How to Build Your Agency Culture So You Can Travel the World

This week we’re re-sharing one of our favorite episodes: a discussion with Marama Carmichael on how to create a business you love. Happy holidays, listeners!

Marama owns Oracle Tree, a digital agency in Australia. She has decades of business experience and has spent extensive time mentoring, including for UGURUS. Her recent best-selling book, Fixing Frankenstein, is available now.

In this episode, we discuss how she’s built a successful agency that fits HER lifestyle.

Highlights from Marama Carmichel’s episode:

• How watching her home burn down spurred Marama to rebuild her life the way she wanted
• What drove her to start her all-virtual agency, including team members and freelancers in Europe, India, the Philippines, and Australia
• How to grow a team culture when you all work remotely
• The secret to building connections with virtual workers (Hint: not everything needs to be work-related)
• The “redundant” practice Marama credits with giving her company stability and flexibility
• Why you don’t need a cool workspace, a foosball table, or beer in the fridge to be a “legitimate” agency

Lightening round with Marama Carmichael:

• Best advice: You can do anything you put your mind to
• Best personal habit that contributes to success: Tenacity, and openness to intuition and feedback
• Online tool or resource: Teamwork and Google apps
• Book recommendation: Drive by Daniel Pink

Resources, plus connect with Marama Carmichael’s:

• Oracle Tree
• Marama’s updated email is [email protected]

Quotes from Marama Carmichael’s episode –

• “I’m a mentor by nature.”
• “It’s profitable, it’s remote, it’s virtual and that’s so I can travel like I want to.”
• “Basically it’s getting the right people in the right seats and then getting out of the way.”
• “Your first or next hire doesn’t need to be a 40-hour-a-week person… …you don’t have to wait to start bringing in help.”
• “You’re almost working on a 24-hour cycle without anyone working outside of normal business hours.”
• “Oftentimes, entrepreneurs are control freaks.”
• “Business support your life or life support your business?”
• “What life do you want? What lifestyle do you want?”

Takeaways from Marama Carmichael’s episode –

• Spend an hour with a blank sheet of paper: what do you want out of your business?
• Now, work backward: how do you get there?

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