By Michelle Lynne

Nobody tells you that starting a business is also a personal development program you didn't exactly sign up for. 😂

Running a business will put a spotlight on the parts of yourself you'd probably rather avoid:

Rejection.
Perfectionism.
Avoidance.
Vulnerability.
Fear of getting it wrong.

And you don't get to outsource those.

But here's the upside: If you're willing to do the work, business ownership can change you.

You become more grounded. More capable. More resilient. More comfortable making decisions without having every answer first.

The business isn't just something you're building.

It's also building you.

But—and this is important—you have to actually be willing to engage with that part of the journey.

Because if the personal growth side of business ownership sounds like something you'd rather avoid entirely...

That might be useful information about whether business ownership is actually the right fit for you.

🎧 I talk about this—and a whole lot more—in this week's episode #244 of Design for the Creative Mind: Do You Actually Want to Own an Interior Design Business?

Full episode #244 available wherever you catch your podcasts.

Do you actually want to OWN an interior design business?

Or do you want to be an interior designer?

Because those are two very different jobs.

If what you really want is to spend your days designing, sourcing, presenting, and installing, working inside an established firm might be exactly what you need.

If you want to build something that's yours, make the decisions, take the risks, and reap the rewards—you can absolutely do that too.

But you also have to be willing to own the sales, the finances, the problems, the technology, the uncertainty… and all the other unglamorous stuff that comes with being the person in charge.

Neither path is better.

The question is: Which one actually fits the life and work you want?

And please—don't choose based on which one sounds better in a caption. 😉

You are allowed to change your mind, too.

In this week's episode of Design for the Creative Mind, we're talking honestly about the difference between being an interior designer and being an interior design business owner—and how to figure out which one you actually want.

🎧 Listen to “Do You Actually Want to Own an Interior Design Business?”, episode #244 wherever you listen to podcasts.

Somewhere along the way, a lot of CEOs decided that being the CEO meant they were supposed to know everything.

Every answer.
Every detail.
Every problem.
Every decision.

And if they didn’t know? Well… maybe they weren’t doing the job right.

But what if the opposite is true?

Michelle and Katie get into the very real pressure principals put on themselves to have all the answers—and how some of that can come from imposter syndrome, from wanting to prove yourself, or simply from feeling like there’s no one else to fall back on.

Because not knowing isn’t weakness.

Trying to muscle your way through everything because you’re afraid to admit you don’t know? That’s a much heavier burden.

Being a principal isn’t about knowing everything. It’s about knowing what you need to know, knowing who can help you figure out the rest, and building a team you trust to bring answers to the table.

🎧 This conversation is part of The Art of Being Principal—a series about the messy, funny, surprisingly human side of running a design firm.

Listen to the latest episode #243 wherever you get your podcasts.

Full episode #243 available where you catch your podcasts.

You can teach skills.

You can teach systems.

You can teach processes.

But you can’t teach someone to care.

When you’re building a team, hiring for the job description is only part of the equation. You need people who are curious, willing to learn, thoughtful with clients, willing to problem-solve, and invested in doing good work.

Because someone who cares but doesn’t know everything yet?

You can teach them.

Someone who has all the right skills but doesn’t give a damn?

That’s a much harder problem to solve.

In this episode of The Art of Being Principal, Michelle Lynne and Katie Decker-Erickson talk about hiring, leadership, delegation, operations, and what it really takes to build a design firm that doesn’t depend on the principal for every decision.

It’s honest, funny, and full of the conversations that happen when two design business owners get together and start pulling apart what actually makes a firm work.

🎧 Listen to the latest episode #243 of The Art of Being Principal series wherever you listen to podcasts.

You’re comparing their highlight reel to your behind-the-scenes.

And babe… those are not remotely equivalent. 😂

You see the gorgeous project photo.

You don’t see:
The client who changed their mind 17 times
The shipment that’s three weeks late
The contractor who disappeared
The project that barely made money
The designer crying in the car afterward

But your brain takes THEIR beautiful finished project and compares it to YOUR entire messy, complicated experience of running a design business.

Of course you feel behind.

The next time you catch yourself thinking, “Why does everyone else have it figured out?” remember: you have no idea what’s happening behind the pretty picture.

Learn from other designers. Be inspired by them. Celebrate their wins.

Just don't use their highlight reel as evidence that you're doing something wrong.

🎙️ We’re talking about comparison, slow seasons, and the reality of running an interior design firm in the latest episode of Tended on Designed for the Creative Mind. Episode #242.

Sometimes “You look like you’re doing so well!” is the hardest compliment to receive.

Because yes… the projects are getting posted.
The brand is moving.
You’re showing up to the events.
You’re smiling and saying, “Thank you!”

But behind the scenes?

The business might feel like it’s being held together with tiny pieces of Scotch tape.

And that doesn’t mean you’re being fake. It means you’re human.

You can be proud of your work and be struggling.

You can be grateful for your business and wonder how you’re going to make it through a difficult season.

You can look successful from the outside while privately questioning everything.

We don't talk about that part of running a design firm nearly enough.

So if things feel harder behind the scenes than they look on Instagram, you're not alone.

And you don't have to blow everything up just because you're going through a hard season.

🎙️ Michelle gets very real about this in the final episode #242 of Tended on Designed for the Creative Mind.

Full episode #242 available wherever you catch your podcasts.

Here’s something I wish more interior designers said out loud:
Sometimes the business is hard.

Sometimes the pipeline is quiet.

Sometimes you wonder what everyone else knows that you don’t.

Sometimes you scroll Instagram and wonder why everyone seems to be booked, thriving, and completely in control while you’re over here trying to hold it all together.

And sometimes… you wonder if you should just burn the whole thing down.

I know because I’ve been there.

What you see from another designer is never the whole story. And a slow season doesn’t automatically mean you’re failing, behind, or doing something wrong.

You are not uniquely behind.

You are running a complex business while also being a whole human being—with a life, relationships, responsibilities, and a mental load that doesn’t disappear just because you have a deadline.

Running an interior design firm is hard.

So if you’re in a hard season right now, take a breath before you make a big decision based on someone else’s highlight reel.

Come back to YOUR numbers. YOUR clients. YOUR pipeline. YOUR business.

You don’t need to catch up to someone else.

You need to keep building yours. ❤️

Hear the full conversation in the final episode of Tended Mini-Series on Designed for the Creative Mind.