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It's two o'clock, you've hired the help and bought the tools, and you've barely touched the one thing you needed to get done today. Join Podcast Club: Watch episodes like this one recorded live, then stay for a private conversation afterward to ask your own questions. Join us at consciousedge.com/club. Get Full Show Notes: consciousedge.com/ep125 Let's Connect on Instagram: @aleciastg In this episode of The Conscious Edge® Podcast, host Alecia St. Germain walks through the five places business owners most often lose time, even after hiring help, investing in tools, and trying every time management hack. Building on the five capacities from EP124, Alecia explains why time keeps slipping when the operating system underneath hasn't been updated. As a Certified Immunity to Change™ Coach, she draws on the method developed by Harvard faculty Dr. Robert Kegan and Dr. Lisa Lahey. For each of the five places, she shows the foot on the gas, the foot on the brake, and the big assumption holding a business owner between them. Alecia also shares how her own belief that money is easy to make helped her until it didn't. She explains how small, safe tests make big assumptions optional, so business owners can decide where their time goes. 📝 What We Cover in This Episode: -Why your time problem usually lives in the other four capacities -What happens when you load new programs onto an outdated operating system -What a big assumption is, and why it helps you until it doesn't -The five places business owners lose time, and the foot on the gas and foot on the brake behind each one -Why everyone ends up waiting on you, even after you hire help -How "It's faster if I just do it myself" can teach your team to stop trying -Why finally having open time can feel so uncomfortable -How small, safe tests make your big assumptions optional

The kids are finally in bed, and you're back at your laptop doing the thing you've put off all week, even though you hired a VA to take things off your plate.  Join Podcast Club: Watch episodes like this one recorded live, then stay for a private conversation afterward to ask your own questions. Join us at consciousedge.com/club. Get Full Show Notes: consciousedge.com/ep124 Let's Connect on Instagram: @aleciastg In this episode of The Conscious Edge® Podcast, host Alecia St. Germain takes on the number one thing she hears from business owners: "I don't have time." Alecia is a Certified Immunity to Change® Coach, and she explains why longer days, AI tools, and a new VA so often fail to give business owners their time back. Everybody gets the same 24 hours. Alecia shares why time is only one of five capacities, and how the other four (energetic, emotional, relational, and financial) decide how far those hours go. She walks through the things business owners tell themselves that keep time leaking out, like "It's faster if I just do it myself" and "As soon as I wrap this up, I'll have more time." Underneath it all is a big assumption, a hidden rule about staying safe that keeps you saying yes when you mean no and holding on to work you meant to hand off. Alecia shares the moment she caught herself asking "Why can't we ever catch a break?" and why managing your mind isn't enough when your body hasn't caught up. 📝 What We Cover in This Episode: -Why time is only one of five capacities, and how the other four decide where your hours go -Why longer days, AI tools, and a new VA often don't give you your time back -What "it's faster if I just do it myself" is really costing you -Why "as soon as I wrap this up, I'll have more time" never comes true -How a VA can add to your mental load instead of lightening it -The big assumption that keeps you saying yes when you mean no -Why managing your mind isn't enough when your body hasn't caught up

You've written someone off before they finished their sentence, or you're halfway through checkout because a countdown timer told you to, and either way the decision got made before you had a chance to think. Join Podcast Club: Watch episodes like this one recorded live, then stay for a private conversation afterward to ask your own questions. Join us at consciousedge.com/club. Get Full Show Notes: consciousedge.com/ep123 Let's Connect on Instagram: @aleciastg In this episode of The Conscious Edge® Podcast, host Alecia St. Germain and co-host Jonathan Dugger, a clinical psychologist and entrepreneur, sit down for a Mindfulness Matters with Jonathan conversation about judgment vs. discernment. Judgment hands down a fast verdict about who someone is. Discernment stays curious about the behavior, the context, and your own reaction before it decides. Jonathan shares the moment at the bank when he wrote a man off as a jerk, then looked closer and saw someone asking for help. Alecia and Jonathan also make room for what judgment is there to do, from keeping you safe in a crisis to pointing you toward your values. Then they look at how to decide who to trust in business, using the coaching industry as their example. They talk about why a sales pitch can leave you feeling like you have to buy right now, how to tell if you need a therapist, a coach, a strategist, or a consultant, and the questions to ask any expert before you hire them. Jonathan's full checklist of questions and red flags is in the show notes. 📝 What We Cover in This Episode: -The difference between judgment and discernment, and how to feel which one you're in -Why judgment aims at a person while discernment looks at the behavior and the context -What your snap judgments are for, and when to trust your gut -How your judgments can point you to your values and your boundaries -Why a sales pitch can leave you feeling like you have to buy right now -Why curiosity helps you decide with more confidence -How to know if you need a therapist, a coach, a strategist, or a consultant -Four questions to ask any coach or expert before you hire them

You've had the email written for three days, and every time you open it a voice asks who you think you are, so you close it and go do something you know you can get right. Start With the Capacity Decision Guide: Sort everything on your plate and see what's yours to lead, delegate, outsource, grow, or release. Get it at consciousedge.com/decision. Get Full Show Notes: consciousedge.com/ep122 Let's Connect on Instagram: @aleciastg In this episode of The Conscious Edge® Podcast, host Alecia St. Germain shares a talk she gave live on the InvestHer Con stage in Phoenix about what hesitation is costing you and how to stop overthinking. Alecia opens with a phone call from her best friend that changed how she shows up. From there, she shows why overthinking is a capacity problem, not a time problem, and why hesitation never costs just one thing. As a Certified Immunity to Change® Coach, Alecia explains the perceived threats that keep business owners stuck, including judgment, rejection, and imposter syndrome, and the psychological immune system behind them. Then she shares the Leadership Rhythm: Focus Out for direction, Focus On for momentum, and Focus In for restoration. Listeners also get five categories for sorting everything on their plate, so they know what's theirs to carry and what isn't. 📝 What We Cover in This Episode: Why hesitation never costs you just one thing, and how it compounds The difference between real threats and perceived threats like judgment, rejection, and imposter syndrome Why imposter syndrome doesn't go away as you grow, and what to build instead The Leadership Rhythm: Focus Out, Focus On, and Focus In Five categories for everything on your plate: lead, delegate, outsource, grow, and release Why cheap help can't deliver a result you can't create yourself (and the same goes for AI) Why taking care of yourself is the first thing you cancel, and the one thing no one can do for you The one question that helps you stop overthinking and start showing up

You're buried in work you know you shouldn't be doing, and hiring the cheapest help you can find feels like the fastest way out, right up until you're paying for the same job twice.  Join Podcast Club: Watch episodes like this one recorded live, then join Alecia and the guest in a private conversation afterward to ask your own questions. Join us at consciousedge.com/club.  Get Full Show Notes: www.consciousedge.com/ep121 Let’s Connect on Instagram: @aleciastg In this episode of The Conscious Edge Podcast, host Alecia St. Germain sits down with financial strategist Jenn Baas for a Monthly Money Talks with Zen Jenn conversation about hiring. Jenn is the founder of Peak to Peak Solutions and leads the Financial Leadership Lab for Alecia's clients. When a business owner is buried in work, hiring feels like the answer. Alecia shared the pattern she sees most often. Owners hand expert-level work to the cheapest help they can find, then feel let down when it doesn’t work out.  Jenn explains how to know when to hire and why most hires feel like a stretch at first. She also clears up the myths about 1099 contractors and W-2 employees that trip up so many business owners. Together, Alecia and Jenn show why cheap help often costs twice as much in the end, and why knowing your numbers is part of the job of every CEO. 📝 What We Cover in This Episode: -How to tell when it's time to hire, and why your profit and loss statement alone won't tell you -What the stair step effect is and why most hires feel like a stretch at first -The real difference between a 1099 contractor and a W-2 employee (hint: it has nothing to do with the job) -Why the IRS won't care that your contractor asked to be paid that way -Why cheap help often costs you twice -Why a savvy contractor may cost you more than a great employee -How to research what a hire will cost before you post the job -Why knowing your numbers is part of your job as CEO

Look at your calendar. Every yes you've said this month is on there, and it's eating the time and energy you meant to spend building your business.  You're Invited to Join Podcast Club: Here's the thing about podcasts.  You listen, have thoughts and questions, then go on with your day.   Podcast Club is different. You get to reflect on what you just heard while it's still fresh, ask the questions that came up for you, and actually apply it to your own life instead of filing it away. And there's something about doing that with other like-minded people in the room. You see it from a perspective you wouldn't have come up with alone, and you realize you're not the only one dealing with this. It's free. It's the difference between passive listening and active connection. Join us live at https://consciousedge.com/club. Get Full Show Notes: consciousedge.com/ep120 Come say hi on Instagram: @aleciastg On this episode of The Conscious Edge Podcast, host Alecia St. Germain and co-host Jonathan Dugger break down the four seasons of yes every growing business moves through, survival, traction, positioning, and legacy, and the moment a strategic yes turns into a drain on your energy. They also share three simple scripts for saying no without the guilt, plus a simple test for telling a real yes from a flinch yes.  What We Cover: -The four seasons of yes every growing business moves through, and how to tell which one you're in -Why the yes that built your business can drain you completely once you've outgrown it -The real difference between a strategic yes and a flinch yes -A simple test for knowing if you actually want to say yes, or if you're just avoiding the discomfort of saying no -Three scripts you can borrow the next time you need to say no

What if the smartest way to size up any income stream isn't how much it pays you, but how much it costs your brain? You're Invited to Join Podcast Club: Here's the thing about podcasts.  You listen, have thoughts and questions, then go on with your day.   Podcast Club is different. You get to reflect on what you just heard while it's still fresh, ask the questions that came up for you, and actually apply it to your own life instead of filing it away. And there's something about doing that with other like-minded people in the room. You see it from a perspective you wouldn't have come up with alone, and you realize you're not the only one dealing with this. It's free. It's the difference between passive listening and active connection. Join us live at https://consciousedge.com/club. Get Full Show Notes: consciousedge.com/ep119 Connect on Instagram: @aleciastg Mandy McAllister spent years chasing cases and commission checks in medical device sales before she bought her way out of her W2 with multifamily real estate. Now she's a co-founder of GoBundance Women, co-host of the Power Up Your Life podcast, and the investor behind 373 doors of workforce housing, student housing, and a boutique motel reposition. In this episode, Mandy sits down with Alecia St. Germain to unpack the framework she built after a season of saying yes to everything, a car wash, a motel, a stack of apartment buildings, until she couldn't tell what was actually working. She walks through the four quadrants of Return on Brain SpaceTM, the question that finally stopped a deal from draining her, and the $4 fix that turned a struggling motel into a five star magnet. They also get honest about the big assumption underneath all of it: that she only mattered if she had a trophy to hold up. It's a conversation about scale, enough, and how to tell the difference. What You'll Discover: -Why the smartest metric for any income stream might not be what it pays you, it might be what it costs your brain -The four-quadrant framework Mandy uses to decide what to keep, what to fix, and what to walk away from -The exact question that helped her set a real deadline on a deal that wasn't working -How a $4 change turned a struggling boutique motel into a five-star review machine -The big assumption that had her chasing trophies instead of trusting her own worth -Why scaling isn't the goal for everyone, and how to know what's actually right for you right now

When you're staring at a decision like upgrading your software, making a new hire, or learning how to bring AI into your business, how do you know if it’s a smart investment or an expensive story you're telling yourself? Join Podcast Club: Get behind the scenes access to every episode before anyone else hears it. Meet other listeners of the show and connect live with guests, Alecia's cohosts, and Alecia herself.  Episodes are recorded in front of a live virtual studio audience, then a private, unrecorded conversation opens up where you can share your thoughts, ask questions, go deeper on the topic, and even shape what gets covered next.  Get access at consciousedge.com/club.  Get Full Show Notes: www.consciousedge.com/ep118 Let’s Connect on Instagram: @aleciastg In this episode of The Conscious Edge Podcast, host Alecia St. Germain sits down with financial strategist Jenn Baas, founder of Peak to Peak Solutions and coach inside The Conscious Edge's Financial Leadership Lab, for a Monthly Money Talks with Zen Jenn. The two dig into a question that came up in Podcast Club: how do you know when to spend money to grow your business, and when does it make more sense to wait? Alecia and Jenn walk through the real difference between a need to have and a nice to have, how big assumptions quietly drive spending decisions, and why "hope is not a plan" when it comes to your business finances. 📝 What We Cover in This Episode: -How to tell the difference between a business dysfunction you'll outgrow and one that needs to be solved now -What questions to ask before you spend money on anything that isn't a clear need -How a big assumption like "if it's not perfect, no one will do business with me" can drive expensive decisions -The difference between visionary spenders and security seekers, and how to work with your own tendency instead of against it -Why setting a timeline and clear metrics before you invest protects you from riding an investment too long -What it actually means when a business is being subsidized instead of run -How anchoring every spending decision back to a real plan creates more freedom, not less

Setting boundaries and protecting your peace has become a popular topic in personal development.  Alecia and Jonathan break down the real difference between a healthy boundary and boundary language that's actually just avoidance in disguise, and why getting that distinction wrong is costing you the relationships and results you actually want.  Join Podcast Club: Get behind the scenes access to every episode before anyone else hears it. Meet other listeners of the show and connect live with guests, Alecia's cohosts, and Alecia herself.  Episodes are recorded in front of a live virtual studio audience, then a private, unrecorded conversation opens up where you can share your thoughts, ask questions, go deeper on the topic, and even shape what gets covered next.  Get access at consciousedge.com/club.  Get Full Show Notes: www.consciousedge.com/ep117 Let’s Connect on Instagram: @aleciastg In this episode, Alecia St. Germain and her longtime co-host Jonathan Dugger dig into a phrase that's everywhere right now: "I'm setting a boundary and protecting my peace." They unpack what actually separates a boundary that's grounded in your values from language that's just avoidance wearing a boundary's clothes. Alecia gets honest about her own break from recording this podcast and whether that was a boundary or something else entirely. Jonathan brings the clinical lens, breaking down avoidance as a short-term, immediate reaction versus boundaries as long-term and value-driven. Together they get into ghosting, people-pleasing, the body's reaction the first time you set a real boundary, and a simple three-step process for knowing which one you're actually doing.  📝 What We Cover in This Episode: -How to tell if you're setting a boundary or just avoiding something uncomfortable -Why avoidance can start small and quietly grow into a much bigger pattern over time -What it means when your boundary is actually an attempt to control someone else's behavior -Why ghosting someone creates more anxiety for both people than an honest conversation would -The body sensation that shows up the first time you set a boundary that's actually healthy for you -A three-step process for checking your motive before you cut someone off or speak up -Why you can't help your initial emotional reaction, but you can choose your response

If your first half of the year didn't go the way you planned, you’re not alone.  The good news is you still have time to make adjustments that will actually change it.  Podcast Club is where the conversation continues. Come hang out in the Podcast Club, a free community that meets most Thursdays. You can join us at consciousedge.com/club.  Get full show notes at www.consciousedge.com/ep116 Instagram:@aleciastg In this episode, Alecia sits down with Jenn Baas, fractional CFO and facilitator of the Financial Leadership Lab at The Conscious Edge. Based on Jenn’s experience working with entrepreneurs, a majority find themselves off-track from what they predicted back in January by mid-year.  But there's a fix. A mid-year audit gives you three things: visibility into what's actually working, two quarters to make corrections, and data to replace the guessing. Even if you’re finding yourself in a windfall, you can still get blind-sided. This is the real conversation every entrepreneur needs to have mid-year so there are no surprises come December.    📝 What We Cover in This Episode: In this episode you'll discover: -What Jenn sees over and over: most entrepreneurs’ first halves don't land as planned -Why mid-year is your actual decision point, not December -What happens in your head when the numbers don't match the story you told yourself at the start of the year  -The difference between financial data as compliance vs. financial data as strategy -How looking at your numbers solo creates stories. How sharing them creates solutions. -The exact adjustments you can make in Q3 and Q4 to engineer a different year-end outcome -What the Financial Leadership Lab actually does and how it changes how entrepreneurs use their data

You’re Invited to Podcast Club: Listeners of The Conscious Edge are coming together on Thursdays at 1pm ET for Podcast Club. Think book club, but for the podcast. We'll talk about the episodes, what landed, where it's challenging us, and how to actually apply it. It's a chance to meet other business owners, get into real two-way conversation, and stop just consuming content. RSVP for the dates you want at consciousedge.com/club.  Get full show notes at www.consciousedge.com/ep110 Come say “hi’ on Instagram:@aleciastg Alecia St. Germain and her co-host Jonathan Dugger take on what actually makes change work inside a team, and it has very little to do with the process. In this month's Mindfulness Matters with Jonathan, they dig into why the phrase "change management" misses the point entirely, and what Amy Edmondson's psychological safety research uncovered when Google studied nearly 200 of its own teams through Project Aristotle. The highest performing teams in that study reported more failure than the ones anyone would have guessed were the safest bets, and they held onto their people while they did it. Alecia shares how the Immunity to Change process can be facilitated with a whole team, surfacing the big assumptions an organization runs on without ever naming them out loud. Jonathan makes the case for treating resistance as an opportunity to learn something no one has seen yet, and for letting grief have a place in professional conversations, because every change asks people to let go of something. They also get honest about what has been lost in business culture along the way, and why relational capacity is the one thing that cannot be outsourced to an algorithm. Solo entrepreneurs are not off the hook here either. A bookkeeper and the one person she calls when she needs to think out loud already add up to a team. 📝 What We Cover in This Episode: -What shifts when you stop calling it change management and start calling it change navigation -What Amy Edmondson's psychological safety research found when Google studied nearly 200 of its own teams -Why the teams that reported the most failure were also the most effective and had almost no turnover -How uncertainty changes your brain chemistry and shuts down the exact capacities you are asking your people to use -Why matching the right person to the right task matters far less than you have been told -How the Immunity to Change process can be facilitated with a whole team to surface the assumptions running your culture -Why grief belongs in change conversations, even the professional ones -What becomes possible when you treat someone's resistance as an opportunity rather than an obstacle

Every time you tuck a good idea away for when you have more capacity, you give it the chance to go find someone else to bring it to life.   If this episode landed, come talk it through with me at Podcast Club. Most weeks we get on Zoom together and turn the podcast into a real conversation with other women who are building real businesses and playing the same game you are. It is like book club without the hangover and the gossip. Pick a date and RSVP at consciousedge.com/club.  Get full show notes at www.consciousedge.com/ep114 Come say “hi’ on Instagram:@aleciastg In this solo episode, Alecia St. Germain reframes the anxiety so many business owners carry around money and the decisions they make in their business. It started with a question she posed to her clients, one that landed hard: are you playing to win, or are you playing not to lose? From there, Alecia explores what shifts when you stop making decisions to protect yourself from the bad things you fear and start making decisions that move you toward your vision. Using a sports analogy that runs through the whole episode, she walks through knowing the real risks of the game you are playing and protecting yourself appropriately, the difference between being attached to winning and being invested in it, and why everything tends to feel most intense right before a breakthrough. She connects it all back to the big assumption running underneath your patterns, the one your nervous system built long ago to keep you safe, and how becoming aware of it changes the way you play. 📝 What We Cover in This Episode: -Why protecting yourself from every possible bad outcome can become the very thing that keeps you from making money -How to tell whether you are wearing the right amount of protection for the risk you are actually taking on -The difference between being attached to winning and being invested in it, and why attachment wears down your performance -What to do with the fear that lingers after a loss, a bad deal, or a market shift you did not see coming -Why the intensity that shows up right before a breakthrough is not a signal that this is not for you -How the big assumption you formed years ago can pull you off course right as you reach for your next level -Why the time and money you think you are missing tend to fall into place once your alignment, your emotions, and your leadership are handled

Too many business owners are paying everyone in their business except themselves, and somewhere along the way they stopped asking why.  Podcast Club is where the conversation continues. If this stirred up questions about your own pay, I would love to keep talking. Come hang out in the Podcast Club, a free community that meets most Thursdays. You can join us at consciousedge.com/club.  Get full show notes at www.consciousedge.com/ep113 Instagram:@aleciastg You built this business. So why does it pay everyone but you? For a lot of women, owner pay is the problem they have stopped questioning. There's payroll, there are contractors, there are a dozen things that have to happen before there's anything left, and somewhere in there their own pay became the lever they pull whenever money gets tight. For others it runs the other way. The business did well, the lifestyle leveled up to match, and now there's a number they have to hit every month or the whole thing wobbles. In this month's Monthly Money Talk, Alecia St. Germain sits down with fractional CFO and financial strategist Jenn Baas to look honestly at both. What owner pay actually is, how to tell whether your business can really afford you, and the simple financial-plan math that shows where your money is going. They also go underneath the numbers, to the big assumption that keeps an owner underpaying herself even when the business could support her, and the entitlement that can creep in on the other side. This one is warm, practical, and a little bit of a permission slip to look at the number you have been avoiding. 📝 What We Cover in This Episode: In this episode you'll discover: - What owner pay actually means, from salary to draws to distributions, and why how you pay yourself matters less than whether you do -Why most owners pay everyone else first and reach for their own pay as the lever they pull when money gets tight -The simple financial-plan math that tells you whether your business can really afford you, and where the money is actually going -The big assumption hiding under "there's just never enough left for me," and why more strategy won't move it on its own -What overpaying yourself looks like, and how leveling up your lifestyle too fast can leave your business fragile when the market shifts -Why "if I'm working this hard, it has to be worth it" deserves a closer look before it sets your salary -How emotional capacity, not just the numbers, decides whether you can hold and enjoy what you have built

Every time you tuck a good idea away for when you have more capacity, you give it the chance to go find someone else to bring it to life.   If you've got an idea you keep telling yourself you don't have the capacity for, come test that thinking out loud with me at Podcast Club. It's free, it meets most Thursdays, and it's there to connect you with people doing this same work. RSVP at consciousedge.com/club and tell me the date that works for you.  Get full show notes at www.consciousedge.com/ep112 Come say “hi’ on Instagram:@aleciastg You have the idea. You can see it clearly. And then you start adding up everything it would take to do it right, the time, the money, the build, the proper way you know it should be set up, and somewhere in that math you decide you don't have the capacity for it right now. So you tuck it away. In this solo episode, Alecia St. Germain offers a different way through. She shares the moment Podcast Club arrived in her head in the shower, right in the middle of deer-damaged cars, a leaking camper, and a conference she was about to leave for, and how she chose to test it in the clunkiest, easiest way she could instead of waiting until she had the capacity to do it perfectly. Forgotten Zoom link and all. You'll hear why your own expertise can be the very thing keeping your best ideas stuck, what it looks like to test something without risking too much time or money, and how letting it be good enough is often what finally moves it into the world.  📝 What We Cover in This Episode: -Why your best ideas lose momentum the further you get from the moment they arrived, and what Big Magic gets right about acting fast -How being the expert in the room can keep you from testing the very ideas you believe in -The clunky, low-risk way Alecia tests every new idea before she spends real time or money on it -Why letting something be a version 1.0 frees you to actually get it out the door -How perfectionism is often less about the outcome and more about protecting yourself from what others might think -What it looks like to feel anger and still lead with compassion when someone won't own a mistake -The one question to ask yourself when you catch yourself making an idea harder than it needs to be

You keep waiting to get back to solid ground before you ask for help, when reaching for help is usually what gets you there.  You’re Invited to Podcast Club: I’d love to keep the conversation going with you by inviting you to Podcast Club on Thursdays at 1pm ET.   Think book club, but for the podcast.  It’s a way to deepen the conversation and engage in authentic dialogue with other business owners. RSVP for the dates you want at consciousedge.com/club.  Get full show notes at www.consciousedge.com/ep111 Come say “hi’ on Instagram:@aleciastg In this episode of The Conscious Edge podcast, Alecia St. Germain calls out a pattern she watched play out over and over at a recent conference for women building wealth. There are two moments an entrepreneur tends to reach for support. One feels like an easy yes, the season when things are working and she is ready to scale. The other feels vulnerable and risky, the season when something is not working, debt may be building, and she has convinced herself she has to climb out of the hole on her own before she is allowed to ask for help. Alecia walks through the questions she asks women sitting in that harder season, the scarcity thinking and big assumptions that keep them stuck, and why the shame of "I should have this figured out by now" is often the real thing standing in the way.  📝 What We Cover in This Episode: -The two seasons when entrepreneurs reach for support, and why one feels like an easy yes while the other feels terrifying -Why waiting until you are "back to center" to get help often keeps you in the hole longer -The two questions to ask yourself first when a big investment in support feels like a risk -How debt in your business is often a band-aid for a big assumption you have not named yet -Why believing you have to know it all or you're a fraud is keeping you from getting paid for what you already know -The reframe that makes spending on the right support feel like an accelerator rather than one more cost -Why the thing actually blocking you is usually shame, and what becomes possible the moment you stop carrying it