How to Handle Pressure as a CEO & Parent

Overview

Our CEO, Kerry Guard, joined Staci Gray on her podcast, The Rooted Founder Show, to share her journey of balancing motherhood and entrepreneurship. Kerry discusses how MKG Marketing, a people-first remote business, navigates the challenges of managing work while raising children at home. She emphasizes the importance of psychological safety, setting boundaries, and maintaining a supportive company culture.

Key Moments

1. Control and Acceptance: Kerry talks about the importance of focusing on what one can control, particularly one's own behavior and reactions, in both personal and professional life.
2. Balancing Work and Family: Kerry shares her approach to juggling work and family responsibilities, emphasizing the need to prioritize and be present in the moment.
3. Setting Boundaries: Kerry outlines how she sets clear markers for work communication to protect family time and ensure a healthy work-life balance.
4. Personal Growth and Therapy: Kerry talks about her personal journey in managing stress and anxiety through cognitive behavioral therapy and mentorship.

Take a listen

Transcript:

Kerry Guard [00:00:00]:

And what it came down to was all about what I can control, right? What I can and can't control. And what I can't control, as much as I would love to, is other people. And so it's all about how I behave in relation to that, right. And that's all I can control, is me. And that's really the path that's gotten us, I think, to where we are today. To say, like, okay, what could I have done differently? And mistakes happen, and we're all human. And it's not about dwelling on the mistake. It's just recognizing it happened.

Kerry Guard [00:00:37]:

And now what are we going to do about it to make it better?

Staci Gray [00:00:40]:

Well, welcome. We have another rooted founder episode today. I'm here with Carrie. She's been on once before with her business partner, but I wanted to have her back on to talk about motherhood and entrepreneurship. The journey, one I have not personally been on yet, but I do have 15 nieces and nephews. But I watch a lot of women navigate this, and I thought she would have such good words of wisdom because they have a people first business, a remote business. She works from home with kids, napping in the other room and all the things. So, Carrie, I'm happy you're back here with me today.

Kerry Guard [00:01:19]:

I'm excited to be back. Thank you so much for the invitation. Stacy, it's good to see you.

Staci Gray [00:01:24]:

You too. So, motherhood, entrepreneurship, napping, all the things. I am curious, like, people ask you, how do you balance it all? But for me, the thing that I feel like might help, folks, is the psychological burden of it all. Like, the tabs we have open in our brain as an entrepreneur, and then the tabs we have open in our brain for, like, the home life. How do you handle that side of it?

Kerry Guard [00:02:00]:

No grass growing under your feet. Stacy, buckle up. We are. We are on journey. Um, I would say the struggle is real. I like to think I'm not great at it, quite honestly. I mean, it's like a minute at a time, right? So what's on fire? The hottest right now?

Staci Gray [00:02:20]:

Yeah.

Kerry Guard [00:02:21]:

And on fire could mean just my kids asking for my attention and me being okay with that and recognizing that that's where my energy needs to be. And all these work tabs need to, you know, go on a different screen, you know? You know, we have multiple screens up sometimes, right? So it's like, okay, I'm going to slot work screen over here so that I can put mommy screen over here. And it's just reading the room, right? So a lot of times it's, it's, I mentioned it before you started recording. It's like minute, minute by minute and reading the room. Where are you right now?

Staci Gray [00:03:00]:

Last night we had our, we have a WTF family night. It's with the family and we call it WTF. And the local family comes over and we eat and we were, my significant other and I were both working all day, and then we felt like we were rushing to get to dinner. And I was like, I'm feeling like family is not the priority right now, and I'm feeling guilty about that. Like, I feel like I'd rather be working and that's not the place I really want to be in right now. Like, the family is important and it is more important to me. But it does feel at times like the urgency of certain business things or what's happening there seems more important. And I'm curious, like, how do you, I mean, I know we're not perfect and we make mistakes and, you know, the family member comes in and you're still on the computer, you're looking at your phone, but how do you, like, in those moments, drop in to be able to be present with the family?

Kerry Guard [00:04:06]:

You put it away, which I don't always do. This is a friendly reminder to myself that you don't take your phone to the dining room table.

Staci Gray [00:04:16]:

Yeah.

Kerry Guard [00:04:17]:

And you put it away and you know that it'll be there when you get back, which is really hard because it piles on. Right. So I'm not saying this is like the perfect fix by any stretch of the imagination, but it is kind of, the only way to be present is to, is to put it away. Take off your watch. Don't get the notifications. I have very few notes, so I have my, so email is not a notification. I don't, I only get, I only get to see the notifications or know what's going on when I go into my inbox.

Staci Gray [00:04:57]:

I'm set up the same way.

Kerry Guard [00:04:59]:

Yeah, slack. Slack notifications I get because there's only a couple clients I have over there, and so if they're slacking me and you pay attention to that, and then I have my other chat channel with the team. We use zoom chat, and that's only people direct to message me and they have to tell me how urgent it is. Like red, this is on fire. I need you immediately. Yellow when the kids go to bed. If you could just pop on and just confirm this with me, that would be great. And green means I'll talk to you tomorrow about this.

Kerry Guard [00:05:34]:

But just so having those markers is really helpful in creating my own boundaries of, like, what I will and won't do. But it's a progress over perfection. Some days, the world's gonna feel on fire, and that's just where you are for right now. And you gotta be in work, and you're good. You know, it's a minute, like I said, a minute at a time of feeling like you're at a. You're at a spot where you can take a beat, go make dinner, get the kids to bed, and then resume, and you might get interrupted in that time. And that's just kind of the. How the day rolls.

Kerry Guard [00:06:07]:

And you know that tomorrow you can try and do better. But, yeah, it's. It's a struggle. I mean, I know I'm gonna. I know that my kids are gonna have memories of growing up saying, but, mom, you had all those meetings, and, mom, it felt like work was more important than me, but, mom, it's gonna be like, yeah, buddy, I appreciate that. And one day, when you have something that you've built and you feel really proud of, and you're really excited about, you're gonna be here. And I did the best I could with what I had, and it was a balancing act, I think, especially as women. You know, my husband.

Kerry Guard [00:06:43]:

My husband's older than me. He's about ten years older than me. He had the heyday of his. That's like, he's not doing well. Now he is. He's working for a really great company. He's doing really well. But the heyday of his career was before we had kids.

Kerry Guard [00:06:55]:

Right. And so now I have to have the heyday of my career while we have kids.

Staci Gray [00:06:59]:

Yeah.

Kerry Guard [00:07:01]:

And that's partially justification for myself of, like, this was the path I chose, and I wanted to have a career, and I wanted to have kids. And I'm taking a day at a time, and I know what my values are. I say to my. I just had it to my daughter. She's so sick of me saying it. She's so sick of me saying it.

Staci Gray [00:07:21]:

How old is she?

Kerry Guard [00:07:22]:

She's eight.

Staci Gray [00:07:23]:

Eight.

Kerry Guard [00:07:25]:

She was asking for something or other, and I was like, ellie, what's my job? To make sure I'm happy, and to make sure I'm healthy, and to make sure I'm a thoughtful contributor to society. Right? Like, I know that decisions I'm making every day as it relates to work or kids has to contribute to those three things. Are they happy? Are they frustrated that I'm having a lot of meetings that are not present. Okay. I gotta make a change to that, right? I, are they healthy? Am I able to take time out of my day to go do the right food shopping and do the right planning that I need to do to make sure I have meals on the table at dinner time and breakfast and lunch? That's going to be healthy and contribute to that and am I sticking my ground? I know I'm really tired. Would I love to give her chocolate before bed because that's what she wants? Yes. Is that going to help or be a thought for contributor to society as well as be healthy and happy? Stick my grounds even though I'm exhausted from working all day and knowing I gotta walk into meetings tonight, like that's just, you know, my guiding, my guiding principles, so to speak, that help me push through.

Staci Gray [00:08:40]:

I love those. And you, I like the red, green, yellow. With your team, have you, what things have you set up with your team to protect your family life?

Kerry Guard [00:08:53]:

So that's one of them. I, I live by my words. So when they're having a family crisis or something's going on for them or they need to be, you know, with their family. Absolutely right. It's not double standard, it's 100%. And so I think leading by example is really important for both giving them the space to go take care of what they need to take care of and showcasing what it looks like for me to take care of what I need to take care of. And so my team, the way that we work remotely from an hour standpoint is very much about defining your hours and sticking to, they have to be somewhat consistent so we can plan accordingly for client meetings and to know if we're having an issue. We know when to get a hold of you internally.

Kerry Guard [00:09:42]:

Right. So I don't care what your hours are between 08:00 a.m. eastern to 08:00 p.m. western. But they have to be consistent. And it's actually 06:00 p.m. pacific. And so I see my team logging off every day at 506:00 their time, right.

Kerry Guard [00:10:02]:

Or whenever their hours are. And so that reminds me to stick to my hours, which are I take a break at five so I stop it. I'm only one in the UK so I have weird hours to my teeth, but I stop at five in theory and I go make dinner for my family and I have a nice dinner with my family. I help get the kids to bed, we have some family time in between. And then I come back on around 830 and I go to ten and so knowing what my hours are and trying to stick to those and then being clear what my hours are with the team, and I let them know. We have a channel in our Zoom chat called general, which is where you tell people where you are. So you say, when you're logging in, you say, when you're logging out, you say, if you gotta go pick up a kid, you say, we don't care. We just need to know because we're not in an office and can look over at your desk and see that you're not there.

Kerry Guard [00:10:57]:

Right. So we need to know that you're coming back. Right. So it's really important that we're open and transparent. So I try and do a. A good job, and I'm not the best at it. I take full responsibility for that, but I try and do a good job to say, hey, I'm online. It's 12:00 my time.

Kerry Guard [00:11:16]:

I'm here for the next 5 hours, and then come 05:00 it's dinner time, and I'll be back. And I let them know when I'm back, and then I let them know when I'm out for the night. So being clear and consistent about where you are and what's going on, which is really hard. Really hard. There was a phase that I went through with my team when we were a bit younger where I was being judged for my behavior because I went out in the middle of the day to go have a bar class because I had to quickly head off because my two year old was having a meltdown. Like, I was being completely judged, and I was like, okay, we're doing a terrible job culture wise to cultivate this. If I'm being judged for how I want my team to be treated. Right.

Kerry Guard [00:12:00]:

So we had to make some changes to make sure that. That. That that change was happening.

Staci Gray [00:12:06]:

I think a lot of people will find themselves in this situation because I've had personal conversations with entrepreneurs where they've even asked their team permission to work out in the morning before coming into the. To the office feeling like they were being judged, like they're not doing enough, they're not showing up the way they should be showing up. So it is a culture reset. Like, how. How would somebody do that? Like, how did you guys do that? Change it from, like, a judgment culture to an acceptance culture around standards takes time.

Kerry Guard [00:12:43]:

Nothing happens overnight.

Staci Gray [00:12:44]:

Yeah.

Kerry Guard [00:12:45]:

Your values are your core. So our value has always been people first, but we've had to redefine that over the years to make sure that it's inclusive. So originally, when we defined the value, it was very much about Mike and I taking care of the team, and we weren't included in that. So we had to extend that to how we're all people and we all need to be taken care of, not just internally as a team, but how that translates to our clients. And then it even transformed beyond that to how we take care of our clients customers, in the messaging we build in, how we make sure that we're not advertising in a way that we wouldn't wanna be advertised to, that our emails are really thoughtful and all of those things. So it really had to look at our values and say, why aren't these working the way that they're supposed to? And redefining them that way? So that was definitely a help. I also think Mike and I, like I mentioned, I'm not great at this, but I was really bad at it. I'm not great at it now, but I was terrible at it where I didn't think the rules applied to me.

Kerry Guard [00:13:58]:

So I didn't have to put everything in Asana and put velocity behind it and say what I was doing for the day because nobody checked on I'm non billable and I'm getting stuff done and I'm just making sure your bills are paid and that's all you need to worry about. To an extent. Yeah, to an extent. Right. And also, I felt like you don't need to know where I am, you just need to know that your bills are being paid and you're cool. To an extent. Like, if they can't see that I'm logging on and logging off for the day, and when I'm trackable of when they can get a hold of me, then how can I hold them to the same standard?

Staci Gray [00:14:33]:

Right?

Kerry Guard [00:14:33]:

So I had to change my behavior too, and take accountability of that as well as holding them accountable. At the same time, it felt very much like a double standard. And the perception, the perception was a double standard, and I could have doubled down and be like, it's none of your business and I'm your boss and I am paying the bills, but is that how I want to be treated? Am I upholding the values that way? No. I'd wanted a transparent, accountable owner, and I'd want to know that they're living by the same standards that they're holding me to.

Staci Gray [00:15:07]:

Yeah. I think what you said is, like, we're all humans. Like, even if you're a CEO or you're an individual contributor, we're all human beings and we all have demons and darkness and shadow sides that trip us up and hang us up. And sometimes, like, bosses could be like, well, it's my company. I get to do what I want and not address their own shadow or their own challenges. And you did the exact opposite, which probably contributed so much to the culture change, because it gave permission for the rest of your company, all the other humans, to own their shadows and own their, their darkness and almost create, like, a healing environment for everybody. Did that happen in some way in your company?

Kerry Guard [00:16:01]:

Yeah, they call it. What do they call it? There's like, so when you join MKG, there's like a three month, I call it trial period, but it really is a two way street. We've had. We'd have plenty of people leave us as much as we've declined them.

Staci Gray [00:16:18]:

Right.

Kerry Guard [00:16:18]:

So I want to be clear on that. It's a trial period, but it's for both remote agency, we're a small company. Taking on a new employee is a huge risk for us and for them, you know, before they get into our benefits and all of that. Like, there needs to be a three month, are we good here? And what I realized in doing that and taking those three months to, like, settle into the company and to see if this is really for you is the healing process, because it's the aha. Moments through that of, oh, what they said is their values. Okay, so you are people first organization. And I said I had to go pick up a sick kid and you, and I didn't have to ask permission. And I just said, I'm going to pick up the kid.

Kerry Guard [00:17:01]:

And I was able to do that and have it held against me. Cool. You have the MKG standards, but it's not just this weird woohoo sort of black box. You have them laid out in terms of what it means to create deliverables. And then you have all the templates that go through deliverables and examples, and then you outline what professionalism is. Okay, I'm gonna be showing up on camera, and I need to look my best and like, okay, I know what that means. And so it's like this healing period in terms of sticking to our word and people being able to see that, of like, oh, you're not just pulling the wool over my eyes. You're not just promising me the world.

Kerry Guard [00:17:44]:

And then I'm gonna show up on day one and you're gonna dump everything onto my plate and expect me to figure it out. Right? I come from a generation. I just had a wonderful conversation with one of my employees about this, how we are the generation of figure it outers. Because we had to, right? Because we were those people who showed up and were promised the world and then dropped, you know, a $10 million account on our laps and told us to figure it out. And I just don't want people to have to live that way. We don't have to figure. We want people who are problem solvers, and we want people who want to figure it out because it's a problem and it's a puzzle, and, like, ugh. But we don't even have to figure out, like, the expectations and the intentions and, like, am I doing the right thing? Is this where I'm supposed to be? Like, what's supposed to be happening? Like, no.

Kerry Guard [00:18:33]:

Like, that's defined, and that's all right here, and you're cool, and you have to prove that it takes a minute. And so it's like, it's the PTSD cleansing, so to speak, of, like, all the other places you've come from. And then you show up here, and we're people of our word, and we're really buttoned up, and we have templates for everything, and we use asana and product management, but we're not micromanaging. And it's like this beautiful balance, and is this too good to be true? But, yeah, people do. They show up, they face their demons, and then they settle in.

Staci Gray [00:19:06]:

It's great. Yeah. Because their nervous system calms down. They feel like they're safe to be in an environment that they can actually work, do their best work. It's going to be recognized and rewarded.

Kerry Guard [00:19:19]:

Mm hmm. They do. And I would say the other piece to that that's really important in building a culture around being people. First is the feedback loop. So not sleeping things under the carpet or pretending they didn't happen, not being able to have crucial conversations because it's hard and it's icky. It makes everybody fidget. But building into your culture of, like, well, this is just what we do. So every day as the CEO, I show up every 90 days with my team.

Kerry Guard [00:19:50]:

I meet with each person individually, and I hear about one thing they're super passionate and proud of that they did in the last 90 days and something that maybe didn't go quite as well or got in their way, or if they could have a magic wand and me as CEO could fix it, what would that be? Then my third question is always, do you have feedback from me? Do you have questions for me? How can I help? Right. So, in showing up as a leader of, like, I'm not afraid to hear what you got from me or to hear what's hard for you, or to hear that this thing, this perception I created or this promise you feel like I made, that I didn't pan out. Like, no, I can't fix what I don't know. So let's have it right? And then we're able to do that on a flip side. Right. So every month they meet with their manager, our people and communities leader, and she gives them feedback. Hey, here's what I heard from the team of what's going on. Here's the stuff that's going really well.

Kerry Guard [00:20:51]:

And by the way, here are some things that have caused some friction that we need to work through. So let's put together a plan and let's talk about how we're going to do that. Right. So you have to be able to create a culture where feedback doesn't feel like you're in trouble. And that also takes time to create that trust of, I'm getting feedback. That means I'm gonna get fired. No, not necessarily. Now, if you create the same mistake over and over again, I'm still having this conversation.

Kerry Guard [00:21:21]:

Three months later, that's a different conversation. But if this is the first time giving it to you, and we're gonna talk about a plan and make it better, then no one's getting fired, no one's in trouble. Right. And so I think that's really important to helping people feel that psychological safety of building into the culture this thing that just always happens.

Staci Gray [00:21:43]:

Yeah.

Kerry Guard [00:21:43]:

We give each other feedback. It's just what we do.

Staci Gray [00:21:46]:

Yeah. Have you ever had an experience with yourself or your team where feedback, maybe how it was presented or how it was received was a little clunky and it created more tension and friction and how do you guys navigate that always? Yeah.

Kerry Guard [00:22:07]:

It's so hard to give feedback. It's so hard. And I've plenty of stories where I've done it really, really poorly. I don't have great examples or mentors where I was given feedback really well. And so you take what you know based off of what happened for you. Right. And so it's an iterative process to figure out how to do it better. I'm still working on it, but at the end of the day, it is about creating that psychological safety of first understanding where somebody is.

Kerry Guard [00:22:37]:

Right. So before I give this feedback to you, I need to understand where you're at that even caused this thing to happen. So I asked some questions like, how's it going, how are you? How'd this meeting go? That meeting was really hard. What was really hard about it? The client just came at me like 1000 miles an hour with all of these questions and I didn't feel like I have the answers. Oh, yeah, that sounds really hard to not have the answers skills. Really hard. How do you feel like you handled it? I had to do so good. Yeah, I could see that.

Kerry Guard [00:23:08]:

You know what? I watched the video and I have to agree with you. That feel, that felt really hard. That felt really hard to watch. That felt like you had a really tough time. And I'd like to figure out how we can make you feel more prepared for when that happens, because that's gonna happen again. That's just gonna happen again. So how do we prepare you for helping that not feel like you're caught off guard? Right. And so when you approach the conversation with first creating that psychological safety through validation and mirroring, then you can give the feedback in a way that they've already acknowledged that it happened.

Kerry Guard [00:23:44]:

Right. They've tripped over their own truth. Didn't go so well. Or maybe they think it went splendidly. Oh, yeah. That meeting was awesome. I nailed it. Right.

Kerry Guard [00:23:54]:

It's like I rewatched that meeting and I rewatched that meeting because I got feedback from the team that they didn't feel like it went so well. And so here's how we saw that going. Right. So there's a way to approach it from either side, whether they feel like it went really well or it didn't, but it leaves gives you a way to have them paint the picture first versus you just dumping on them.

Staci Gray [00:24:19]:

Yeah.

Kerry Guard [00:24:19]:

Right. Showing up and being like, I have tough feedback to give you and this is how this went. That give yourself an hour. If you got to deliver tough feedback.

Staci Gray [00:24:31]:

That's such a good point.

Kerry Guard [00:24:32]:

Give yourself an hour.

Staci Gray [00:24:33]:

I was going to ask you, because that when you're over capacity as a leader or any of your leaders on your team are over capacity, I find one of the things that suffers is the patience to have the long enough meetings to handle them well. So when you guys are stressed, or maybe you do it preventatively, but like when, when the pressure's on, like the pipeline's full, it's coming, you got a full book of business, you got the whole team going, you're working on improving processes, you're maybe even hiring. And then you have like some, some infrastructure struggles or a client meeting doesn't go well. How do you maybe as a leader or even within your company calm everybody down to get back to a place of psychological safety and then have the emotional capacity or even the logistical capacity to show up in that way.

Kerry Guard [00:25:30]:

Well, again, it's not something that you do in one swoop, and then it's done.

Staci Gray [00:25:36]:

Right?

Kerry Guard [00:25:37]:

Right. It's an interval of process where you show up every day to create that. So a great example is during COVID right? Talk about stress and feeling stretched thin and our clients asking for the moon and our team having kids underfoot for the first time and dogs running around and, you know, the world basically feeling like it's on fire at the same time. And so I showed up every day. I did a daily video, and I said, you already know this, but I'm just going to recap. Here's what's happening in the world. Here's the COVID numbers. Remember, here's how we manage this on a day to day process at MKG, right? So we know you have kids at home.

Kerry Guard [00:26:22]:

We know you're doing your best, and we just need to know what's going on. So you need to tell. You need to raise your hand and let us know how to help you, because we can't see you. We don't know what your personal situation is. So it's constantly reminding them that, like, we are here and giving examples ourselves of, like, how we've actually. This just happened. It's a great example. So this just happened to me.

Kerry Guard [00:26:48]:

I really missed marketing. I missed being a marketer. And so I got back into the marketing seat and I took on my own clients, and I became billable, which also helped our bottom line. And so I knew the team needed it. I was like, okay, we can't hire, but our margins are stretched in where are we going to get more billable? So I took on a few clients, and I'm about to take on a third, and I raised my hand and said, what I've been doing for these last two clients isn't sustainable. I'm just holding it together, and I can do so much better if I just had a little help. I said, here's what I'm thinking about, and here's what I need. And I didn't even problem solve it.

Kerry Guard [00:27:33]:

I just said, here's what I like. Here's where I'm at in terms of the problem I'm having, and here's what I think I need. And then I let the team come to me and say, okay, we think you need a project manager. We think Avery would be really great. I think you two would work really well together. And then you get this accountability person every day. That's like working with you on your schedule. This sounds amazing.

Kerry Guard [00:27:53]:

And so today, every Monday, I send out a team newsletter that is a reminder of what our rocks are, any hot new deals we have in the pipe, any team updates, and then important dates. Right. The CEO weekly one pager. It's from one of the scale up books that we've all read. And when I send the newsletter, I told the story about how part of our values of the MKG standard is that no person's an island, not even me. And it comes from a place of where I was. I held a $10 million account when I was an assistant media planner, reporting to a VP with nobody in between, nobody checking my work, and the stress and anxiety that caused. And so, as part of our values that went in there, no person is an island.

Kerry Guard [00:28:43]:

And recently, I found myself to be an island. And, of course, correct. And I told this story. And then today in our. In a meeting with the team, somebody raised their hand and said, I don't normally talk about myself. It's kind of super hard. But I'm structurally thin, and I'm really nervous about anything that's going on. So I'm going to be calling on people for some backup.

Staci Gray [00:29:05]:

Yes.

Kerry Guard [00:29:06]:

Right? Like, okay. Yes. I'm so glad that I gave you the voice to feel like you could do that. Maybe she, you know, they would have done that regardless of whether I said anything. But there was sort of these correlation elements that happened, and then they were able to raise their hand and say, actually. And so I think that's really important when you're structurally thin and to give yourself space to say, hey, I need some help up here, and to lead as a leader. And I'm not sure I answered your question, but it just felt like, you know, when you're stretched really thin, the best thing you do is ask for help.

Staci Gray [00:29:41]:

Yes. And I think also, I love. I love that value of not being an island, especially being a remote team. You're already isolated and you're working from home, and maybe you go to a coffee shop or maybe you go to sit someplace at the library, but you're still alone. And when you do, are working on things. I know my team. They love just the thought partnership. Even if it's nothing tactical help.

Staci Gray [00:30:09]:

Like, it's. It's the thought partnership, the emotional support. And if we can do that inside of our companies and teach people how to ask for help, because it's not happening, people feel like they have to be alone and do things on their own and just gird theirselves up and be strong. Figure it outers. But it creates anxiety and it creates stress. And so I'm curious also, if all this work that you've been doing inside of your organization and the team culture, if any of it has impacted not just your family life, because I'm sure it's changed you as who you are at home, but your team, like, how they show up for their spouses or their kids at home, you know, I.

Kerry Guard [00:30:59]:

Don'T know the full extent of that, and I can't speak for them. What I can speak to is the fact that they know that it's okay to raise their hand when this happened. I have multiple people who have kids who are at that driving age, right? And they're like, my kid was just in the car accident, I gotta go. And all it is is heart emojis everywhere, right? All we can give them in that moment is 100%. Like, I had one person be like, I gotta go put on outside clothes and, like, go attend to my daughter. Like, absolutely. We got this, right? When they want to take a day off to go celebrate their kid's birthday, right? We have a policy of PTO, where it's a certain amount of days a year, use it or lose it by design, once you take PTO, we want you to go spend that birthday with your child. Yes.

Kerry Guard [00:31:57]:

Go have that slip and slide party. Yes. Right? Like, even though it's on a summer weekday. Go do that, please. That sounds awesome. The fact that they share pictures and we have a random channel, and people will post pictures of their vacation while they'll be on vacation away from work, but then they'll post pictures in the work channel about the great time they're having. Right? Like, so I don't know exactly how this is impacting their families. I don't have that information, but I have this anecdotal data that I have people who've been with us for anywhere from three to eight years.

Kerry Guard [00:32:35]:

Right. When you have that stickiness of an organization, you have to believe it's because of the values and the culture you create that, you know, people will slog through the toughest moments with you because they know when we come out the other side, you know, we'll take care of them through the slog as best we can, and we come out the other side. Yeah, it's. It's a wonderful place to be because they experienced it before the slack, and we'll get through the slog together, and we'll come out stronger for it. Right.

Staci Gray [00:33:10]:

I feel like that those seasons of hard forge teams, though, good teams, it's where you know who your ride or dies are, you know, who's in it with you, who's committed to growth, like, versus sitting out when it gets hard versus leaning in. It sounds like you guys have created such a beautiful culture. I curious for you, what do you think has been your own personal biggest growth?

Kerry Guard [00:33:40]:

So in 2019, I would say was probably one of my toughest years as mom and entrepreneur. I didn't have a good balance of either. I still don't, but I create the perception that it's going better. But I didn't have any patience with my family specifically, and so I had a momentous where, you know, rock bottom for whatever. Everybody has their different rock bottom. For me, it was. It was a Halloween night, and I yelled at my family pretty hard, and I was like, yeah, I'd like to stop doing that. Really like to stop yelling at people.

Kerry Guard [00:34:22]:

That would be good. And I started therapy, and I specifically wanted cognitive behavioral therapy. I didn't want drugs. I didn't want somebody to just numb namit. And I'm not saying that's what it is for people. That's just what it felt like for me. There's a million reasons why these drugs exist and the brilliance that they bring to the table for people who need it. And I don't want to dismiss that.

Kerry Guard [00:34:49]:

It just wasn't right for me in my own anxiety. And so I sought out somebody who could basically rewire my brain. That's what cognitive behavior is. It's basically rewiring your brain. And there's a couple things that come with that, and one is letting your brain know you're not in actual danger. The world is not on fire. I am not in trouble. I don't need to run away.

Kerry Guard [00:35:18]:

I just need to breathe. Now to your nervous system. It's gonna be okay. Just ride the wave for the next 90 seconds, and it'll pass. Right. And the other thing that was really key to that, that then I worked on for many years with multiple, two different therapists having moved. And then my coach. I have a business coach.

Kerry Guard [00:35:41]:

And what it came down to was all about what I can control, right? What I can and can't control, and what I can't control, as much as I would love to, is other people. As much as I would tell people how to do and behave and be even my own eight year old daughter, that is just not how people work. And so it's all about how I behave in relation to that. Right? And that's all I can control, is me. And so as I worked on rewiring my brain to control that side of, like, okay, I'm frustrated and I'm mad at this person right now. What could I have done differently that may have produced a different outcome? Right. And that's really the path that's gotten us, I think, to where we are today. To say, like, okay, what could I have done differently? And mistakes happen, and we're all human.

Kerry Guard [00:36:42]:

And it's not about dwelling on the mistake, it's just recognizing it happened. And now what are we going to do about it to make it better?

Staci Gray [00:36:50]:

Thank you for being so vulnerable. And I can relate to all of it. I think my life lesson is patience. I think this is what I'm supposed to learn in this loop around. I also can totally relate to trying to control outcomes. I've witnessed this, too, in a lot of entrepreneurs. And there's other leaders that talk about it, about how building and scaling a business puts you face to face with your trauma. And there's another guy who has this quote that says, you spend the first 50 years of your life recovering from the first five from Brian Tracy.

Staci Gray [00:37:30]:

And it really. I think building a business just accelerates the character growth. It just accelerates the growth journey. And so you hit these moments where the pressure is on so much, and it's hard to manage your human when the pressure is just, like, suffocating. And it's easy to yell or blame or take it out on other people, but to really sit with ourselves and say, what am I really in control of? What I'm not? And how can I either manage my nervous system better so that if I am in these high conflict situations, I can diffuse it instead of pour gasoline on it? And also just the grace. Like, to go through life just wrapping yourself in a bubble of grace, knowing that you're gonna make mistakes and you're not gonna be perfect, and you're gonna have that moment where the pressure is on, and you might say that thing that you didn't mean. And we can give and receive that grace, then we can really grow. Which is full circle testament to what you created inside of your organization with that psychological safety, where people can bring their cringy moments, their mistakes, their, I wish I didn't do it this way.

Staci Gray [00:38:51]:

And it to be held in a container of let's all learn and grow versus you did something wrong, or you're bad, or I did something wrong, and I'm bad, because neither of those are true. It's just. It's just an opportunity to evolve, and you're doing it so beautifully.

Kerry Guard [00:39:10]:

Yeah. You know, it's definitely not easy. I would say. Don't go at it alone. I got a mentor in about 2017, which was awesome. He taught me the importance of what he called MRI. Most respectable interpretation of, like, is this really about you or how is it really about them? And how can you separate yourself from taking this so personally? And so that was really the start of the journey for me. And I think it's really important that you find your.

Kerry Guard [00:39:43]:

Scott Galloway, who is an entrepreneur himself, hosts many podcasts, and one of the things he talks about is having your cabinet. So who are the people you can go to that will give you honesty and give you true advice in the face of whatever it is you're facing? And who are those people? And it's not always. It's gonna be really hard to hear from people. It's not always your partner. And what I mean by partners, I mean your husband or your wife or your significant other. It's not. It's not. Do not make it them, because you muddy the waters and you put so much pressure on them to have the answers to your problems that they don't have full context to.

Kerry Guard [00:40:26]:

And while they own a part of your business and live and help you grow it from just being in a relationship together, it is not their responsibility to solve your business problems. Go find other people who have built businesses. Coaches, mentors, whether it's, you know, I joined yec for a moment. My business partner joined EO. We both have a coach that we work together with. I've mentioned mentors. Right? So go create a cabinet of people you can go to to say, this is what we're up against. What have you gone through? Is this.

Kerry Guard [00:41:06]:

Chances are I went to school for photography, and while this drove me nuts that my professors would say this, they're like, you're not reinventing the wheel. That photograph you're making isn't anything particularly new. It just has your. Your vision on it. And so go look at the greats to figure out, like, what they did, right. And then just recreate it with your viewpoint. And that's really what we're doing as businesses. Right.

Kerry Guard [00:41:30]:

Like, so many businesses have been built before us, and so we're thinking we're doing something new and exciting. Gents are. We're not. Go find your cabinet.

Staci Gray [00:41:39]:

So say what MRI is again, because I thought that that was very good.

Kerry Guard [00:41:45]:

Most respectable interpretation. So somebody's coming at you with a lot of shame and blame. It's not about you. It's their shame and blame. And so how do you create the psychological safety to unpack that for them, to help them understand that this. This isn't really about me, and you're part of the problem for sure. Don't just think you don't have any ownership in the situation. You do.

Kerry Guard [00:42:10]:

But understanding the core, at the root of. Of what it is they're feeling right now. And if something goes wrong and they don't own that and they put the blame immediately on you, it's not being frustrated and angry about that, but it's understanding why they can't take their own ownership and figuring out the root cause of, like, what actually happened and then how you both can come to terms with it. But you can't do that if you're in fight or flight, if little brain isn't. Is activated and somebody's coming at you like, you can't, so you can't help them unpack it, and you can't unpack it for yourself. So MRI was a nice trigger for me to be like, wait, this isn't. What is the most respectful interpretation about this? It's okay to take a minute. It's okay to be like, I hear you, and that sounds really hard.

Kerry Guard [00:43:00]:

And I appreciate why you're frustrated with me right now. We're gonna go to our opposite corners, and we're gonna come back when we're both cooled off and have a honest conversation about what's going on. Right. So I think that's okay, too. But having these, like, moments. MRI is a great trigger. Why is this happening? Just asking why a bunch of times. Why? Why? Why? Right? And unspiraling yourself is really good.

Kerry Guard [00:43:24]:

I watched a video about somebody saying, go have a banana. Like, say, hey, listen, this seems really amped, and, like, we just need a minute. Like, go have some. Let's both take a minute. Let's go have some food. Sometimes hangry is a thing, right. And come back to the table when we're both in better places. You know, that's.

Kerry Guard [00:43:42]:

That's okay. That's good. That's healthy. Yelling at each other, trying to problem solve when you're not in a healthy place, not a good idea. MRI, misrespectful interpretation situation.

Staci Gray [00:43:55]:

I love that. And the cabinet thing is so great. I have a list of these people in my life that I. And it goes in a couple ways. One is it goes in the way where they have permission to tell me hard truths. And I know they're going to tell me hard truths, but they're also the ones that have a right to have an opinion in my life. So if somebody posts something on the Internet or does something like I. They're the ones that get to validate or reject it versus.

Staci Gray [00:44:26]:

And I do, too, but versus it being. Everyone has this free right to speak in. Into my life hard or kind things because you can, you know, believe your own press sometimes. So both things. Both things are true. You know, you need someone to tell you the hard truths, but also tell you when you do get beat up, like you're actually a good person. These are great things about you. So that's such good little tidbits.

Kerry Guard [00:44:57]:

Yes. Yeah. You do need that person in your corner who knows how to build you up as much as they know how to let you know what's really going on. It helps you believe both sides, right? Because if they can't tell you, if they only build you up and they're not willing to have to tell you what's actually going on, then it's really hard to ever believe the good stuff, too. So, yes. Yes. You need both sides for sure.

Staci Gray [00:45:22]:

Yeah. One of my favorite lines that they'll say to me is like, okay, I'm gonna play devil's advocate. Advocate. And I'm like, great. That's what I want you to play here because that gives you a real conversation. Wow, this has been so delightful. And you have just shared so much wisdom on building teams that have psychological safety, becoming a leader that can create an environment like that. What are projects that you guys are excited about that are coming up?

Kerry Guard [00:45:55]:

So we have three rocks this year, and I love them all. One is, we created an agency leadership committee. I didn't want a COo or I had a managing director. And she was wonderful. Absolutely loved her. Loved having her. The challenge was that when she left, I didn't really understand all the ins and outs of everything that was happening, because it was one person, and it was her whole responsibility to know all of these things. And while she did an amazing job breaking it down and trying to delegate before she left, I still felt like I don't know what's going on.

Kerry Guard [00:46:40]:

And so I had to basically have the whole team report to me for the last two years while I got the lay of the land and, like, figured it out. And so what I realized is that I need multiple checkpoints, and it can't just be one person. It's just too big. It's just too big. And really, what ended up taking up most of her time was managing the team when they had a tough day or they needed something or they needed a vet. Right? Like, she was the person they went to, and everybody needs that, but she couldn't get anything else done. And so by spreading the load across an agency leadership committee, I have one person who's dedicated to that. I have another person who ultimately makes, like, if push came to shove and a decision needed to be made and nobody could figure out which way to move forward, she's it.

Kerry Guard [00:47:30]:

She gets to say, okay, here's how be. So if everything I've heard you say, this is where we're going to start, and then we'll iterate and we'll figure it out, but, like, we gotta start somewhere. So she's that person, and then she also runs it. She's like, well, the committee all reports to me at the end. She runs the committee. And then our third person, as the strategist, is responsible for client relationships and making sure those are going well, as well as our second project that I'm really excited about, which is called the coordinator program. I don't believe a company can really grow sustainably in a longevity term without having a way for people to come in and grow. And so if you're only ever hiring people with expertise and, like, ten plus years of experience, then you're going to run into a wall.

Kerry Guard [00:48:24]:

At least we did. We ran into a wall where it became really hard to hire and find these quote unquote unicorns. Right? And so we have to cultivate them. And so we have had two people go through the program, and now we're figuring out how to scale it. We have a third person right now who's, like, starting on that journey, and Nathan's leading the charge on bringing her up through the program based off of a framework that a previous employee built. And so that's my other sort of baby that I've held near and dear to my heart for a long time. I've been saying it for years of, we can't just rely. I know you want people to come in here and immediately take client work and immediately be client facing, and how are we building the next generation of marketers? Because they've been left behind, and we're part of that problem.

Staci Gray [00:49:09]:

I love both of those. And they go very well with being people first, they're both leadership and development, which is just right up the alley of your culture there. I love it. Where can people find you if they're interested in connecting?

Kerry Guard [00:49:26]:

Oh, LinkedIn yeah, I live on LinkedIn. You can also go to MkG marketing. That is a URL. And you'll get to our website. You can find me there, too. But yeah, just connect me on LinkedIn. Love to have you.

Staci Gray [00:49:41]:

We'll put that in the show notes. But this conversation has been so wonderful, and I can see the transformation and growth even in just how you talk, because the ownership of the things that you've evolved from and what you've created inside of your company is so beautiful. And I think a lot of companies could benefit from hearing you talk about just the specific things that you do to make people feel safe, to make people feel like they're developing. And so everyone listening, go follow her and maybe get some marketing tips, too. She has a podcast as well, which we will link in the show notes. And just remember, when you're building and scaling your business, stay rooted in your values while you get shit done, because that will be the path to sustainable growth. Cheers, y'all.