#awinewith Catherine Ashton: death admin, end-of-life planning and the platform that makes it simple
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Closing a loved one's estate means dealing with 50 to 100 organisations and around 200 hours of admin, while you're grieving. Catherine Ashton learned that the hard way when her friend died in 2023 and she spent six weeks helping his children navigate the mess. The Excel spreadsheet she started that week became Critical Info, a social enterprise helping people get their information in order before life demands it. This episode covers the platform, her Don't Be Caught Dead podcast, and how she runs it all while managing chronic pain, with more colour and laughter than you'd ever expect from the topic.
Why does nobody know what to do when someone dies?
When Catherine's friend Roland died, she and his adult children started from zero: no idea where his car keys were, whether he had a will, or how to wind up his decorative painting business, the tax returns, the registrations, all of it. "It is so overwhelming to do these things when you don't have a map, and you're trying to grieve." The numbers are staggering: closing an estate means dealing with roughly 50 to 100 organisations and an estimated 200 hours of admin. And as she points out, death is the one thing every single one of us is guaranteed to experience, and yet we don't prepare for it.
How does the Critical Info platform work?
Ten minutes a day for 15 days. Each day you answer a set of questions, and by the end you know exactly what you have, what you don't, and what you still need to gather, from who you'd trust to enter your home if you're in hospital, to who feeds the pet. You nominate two key contacts and choose when they see your information: now, if you're hospitalised, or when you die. Then the platform connects you with organisations across Australia to get the missing documents done. And woven through it are storytelling prompts, little gold nuggets like "what was the first job you did for pocket money?", because research shows reminiscence eases grief. Catherine did it with her 86-year-old mum, who recorded her answers in her own voice: "For my son and all of her grandchildren to have access to her telling her stories, in her own voice, is kind of priceless."
How do you build a business around a taboo?
With humour, honesty, and relentless listening. Her podcast is called Don't Be Caught Dead ("you should approach the conversation of death the way you approach the conversation about life"). The product was built through surveys, expert interviews and multiple focus groups, with her ego deliberately left at the door: "I am not the expert." When a focus group participant said she wouldn't know what to do if a loved one died tomorrow, Catherine built the When Someone Dies guide, a prioritised checklist covering the first hours, days, weeks and months, now segmented into self-care, decisions and tasks, with QR-linked resources and curated podcast episodes, available in print via Amazon. Pilots followed: a national program with end-of-life doulas (with lifetime subscriptions sponsored for clients with life-limiting diagnoses), and a partnership with Melville Cares in WA reaching 2,000 aged-care clients, both measured against the international Death Literacy Index and Coping with Death Scale, so the impact is provable, not just felt.
How do you run a business while managing chronic pain?
Catherine's route into business wasn't chosen: a rear-end collision on the Monash in 2019 led to spinal surgery and chronic pain, ending a 13-year events career at the Royal Botanic Gardens Victoria. Because her health has to come first, she built a business that doesn't need her physically present: a SaaS platform, a digital guide, a podcast. "If I'm feeling like a nap after this interview, I can." The system around it: deep water running, a monthly magnesium float (where her best ideas arrive), guarded time with girlfriends, a developer she spent a year in conversation with before building, a podcast editor from day one, and programming everything three months ahead, a habit from her Gardens days. Fridays are blocked, guilt-free: "For me to function on the level I need to, that just has to happen."
Catherine's one piece of advice for women in business
"Automate as much as you possibly can. Whether that's through ChatGPT, whether it's through Calendly, whether it's through delegation. Automate as much as possible, so you free yourself up to do what you really need to do, the important work."
Meet Catherine Ashton, Founder of Critical Info
Catherine Ashton is the founder and CEO of Critical Info, a social enterprise helping people get their critical information in order for life's emergencies and endings, through its 15-day platform, the When Someone Dies guide, and the Don't Be Caught Dead podcast. A former major events producer at the Royal Botanic Gardens Victoria and a member of the Good Death Impact Network, she's on a mission to make one of life's only certainties something families can navigate with a map, and maybe even a laugh.
You can find her here:
Full transcript
Danielle: Amazing! Catherine, welcome to Spark TV!
Catherine: Thanks so much for having me, Dani!
Danielle: I am so excited to have you here and share your story. Let's start out by telling everyone who you are and what you do.
Catherine: My name's Catherine Ashton, and I'm the founder and CEO of a social enterprise called Critical Info.
Danielle: Critical Info now. What the heck does Critical Info do? Tell us.
Catherine: Well, as the name implies, we help people get their information together, so when a critical incident or an accident happens, or when someone dies, it's all in place, and other people know about it, so they're not left with a mess like we were when our friend died in 2023.
Danielle: Oh, wow. It's interesting when businesses are born from necessity, and sometimes tragedy and horrible things happening. But it's interesting that you've taken something that was potentially quite horrible to go through, and turned it into something that's so empowering for other people.
Catherine: Look, it was a gap that I discovered that I didn't realise existed, and I was in a situation where I could turn it into a business. I had been happily working at the Royal Botanic Gardens in Victoria for 13 years, managing major events as part of their programming team, and I thought I would be doing that forever, and most people in that job do. But I was on my way to work in 2019, on the Monash, and if anyone knows it, it can be a car park, and the person behind me didn't realise it was a car park and hit me from behind. That ended up with me developing chronic pain after I had spinal surgery from that accident. So there I was, in my early 40s, only qualified for events or conservation and land management, thinking, what the hell am I going to do now? I have to manage my chronic pain, and the options aren't that spectacular when you look at the workforce for managing a condition and returning to part-time work. I was really in a situation where I didn't know what I was going to do.
But in hindsight, it was fortunate, because when our friend Roland died in February of 2023, it meant that I could actually spend six weeks with his two adult children, who had to travel from overseas, they live in the States, going through everything they needed to do to settle his estate. And I just couldn't believe that there wasn't something I could hand over to them and say, here, this is what we need to do. So, being the good producer I was, I started an Excel spreadsheet. And that Excel spreadsheet has now turned into the Critical Info platform, to help others.
Danielle: I just think this is so fabulous. So, I turned old this year, and that has meant I've suddenly thought, I need to do all my adult things. I've got the will, I've got my little folder. But when you said "all of the critical info", I think about, firstly, if my husband passed away, or if I passed away and left my husband with my mess of a life, how difficult it would be. All of these things that we don't get taught how to do. Where's the checklist? And that's problem number one. Problem number two is, I know how unorganised I am, logins here and there, bank accounts, businesses, all of those things. I always think, if you really love the people around you, perhaps being a little organised is a nice way to show them that you love them.
Catherine: I think that is so true. And for me, I didn't realise that people weren't doing this, or didn't know how to do this. Because I'm the youngest of four children, I've had a will since I was 18. I was the only one in my family that didn't join the armed forces, and my father worked as a clerk in the coroner's court, so we always had very open conversations about death, dying, our wishes. There was never any confusion in the family I was raised in. So when we faced this situation when our friend died, and we didn't know where his car keys were, we didn't even know if his car was parked downstairs in the apartment block, we had to start at basics. We didn't know if he had a will. And then obviously having to navigate his children through it, it's such a difficult thing to do. And as you just said, Dani, it's one thing to have your personal life, but most of your audience will have a business life as well, as our friend did. He ran a decorative painting company, so we also had to go through and lodge tax returns for his business, close down all of his registrations. Thankfully he didn't have any staff. But it is so overwhelming to do these things when you don't have a map, and you don't have any idea where to begin, and you're trying to grieve.
Danielle: Yeah, and it's the things you don't even think of. It's interesting, I made the probably sweeping comment about my businesses and the mess I'd leave someone, but I reflect on a friend of mine who also passed away a couple of years ago. I didn't have to look after the estate, his sister did, and that was one of the big things she came to me with. She said, he has clients, and we don't know the password for their Shopify account, or something like that. Do you have any idea where we would even start? The impact of a death is so widespread, and you're right, the only thing you want to be doing at that time is grieving.
Catherine: And it's so true that, like, you and I are just having a conversation now, and we're both recalling stories of people who have had similar experiences. When I started seeing whether there was a need for something like the Critical Info platform in the market, I started speaking to people who had been in the industry, asking them their thoughts. And what I found is that everyone has a personal story about how they've been impacted. Death is a universal thing. It's the only thing we're all guaranteed to experience at some stage of life. And yet, we don't prepare for it.
Danielle: Isn't it bizarre? It's a topic people have a really hard time talking about. It's interesting, even as I go through this experience, as I was preparing my will, I started talking to my mum and dad about theirs. I'm like, come to think of it, I don't even know where your will is. Do you have one? And they're like, oh yeah, we have a will, it's there, you're in it, and you and your two siblings are the executors, so you can battle it out. And I was like, firstly, that's a terrible decision. But I'm glad this opened up a forum for us to talk about what your plans are, because our family is very much, we don't talk about anything, everything is swept under the rug. But I love that you said death is a universal thing. It's something we will all experience, and we are just so uncomfortable talking about it.
Catherine: And it's really strange, because the more you talk about it, the more you realise that, A, it impacts every aspect of your life, but also, when you talk about it, it actually gives you very strong clarity on what you value, what's important to you, and where you want to spend your time. That was something I had the opportunity to speak to Kate Christie about, she's a time management expert, on the Don't Be Caught Dead podcast that I run.
Danielle: Sidebar: that's the best name ever for a podcast. Oh my god, that's incredible. I interrupted you, but that was too good.
Catherine: No, that's fine. And look, that's the reason why. You should be approaching the conversation of death the way in which you approach the conversation about life: with a sense of humour and openness and honesty. That's why I called it Don't Be Caught Dead. Because, A, you shouldn't be caught dead, that's a bad position to be in. But if you are, and we are all going to be there, just be prepared and have the conversation beforehand. It was all of these people coming up to me at events, or when I was reaching out saying, hey, do you think this is useful?, everyone had a personal story. So that's how the podcast came about last year. It was a way to initiate those conversations in a really safe environment. People can listen to experts within the industry, learn about things like water cremation, which is now a thing in Australia.
Danielle: Water cremation?
Catherine: So, most people, when they think about cremation, think of the standard flame cremation. The actual term for water cremation is alkaline hydrolysis. It's a process where you dissolve the body over a period of time in a solution of water, effectively.
Danielle: Wow, that's fascinating.
Catherine: Yeah, see? This is the beauty of being in this space: there are all of these amazing things you can learn about and talk about. And just because we're talking about it doesn't mean it's going to bring it on, or be a curse or anything like that. But I see on a daily basis the impact that happens when families haven't spoken about it, the problems with grieving, and the conflict, it's just devastating. However you do it, it's just making sure people have that conversation.
Danielle: Yeah, I think that's incredible. And I love that it starts with the conversation. This is a long road of things to get prepared and talk about and decide, so if you simplify it down to "let's just start the conversation", that's the catalyst for making everything easier along the way.
Catherine: That's so true. And I love the example you gave, Dani, about just asking your parents whether they had a will. That's a really basic level to start, because then you know what you're dealing with. And the fact that you were an executor in a legal document and you didn't know about it…
Danielle: It's mum and dad!
Catherine: There probably should have been a conversation about consent before that one! But it's a classic example. And I think there's a level of assumed responsibility that comes with these things. If you look statistically, the majority of the population across Australia will have some sort of caring responsibility for a friend or family member, someone near and dear to us, at some stage in our life. So we have to develop the skills to have these conversations, regardless of how difficult they are.
Danielle: Yeah. Actually, it's funny you say that. When I got my will done, my lawyer said, if you're unable to look after yourself, there's another document that your will doesn't cover. I haven't done that step yet! You've just reminded me.
Catherine: So the document they're referring to depends on what state you're in. Because, the joys, everyone, if you're not aware: the laws in every state of Australia are completely different. So to navigate this space, you not only have to do the work, you have to work out what state you're in and what law applies, which is just an added layer of fun. The document they're referring to is an advance care directive or advance care plan, and some people may know it as a power of attorney or medical power of attorney. It's actually appointing a decision-maker to make your decisions when you can't.
Danielle: I'm just glad we're having this conversation. Isn't it funny, just talking about things makes you aware of what's still on your list. So then, tell me, because I guarantee 90% of the people listening right now are going, oh dear, there's a few things on the list I might not have done yet. Talk to me about the platform. How does it make our life easier?
Catherine: So, I've just mentioned that all of our life stages are different, and all of the laws in Australia are different depending on your state. So I developed a system that meets you where you're at. It's very simple: 10 minutes a day, and at the end of the 15 days, you have a series of questions that you've answered each day. What that does is give you a clear indication of what you do know, what you don't know, and what you still need to gather. But most importantly, as part of that process, you've also gone through thinking: who is the person I'd feel comfortable to enter my home if I'm in hospital? Or, if I have a pet, who can step in and feed them and take care of them? Because I'm the classic example: I was on my way to work, I got hit by a car, I ended up in hospital. It can happen at any point in time. And I think that's the thing some people forget. They think, oh, it won't happen to me, I'm not old enough, I haven't hit that milestone age where I need to be adult enough and get my paperwork in place, like you just said, Dani!
Danielle: Oh my god!
Catherine: So, at the end of the 15 days, you have nominated two key contacts that you will share your information with, and you can nominate to share it straight away, or when you're in hospital, or when you die. And then you have your to-do list of the documents you still need to collect, so in your case, your advance care directive, and we connect you with organisations across Australia who can help you get those documents done.
Danielle: Oh my god, this is so good. You've taken a topic that's difficult for some people to talk about, and definitely a bit complicated, and made it really simple, and not confronting, and manageable. Which I just think is incredible.
Catherine: Well, if anyone is watching the YouTube version, you can see I'm hardly a colourless, morbid-looking person. I'm wearing a bright orange sparkly top! People always say to me, how can you deal with death on a daily basis? But the thing is, it's never, ever about death. It is everything that happens beforehand, and everything that happens after, that we actually have to deal with. Very rarely is it about the death itself. And we can really make a difference to the impact that experience has if you do the preparation beforehand and have the conversations beforehand. That can make a massive difference to what comes after when someone does die. It means your family and your loved ones can just grieve freely, and can feel like they're honouring your wishes, because they have some way to navigate it.
Danielle: Yeah. And that's probably been the biggest eye-opener for me: what do I want my loved ones to experience when I'm gone? I make the joke that my affairs are a mess, but that's what you'd be leaving people if you don't take steps to make things easy and accessible, with the right documentation. It is really an act of love to the people you claim to love.
Catherine: It truly is. Although, I will say, we did a focus group before we launched the platform in April this year, the third focus group in the development process, through the Carers Australia network. And the people who went through that focus group felt there was pre-emptive grief. The thought of their funeral, the thought of leaving their loved ones, did impact how they were feeling. So what we did is increase the amount of reminiscence in the platform, because research tells us that storytelling actually alleviates and helps with feelings of grief and depression. So we've included a little gold nugget of storytelling each day. It might be: what's the first job you did for pocket money as a kid?
Danielle: Oh, cool! And oh my god, I'm answering the question as you're asking it. I did a paper run, and I can guarantee you, if my mum and dad read that, because I made my dad do it at 5am when I didn't want to get up, they would just love to read that. This is incredible!
Catherine: And look, it was so much fun. I did it with my mum. My mum's 86, and I've got a son who's 21, and my husband as well, they've all been guinea pigs in this development process. With my mum, she lives 3 hours away, so we did it in a block session. On the first day we did all the logistical, practical questions. On the second day we did day 15, which is your funeral questions, but also all the storytelling. And she wouldn't let me video her, but she allowed me to audio record her voice. So for us as a family, to know that my son, and all of her grandchildren, have access to her telling her stories, in her own voice, is kind of priceless. It's a sad thing that we don't do often enough: we don't capture the beauty of our own stories and celebrate them. While everyone thinks it might be boring, there are some really beautiful things that have come out of it.
Danielle: Yeah, I love that you said that. There's a woman in the Spark community who does life biographies, often of the average Joes among us, and that's literally the thing. People go, I've got nothing to say, no stories to tell. But when they open up and share these things they think are boring, the people around them go, oh my god, I didn't know you went through that! I love the idea that we can document our stories and share them with the people around us.
Catherine: It comes from one of those things, and I'm sure there are people listening who have attended a funeral and never knew a certain fact or fascinating story about someone until they were sitting at their funeral. Like, oh my god, I didn't know they were a union rep! Because we don't take the time to ask those questions. We sometimes just see a bit of a caricature of who that person is in our life. To actually really spend the time is quite a privilege.
Danielle: Wow, I absolutely love it. I just think this is such an incredible product, so congratulations, and so necessary for literally everyone on the planet.
Catherine: Thank you, Dani. But it hasn't all been easy, and I'm sure we're about to go there.
Danielle: Yes, absolutely. So, building an online platform, how's that been for you? Any challenges along the way?
Catherine: No, not at all. I'm living the dream!
Danielle: Oh my god. Disclose all, tell me what's been happening.
Catherine: Oh, look, it's one of those things where, to start, it's such a rollercoaster, as you're well aware. And when you're doing it yourself, and the platform only launched in April, we're only coming towards the end of the year now, it's still very, very early days. But what I've tried to do is always take my ego out of what we're doing. When I first started with that Excel spreadsheet, I went to people who were experts within the industry, who had been in this space for a long time, asking for their thoughts. Because I am not the expert. And what I found during that process is you start identifying the gaps you can fill. Through the conversations I was having, the surveys I was doing with the public, that formulated the way I could build and fill the gaps people said they needed.
In one of the focus groups, one of the women said to me: look, I wouldn't know what to do if a loved one died tomorrow. And here I was, working on a platform for planning, not for dealing with the after-effects. So what I did is developed a guide that takes you through a prioritised checklist of what you need to do immediately after someone dies, covering the decisions you need to make in the first hours, days, weeks and months. Because the joy is, you're dealing with around 50 to 100 different organisations when you're closing someone's accounts, and they estimate it's around 200 hours to close someone's estate.
Danielle: Wow.
Catherine: So to have a guide that tells you what you can do in the first 24 hours, and what you can delegate to someone else, or leave a few days, is really important, because it's so overwhelming when you're faced with that while trying to grieve and get over the shock and trauma of a loved one who's just died. That was a product we developed last year, and people have been able to give feedback on it over the last 12 months. Again, listening to the audience, we've just released a modified version: the printed version now has QR codes that link to all of the active links in the guide, because we found older audiences wanted something printed they could make notes in. The checklist can seem quite overwhelming, so we segmented it into what's self-care, what's a decision, and what's a task. And because we were redeveloping it just before being published and distributed on Amazon in October, we made sure there's a curated list of Don't Be Caught Dead podcast episodes to support people through the process, talking about funerals, ritual, memorial, to help them make the decisions they may need to make in those first days after someone dies. That's an example of how we're constantly testing with our audience, hearing their feedback, and producing the services and products they're asking for.
Danielle: Yeah. And it's really interesting to me, because you say it so nonchalantly: you've spoken to your audience, you've got feedback, you've interviewed industry experts, you've done focus groups. So many people start and grow a business based on their own experiences, and then wonder why things don't land. They think the first thing they put out needs to be perfect and never change, and it's so far from the truth. You are literally the epitome of best practice in creating a product: doing the research first, and then, once you've put it out, adapting. Getting feedback from your customers and changing it so it serves them best. So many people miss that because they're worried about getting it wrong, so they don't ask the questions. If you can hear the feedback and take it not as "you're wrong" but as "this is how you co-create something that really serves our need", your products and your business will go so much further.
Catherine: It will, but we're not quite at that stage yet, because we still have that challenge of being young.
Danielle: Well, it's never-ending, right?
Catherine: Yeah. And in a taboo topic that's not openly discussed, with cultural layers on top as well, it's super challenging. And it's that classic thing of being first to market, doing something no one's done before, trying to find that product-market fit. That's the stage we're at now, and that involves a lot of testing and messaging. I've just decided I'm actually going to be launching a crowdfunding campaign in the new year. It's just constantly hustling. But not without significant success. We've managed to speak to amazing experts, that has opened up wonderful doors, and people have been extremely supportive, including large organisations. An example: we've just finished a national pilot program where end-of-life doulas trialled the platform with their clients who have a life-limiting illness diagnosis. We worked with them on how to use the platform and what we needed to tweak, and developed resources to support them. And that was supported by an organisation called Sustainable Funerals Group, who sponsored lifetime subscriptions for those clients who had been diagnosed, so they could get their affairs in order, which is amazing.
And there's a very brave aged care organisation in Western Australia who heard about the work we were doing through Palliative Care Australia, in an interview I'd done with Camilla Rowland, the CEO there. Maria Davison at Melville Cares in Western Australia contacted me in August of last year and said, look, I love what you're doing, we want to offer it to our 2,000 clients in WA. So we've just completed a pilot program with their volunteers, who are now all trained up on the platform, and we're heading over there in February to support and raise awareness of the pilot program we're running with them. Hopefully that becomes a model we can take across Australia. And we're a member of the Good Death Impact Network. Yes, there is such a thing!
Danielle: This is the first I'm hearing about it!
Catherine: It's a group of people with similar values and goals who've gathered to accelerate what we can do as a collective and support each other in collaboration, experts across end-of-life planning, death care and bereavement. Through that, we received funding to test both of these pilot programs against the Death Literacy Index and the Coping with Death Scale, which are internationally recognised. So we can clearly show organisations that the work we're doing makes a difference: people not only complete the platform, they've actually gone on to act and do their to-do lists.
Danielle: Wow. And it sounds like growth so far has really been a result of collaboration, building relationships, doing those expert interviews, getting feedback, which triggers word of mouth, because you're doing something so incredible, and you're a first mover.
Catherine: And I think that comes from working at the Botanic Gardens for 13 years, where we had no budget. We had to do programming purely based on collaboration and partnership, bringing multiple stakeholders together for a combined goal. That's always been how I've worked. And by doing that, you develop a better service, because you're providing people with direct access to the support they need. That's our role. The platform, we're not the expert. The guide, we're not the expert. The podcast, we're not the expert. But what we've done is make it bite-sized, easy to understand, and given people a map so they can navigate it. Because that's what I found the most challenging: even me, having worked for a state government organisation for 13 years, I could not navigate death when our friend died. And I just thought, how the hell can anyone else?
Danielle: Exactly. It is such a wild idea that something so universal is so complicated, and so out of reach, at a time when that's not what you want to be thinking about. So then, talk to me about you. You mentioned the accident, chronic pain, but you've gone from a very impressive career to building a very impressive business. How do you actually manage yourself, looking after you as a business owner while building something so incredible?
Catherine: Well, it's not advisable to have a car accident to do it! But what I would say is that, because I had no choice but to put my health first, when I went into developing systems for my business, the fact that I developed a SaaS platform, and a digital guide, and a podcast, and the website, all of these things don't need me to be physically there to make them happen. So that means if I'm feeling like a nap after this interview, I can. There are days when I need to not be sitting at my computer desk. My thing is walking the dog. I do deep water running a couple of days a week at the pool, to make sure there's no impact on my spine while I keep active. I make sure I have a magnesium float once a month.
Danielle: Oh, I love that.
Catherine: That is my time. Where I go, they give me a little peppermint tea and a little biscuit afterwards. However, it's just as important for me to catch up with my girlfriends. I've got a really close girlfriend, and quite a few girlfriends I carve out time for. And of late, I did my first vision board, so that was exciting.
Danielle: I love that, love a bit of woo-woo in the business chats!
Catherine: I did my first vision board, and some of it came through, so that was pretty weird.
Danielle: See, I told you, it works! It works, people. And I love the idea that you're hyper-aware of what you need, and you've created a business that aligns to that. When you need to take time, you can, and you factor in the things you need to look after yourself. It's another important conversation, because this will air in the new year, but we're talking at the end of the year, and it's about that time when everyone's feeling a little overwhelmed and burnt out. A lot of that is a result of not prioritising you, the human, the business owner.
Catherine: And look, there are days when I'm pretty crap at it as well, and I need to be pulled back into line. But all in all, I do try to make sure I put that focus on me. Another thing I did right from the start: I didn't have the skills to do the development of the platform, so I found someone who did, and they take care of all of that. They were actually with me for a year in conversation before we developed, so it was really important to build that relationship before we went to technology development. And the other thing is, I've never edited my own podcast. I don't know about you, Dani, do you do yours?
Danielle: No, I don't. I don't want to hear my voice!
Catherine: So, there were skills I knew straight away I didn't have, that other people were better at, and I just made sure I delegated those.
Danielle: Yeah, and I think that's such a good thing to put a pin in, because, overachieving business owners that we are, oftentimes we think, I should be the best at everything. And it's like, no, do your thing. I talk about this in Spark: $1,000 tasks versus $1 tasks. There are things you add value to as a business owner. In my business, I'm the only person who can be here interviewing you, but I add zero value to editing it, zero value to chopping it up for social posts. I consider those $1 tasks, because anyone can do them, and this is a $1,000 task, because I'm the only one who can do it. That delineation, knowing what I need to do and add the most value to, and what I add no value to, was huge in making sure I wasn't the bottleneck in the business.
Catherine: Yeah. And sometimes that can be perceived… like, I'll go to a networking event or a conference and people go, oh my god, you're so busy! And I'm like, it may appear that I am so busy, but I have a good podcast editor who creates amazing content for me. And at the moment I have my 21-year-old son doing my social media, because my normal VA is on maternity leave. It comes back to appearances: what you see on social media is an illusion. It's great that I appear super active, fantastic. But the reality is I'm just investing my time where I want, like you said, the $1 versus $1,000 tasks. For me, turning up to a conference or a networking event is where my time and energy is. Managing my social media is not, unless it's a content-making day, such as today, because I'm wearing makeup and looking pretty! You've just got to block your time accordingly. And the other thing people are always amazed about, and this is a real hangover from the programming days at the Gardens: I block and program three months in advance. Looking at what days I want to commemorate, what days I want to see Critical Info supporting, or me, Catherine Ashton, supporting on my social media, using an Excel spreadsheet to map all of that out, then mapping our podcast guests and what they're talking about in relation to that, and mapping what conferences are going on that you can leverage. Instead of being responsive, you spend the time to do that pre-planning, and it makes a world of difference.
Danielle: Yeah, it really does. And from a mental load point of view: if I've done the thinking on a day when I'm well, then on a week like this one, where I've been a bit sniffly and I don't have a brain, things are in my calendar, so I'm showing up and doing them, but I don't have any creative drive. Because I've done the pre-planning, I don't have to. The value of mapping things out, scheduling in advance, time blocking and batching, is a godsend as a business owner when things get out of your control, like getting sick, or something unexpected coming up. The power is in the planning.
Catherine: Yeah. And even small things, like using Calendly so you're not managing your own diary. I also block out every Friday. That's a no-go day for anyone, that's my catch-up day. Having those things without any guilt. I've never had any guilt associated with any of that, because for me to function on the level that I need to, that just has to happen. That's survival.
Danielle: Totally. And I love that you've put those boundaries in place. Those things are a form of self-care for us business owners, because if we can save ourselves time and sanity, we have space for creative thought, innovative ideas, making our business better, growing bigger, making a bigger impact. That's where the magic is.
Catherine: Yeah. And when you're not doing that… I know there's research that when you're not thinking about your business, not actively working in it, it allows your brain to go to that creative thinking side, and that's when the magic happens. Those shower moments. Or, for me, lying in the flotation tank going, oh my god, that's it!
Danielle: That's so good. This is literally the second conversation I've had in the last couple of weeks about float tanks, and now I'm like, okay, that's it, I've got to get into one, because I need the inspiration! Oh my god, I love it. I could talk to you all day, but I'd better wrap up. I always love to finish these podcasts on one last piece of advice. So, reflecting on your time in business, what would be a piece of advice that you would give to another woman on her business journey?
Catherine: Automate as much as you possibly can.
Danielle: Such a good lesson.
Catherine: Whether that's through ChatGPT, whether it's through Calendly, whether it's through delegation. Automate as much as possible, so you free yourself up to do what you really need to do, the important work.
Danielle: Ugh, I love it. Catherine, you are the best. Thank you so much for being here and sharing your story and your wisdom with the Spark community. That was absolutely incredible.
Catherine: Thank you so much, Dani.
