Creative Business Design Lab Sessions | See it again!

The Creative Business Design Lab

Transforming sensitivity into creative strength, with Eleanor Chaney

Session Notes

So many creatives are highly sensitive people, which can lead to struggles with visibility, boundaries, and taking action on plans and goals.

Join us for an eye-opening episode as we delve into one of the most profound struggles faced by creatives—the relentless fear of what others may think. This fear can become an insidious force, leading to a perpetual cycle of over-delivery and burnout.

My guest today is Eleanor Chaney, a coach for highly sensitive creatives, who helps artists and creators navigate self-doubt and reclaim their confidence.

Eleanor offers valuable wisdom on navigating the treacherous waters of visibility, and provides effective tools for cultivating confidence and embracing your unique voice as professional creative in the world.

Our topic in the Creative Business Design Lab this month:

Transforming Sensitivity into Creative Strength

Together, we explore the unique strengths of highly sensitive people and share practical tips on how to set boundaries, identify non-negotiables, and respect your needs. We also discuss the concept of “guardrails” and how it relates to visibility and success.

In this session:

How to embrace your strengths: Being highly sensitive is not a weakness; it has its own powers that you can make use of
Ways to handle rejection and develop resilience
Rethinking visibility by finding approached that feel safe and authentic to you
Strategies for setting boundaries and methods to help you enter into professional engagements from a place of strength
How to reframe marketing as an avenue for genuine connection, and create methods for selling your work ethically and with confidence
Unleashing and embracing your authentic (sensitive!) self: Explore your unique background, and embrace your true interests and values to find fulfillment in your creative pursuits.

No matter what type of creative professional you are, this episode will empower you to step out of the shadows and claim your place in the spotlight.

Links

Eleanor Chaney's website

ADHD & Creativity: How to lean into your strengths, with Emily Zilber

Session Notes

What if, instead of attaching negative labels to behaviors, like lazy, procrastinator, disorganized, we looked at what we expect of ourselves, and redesign THAT to work with our brains, instead of against them? What if, instead of pathologizing certain neurologies, we saw neurodiversity as akin to biodiversity, and just as important?

Those are the kinds of questions we address in this deep dive episode of the Creative Business Design Lab.

Whether or not you identify as neurodiverse yourself, the arts are chock full of wildly creative people across many spectra of neurological diversity…
…and we wouldn’t have it any other way.

Our topic in the Creative Business Design Lab this month:

Navigating a creative business (and life!) with ADHD & other forms of neurodiversity

In this session:

We explore the concept of a “neurodiversity-affirming framework,” which views neurodiversity as a natural and valuable form of human diversity, rather than a disorder.
We delve into the challenges and strengths associated with neurodivergent individuals, particularly those with ADHD, in creative fields, as well as the importance of understanding one's unique brain needs and finding the right resources and support to thrive.
We emphasize the need for balance in serving clients while maintaining a fulfilling life by addressing personal limitations and capacities, and aligning pricing and business models.
We also discuss strategies for redesigning personal habits and structures to align with individual strengths and gifts.

I dive into it all with Emily Zilber, a neurodiversity-affirming coach for creatives and cultural workers, and a curator with twenty years of professional experience in art museums, cultural organizations, and higher education.

Emily was diagnosed with ADHD in her late 30s, and learned through coaching to see her ADHD as a strength. Emily now brings strengths-based, neurodiversity-informed coaching skills to artists, creatives, and cultural workers, empowering them to embrace their unique strengths.

Links

Emily Zilber's website

Avid Gaze Coaching & Consulting

How to make more money without investing more time, with Sam Clark

Session Notes

Ever feel like no matter what you do, you can’t seem to break some invisible revenue ceiling with your creative business?

Whether that ceiling is in the low 4-figures, or the mid-5 figures (or higher!), you’re not imagining it.

It’s time to radically rethink HOW you’re selling your thing, and even what that thing is…so that healthy, sustainable growth is not only possible, but simple.

Our topic in the Creative Business Design Lab this month:

Breaking through an income plateau to make more money without killing yourself to do it

In this session:

How thinking small set you up for unworkable decisions
The four primary levers available to bring in more revenue without investing vastly more time
How one key technique will reduce the time you put in with each client (and preserve quality) while ALSO making sales easier
The marketing asset you don’t know you need that not only makes sales smoother but also helps you get over internal resistance to raising your prices
...and more!

My guest, Samantha Clark, is an award-winning artist and author who’s transitioned from an academic career to creative coaching. She joined the Autonomous Creative Incubator last year to build her business, and it’s going really well! She’s hitting her goals, and has almost more clients than she can handle.

And that’s the problem.

Sam has realized her income goals were too modest, yet she’s maxed out. We’re going to brainstorm about how to solve that problem, and help her break through her current income plateau.

Have you hit an income plateau with your creative business?

Do a business brainstorm with me!

Fill in this form, and let’s see if we can use strategy to get your revenue growing again.

Links

Samantha Clark's website

Samantha's Autonomous Creative Incubator Story

Samantha on Instagram

How to Get Into the Room Where it Happens, with Sarah Marie Lacy

Session Notes

When you figure out that you’ve got to raise your prices (or go broke), the first question to spring to mind is: Who the hell would pay me that kind of money? And where can I find them?

These questions were vivid for portrait painter Sarah Marie Lacy in 2021 as she pivoted her career from running a painting school (closed by Covid) to making a living painting portraits.

Back then, Sarah was severely undercharging for her time-intensive work, but she had no idea what her prices should be, or who would possibly pay those much-higher prices.

In this super-actionable conversation, Sarah and host Jessica Abel explore the series of steps that Sarah took to raise her prices into the 5-figure range, get comfortable with the feel of the phrase, “My prices start at $10,000” in her mouth, and join the most exclusive club in town, where she’s building relationships with her ideal clients every week.

This was not a simple process! It took courage, vision, and persistence. But Sarah has seen remarkable success already (250% increase in portrait income in 2022 over 2022, and a booked-out roster). And she’s set up for much larger success in the near future.

In this session:

What is the “croissant technique” for networking?
How to get invited to fancy parties
How to deal with the gap you may feel between the social world of your clients and your own
...and more!

Links

Sarah's Autonomous Creative Incubator Story

Sarah Marie Lacy's website

Sarah on Instagram

How to take brave action on your creative project…even if you are plagued with self-doubt, with Henry Thong

Session Notes

There is LITERALLY nothing more important to building a creative career than putting your work out there even when you’re not 100% confident about it (because no one is ever 100% confident…and it’s usually more like 25-50%).

Putting your creative work in front of potential clients or fans is scary! But trusting that your courage—taking action before you feel “ready” will lead to feeling more confidence in your work and thus taking more risks with it—is the pivot point between dreaming about a creative career and actually living that life.

My guest for this edition of the Creative Business Design Lab is Henry Thong, a self-starting, self-producing documentary filmmaker, whose original series Makers Who Inspire has amassed over 1.85 million views, and has won multiple awards. Henry parlayed his personal success into a full-time job as a filmmaker for ConvertKit.

I asked Henry to join me because his story is one of Courage Before Confidence over and over again: He submitted to film festivals while still in high school, won, and gained amazing mentors as a result. He started a freelance business as a filmmaker straight out of high school, skipping film school altogether.

He moved to the USA from his native Australia without a job or a plan, and secured a full-time position as a filmmaker for email provider ConvertKit within 3 months (That’s how we met! Henry made a film about me in 2021). I use ConvertKit, and if you’re curious about it, here’s a referral link!

Henry had a ton of insights to share about how to be more courageous with your work. Watch to find out how he blocked his exit, asked "What’s the worst that could happen?", leaned on preparation and mentors, turned “expensive” mistakes into stronger decisions going forward, hypes himself up, and uses stress as fuel.

Don’t miss the awesome Q&A at the end!

Links

Autonomous Creative: Don't settle for just surviving. Build a creative life you love

Henry’s personal YouTube channel

Henry’s work at ConvertKit

Henry's Instagram

Creator Sessions by ConvertKit on Instagram (filming + photography by Henry Thong)

How to handle your creative business finances—even if you’re “not a math person,” with Shawn Fink

Session Notes

Creative people often run screaming from any mention of math…but taking charge of the numbers in your business is incredibly powerful and far easier than you might think!

In this session of the Creative Business Design Lab, coach Jessica Abel and guest Shawn Fink, a business design strategist and courage coach for creative entrepreneurs, explore two ways using super-simple numbers will save your butt when it comes to business.

Both Shawn and Jessica are Capital-C Creatives who grew up with complicated feelings about math but now use simple business numbers on the daily.

Jessica demonstrates how a little 3rd-grade multiplication and division reveals strategic decisions that you need to make, and helps guide you to the right answer. You can get the free calculator she talks about in this blog post.

Shawn walks us through a 3-step finance-check-in ritual designed to calm the nervous system and release fear around business math (and then also get the tasks done!)

We grew up marinating in the idea that math belongs to the Enemy Camp. It’s scary, it’s overwhelming, and paying too much attention to the numbers makes you akin to The Man.

We got over it. You should too.

We know that numbers (and facing reality?) can be scary! But we’ve got you! We won’t let the math stop you!

We hold a live, free Creative Business Design Lab session every month! Find out more, and join the next Design Lab live at https://jessicaabel.com/creative-business-design-lab/

Links

Get the blog post about creative business models, including a button to get access to the Income Clarity Calculator: https://jessicaabel.com/not-making-enough-money/

Get Shawn’s weekly financial check-in: https://shawnfink.com/financial-checkin/

YNAB referral link: https://ynab.com/referral/?ref=NzGIBY4iTPmrNsU3

How to create a multipassionate website that works, with Victoria Lansford and Charlene Lam

Session Notes

Multipassionate creative people hate being pigeonholed, and can’t stand to hide or suppress any of their many interests. So how can multipassionates create a website that works?

You CAN showcase your interests without alienating potential clients.

In this session of the Creative Business Design Lab, coach Jessica Abel and guests Victoria Lansford and Charlene Lam discuss how to welcome potential clients and customers to their websites in a way that guides them through what they need to know to make a purchase and ALSO invites them to explore what will delight them!

Lots of Q&A on special cases for various website situations and bodies of work, and recommendations for best practices.

Links

https://victorialansford.com
https://www.charlenelam.com
https://www.thegriefgallery.com
https://www.rettswood.com
https://www.samanthaclark.net
https://jessicaabel.com/authentic-personal-brand/
https://jessicaabel.com/resources/diy/making-minicomics/

Session list:

How to create a multipassionate website that works, with Victoria Lansford and Charlene Lam
How to handle your creative business finances—even if you’re “not a math person,” with Shawn Fink
How to take brave action on your creative project…even if you are plagued with self-doubt, with Henry Thong
How to Get Into the Room Where it Happens, with Sarah Marie Lacy
How to make more money without investing more time, with Sam Clark
ADHD & Creativity: How to lean into your strengths, with Emily Zilber
Transforming sensitivity into creative strength, with Eleanor Chaney

I’m Jessica Abel

I’m a cartoonist/ author/ teacher/ editor/ illustrator turned creative business owner.

I know what it’s like to be doing everything “right,” and realize that people on the outside think I’ve got it all nailed, yet working insane hours and still not making ends meet.

I like to think of myself as competent. Yet a total lack of connection between the massive effort I was investing and the minimal return was driving me crazy.

I needed control over my life and my future.

I needed to support my family.

So I pivoted, hard, to creative business ownership.

This pivot point for me and my career is exactly the pivot point I am driven to create for others.

I want you to have an independent, creative, sustainable business.

I want you to have control of your future.

I want you to stop feeling victimized by your creative life (and stop feeling guilty for feeling that way when so many others would love to do what you do).

I believe that every professional creative needs to equip themself with powerful, effective strategy so that they can build businesses that meet their needs.

We (the big We—the world) need you to be successful because we need you to have the freedom and support to bring your work to the world for the rest of us to experience!

make more money with creative business - jessica abel

I’m Jessica Abel

I’m a cartoonist/ author/ teacher/ editor/ illustrator turned creative business owner.

I know what it’s like to be doing everything “right,” and realize that people on the outside think I’ve got it all nailed, yet working insane hours and still not making ends meet.

I like to think of myself as competent. Yet a total lack of connection between the massive effort I was investing and the minimal return was driving me crazy.

I needed control over my life and my future.

I needed to support my family.

So I pivoted, hard, to creative business ownership.

This pivot point for me and my career is exactly the pivot point I am driven to create for others.

I want you to have an independent, creative, sustainable business.

I want you to have control of your future.

I want you to stop feeling victimized by your creative life (and stop feeling guilty for feeling that way when so many others would love to do what you do).

I believe that every professional creative needs to equip themself with powerful, effective strategy so that they can build businesses that meet their needs.

We (the big We—the world) need you to be successful because we need you to have the freedom and support to bring your work to the world for the rest of us to experience!