315. What Really Happens at a Mastermind Retreat and Why It Matters for Business Growth

Speaker A: Well, hey there, friend. And welcome back to the Creative Shop Talk podcast. I'm your host, Wendy Batten. I'm so happy that you're here today. We are recording our podcast today with every neighbor I own or I have in my hood lawn mowing and they have been for three days. So I apologize for any background noise today. I'm just excited to be here and I wanted to share today. I'm going to share with you a little bit about my recent Mastermind retreat that I hosted here in my little fishing village. And I've had a lot of questions about it and I thought, hey, I'm just gonna record a podcast. I'm going to turn my podcast on. I didn't turn the podcast on. I'm going to turn my mic on. I'm going to share some takeaways. I've done this in the past. It's always been a popular post and I guess the question I'm asked a lot about our level up Mastermind and what happens at a retreat. What happens at a Mastermind retreat? What goes on, what's behind the scenes. And if you were here, don't worry, I'm not sharing any of your stories, but I will be sharing some of my observations, some of the feedback I have had and some of the things that happen actually what we do, why we do it. I just want to remind everybody as well too that Camp Q4 is coming up in July. We have space available for you if you'd like to join us. It's three weeks. Once a week, three weeks, get it done. You'll just feel amazing. So. Wendybatten.com camp the reason I'm calling it Camp Q4 is literally, honestly, camp should be like light and easy and fun and, you know, and then we kind of teach you some things underneath. That's how camp was for me for over all the years that I went to camp. I look back and I realize almost all of my major leadership skills, they all came from camp. I went to camp for years and, you know, you're just always learning things, but you're having fun doing it. So that's my intention and my goal. And there's no bugs and no bunkies and no out houses you need to worry about. We are going to get Q4. We're going to get the holidays ready for you and, you know, make it light and easy for you at the same time. There's a lot more to getting and getting and having an amazing Q, uh, four than making sure your inventory's prepped and you have a few extra staff. There's a lot going on in Q4 and it doesn't have to be so complicated. And this is the program and what I'm going to be teaching is what I teach my ambitious retailers that see a lot of success every year, year after year. So you'll have it all done. You'll have the big rocks in place. We're going to work on the actual numbers you need. We're going to work on marketing to get those numbers and we're going to work on systems and people and all the things and it makes it sound really heavy and hard but we're gonna do it slow and easy. Okay. So I'd love to see you at Camp Q4. Wendybatten.com camp. We'll get you to that, that program. And also I have a summer coaching program as of recording this right now, while I'm recording it, I do still have a few spots available for a three month coaching program. And I say coaching program but we're going to customize it to make sure that it works for you. What? I, I don't normally do that. I don't normally have a coaching program over. I, my travel plans changed this summer so I am going to work on you guys instead of working on travel. So I can't wait to see who jumps in. You can find out how to jump into my summer coaching program. That's you and me. We're going to work together to get whatever it is you need to get untangled, done, move forward. Maybe you have a new location, you're opening up. Maybe you have, maybe you're retiring. I have one client just hired me. We are going to spend the summer new getting her business set up so that she can retire and sell her business. We're going to work on that. We are actually way into that process already. There's lots of things going on. We can do lots of things in your business. Maybe we can finally get you out of the business. Maybe you need to be a little more hands off. How do we do that? I work with a lot of clients who are in that position at this time. And speaking of a lot of great clients doing great things, that's who was at my mastermind. So that's what we do. That's how I coach and how I teach. I love working with big thinkers, ambitious retailers. I love helping businesses put uh, their life first. Right. And then we fill in, we fill in the business around the life lifestyle congruence. You've heard me say that before. If you've been around. I love to co create with people. I'm their mentor. I have a big giant toolbox. So we'll, we'll talk a little bit more about that when I share the rest of what happened in the Mastermind. But that's how I work with people. It's not that I'm going to tell you how to do and how to run your business. That's not what a coach does, not what a mentor does. I'm going to give you tips and tools and you were going to use my tool bag, my Mary Poppins bag of tricks, and my 30 years of being self employed. And we're going to put that together with my big vision. And I'm not going to hold your hand and do your work for you, though. That's not what I do. I, as I mentioned, I love to do work with ambitious people. So I co create, I mentor. Yeah. And if that's something you want to do, let's, let's do that together. Okay, let's jump in. I want to share with you what happened at my recent Mastermind retreat held here in Lunenburg, Nova Scotia, where I live. Go Google that if you don't know where we are. It's a very picturesque UNESCO World heritage site. That's where I live. And I've mentioned before, if you've listened, I'm looking outside. I'm looking out my window right now. Well, I'm looking at everybody lawn mowing, but I'm also looking at everybody the fishing boats bobbing outside my window. So that was kind of fun. So what exactly happens in a Mastermind meeting with me or a retreat with me? Let's jump into that. Running a retail business doesn't have to be so hard. Welcome to the Creative Shop Talk podcast, the Go to podcast for creative shop owners, studio owners and independent retailers. Hi, I'm your host, Wendy Batten, retail business coach and mentor. Each week I'll share simple, proven business strategies, inspiring stories from fellow retailers, and advice from industry experts. Together, we're going to work to find the success you want from your retail business with more profits in your till and a little more joy in your life. Okay, so I have to share first and foremost that, uh, my business, our business has made a decision. A couple of years ago, we made a decision that we were no longer going to host retreats at fancy nameless resorts like big brand resorts. We did that for a couple of reasons. We found ourselves in Orlando a few years ago and I've done it several times in Orlando. Where I hosted retreats and it just uh, like we're just like spending money with big brands and there's nothing wrong with, you know, we were at Disney and you know, all of that, but I just felt like couldn't even find a restaurant that was locally owned. They were all chain restaurants and I thought ah, uh, so we started hosting all of our gatherings in our clients towns in my town or in my clients town. So we've been in Georgia, we were in North Carolina, it's been you know, in here, in Nova Scotia, in my town. And that just feels good. Like to me it just feels good. We're supporting local restaurants, we're supporting just local, local people, like all of the things. Right. My business values also include, you know, really deeply caring about what my people care about and they care about small towns. So that's what we're doing. I um, am also you know, gonna give you like a high level view of some of the things that I believe in and that's that part of my mission is to share what I know. I mentioned earlier I have 30 year, 30 years self employed. We just passed that beautiful mark a while ago. Not all coaching. I've been coaching for 11 years now, which is great, it's crazy to me. But you uh, know we owned a cafe, we owned a service industry. My husband and I owned a service based industry, a cleaning company for 25 years. Of those 30 years we've had other businesses as well. Taekwondo studio, a cafe. I've had other businesses in and around the that time frame. So I do have that Mary Poppins bag of, I don't know, experience and tools and resources. And I'm a big thinker. I love big, I love big ideas, I love seeing what people are doing. I love the ripple effect. As a matter of fact, I have a uh, necklace that's like a wave on it and it's all about the ripple effect and the wave effect. So I also have no patience for fancy, I don't know what you call like whiz, bang, bells and whistles, you know, fancy hustle formats and frameworks and all of that. That's not how we roll. If you're looking for that, keep scrolling or keep listening or fast forward. I'm just not your human. I like to see each individual retailer has a different reason or even every business owner I work with. I work with a lot of non retailers as well and I like just seeing how the human behind that business, how they are thriving. I love watching them thrive. I love believing that the founders and the CEOs and the head honcho, queen bee, whatever you call yourself, I love seeing you thrive. Because if you're thriving, then your business will thrive and the people around you will thrive. Your family, right. We regularly say your board of directors is usually, you know, your board of directors is usually sitting at your kitchen table, right? The people that you're most accountable to, they're usually. It's yourself and the people the nearest and dearest to you. So I love seeing you thrive. I love seeing the founders thrive. And that just pours out. That's just. That just pours out to everybody else. Your team and your people and your community. And I don't know. That just. That lights me up. So it's all about me. No, that's. But that's part of my values and part of why I do what I do. And I'm explaining all of this because this is part of how we run our retreats. We're not just, you know, it's not fancy, right? We're not doing them fancy. And I also really like running my business with clients that I really like. And maybe that's weird, I don't know. I just really like the humans that I work with and all the. And I love what they're doing in the world. I work with really just cool people. And so, as I mentioned, we used to host our retreats, you know, in resorts and fancy places. And I don't know, that's just not how we do it now. We do it in. We still do it very professionally, and we still do it in lovely places. But I think that it's. There's something different when it's more intimate, and that's how I run my business. So I love working with people who are building. Building a brand, and you get to do it your way. That's how I'm building my business. And that's what I'm trying to teach by example, I think that's what I'm trying to say. And, um, that's why I'm sharing this. Fellow coaches, a couple years ago when I hosted my first retreat here in my fishing village, in my little, tiny, imperfect house, I love to call it. I love to say that I live in a dodgy little cottage, but it's not horrible. It's just. It's old and it's very imperfect and it's not fancy. And I had some fellow coaches that I was in a mastermind group with. And I want you to listen to me when I say this, because feedback from other People is, is good. And information from other people, whether it's podcasts you're listening to or close, intimate mastermind friends, is good. But you have to take that feedback in through the lens to which they're looking at it and through the lens to which it matters to you. So the feedback I got was, and it's been in my head that imposter syndrome. And it's just kind of sits on my shoulder quite a bit. I have to remind myself the feedback that I received was they would never invite customers into their house, especially if they weren't a fancy house, because it wouldn't be very professional, it wouldn't look very good and they would never, you know, just, they would always make sure that, you know, there was a full fancy professional retreat planned. And I, I hesitated I guess a couple of years ago when we had our first retreat here and we just did it. But I had people that ended up coming from New Zealand and Scotland, the US and Canada for our first retreat and the same for this retreat. They came back. So it wasn't horrible, I guess. Apparently it wasn't horrible but it's not my world and it's not my people to be totally fancy. And honestly I love fancy. I love. I'm going to retreat. I'm going to retreat in the uh, not too distant future. And it's, you know, totally beautiful, but that's the vibe of that brand. So I'm sharing all this. I don't know, I feel like I may be babbling. I don't mean to. I do have notes. I am trying to follow a script in a way or my points. I'm trying to stay to the point but I love people to realize that for me, two years ago when we had our retreat here, the first one we did here, one of my favorite moments was spontaneously end up in my backyard in a campfire with my people. Anyway, that's how I roll. I just, I. That just made me feel good. Everybody was sitting around. It was wonderful. So the people in my, my life or my business, they get that and they like that too. So my. I'm still professional and I can still be valuable and still have a great retreat even though we're doing it in my little cricket house by the sea. So here's what happened. This is literally what I've been asked lately, what happens at ah, your retreats. So our members all came. We had some members that came a earlier and we ended up doing some hiking. We had a lobster feed and these are some of my clients from New Zealand that came in. And when I was in New Zealand the same thing happened. We were like, we went hiking and we had chats and we had dinner at their house. And that's just, that's how I roll. And I love working with people that I'm building relationships with. You guys know if you've been listening for any length of time, if you've been around here. In my coaching world, I believe relationships are rocket fuel. I say it all the time. And I think, you know, working with wonderful humans is a great business model and I'm hoping that you're doing that in your business as well too. We're all just humans, right? Human to human. So we had some people come in early. We had pub ah dinner one night. We had as everybody was kind of coming in, not really part of the official, you know, official retreat schedule but we just had some gatherings because people were arriving and driving in and coming together. So we had dinner, hiking, we had a pub dinner. All of that before we even started. We had our first day whenever our first official day together, we took everybody down to a local. I realize this is going to sound lame but trust me, hang on with me here. We took them all to a local historic museum down on our waterfront. It's like a working museum. Which really explained a lot of the. The vibe in my town. Again, UNESCO World Heritage site fishing site completely new to a lot of people that were here. So they got to know a little bit about what they were seeing in my town because they spent a lot of time. We were right in the heart of the town. Our location was right in the heart of town and everybody was wandering and shopping and seeing, you know, our Bluenose 2 which is an iconic ship and understanding what, why that matters and the wharf and the water and all the things. So it was a lot of fun. After our museum, one of our members, millie from M. Mrs. Blackwell's Village Shop in New Zealand in Greytown, New Zealand she hosted. She just. We all sat down and she showed us a little bit of sketching and note how to. How to sketch and watercolor and do some travel journaling together and that was just so fun. We had another member who does rug hooking and felting and she brought everybody a really cool felting gift. So we all learned to felt during you know, a couple of day. Over the couple of days actually she purchases from a client in Lunenburg. Lunenburg Makery. So it was just had a lot of fun. So that wasn't just. We're not Just doing business. We're doing human. We're human to human interaction. Chatting. We had an east coast kitchen party the first night at my house. East coast kitchen party is just laid back. Help yourself. Here's some, you know, we had some beverages, cold beverages, alcoholic, non alcoholic, some fun. We had seafood, we had lobster, we had scallops. We had all kinds of yummy goodies for everybody. And it. We squished 16 people. Oh, sorry, 18 people into my little house. And of course, where does everybody gather? They gather in the kitchen. So we had a kitchen party, that's what we had. And it was kind of rainy, the weather was okay. We were outside, inside, just laid back, chill, catching up, chatting, laughing, having some fun and getting to know, you know, getting to know each other on a different level. So those are the kinds of things that we sort of start with. We love getting everybody together. We met our. Our business sessions were held for a couple of days in a local Lunenburg School of Arts, which was again, just an old building, ironically. Side note, built by my great great grandfather, which is kind of cool, kind of a little, nice little tie in. But it was so unfancy. Is unfancy a word? I don't know, unfancy. Um, meaning our tables were all splattered with paint because it's an art school. The sinks were all dirty. And I promise you, while we were setting up, I had a moment of, what am I doing? Oh my gosh, this is so imperfect. And it's so. Oh my gosh, that, that voice, those. Those voices of other people's. The shoulds and the musts, those are usually other people's voices. That's a takeaway maybe that you might want to think about. I felt like I should be someplace fancier. This is while we were setting up, just so you know. And I'm like, you know, friends, um, this is my help, my information for you or my thoughts for you. We have to do our business our way. And this is. This was okay. My people were going to be okay. They loved it in the long run. I did get a lot of feedback about that, that they loved the location. So I'm really happy about that. But those voices are still in your head. That imposter. I don't know if that imposter syndrome or the second guessing or whatever, but it was like wood beam ceilings and creaky floors and big open spaces and paint easels and paint murals all over the wall. And it was super fun and laid back and we still had a lot of. We still had a lot of fun, but we did learn. We were set up, you know, for a couple of days, doing teaching sessions. A lot of things I wanted to mention as well are swag. A lot of times you go to retreats and I always love to gift things to our members. And this year I just decided, well, I've done this in the past, but full on this year, I didn't have anything. There was nothing with my name on it except my business card. We bought bags, pencil case bags from a local sailcloth made out of sailcloth, which is tied into, of course, Lunenburg. And everything that we had, everything that we gave our, everything that we gave our members as swag, if you will, as take home, was thoughtfully purchased at our local markets from our local vendors and right here in Lunenburg. And so I'm really proud of that everything. So you can jump into my Instagram if you want to see some of those things, some of the things that we gave away. But that's the kind of like, that's supportive of other small business owners. That's the values that my people have. That's the values that I have. So we did two days of training, two days of working together. We worked on what it takes to have a business, to have a healthy and happy and beautiful business. So I teach two things. I always say, I love to teach two things. I teach nuts and bolts. Like, here's how, here's how we do this, you know, and again, you do it your own way. But I also teach the untangible thing about being a leader and being the founder and how to, how to be a healthy leader. As I mentioned at the top of it, we have to be in, we have to be healthy and happy and fulfilled in our, in our role as business leaders or we will not have a healthy business. So we spend a lot of time on that. How we spend our time, how is our energy, what kind of money like? Again, time, energy and money are the only resources that we have. So we spend a lot of time around that. We did hot seats, we untangle some specific business knots for a few of our people. We did sessions on data. What and why? Like why, why are we. What. What data and what metrics and what numbers should we. Or could we. I don't like to should on people. So could we be measuring and why, why does it matter? What does that look like and how powerful does that make you? And we spent a lot of time on that. We had evenings and dinners together. There were some cocktails, I believe had in between sessions. I didn't go out for all of those, but I did. I did see and hear and witness and have some, I don't know, feedback, I guess, on how much fun it was for everybody to go and hang out together and break off into little groups. And, you know, some people don't. Aren't into that. They go and they walk away, and then other people come back. And we just loved seeing everybody together. That's a really big thing for me. I realized as well too that during dinners, we had dinners together. I think every night, Saturday, Sunday, Monday, Tuesday night, all of us had dinner together. We also include spouses. I didn't mention that at the beginning, but we include spouses for these things because I think it's really important. This is this. Not everybody brought a partner or spouse with them, but a lot of. A lot of our retailers do because you're traveling and you're coming to an event and, you know, they can participate or not participate. That's up to them. But I do think it's important for them to see and hear and chat with. And I think it's a whole. There's not usually one. One person in the business. The whole family is usually in the business, right in, you know, in the. In the ecosystem of the business. So there were some big ahas that happened at dinner a couple of nights. A couple of them that were shared with me privately, and then a couple that were shared in the session the next day. We had one member who just said, you know, I was eating my risotto and I just. This big aha moment happened and I was trying not to cry. And she cried in the session and explained to me, uh, you know, and to us as a group why, you know, what happened. And it was like, feels so good. Big things. Sometimes we need to hear things through different lenses or at different times. And that was one of those things. So again, I'm just sharing all of the sort of. I don't know what happens at a retreat. We had a lot. I guess I mentioned a lot of creatives in our group. So we spent a lot of time. I. I spent time watching. They were all teaching each other different things and rug hooking and I don't know, it was just so fun. We also. We also extended our retreat into an unstructured time. A couple of extra days. We stretched it out because we had so many people traveling so far that we extended a couple of days to a local resort. I went down for a couple of days. A few people came with with us. And that was really fun. I've never done that before, but it was really great to just. We just went and had dinner, hung out. There was no teaching. It was just more chatting and unfolding and untangling some of the things that they wanted to work on or. And that. Actually that retreat came, that part of the retreat came because a lot of people come to retreats and they learn new things or they have ideas or they get empowered or excited or they have momentum and then they go back to real world right away and they don't implement or they don't untangle or they don't journal or think upon or expand upon. And that's sort of why we added those extra days on that. That was a first time doing that. We'll see if we do that again. But it's really, I think it's really fun to add, even for yourself, if you're attending any kind of retreat or you're learning something new to make sure you're blocking time to process, to put it all together. For me, sometimes I do that on a plane, sometimes I take an extra day and then I make sure that I'm really soaking it in because things happen really fast. We also gave all our members prompts to take home, like journal prompts to take home, like to help them reflect on some of the things that might have happened or, you know, just to follow up, I guess, on the retreat. And yeah, that's. That's sort of how it all unfolds. We have a lot of fun. We have, but we do a lot of business. We had a guest expert actually cancel us on us in the last minute for good reasons. But we did have a guest experiment expert. So we had somebody else pop in one of our members Graciously, you know, Mr. Blackwell jumped in and he's an expert branding, branding expert. And he jumped in and taught us a phenomenal session. So sometimes you have to be open to the unexpected things. Things are not always going to go perfect. As a retreat host or as a retreat guest, maybe we had, you know, there's always things. So being resilient and being able to just, you know, have a business that feels good and have a business that's. I don't, I don't want to say laid back because that sounds kind of. But that works for you and isn't so structured and planned and so hard. And this even again, going with my retreat, being able to just follow what's unfolding and have that plan, have that plan, have an idea, know what you Want know what, you know, what you need as a, as a CEO or, uh, what your outcomes are? What, what are you trying to achieve? And just making sure that we're filling it in with things that feel good and work for you. That's, I guess, how we run our retreats. That's how we try to run our businesses. So our retailers left with accountability partners. I think they left with lots of ideas. I love watching them all gather together. And there was some extended learning. A lot of our retailers stayed, uh, like almost an hour and a half after our last session with another member who was teaching some extra things on E Commerce and Shopify and some other things like that. And so people in my world, they take their business really serious. They have really high standards. They have big, audacious dreams that they really want to get to, but they're not driven by hustle and drive. Right. I don't know. I hope you can hear that in my voice. I hope you can tell who, who's in our world. I really do love to encourage audacious goals. I love what I call bhags, like, big, hairy, audacious goals. I love. And this was actually some feedback. It's always funny to me sometimes. Side note, it's funny to me what kind of stuck with some people. And I had a couple of my members say, you know, when you say, blow your own mind, which is something that I have written down on my own, like my own wall. Blow your own. Your own mind. Right. Blow your own mind with what you're capable of and what you can achieve. And that. That stuck with a few of our members. So I love working with people who think impossibilities, and they're not. They're not stuck to this formula. Must do frameworks. You know, I have frameworks. I teach frameworks, by the way. But it's like thinking of recipes, you know, and how we make recipes, how you make your chocolate chip cookies and how I make my chocolate chip cookies. There is, you know, we need chocolate chips and we need flour, and you need things in them, but we get to do it our way. So we want to blow our mind with the best freaking chocolate chip cookies ever. You know, like, that's how I teach. There's a framework for what's, you know, what works. And then there's your way, do it your way, add your own ingredients. And again, I teach nuts and bolts. I teach the resources. I have all that, but I'm mostly teaching to do it your way and how to do it your way and how it can feel good and what life first business looks like. Seriously friends, I'm going to tell you right now, for years for me it was business first life kind of filled in around the uh, you know, around the extra whatever was left over. But I love to teach people and I love to like example, exemplify, example. How do you say that? Exemplify. I don't know that. Honestly, our business should work. Our business should work for us, right? The business shouldn't own us, we should own the business. That's what a life first business is. You know, how you spend your time, how you spend your the time, money and again, capacity or energy, those are the resources that matter. Life matters. Don't waste any time. I don't know, I'm just at a point maybe now as an, you know, been around for a while, 30 years as I keep mentioning and I just, I just don't have patience anymore for running a business that's just a business. Right. So what are we doing? Why don't we just go get a job? So anyway, I love to work again. I get to work with the coolest, smartest people and I don't hand hold anymore. I don't handhold, I don't spoon feed them everything anymore. I love to guide, co create, mentor. And again, if that's something that you're interested in, reach out. Let's chat. We have Camp Q4 coming up this summer again in July. You can have a great summer and you can still get all your holidays done. We can do it and have fun and laid back way. I have coaching programs. I have on demand things. What do you want to level up or skill up or you know, how do you want to run your business life first? Maybe you want to join one of my next cohorts. Coming up, let me know, jump into my DMs on Instagram, send me a message. Wendy. Wendybatten.com you can find me there. Jump over to my website, reach out. Your move, right? That's what I always say. It's your move. I don't chase anymore. That's another thing that some of my retailers empower. We like to say, we love to use the lighthouse analogy where you're attracting people. The right people will find you. You've got to do things to let them know you live out your your. You gotta let people know that you exist. You gotta let them find your lighthouse. But you gotta track. We're not chasing people. This is not, this is an era I think of meaningful and trustworthy business building right now for you in your business. And that's how I build my business, too. All right, this was a long podcast. I'm sorry. I hope you found it helpful. And we're jumping into some mini episodes in July. Not, not. Some of them might be replays where my team is taking a little pause in July. So watch out for just some different, uh, podcasts popping up every now and then. And I hope you listen and we love having you follow along. Please leave a review. It really helps. Whatever star review, we really do find it helpful. It helps other retailers find us and find the Creative Shop Talk Podcast. Jump into my DMs, continue the conversation with me there. If you're in a container with me, if you're already working with me in a container in one of our coaching programs, if anything here sparked, let's have, let's continue our conversation too. You know, I love hearing about your business, so let's make sure that we have a wonderful summer. Let's make it impactful again. Camp Q4 is coming up, but don't. Don't let business run your summer. Let, let you run your summer your way. Be intentional with your business. Be intentional with your life. And again, that's why we do first business coaching and mentoring here in my world. So thank you for listening. Have a fabulous July. Well, that's it for this week's episode of the Creative Shop Talk Podcast. I'm so glad that you're here to join us this week, and I hope you found value in what we're sharing here. I want to remind you that our website has all of the show notes. You can find it at wendybatten Podcast. Everything that you need to hear about today's podcast. Is there also an opportunity if you need to reach out to me? If I can support you in any way whatsoever, please feel free to reach out. So thanks for joining us. Please leave a review, subscribe if you can, and never miss an episode. We hope to see you back here again next week. Thanks, my friend. Have a great week. Sam.