These transcripts are AI-generated, and spelling may not be 100% accurate (especially for names, places, and methodologies).
I THINK THE FIRST THING THAT WAS
THAT I REALISED WHEN I STARTED WORKING FOR MYSELF
AND HAVING MY BUSINESS
IS OUR OT SKILLS ARE NOT BUSINESS SKILLS
WE THINK OKAY I THINK I CAN DO THIS
I THINK I KNOW WHAT I’M DOING
AND THEN WE ALL GENERALLY HAVE A BASIS OF LIFE SKILLS
BUT THEN I QUICKLY REALISED
I PROBABLY NEEDED HELP
TO UNDERSTAND THE BUSINESS SIDE OF THINGS
AND I CONSIDERED THAT AN
INVESTMENT IN BEING ABLE TO THEN LOOK AFTER MYSELF
SO LESS TIME WASTING TIME MAKING MISTAKES
IF OTHERS HAVE RUN THE PATH
I’M GOING TAKE THEIR ADVICE
Hello and welcome to the Healthy Business Lab Podcast
where we interview awesome
allied health business owners to
share insights
knowledge learnings for others in the space as well
and today
I’m super excited to be joined by Kezia Tieck
from Staying Independent
and I know she’s gonna share bunch loads up
we’ve had a great chat before this episode today
so great to have you on the call Kezia thanks great
feel free to introduce yourself
a little bit more than what I’ve just done there
sure
so I’m Kezia I am an occupational therapist
I also in my own practice
Staying Independent we are an approved provider
I started the practice as a sole trader and thought
okay I worked in public health
I like the NDIS I was interested in disability
so then I thought I’d shift across and I think I came
into this thinking oh yeah
you know limited time at the hospital work life balance
let’s work for ourselves
and then in reality it’s a bit harder
but still I still think it’s the best
the best job I’ve had so far by a mile
love it
I love that sort of what you’ve touched on a few things
will unpack a little bit further on this call
but again that journey from hey
being very good at what we do and then going into oh
now running a business okay
what do from there somewhere
I like to start these chats with
is also that
one of the things of looking after yourself
as a business owner we often don’t do that very well
I know I’ve been at fault of doing that
and because we’re talking with
people with great experience
in ways of looking after yourself
I’d love for
for you just to share a little bit of that expertise and
things that you see that you do
that can also translate to business owners
looking after themselves as a part of no
daily habits and rituals and those sorts of things
so I think the first thing that was
that I realised when I started working for myself
and having my business
is our OT skills are not business skills
we think okay
I think I can do this I think I know what I’m doing
and then we all generally have a basis of
life skills
but then I quickly realised
I probably needed help
to understand the business side of things
and I considered that an
investment in being able to then look after myself
so less time wasting time making mistakes
if others have run the path
I’m going take their advice
and I feel like that has been really
really good
to align myself with people who have done this before
and talk to them and reach out to them and say hey
I’m new to this what do you suggest
and people are very giving of advice and time
if you ask
Brilliant, I love that!
and that’s that kind of idea of knowing that
your clients are reaching out to you
for that same process and it’s like
okay from a business sense
I haven’t really done that
so I’m gonna look after myself by hey
seeking out expertise knowledge
insights and all those sorts of things
which hopefully again
that’s what we’re now paying that forward
it’s a part of what we’re doing here yeah
even that evolution then
of stepping into that learning
and evolution of going from this solo trader up to
multiple team members yeah
and the like is what sort of experiments have you
done in your business
and again as soon as we met
and jumping onto your website and your social profile
something that you know I’ll throw out there as you
I thought no doubt one of the
coolest experience with you’re
you’re nashing and you’re really focused on
who you actually work with
and how you go about that
I love to unpack that a little bit
and your experience with that
I think the thing that I’ve worked out is we’ve got
within the NDIS there is so much work
there’s work for 10 times the supply
demand is so out of wack the way that I found if I pick
I really like working with young people
young people is probably our area
and so I’ve made I built my business
that’s what we do and we do it really well
so I’ve I says it on my website
I send it to all my contacts to my providers
if we don’t fit your brief
I will help you find someone else
because it’s actually not in our interest
and the guys that work in my team to say hey
here’s a client you know go and see this participant
if they aren’t comfortable
then it
we’re actually doing a disservice to the participant
I feel very strongly to say
we don’t take referrals from everyone
if we’re not skilled in that space
let us help you find someone else because between
the network of contacts within
Sydney alone
there’s so many really great providers
and great OT’s and other allied health that we
can share and provide the participants
a much better service if it’s not necessarily us
yeah I love that
and that’s again all I can hear bouncing around
my brain is that’s happening
is the scarcity versus abundance
mindset side of things it’s that at the end of the day
I’m here to achieve great outcomes for our client
so but for anybody who comes into our sphere
then how can actually we do that
which really comes that lovely
person centred approach
to everything we’re doing
but that also rolls into that we can help
other colleagues build their businesses
so it’s not just it’s two fold
so absolutely about the participant
that they get a good match
but then it’s also about supporting other allied health
staff whether like allied business owners
whether they’re O.T’s or physios or EP’s
there’s a community of us
starting off as business owners
or people who have we’ve got a bit of a thing going
but we need to support each other
I really feel strongly that we can share referrals
we refer on it’s actually helping another business
build their business
which I am 1,000% for supporting other businesses
that is brilliant and it’s echoing as why
you are such an ideal person to be chatting to
for what we’re doing here
and I think again
you practice what you preach here
I’ve been across your social
since we first got connected a little while
ago which was from somebody else
actually mentioning you as well
but then I think I think you LinkedIn and
you were catching up with
a fellow dietitian in the last week
and again sharing that out there and saying hey
connect me with me if you want to
so obviously we’ll have attached to this episode here
all of your details
and if anybody is out there that wants to connect
feel free make sure you reach out to Kezia and yeah
continue this whole process of
the the rising tide at the end of the day of
that’s how we get great outcomes across the board
Now we’ve spoken a little bit of air as well
a little bit some other experiments that you’ve
you had a lovely for you to share a few of those
you’ve got some great
sort of things that you’ve tried in this
growing phase of your business
what other sort of experience
and learnings have you had in growing your practice
so one of the things that I did
which I didn’t ever know or understand about
was the value of a business coach
so I prior to working as an O.T
I worked in marketing and advertising
and then I retrained so
I kinda have a bit of an idea
of some parts of business
but I haven’t run a business before
so that was new to me
In the same way if you go into the bank
you see a specialist person for whatever you need
a home loan specialist
I went and did uh like a 12 week course
it was one session a week and I got some 101 basics
I think that made a huge difference
that then I could understand the processes
so things like for example
I learnt what a concrete diary was
which means about time blocking
so then it’s not putting spot fires out
so then there’s times of the day where
you know you’re doing your emailing
you’re responding to clients and that’s at that point
and then you block in another time
and that’s when you’re on the road
and then you block because if you block it
the productivity rises dramatically
I think that has been really useful
and the other thing
which I have found quite interesting
and I imagine others who listen to this
who are starting their business or have a
their business when you work for yourself
you become very accessible
because there’s not a gap between like in the hospital
there’s not a pager to page you like this is
this is oh
cause I am on the phone
so that’s been a really big learning as well
to say that hang on
I can’t always be available
because a client wants me right now
because then you have to split yourself
so having some boundaries to say yes
I hear you
I will do it but then I can’t do everything immediately
so like managing expectations has been a big thing
I think yeah
brilliant again
I think that managing expectations and boundaries
it’s a it’s a great word of hey
how do we put some
and the space between what we’re doing
and align with the how am I going to work best
yeah and I need to work at my best
to have the best outcomes for the people
and if I do a piecemeal thing over here for you
and may not I should give you the best outcome that
that you actually could
if I put it in where it needs to fit
and so
which is also you touch upon there that whole year of
I’ve only got certain amount of time
at the end of the day and so
one of your more recent grows that touch upon these
growing a team again
how have you found that in the experimenting
sort of piecing that together
how have you found that experience look
I think its been really good I feel like I tend to
it’s very liberating when you run your own business
you can sort of write your own ads
when I wrote my first seek ad
I thought hmm
what am I meant to write here
and I thought actually
I can write what I like cause my ad
so I think the way that I’ve
built my team and picked
who fits within our group is very much on
yes people have their qualifications
but it’s also on gut it’s fit
it’s feel who are the kind of people I wanna work with
and who I feel work well with the clients
that’s been really cool I’ve really enjoyed finding
interesting people who are vested in the work and also
particularly who have other parts of their life
you know
quite a few of the guys are parents and that’s okay
so we can work around that and
working very flexibly
if you support people outside of their life as well
you reap what you sow the return is huge
if you let people have some space to say hey
this is what’s my priority outside of work
and we work together
it’s been yeah big big difference it’s really exciting
I really like the guys that I work with
and we work in a really unusual space
we don’t operate out of a traditional practice
we part of a big warehouse in a shared workspace
we have a like a locked office
but then we’re also part of this like
really cool space with common areas
and there’s pool table and outdoor space
and ping pong table so yeah
we’re doing it a bit different
but it’s like pretty cool
and I love touch up on that
that there’s a couple of great things you
would like to unpack it
in as much as that idea of
we’re looking at team members as a whole
they’re whole people
the same as what we do with our clients and like well
let’s put that into how we’re going to structure and
build the business
which is something great
and even the premises that you’re talking about there
hundred percent I love for you to
share a bit more around the thinking that
I guess
went in around that aspect of getting the right fit
and for what you was trying to create
because as you touch upon there
that’s very different
and some people will have just gone
I need to do what other people have done and just go oh
I’ve got to get a premises
and it needs to look like this
and potentially have that feeling of like
I should or I’m supposed to or alike
but what I love is you’ve sort of
obviously gone through a process
that’s a bit different to that
to then go well
how’s this and then
you’ve already touched upon some of the benefits
you can see it in
what you’ve sort of mentioned there
but love to go a bit deeper on that
I think I thought about I started as a sole trader
I was working at home
I was working in the room from my house
and then as things ramped up
and they ramped up really quickly
I’ve also had to learn scaling as well
which is a whole another business skill
so that’s a side thing
but when I needed to find a workspace
I looked at heaps of different options
I looked at more traditional ones of a practice room
within like a
like a doctor’s sort of place
and then regular office building
and then I came across this idea of shared workspaces
so they became pretty big in Covid
where you can like Hot Desk where we’re based in
it’s called Wotso. W O T S O
Wotso in Zetland and most of
the people who work from here are creatives
there’s lots of
digital agency ad agency
the vibe is so far from disability
but when we came to look at the space
I thought oh
this is great this is great
because it’s not what you expect
and when we’ve had our clients come
they’re like wow okay
this is cool so
there’s
heaps of spaces where we can do a lot of our work
cause a lot of our clients
it’s like a social disability
spectrum and intellectual disability
we can work with them anywhere
we’re not limited by any sort of
we could take them wherever we like around
they love it! it’s fantastic
and I think that they just walk in and I think wow
this isn’t what I was expecting
but it’s been excellent
and also on that note the staff really like to come
they like to be in this space
because it’s got a nice vibe
and there’s a nice there’s coffee shops nearby
and there’s spots
they can take their work and do it in the sun
cause there’s big courtyard and stuffs
it’s great I
I’m like thinking where is everyone else
yeah ha ha ha
why isn’t there a whole warehouse
of allied health practitioners
creating these spaces yes
yes because
and the thing that people say is
but this isn’t where disability is
I’m like yeah
that’s why we need to be here
yeah this is why we’re here
because particularly for the young people
why shouldn’t we be in this like kind of cool warehouse
so come on here we are
which again he’s working in alignment with well
who are you working with as well
and how is that actually going to benefit them
and I can totally picture that of how you just said uh
clients coming and go whoa
this is what I was expected
but okay this is interesting
and again that will also help
well if there are certain clients that
that may not be a fit for
that it helps to say well
actually that’s not going to be a fit
cause this is our style and our approach
and we can leverage all this
but we can use it in our practice
in what we’re actually doing
and what we’re trying to help our clients
with especially you touch upon there some of the
the social and the different environments
and being able to be flexible
that rather than going into the same four walls
every session kind of things can
exactly so we do we do lots of our work
we meet them where they want if it’s in the community
we go to their home to their school to their uni
whatever but then we also have that we
they can come here for example
one of them this week came
and we’ve got a big pool table here
we did our session often also with some of the clients
sort of sitting face to face
like let’s talk about things
it doesn’t work but you’d be surprised how
open people become if you’re doing
learning with them over an activity
it’s far less confrontational
we’ve used that as a bit of a tool
also to get to know someone
let’s play table tennis there’s ping pong table
let’s do that people open up immediately
it that the where we are has served a purpose as well
to be able to connect with our
clients more so it’s been really good
I love that
and it’s a brilliant example of experimenting
trying something a bit different
and then going through the process of war
how can we actually leverage this
and and again that whole idea or you know
we do it with what we do here
that idea of being out of sit beside people
so to speak
it that whole idea of sitting opposite people is like
hang on a second it’s like
how can we look at something or do something over here
and we’re kind of
we’re doing that together and again
having a space
to be able to do that is absolutely brilliant yeah
it’s great and you know the other thing which is
my staff thinks quite novel
we have other providers we work with within the city
so I thought so we’re set up
so kind of like the fringe parking’s a bit of a pain
we’ve got push bikes so we’ve got bikes that we ride
if we’ve one of the guys we work with down the road
they’re about I don’t know 900 metres
we just get on our bike
there’s a couple of bikes we have downstairs okay
we’re gonna go meet them over there we go happy days
yeah and coming back to that idea of
I’ll circle back to looking after yourself
as a business owner or team members
all alike
there’s some pretty cool benefits of looking at
keeping active
moving all the time and those sorts of things
and even what you’ve just talked about there again
I know myself working in the office at times it’s like
ah I gotta get out and move more
which at different points of being a busy
I’m head down
I’m doing all the work and go hang on a second
I gotta get out and interact with people
I’ve got to just get fresh air
I’ve got to do all those things
so even having that
that cool ability there of being conscious of that yeah
it’s super cool I just said to one of the O.T’s
just before I came into the office
this is actually just one of our breakout rooms
it’s like pretty cool set up anyway
I just said to her oh after this
we’ll go get a coffee cause I wanna
we need to catch up about what she’s doing
and her clients on so we’ll jump on the bikes
and we’ll just like pedal down
it’s like literally five minutes
but it’s kind of nice to get out
we pedal we have grab a coffee and then we come back
so love it that’s great
I know it’s a bit odd but no
I’m taking you on myself again
I was aware of um where you’re located and again
having done a bit of research and that
but just gonna hear you talk it out
it’s like yeah that’s super cool
so I’m so glad you’ve shared that with people again
to be able at least think differently to go hey
there are options and what’s gonna work for me
if I’m starting a practice or even evolving a practice
something to be consider something to think about
people may not go and do that
but like oh
there might be aspects of it
they could incorporate into
the traditional one premises or or whatever it is
and I think that that’s been the really big thing
that’s been when I started
I thought I need to do it
because that’s what I thought I was meant to do
and I think now I’ve thrown everything out the window
because I can do it because oh
that would work
it’s like problem solving as any an O.T or anyone
how can I make this work oh
we could get bikes let’s get bikes
so we the beauty of working for yourself
is you make the rules
that’s been really cool to
but it takes a bit of confidence to then kind of say
well that’s what I’m gonna do
I’m gonna write my ad this way
or I’m gonna whatever it is
but that’s something definitely that I would feel
so a few other
Allied Health
people who have businesses have reached out and said oh
how do we do this
that’s the kind of thing that I would wanna help others
to say
give them a little bit of a a lift to say we could
you can but it’s just a bit of a push of confidence
that’s all yeah
and again
and he’s saying he’s believing sometimes as well
which again why I love sharing these stories people go
hey I can see it
I can see what Kezia is doing and amazing stuff
and awesome
these have awesome little ripple effect to go oh
there is somebody out there doing it
and even if it’s not they have to got none
they don’t have to copy that so to speak
but it’s like
I can see the thought process that is going on
behind that which is hey
I think a bike’s a good idea bikes are a great idea
I think the outcome you
all the steps that you would have gone through
underneath even just at that means I think it’ll work
I think this means that we could get out
we could do XYZ all the rest of it
and then there would have been a process of
the first few times you’re doing it
is it actually achieving that
is it worthwhile
so it is that whole idea of experimenting
which is why I love using that word
and I bandy on about it
in these conversations as well
is because at the end of the day
you can have a hypothesis
you can check whether it works
and then you can always change it
and I think it historically in business
it’s kind of like uh right or wrong and it’s like nah
let’s let’s be done with all that
it’s experimenting what works
and it’s the word pivot
that’s one of the things that I’ve learnt is
you do it and you pivot
because nothing happens if you just think about it
you just do it and you pivot
so nothing’s perfect
but nothing will happen if you do nothing
so I always think when we do so yep
let’s go and then we pivot
and then we pivot and yeah
most of the time it’s pretty good
and things don’t go right all the time
but that’s life that’s life
that’s like personal life
it’s life it’s business
but you pivot
and the best gains is what you learn from the fails
that’s been
a big lesson sometimes it’s hard and you think
oh my gosh why did I do this
but then you just pivot and you keep going
love it so many cool words again
I love that as well as people can go
that word works for me pivot brilliant
that’s great and I know the analogy of
heard a number of times is the old yachts
of the changing tack
they never go in a straight line
it’s like I get from me to there
they’ll keep on changing to find the right winds
and the like so another
I’m doing that any last little experiments
conscious of time here that you’ve
we’re talking off here a couple of little text
sort of things that you’ve experimented
we’d love for you to share a
one or two of those as well
so I would say one of the things that
I am really interested in is AI
and I’ve got a few different platforms
that I’ve been using within my business
and I’ve Learned a lot of this off
lots of different avenues
including within Allied Health
we’ve got some really
really good experts who know AI far more than me
but using these platforms to become more efficient
it will never replace our clinical reasoning however
it can help training staff for example
so there’s tools that can you can do that
you can do the task you can do your record screen
and it will then break it down task by task
so I’ve used that a lot when I’ve been teaching
so then I can speak it it breaks down
and then it sends to her so she can do step by step
that also works also for training for new staff
so that’s been good
and then there’s been other ones that
are useful for recording
and also all sorts of different
the other ones like the Allied Health
and then there’s the ones to help with every task
but also on that note AI
is really good for our participants
to teach them efficiency so it’s not just for us
but we using it also to
how can we help our participants learn technology
and AI love that and that’s a great way again
you’re experimenting with yourself
you can pay it forward for obviously
the business side of things
but this is where the world is headed yep um
at the end of the day
being educated and aware of that to then
have that flow through is great
I guess rounding off I’d love for you to share sort of
an example of a case study of
the transformations you’ve take from
the clients that you have come in and
the benefits of what you do that
keep you doing what you’re actually doing well
what do I so our main our passion is young people
the biggest thing that we see is
and I think this is also because of
social media as well
a lot of our young people really want to connect
they want to make a friend
they want to have a relationship
they want to have a connection
but they don’t know how
the first thing I say is if you want a friend
you have to know how to be a friend
so
that’s been one of the big things that
we’ve learnt to teach some of our guys
how to make social connections
learning how to connect with someone is
kind of the crux of being able to live in a house
with people work in a workplace
go to school
because if you can’t read the world around you
which with a lot of our clients with ASD
it’s just a different language
it’s not that they’re they’re not being rude
they’re not being dismissive
it’s just it’s a different language
and we just need to help them read it
so with a lot of our guys
once we’ve taught them how to read and interpret
the connection is mad
it’s like crazy it’s like they’re suddenly like whoa
I didn’t even see that people’s body position
or their language
or their expression is saying something
but it is so that’s probably been
pretty epic that we’ve been able to see
we can actually show these people
teach them how they can communicate on their terms
to be able to read the world around them
so I think that’s probably
pretty good like okay
back to what you said earlier
that the excitement in your voice and face
for those who watch this on video as well is
I can picture you seeing those light bulb moments
going off with the client
when you’ve worked on these sorts of things
and then seeing that and going whoa
this is yeah
life changing at the end of the day
yeah no
it’s good and I’m a kind of
I’m an all in kind of person
so I love what I do and I’m very enthusiastic
yeah it’s great
I’m so happy and grateful for joining us
to share some in insights
and you’ve covered so much ground in a short
space of time
again this podcast
is all about is sharing insights
sharing knowledge sharing learnings
and showing
the great outcomes
that are possible from
the rising tide
as you touched upon a little bit earlier
we want more amazing
allied health businesses and practices out there
doing exactly what Kezia
and the Staying Independent team are doing
and with that feel free to connect with us
connect with Kezia
we’ll have all the links to socials and websites
in the show notes
and very much stay connected Kezia
thank you very much
for joining us and sharing your message
Thanks Craig!
catch you later everybody
yeah bye