly it's like, oh, OK. It's a kind of double-edged sword. The success can feel heightened. Look what I did. And then the things that don't necessarily work at that time can feel quite pushing and disappointing and you know all of this in there as well. I'm really curious about what are your metrics of success Anna? Well great, it's prepared. I know you are, love her.
Anna Campbell (27:48.974)
Well, I have a list. I have a list. I've always got to have my little list of things. But one thing that actually has... I remember... How long ago would this be? Like 20 years ago maybe. I don't know. But I remember very clearly. I was walking home and I just had this thought of how... I would love to, I was a teacher at the time, full-time teacher, and I was kind of struggling with the energy of that for lots of different reasons that we don't want to get into necessarily here. But I remember walking back and just thinking, gosh, it would be so lovely to just, to not have this, have to be in a certain place at a certain time. This was, working from home was not a thing at this time at all, really. And I could just go to like, because I was doing exercise classes and things, I could just go to an exercise class in the morning and I could, you know, I could have a much more leisurely day and it felt like that would be success to me, that I had the opportunity to kind of plan myself, my life around myself and then I just want to tell you about this morning because I I was like, my god, this is so good.
Heidi Hinda Chadwick (29:01.806)
Hmm.
Heidi Hinda Chadwick (29:06.874)
Yeah, this is great!
Anna Campbell (29:11.022)
So for one thing, I am not a morning person. I do not schedule anything for before half past 11. That's just not a thing for me. If you see me at anything at 9 a.m. you know, don't talk to me yet. So it's not my thing, but my life right now, it just feels, it feels like my definition of success. So the alarm goes off at eight. I read, my husband and I just stay in bed for an hour. We read until like nine. We have breakfast from nine until nine thirty. We sit by a window by a river and we watch the Kingfishers. Honestly, I saw it twice today. I know, I know.
Heidi Hinda Chadwick (29:26.103)
Yeah.
Heidi Hinda Chadwick (29:49.608)
My god, I'm tearing up at this. This is beautiful.
Anna Campbell (29:53.21)
And we have, and this is very Gen X thing, we have the radio and we have, it's a digital one, so we switch between different channels, so 70s, 80s, 90s and dance. And I'm dancing in the kitchen, like I'm just having like a proper dance party. Then we go for a walk for an hour up a massive hill, because Edinburgh is all hill. So we go for a walk for an hour and then 11.30 is when I can actually be at work.
And I think back to that me who was struggling with the job that I was doing, struggling just with mental health and all of that stuff. And thinking, yes, there's so much I want to do with my business. There's so much. There's more. Like, this is just the beginning. But in terms of life, the life I want and the life I've crafted, I'm like...
Heidi Hinda Chadwick (30:42.372)
Yes.
Anna Campbell (30:48.952)
The joy! Hopefully you can feel this joy that I've got because I was just like so joyful this morning and it's been the same every morning.
Heidi Hinda Chadwick (30:58.614)
I am so moved by that. It is so beautiful. So I want to celebrate that, Anna.
Anna Campbell (31:08.322)
Me too.
Heidi Hinda Chadwick (31:08.538)
And also the simplicity, you know, this, I think what you said about, you know, the kind of life you'd like to be leading, I think for most of us, it isn't complicated. It is simply being able to dance around the kitchen in the morning, have a leisurely breakfast, be outside in nature for a bit, have some time with our, you know, our partner or family or ourselves and then start work at half 11. This is why we work so well together as well. I’m such a night owl. I mean, this is a thing for me. It's always the way. But this life of the simple things.
Anna Campbell (31:50.798)
Because we're both the same. Actually, yeah, we both start like, we're forever messaging, like, can we just push it off for now?
Heidi Hinda Chadwick (32:06.36)
And I do wonder if it's an age thing as well, as I've gotten older, particularly in the last few years. One of my values much more is around simplicity. It doesn't mean I always can kind of connect into that or be living by that, but I'm very aware a lot of the time, the simplicity of my life in some ways is what makes me feel so full, like nourished, touched, grateful appreciated. All of these things.
Heidi Hinda Chadwick (32:41.176)
When you know, when we're looking for, what does that mean? How would I know what my metrics of success are? Personally, those of you that are listening, you know, could be super inspired by what Anna's just shared and very moved. But also to think about, am I making it more complicated than it needs to be? You know, like looking at that, of going, well, really, is it that, really what makes this feel, for me, it makes me feel, there's a sense of satisfaction or fulfilment or just almost a quietness actually sometimes. I think big successes are great. The whoopee-doo-dah award-winning, like hit that kind of goal target, great. But actually running through the more kind of quiet, sustainable sense of success is what keeps us on track, I think a lot of the time.
Anna Campbell (33:36.3)
Yeah, I'm thinking about people that I know who maybe have very successful businesses, great. The sales are exceeding their expectations and all of that. And they burn themselves out and they get themselves into a state where they can't continue. And I think we have to care for who we are and who we want to be. And for me, I don't love the term work-life balance because I just don't, I don’t know, I prefer seasons in some ways, I prefer the idea of working solidly for a certain amount of time and then having that break. I don't know about balance particularly, but it's what we call it, a way of talking about this side of things.
But I think what's very key and it's important, I've got some good coaching questions coming out for you to do some journaling everyone here today listening. But the key is to know what that level of success means to you. Like you may well be an early bird and getting up at 5 a.m. and having a morning routine and doing something that way might be your thing. And for me, it sounds like a horror story having to go for 5 a.m. every day. I hate that idea. It doesn't work for me.
Heidi Hinda Chadwick (34:42.126)
Yeah.
Anna Campbell (34:58.764)
So, but I think we need to be very clear about what that does look like for us. And I think often we talk about success and we're talking about those, like you said, the kind of fame and celebrity in that, the sales metrics and all of that. But I think like you mentioned, the quiet stuff is where you're actually gonna feel, because those things can sometimes, I think when you get there, I mean, you know, I'm gonna get there, but like they might feel a little bit hollow or they might not feel like what.
Heidi Hinda Chadwick (35:04.195)
Yeah.
Heidi Hinda Chadwick (35:25.978)
We are there and we're growing more and more there. Yeah.
Anna Campbell (35:28.59)
And we're continuing to move towards more of those things that we have in our lives that are goals. But it is about not just those metrics, it's about everything. Again, it's that holistic side.
Heidi Hinda Chadwick (35:46.106)
Absolutely. And something that you might want to do as well is, and this can be a bit like, whoa, is actually just really look at your life and go, sometimes we don't realize we're in that or we're living that or we have that metric of success already. You know, it could be like we don't notice. My goodness. Like what you experienced this morning, of going, my goodness, this has actually happened. This has happened. It's here. I just, I'm so focused on these other aspects, all these things that I hadn't paused enough to look around and go, my God, wow, I have this already, or I have one of these aspects already. And I think appreciation, you know, and being able to pause, we talk about this, the celebration of, because it's very easy again, you know, this metrics of success, that kind of traditional way is always forward, forward, forward, forward, forward, forward, forward, forward, forward, forward, forward, forward, forward, forward, forward, forward, forward, forward, forward.
And it was an interview thing and he was saying, one of the regrets he has is that he wished he'd enjoyed this experience of success in his life, that he hadn't enjoyed it. And I've heard that from other people as well that have a measure of, you know, what we'd probably call successful careers. It seems to be a little one of those things of, oh, I wish I'd actually stopped to like,
Oh, it's Ferris Bueller. We're doing very 80s today. It says at the end of Ferris Bueller's day off, if you don't stop to look around every once in a while, you're going to miss it. You know, at the end of the day, success isn't necessarily something, yes, it is over there. Let's say, yes, it's the and. Yes, success is something over there. There's our goals. There's our plans. There's those, the sales, there's the full, you know, memberships. That's the X amount of clients. It's this level of...
Anna Campbell (37:54.733)
Yes.
Heidi Hinda Chadwick (38:05.516)
…expertise or respect or whatever it might be. And it's also the ability to kind of appreciate and notice what is around us and what we have already. It has to be both. And we can get very caught up in that future as opposed to, you know, I do a daily appreciation practice and I'm starting to do this more and more throughout the day when something has happened, whether it's been a new client come in or I've noticed like this gorgeous smell of gorgeous flowers walking through a particular area of the city or had a great conversation with somebody or whatever it might be to pause and to really feel that and appreciate that. I can feel it filling me up from the inside more and more. And I know that's also creating sustainability in my system and more availability for more of these things to come in.
Otherwise we're all the time running on a place of lack, of emptiness, which as you say, will keep doing the things and then suddenly we're burnt out. We're literally, we've used up everything that we have.
Anna Campbell (39:16.034)
Yeah, yeah, absolutely. So what have you got on your list of metrics of success? What have we not talked about yet?
Heidi Hinda Chadwick (39:25.946)
What have I got on my list? I'm going to have a look at my list as we are here. I think we've, I mean, pretty much ticked off a lot of these things, but I will, well, I actually, I'm gonna think about that personally, unlike you, I'm not the biggest planner. I kind of go in with, you know, see what comes up. So I haven't done my list, but I really like this, I take this opportunity to think about what is.
Anna Campbell (39:29.07)
Tell us one of them because otherwise we'll end up.
Anna Campbell (39:36.43)
I've got more.
Anna Campbell (39:50.284)
Yeah. Okay.
Heidi Hinda Chadwick (39:54.638)
I think one of the biggest things to me more and more is that I feel alive. That is one of the big things for me. I feel alive. And that doesn't always mean that's comfortable because I think often daring and trying new things and asking for something and all this of putting oneself out there as a writer, I'm putting myself out there all the time and you know, you've got to get used to the the no's that come back and that's a work in progress.
Anna Campbell (40:01.562)
I love that.
Anna Campbell (40:12.396)
Yeah.
Heidi Hinda Chadwick (40:24.728)
But as long as I'm feeling alive, this for me is a huge metric of my success. And it's something that I really anchor a lot more into my day, even to the point of following things, whether it's opportunities, conversations, invitations to collaborate. If that comes in and I can feel this aliveness, then I'm like, okay, great, this is going to expand something more, this is going to evolve something more, whether it's just something I enjoy doing for a while or I learn something or it's impacting on my business. And I'm really seeing that playing out energetically, you know, from conversations I know and I have had that she understands. When I say that, it seems to invite more success, actually, when I'm following and listening to that. And that might not be like a traditional metronome, it might not be yours. You might be like, what are you talking about? But for me personally, that is.
Another metric of success for me is slowness. Don't always get to do that, is when I can honour my slow pace.
This is, things get done more. I feel like I'm still present in myself. I've not abandoned myself. That's important.
So being able to drop back into them or even say something.
Anna Campbell (41:48.546)
Yeah, I think that's such an interesting one, isn't it? Because I think when we think about things like KPIs and the corporate idea, it's always a kind of go, go, go. It's got that kind of feeling of like rush forward, run forward, keep going. And I love the fact you say, if I'm slow, I get more things done. And it sounds ridiculous to say it, but it can be so true. I mean, if we're doing things at the right pace for us, I think.
Heidi Hinda Chadwick (42:00.836)
Hamster wheel.
Heidi Hinda Chadwick (42:11.706)
It's very...
Heidi Hinda Chadwick (42:15.727)
Yeah.
Anna Campbell (42:17.196)
That's the key, isn't it?
Heidi Hinda Chadwick (42:18.97)
I think the pacing is really interesting because also, so one of the things that I do at the beginning of the week and sometimes I'll do it Sunday evening, sometimes it's Monday, is I will look at, and I think this is something if maybe for a lot, I'd be really curious to know, just to say at this point as well, anything that we're sharing or anything that you've realised or any answers to these reflections, please let us know, comment wherever you see this or, you know, private messages, we love it so much to receive your feedback or all of it. So this is an ask in that way to go for it. So I will look at what I want to achieve this week, you know, stepping towards my goals and what works best for me, you know, connecting with the slow things. So some of you might resonate with this, especially if you find you're kind of this overwhelmed and it’s to go, okay, what three things do I want to focus on this week? And it might be one of those things that is huge, in which case I'll go, okay, so that, okay, that's a huge thing. What would be one or two little, little steps in that that I can get done this week? And that means then, and this is also what I do on Friday, and I do it with my membership group, the 8 % Club, which I'm just gonna plug here, which is for those of us that are absolutely on board with both feet, yes, to being successful in our own personal meaning of that in our business or creative projects and so on. That's what the 8 % club is. But every Friday, we put our celebrations to the week, our success stories. And that could be to do with one of the goals we set at the beginning of the week, or it could be just something personal in our lives. And so there's a nice flow. And I look at that for myself as well, and maybe tweak that. And I find that a really helpful way of almost like ticking my success boxes each week, which is, you know, I'm feeding into that energy of this is successful, this is successful. Even if it's just one of those things that gets done, it's like, yeah, that's successful, well done, you know, for doing that tick. I feel like I should get a badge or some five little gold sticky stars. Do people still do sticky stuff? People are putting them on their faces these days. I know if you've noticed that on social media. I don't understand. Is that to hide pimples? Anyway, that's the society. If anyone knows the answer to that, let us know as well.
Heidi Hinda Chadwick (44:40.996)
But measuring success for me is putting in place, sorry, I just want to say, is putting in place a system, a strategy, which, as I'm saying for me, is very simple things or things that feel achievable. If I'm not setting myself up for failure that week, even if it's a hard thing to do, it can still be achievable. And then at the end of the week, being able to tick those things off and go, great, that was successful. That's how I measure that for me. hmm.
Anna Campbell (44:45.112)
Yeah.
Heidi Hinda Chadwick (45:07.098)
I've been avoiding this particular thing that's been on my list for a few weeks. Let me look at what's needed here. Does that need redefining? Do I need to go and ask for help? Do I need some coaching around that? Do I need to go and do some training around that? Is that just not working in line with my values? That's why I'm finding it challenging. And that for me keeps me moving forwards in that particular pattern of success.
Anna Campbell (45:31.842)
I think that's a really key one. You know my thoughts on the to-do list and it's not that we don't need to know what we need to do, but in the, it's the never ending thing that you're always gonna be adding things onto that list and we can do 10 things on that list this week and still feel like we're not achieving and that's why I don't like it particularly. But I love this idea of setting yourself up for the week and saying, these are the three things that I want to achieve this week.
Heidi Hinda Chadwick (45:49.604)
Yeah.
Anna Campbell (45:58.56)
And then at the end of the week, you can say, have I been successful? Have I done those things that I said I was going to do? And I think that's what's important because when we set ourselves up to be like, I need to do absolutely everything, and if I don't do everything, then I've done nothing, it just doesn't, it's no good. And we just then feel kind of demoralized ourselves because we're not acknowledging the things we are doing. We're looking at the things we're not doing.
Heidi Hinda Chadwick (46:20.067)
Yeah.
Heidi Hinda Chadwick (46:23.802)
And also for me, part of my metric of success is having a lot of spaciousness in my week. I need that for my own self and wellbeing. That for me is one the important aspects of success is wellbeing. And I like having space to dream. I like just mooching around, going for walks, going to coffee shops. And it's finding that balance for me. You know, you're about that balance and some weeks, yeah if I'm working on a project or I've got a deadline for some writing going in, that will be more of that than just, you know, what do I call it? Just floating, not floating around, but I don't know, just moving around, mooching in that languid way that I like to be, in kimono or something or other, just enjoying life. You know, some weeks it's more that, but I'll still have my little things in there, you know, that I have to do, so it's not stopped.
And then there's some weeks it's like, I'm really focused this week on this and most of the time I'm working. And part of my metric of success is it doesn't have to fit into the time, you know, like you were saying about starting your working day at half 11. I often work into the night, sometimes into the wee hours. I like that. My brain works a lot more at that time. So I'm really happy to start work in the afternoon or even early evening knowing I'll probably work till after midnight with some food, maybe a chat with a friend, might watch an episode of something, but I'll get what I need to get done. And that doesn't stress my system out, it just works with who I am. That's one of the things is finding my own rhythm and flow in a working week and day as well. That might not necessarily work in your business, it might not work if you're working with a team, but it might do. So these things are really, I think are really important.
Anna Campbell (48:13.934)
I think so. I think it probably is worth acknowledging that neither of us have children and so therefore we know that in particular times if you have kids or you've got kids and they've left home or whatever, we know that we're...
Heidi Hinda Chadwick (48:22.2)
Yeah.
Heidi Hinda Chadwick (48:29.272)
Or you're caring for some people, caring for your parents, or you have some kind of responsibilities in that way, yeah.
Anna Campbell (48:37.538)
Yeah, we're in a different kind of position. And I think in some ways that's why I wanted to just acknowledge that fact. But also having said that, both of us have done those jobs where we have been working and doing the 95 things or whatever that might look like for you. And I've done commuting into London two hours a day for a long time. So I am aware of those kinds of things. It was in some ways for me, it was like, I don't want to do that anymore. And this is what I want to do instead. And that helped me clarify what I wanted because I got to do the thing I didn't want to do. Do you know what I mean? It's like, sometimes that we need that clarity as well. I'm just going to finish off. I'm going to say a couple of things that I've put on my list of things that I feel are metrics of success. So I had sales obviously because I do think it is a key factor and it is important, but also the work that's gone into it, the effort, you know, I think that's a separate thing in terms of our success. And I think action, again, we've talked about this already today, like taking action because knowledge isn't power, implementation is power.
And actually doing the thing that we say we're gonna do. That I think is like the hardest possible thing that we need to do. And I think we should value ourselves when we do that. I put in here around persistence and resilience a little bit, because I think one of the things we need to remember, as I mentioned before, about how long it can take for a business to grow and to be profitable.
Heidi Hinda Chadwick (50:00.716)
Love that.
Heidi Hinda Chadwick (50:08.28)
Hmm.
Heidi Hinda Chadwick (50:20.73)
Hmm.
Anna Campbell (50:24.75)
Is that really, and that's why you named your business the 8% club, the 8 % club, because it is around like the percentage of people that are persistent, that are resilient, that do keep going. And maybe the business evolves and it should do in terms of where you need to go. But it's that constant, constant again, maybe not the right word, but that movement forwards in whatever way, in whatever pace that needs to be. Does that make sense?
Heidi Hinda Chadwick (50:56.546)
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, absolutely.
Anna Campbell (51:01.164)
And then I put on here the idea, and again, I'm not sure this is quite the right terminology for it, but that idea of kind of self-actualization, you know, that idea of that we are becoming the people we want to become as part of doing this work.
Heidi Hinda Chadwick (51:14.836)
But you know what, I love how you said that because in my head I had this, the believing feels important, know, thinking about all the people, all the kind of iconic people, you know, that kept believing, like Disney going to the bank 60 odd times to get the loan, Walt Disney to start that. You know, like there's almost like a, almost a slight obsessive kind of thing in your belief of what you're doing, that's not gonna knock you. You know, I think there has to be some crazy, you know, to be a, let's just be honest, to be a self-employed freelancer, creative entrepreneur is a crazy position. So we salute you, all of you, for already just doing that, okay? But there's something here about exactly this, the identity. What is the identity I'm leading my business from? And is the identity I've been leading it from, this has come back to self-leadership, or touches on self-leadership, is it serving the success I'm wanting, or do I need to look at this again and shift into a different identity? And that is a whole, maybe we can do a whole, maybe there is a whole kind of podcast on what does that mean, becoming, you know, shifting our identity, because it's a huge thing and it's not about pretending, it's stepping into actually who we are that maybe we haven't allowed ourselves to be before and then making those choices, those power moves, those actions aligned with the identity of who I am now as a successful businesswoman. And actually, I'm going to take that from today myself. And I thank you for inspiring that to kind of really work with that. There's something else I want to say as well here is around, and it might be a thing to finish, but you might have some more of these metrics is, okay, so this is what I feel like is a good place to end on.
Anna Campbell (53:09.12)
No, I think this is finished now.
Heidi Hinda Chadwick (53:14.414)
Because we talk a lot about the fear of failure, but what if actually what you're fearful of is your success? What if you're fearful of those six figure months? What if you're fearful of notoriety? What if you're fearful of being in a position of visibility? What if you're fearful of how your life is gonna change or what responsibilities are gonna be asked of you when you hit that particular level of success that, or metrics of success are being put in place about. I don't think enough is spoken about this because I think if a lot of us are honest, we're fucking terrified of success for all sorts of reasons. So I think it's a good one to reflect on. Are you fearful of success?
Anna Campbell (54:01.806)
That's a good question to end with. Well, thank you so much, Heidi. And one thing we are going to put in for you here is an exercise that you can choose to do and to download to really help you process some of this stuff around what does success mean for you? Because I think what's really key for everyone is we can only get there if we know what it is, you know, and I think we can be scrabbling around in the dark a little bit when we're not super clear on what success means and what our own personal metrics of success are. So we'll make sure we have that in the show notes for you, a free little exercise download to do.
But thank you again, as always, for an amazing conversation, Heidi, and thank you for listening to everybody. We will see you again on an episode of the Full of Ourselves podcast very soon.