Q&A: How One Serial Entrepreneur
Escaped "Crippling Self-Employment"
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Audio Title: 8 questions with tamryn dicks on escaping crippling self-employment
Description: In 2007, at just 25 years old, Tamryn Dicks opened the doors to what would become Pharsyde Accounting, convinced that being her own boss would mean more freedom, more income, and less stress.
In 2007, at just 25 years old, Tamryn Dicks opened the doors of Pharsyde Accounting, convinced that being her own boss would mean more freedom, more income, and less stress.
What followed was something very different: years of overwork, perfectionism, repeated burnout cycles, and the sobering realisation that she had “crippling self-employment”.
In this conversation, Tamryn reflects on the hard lessons, identity shifts, and structural changes that transformed her from an overwhelmed practitioner into a systems-driven, multi-business owner determined to help others build companies that don’t consume their lives.
Note: These answers are the direct words of the interviewee. Answers may be shortened by the editor for effect.
Tamryn Dicks
Time to just, BREATHE. That’s all you need| I help you create time to rest AND make more money at the same time. | Business advisor and mentor at Pharsyde
Question 1
You started Pharsyde Accounting in 2007. And you stated you thought running a business would be a lot easier. What did you think running a business meant?
I think most people do this; I think it’s this idea that being your own boss will come with a higher income and more freedom.
When you’re sitting in an office as an employee, you see your boss arriving later, leaving earlier, walking into meetings, and often appearing relatively “unstressed” while you’re buried in workload.
And we look at these things, and we know that they’re being paid more than us.
From an employee’s perspective, you can start to feel like you’re being used somehow. Looking back now, 25 years later, I realise that when you’re young, you see things very differently. The realisation that if I’m earning my living, I need to earn it; you work for your pay. So it is expected of you to work for that remuneration.
But because we only see our bosses dipping in and out or attending meetings, we assume their lives are better than ours. What we don’t see is everything happening behind the scenes.
So many professionals think, “I’ll do this for myself. I’m tired of answering to a boss. Managing clients is stressful.
And then you don't realise that when you do it for yourself, you are still answering to hundreds of clients, they become the boss. But now you're responsible for all the things that your boss is responsible for - and there's a lot more of it than you realise.
– Martin Kuscus
And then you don’t realise that when you do it for yourself, you are still answering to hundreds of clients, they become the boss.
But now you’re responsible for all the things that your boss is responsible for – and there’s a lot more of it than you realise.
Question 2
What would you say your biggest mistakes were early on in business?
That’s a good question.
The biggest one is one I can only see with retrospect, which is undervaluing myself.
I was so desperate to build a business and so nervous about being too expensive.
I was only 25 and felt inexperienced compared to others in the industry.
So when I was competing against more established firms, I didn’t feel confident enough to charge higher fees, even though I was actually very good at what I was offering at the time, which was bookkeeping.
And I should have backed myself more. I should have focused on the outcome I was delivering to business owners, not just the hours I was working or the years of experience I had. I only thought in terms of time and experience. Instead of the result that I could provide to them.
So definitely undercharging and underselling myself and underestimating my value. That was one of the biggest mistakes initially.
And I’d say the next one was trying to do everything myself. Trying to be Wonder Woman.
I wanted to do the client delivery. I wanted to be a successful business owner. I wanted to also be a good wife and friend and daughter.
And I didn’t give myself any breathing space. I had to be perfect in everything. And I think that is a big mistake that business owners make as well.
They try to carry everything instead of accepting that you’re only good at something. So some things you have to hand over. Some things you need to manage
Question 3
Do you find delegating work difficult?
I did. Yes, I did.
I think the type of person who wants to be their own boss is a highly independent person. That’s what drew you to this in the first place: “I want to do this for myself.” I want to be in control of my life. That’s the personality that was drawn to open a business in the first place.
There are other reasons. I know some people are passionate about what they’re doing. Some people lost their jobs, so they had no choice. But if we’re looking at someone who just chose to be their own boss, they’re going to battle to delegate.
That’s the type of person who’s going to battle to ask for help. The type of person who probably feels they don’t work well with others, nine times out of ten.
I got a part-time bookkeeper to help me with backlogs. He didn’t do it properly, and so it went badly. Then, because it went badly, I was like, “If you want something done properly, you do it yourself.”
That’s the full-back position of a lot of business owners. Delegation does become harder and harder because every time you delegate, it goes wrong. Because we haven’t delegated correctly.
Question 4
Do you think that not delegating properly (so delegating to the wrong people, under-qualified people, the cheapest people out there) do you think that is connected to burnout in the end?
Oh yes, absolutely.
Burnout [can be caused by] an excessive amount of responsibility. That workload is part of responsibility, but obviously, there are other demands on your time. There’s that feeling of being responsible for something.
These things are mounting with more and more responsibilities. That combines with limited resources.
A resource could be money. It could be people. It can be time.
In most business cases, it’s time because we only have a fine item out of time that we’ve got to put everything into, so you do keep running out of that time.
If you’re still building the business, you’re running out of time, and you don’t have enough money to make a plan around that. Those start to work together as well.
Now you’ve got too much responsibility. You have too few resources to meet those responsibilities. Then that combines with the third element, which is chronic stress.
There is a lot of stress involved in building a business, and you’re not going to get away from it. Anyone who tells you that you can build a business without any stress is lying. There is stress involved in building a business, but that stress can be of a healthy level.
It doesn’t have to be chronic. If you’ve got chronic stress, then you’re mixing it with high responsibilities, and you’re mixing that with the resources you are going to burn out.
Of course, not delegating properly is causing you two problems, because one of the resources is people.
If you’re delegating to the wrong person, and this is actually the more common reason that delegation goes wrong, is you’re not giving the proper instructions. You’re assuming that they know what to do, or you’re assuming that they know how you want it done. That’s going to go wrong.
Of course, it’s bad resources in not having those people, but it’s also going to affect your time, because there’s time involved in finding someone, appointing them, giving them the work, and then, of course, discovering that they did it wrong and having to redo it, or praying, or that sort of frustration that kicks in. And then the money is affected as well, because you would have paid someone to do this job, and then you’d be frustrated because you paid the money. They did it badly, and you ended up doing it yourself.
So it absolutely does contribute to burnout.
Question 5
So at what point did you realise you were building something that wasn’t sustainable in the long term?
Much too late.
Because there is a very long, big list of things to do, whether it’s client delivery, or bringing in a new client, or keeping a current client, and then the actual operations of the business, you’re always busy. You are always, always busy.
So it’s very easy to get lost in that busyness and not look up and not actually question if the busyness is taking you somewhere or if it’s just taken over your life, which is what happened. So mine just took over my life. I never actually gave myself the time, because you have to make the time.
I just kept pushing until I collapsed, but the burnout just got so bad that I couldn’t keep pushing anymore.
And then I had to stop, because I was literally bursting into tears every five minutes. So it's very hard to concentrate on work when you can't see your computer screen because you're crying.
– Martin Kuscus
And then my initial reaction, because by then, as well, one of your symptoms of burnout is the loss of passion, is that people think that a loss of passion causes burnout. It’s very much the other way around. So I lost my passion for what I was doing.
I also had gone into another symptom, which is escapism.
I also started another business with a friend of mine. So I had these two businesses running side by side, which is why the burnout got so bad.
Because I was in that mix of loss of passion and escapism, my first reaction to that burnout was, well, then I’ll sell my own company because I’d lost my interest in it.
I’d lost my passion for it. I didn’t want to do it anymore. It was 10 years old at the time.
I figured it’s got to be worth something, probably enough to keep me going for a year or two when I figure myself out. And then I discovered that 10 years of worth would be nothing, because I had never asked those questions. Where was I going? Is it sustainable? How do I make this into something that lasts? How do I make this into something that doesn’t devour me? Because I’d never asked those questions.
This wasn’t a business. It was actually just crippling self-employment. And it was worthless.
Question 6
So you mentioned a bit about you bursting into tears. So what did burnout look like for you? Is it emotional? Is it physical?
That’s a good question, because I think it shows up quite differently for a lot of people. And that’s something to bear in mind.
Burnout has about 12 different stages and a myriad of symptoms. And I actually went through burnout three times before it hit badly, because it’d go through a cycle and then I’d get a little bit of respite, and it would sort of peel off, but then I’d carry on with my bad habits, and it would start again. And my first set of symptoms for burnout was mood changes.
So even though I’m normally quite a patient person, I would suddenly find myself being easily irritated by stupid things. I am normally quite a positive person, but I would find myself looking on the bad side of things. That was probably the first indication that I ignored.
Then it started affecting sleep. The next area I just ignored was that I was sleeping badly, battling to fall asleep because of my anxieties and my stress at the time. And I sort of wrote that off as being the normal stress of building a business.
So I know there are things to do; this is normal anxiety. So I just ignored it because I thought it was normal. So that was the second thing that started affecting.
And then the third thing it affected, and actually, without my noticing, was physical health. So for many people, it’s things like stomach aches or headaches that start to recur. I didn’t get those.
Instead, my hormonal balance went completely out. I ran out of serotonin. I couldn’t stop crying. I could not control my emotions anymore because my whole body had run out of chemicals, and mine had gone completely out of balance. So I could not actually control the way I was reacting to the things.
Question 7
How did your leadership style change?
I suppose I wasn’t really much of a leader beforehand. I was too independent. I am a terrible introvert – if I were allowed to, I’d never leave my house. So leading others does put me under strain.
So I didn’t do much leadership in the beginning, and I think that was part of the big problem. I tried to give away work or instructions without being interactive. Without being a leader.
I have a very specific outcome that I want for my clients, and I have my way of achieving that outcome. And when I’m not clear and structured in how I communicate that, then give over work to a new hire, then of course they don’t do it that way. Then you get upset because…well, because they can’t read your mind, which is not fair.
They are going to follow the way they were taught by previous experience.
So now I have videos, manuals, and all sorts of things in different formats, because people are different.
So, I think that is the biggest way in which my leadership has changed.
Question 8
If you could speak to the 2007 version of yourself, what would you say?
I think the first thing is that I would encourage her that starting her own business is a good idea. But I would have also encouraged her to charge her value and not do everything alone.
Teagan specialises in Copywriting, Public Relations, Social Media Marketing and Blogging. Teagan uncovers the deeper “why” behind every venture. She believes that every person and project has a unique story, and nothing excites her more than transforming these narratives into compelling content that demands to be shared with the world.
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