EP 365 | Feast or Famine with Danielle Hendon

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Managing fluctuating client cycles of feast-to-famine can produce anxiety in even the most seasoned professionals. Anticipating annual trends where business slows down such as holiday time or the height of summer can help.  But navigating longer ebbs and flows is part of any business owners journey. Let’s talk about the essential skills required to cope with feast-to-famine. 

In this episode we learn:

• managing cash flow is part of successfully navigating the feast/famine cycles
• don’t put your head in the sand in terms of your financial health
• don’t rely on how business “feels”, know what your numbers say
• pay attention to your balance sheet
• talk to your CPA about income splitting and other ideas that can help you minimize taxes
• three profit levers to pull when your business is in a famine era
• different ways to create safety nets in your cash flow as a designer (line of credit, savings, etc.)
• which tasks that should be completed at a regular cadence to keep your finances healthy (including those you can outsource)

 

DESIGN INTERVENTION

One of the best pieces of advice I’ve ever received happened early in my corporate career. A colleague told me to always have a proposed solution when I present a question or problem — she was essentially guiding me to lean into my agency and independence, but it did so much more than that. It propelled me down a path of constantly thinking outside the box and building a habit of seeing solutions instead of problems. It truly shaped the way I think about business and life.