The Ultimate Guide to Preventing Entrepreneur Burnout and Thriving with Rai Cornell

Burnout is a constant threat for many entrepreneurs, especially those who feel like they must do everything on their own. In this episode of the Catalytic Leadership Podcast, I sit down with Rai Cornell, a highly successful content marketing agency owner, who shares her journey from working 18-hour days as a solopreneur to building a thriving agency with a fully engaged team.

Rai opens up about her initial resistance to delegating tasks and how that mindset nearly drove her to exhaustion. She explains the pivotal moment that led her to trust others, hire help, and begin building a team that now spans the globe. We also discuss practical steps you can take to avoid burnout, such as delegating before it’s too late, setting rates that reflect your value, and cultivating relationships that fuel, rather than drain, your energy.

If you’ve ever felt overwhelmed by your workload or unsure how to scale your business sustainably, this episode is for you. Join us as Rai shares invaluable lessons on leadership, mental health, and building a business that supports—not depletes—your creativity and life.

Connect with Rai Cornell:
If you’re looking to take control of your freelance career or build a business that supports your life, connect with Rai Cornell. Reach out to her on LinkedIn or email her directly at rairose@cornellcontentmarketing.com to learn how she can help you create a fulfilling, sustainable business.

Books Mentioned:

• The One Thing by Gary Keller and Jay Papasan

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Chapters

• 0:00 Starting the Entrepreneurial Journey with Rai Cornell
• 3:13 Overcoming Adversity and Embracing Freelance
• 4:44 The Catalyst for Leadership Growth
• 9:13 Preventing Entrepreneur Burnout
• 14:46 Building a Global Team
• 18:04 Trusting Your Gut in Business
• 25:34 Continuous Growth and Learning

Transcript

Dr. William Attaway: 0:00

I'm thrilled today to have Rai Hyde-Cornell on the podcast. Rae has been building online businesses for over 15 years, from building her own marketing agency to helping large companies and solopreneurs alike build more profitable, streamlined and joyful businesses. She's on a mission to help people enjoy a higher quality of life while fulfilling their life's purpose. She has built multiple successful businesses of her own, worked in hundreds of businesses through her marketing agency, consulted for diverse companies, including SaaS, subscription and DTC, and she has mentored dozens of freelancers and entrepreneurs. Rai, I'm so glad you're here. Thank you for being on the show.

Rai Cornell: 0:43

Thank you so much for having me. I really appreciate it.

Intro / Outro: 0:48

Welcome to Catalytic Leadership, the podcast designed to help leaders intentionally grow and thrive. Here is your host author and leadership and executive coach, Dr William Attaway.

Dr. William Attaway: 1:09

William Attaway, I would love to start with some of your story. I'd love for you to share a little bit about your journey and your development as a leader. In particular, how did you get started?

Rai Cornell: 1:16

Sure. Well, you know I don't think anybody. Well, I shouldn't say that For me. I didn't plan on being a leader. I never set out to say I'm going to lead a group or lead a team or lead an agency. That was never really my goal.

Rai Cornell: 1:31

But I did always follow the beat of my own drum, so to speak, and I would say that instinct to be very independent started very young. So growing up both of my parents were police officers and I was home alone a lot, so I took care of myself quite a bit, left home at 16, started undergrad at 17, kind of had that entrepreneurial spirit from the very beginning, paid my way through all of my adventures, ended up graduating my undergrad program in three years, went on to get two more master's degrees and then eventually the side hustle that I was doing to pay my way through school and life and a move from California to Texas, and everything ended up being what I really fell in love with unexpectedly. Being what I really fell in love with unexpectedly. And so that led me to grow my freelance writing business into a full service content marketing agency and it's just kind of taken off. The more I throw myself into the things that I'm really passionate about the more it grows organically, that's remarkable, you know.

Rai Cornell: 2:41

I bet, if you were to go back and talk to yourself back during those undergrad days, you would never have imagined that you would be where you are today college days, and so thinking this far ahead, and me being in the marketing industry and working with large companies, was completely unfathomable, especially when I was just thinking about how to get through the week.

Dr. William Attaway: 3:13

So yeah, so. So what? What really got you started thinking beyond just the traditional W2 job, moving into the entrepreneurial world? What was that catalyst?

Rai Cornell: 3:28

It was really out of necessity. Growing up, I came from a bit of a rough household. My mother was a gangs detective and she was a very violent woman, and so part of why I left home early was because of just the very violent and aggressive environment that she created. And so I was always in the mentality of I need to survive, I need to survive, I need to survive. And when I was young, I would work any job that I could possibly get. My dad was a police officer and he had a tree trimming business on the side, so I would work for job that I could possibly get. My dad was a police officer and he had a tree trimming business on the side, so I would work for his tree trimming business. I would tutor kids in math. I worked as a soccer referee. I worked as a coffee shop barista. I took any job that I could possibly get my hands on in order to pay my way to escaping the situation that I was in.

Rai Cornell: 4:26

And then in undergrad I ended up developing really bad PTSD after being attacked on campus and I couldn't hold down a job I had at the time. I had seven jobs around campus. I was working as a math grader and a website developer for our university and an events coordinator for the student life department. I had all kinds of jobs around campus and then, after I was attacked, I couldn't function. I couldn't sleep at night, and so in the mornings I couldn't wake up and show up to work on time, show up to class on time, and so I still had to. I still wanted to finish my degree, still wanted to keep a roof over my head. So one thing that I knew I was really good at was words and writing, and so I turned to good old Google and said how to make a living online writing, and that's really what started my freelance business.

Dr. William Attaway: 5:25

Wow. You know I often say there's no such thing as a wasted experience. Even sometimes the most painful and most difficult are part of the story, you know, and that has made you into who you are today, and somebody that a whole lot of people rely on, not just as clients, but your team. What was the transition like for you from that place to a place now where you are leading other people and guiding them as clients or as team members?

Rai Cornell: 5:56

Yeah, the transition was not an intentional one on my part. It was, I think, with all of the things that have been positive in my life. They just kind of happen organically and they just I don't want to say fall into my lap. But it's like the universe just gives you these opportunities that you don't realize they are opportunities at the moment, and then later you look back and you go, wow, like I'm so grateful for that person or that situation. And for me it was, um, I had been freelance writing for oh man, uh, probably about six or seven years, and I was. I was maxed out, I was writing 18 hours a day, I had wicked carpal tunnel, it was probably writing 5,000 to 8,000 words a day. And my husband, who I don't think we were married at the time Now we are, we've been together a very long time, so I don't think we're married then but he said you know, you, you might need to hire a writer and teach them what you do and how you do it, and then you guys can share the work and you pay them. Your clients just pay you. And I was like, oh, there's no way I could ever do that. You know, I think, cause I've always been of the mentality of I can do it on my own. I'm very independent. I was never a group person, it was always a kind of solo outlier person. But I just couldn't go on. I burned out on working so much and so I was like, okay, I'll give it a shot.

Rai Cornell: 7:26

And over the years I found writers who had similar stories to me where they thought their life was going in one direction, but they had this natural creative gift and so they wanted to see if they could make some extra money from it. And I kind of took them under my wing and showed them how I do it and gave them assignments and coached them through how to make sure that you're meeting the client's request. And over time I grew unintentionally into an agency um, of just writers at the time. Now we have designers and website developers and videographers and all the things.

Rai Cornell: 8:05

But, um, really the the leadership role kind of came when the freelance writers on my team started coming to me and asking for advice on how to handle their other clients. And they would say hey, I know you've been in this situation before. How should I handle this contract negotiation, how should I price this project? And it felt so good, because I was at a place where I was no longer paving this path in the brush that had never been tread before. It was more like oh, now there are people with me and, yeah, I might be at the front of the pack, but we're all in this together. We can all learn from each other, and that was really what motivated me to build a really close knit team within my agency, which we now have.

Dr. William Attaway: 8:55

That is. That is an amazing journey and I think a lot of people you know, when they get to that point of burnout where the work just absolutely begins to swamp them and they get overwhelmed, they don't take the path you did. They don't take the path of saying how can I basically duplicate myself and learn to delegate and build a team? They just keep trying to do it all themselves. Do you see that?

Rai Cornell: 9:23

Absolutely, absolutely.

Rai Cornell: 9:24

And you know there are Some people who maybe leading a team or running an agency is not for them, and instead, if you're in that situation and you're facing burnout and you're thinking, man, I just I don't have any more time to give, but yet the work is there.

Rai Cornell: 9:44

Well, that's when you have to make a decision. Either you go the agency route and you start growing your ability to deliver on the volume, or you have to find a way to make sure that your time and your value is protected, but the volume is reduced, and usually that looks like becoming very choosy about the types of businesses that you work with or increasing your rates. So you're pricing yourself out of some jobs, but still making it worth your while for the jobs that do come through. And so I just want to say that I don't think running a team is for everyone. I didn't think it was going to be for me, and now I absolutely love it. So give it a try, see what you actually like. You. You never really know until you're in it, even if you think you know how you would respond to a situation like that.

Dr. William Attaway: 10:36

But yeah, that's a good word. I talk a lot about operating, leading and just executing your day-to-day in a healthy and sustainable pace, and I think this is something that people really struggle with, because there's always so many good things you can be doing, but the good as Jim Collins pointed out to us so many years ago the good so often is the enemy of the great, and I think there's a better way. Healthy and sustainable should always be the center of the bullseye. That's what I hear you describing. Center of the bullseye that's what I hear you describing, and it feels like that's how you lead not just yourself, but your team in executing what you do. Would that be accurate?

Rai Cornell: 11:24

Absolutely. Actually, I was just talking to the designer on my team who she and I are very close. We're very good friends, we talk every day and she's going through what I would consider a growth spurt in her freelance business and we were pricing out a project that we have coming up and she she wanted to increase her rate and she said you know, I'd like this amount, but if that's too much, if it doesn't fit in the budget, you know I'll go down to this. And I said no, no, no. If that's what you need in order to feel like this is worth it, then let me figure out the pricing within the proposal for the client, because I want to make sure that, and I think this is a big reason why many of the freelancers on my team have been with me for years.

Rai Cornell: 12:06

I think the longest one has been with me for almost five years now, and that's pretty unheard of in the agency world. Freelancers usually have a high turnover rate, but for us, I think, because we do all look out for each other's interests you know, my team looks out for the fact that I care an incredible amount about the quality of what we're putting out for our clients and at the same time, I care about their well-being and I know what it's like to burn out as a creative who is making a living out of what you create from your mind. So I try to protect them, particularly within that financial, energetic exchange of creativity for financial stability and it becomes this very healthy, mutually respected relationship.

Dr. William Attaway: 12:57

I love that you see your team members that way. Oh yeah, I couldn't do what I do without them. Right, and yet I'll watch so many people trying to lead the people that work for their company, trying to lead them in a way that treats them like gears in a machine. It's just about what they do, what they contribute, and that's all you really care about, and I think that's such an unhealthy way to lead, and I love that you do this so differently and you're so focused on the people, the individuals.

Rai Cornell: 13:28

Well, we all left the corporate world for that reason in one form or another. And you know, I had I've been an employee very little in my life an official W2 employee, and anytime I was in that situation I did feel like a number. I felt like I was just filling a seat and nobody there really cared about me and who I was and the value that I brought. They just cared that the job was getting done and the boxes were getting checked off and that there was somebody there 8 am to 5 pm. That's all they cared about.

Rai Cornell: 14:03

And so with freelancers, I found and I count myself in that, although I guess you could say I am a W-2 employee of my own now but with freelancers in particular, nothing about that traditional corporate world appeals to us. And so why would I want to recreate that same feeling of, oh, you're just a cog, oh, I need you to do this for as cheap as possible within my own business, when the value of all of us being together is that we really care about what we're doing and we care about each other and that means that the output of what we're able to create for our clients is so much stronger? Well, said.

Dr. William Attaway: 14:43

So you've got two logos on the wall behind you, two different things that you are involved with. I'd love for you to share a little bit about that.

Rai Cornell: 14:51

Sure, yeah, so the Cornell content marketing logo that you are involved with.

Rai Cornell: 14:53

I'd love for you to share a little bit about that.

Rai Cornell: 14:56

Sure, yeah, so the Cornell content marketing logo that you see, that is our full service content marketing agency and that's where I started as a freelancer 17 years ago and since we've grown into this incredible team of international people in the U S Canada, mexico, the UK, philippines, africa, australia, all over, and we do content marketing and organic demand generation strategies for businesses. The Chiron Consulting logo that you see behind me is that passion project of mentoring freelancers, and this is really something that just started organically, like I was saying before, where my team started to come to me asking questions about how to build a healthy, sustainable freelance business, and I enjoyed doing that so much that I separated that out into a completely separate business to where now I mentor freelancers, whether they're on my team or not, and do workshops on how to price yourself, how to manage your time and your energy all the things that a lot of people don't really think about when they decide, hey, I'm going to be a freelance social media manager, a freelance graphic designer, a freelance writer.

Dr. William Attaway: 16:01

That's so good and so intentional. I think one of the things that most of us would have loved to have had early in our careers was somebody doing exactly what you're describing.

Rai Cornell: 16:14

It would have made things a lot easier when I was starting out if I had someone to call up and go. How should I handle this situation?

Dr. William Attaway: 16:26

I love that. You stepped into that, though, and said hey, I want to do and be a conduit of what I've learned and not just be a reservoir and hold it all in just for me, but I want to share it for their benefit.

Rai Cornell: 16:40

Yeah, and this, this self-employed life, is something that I'm very passionate about, not just for me, but for anybody who feels miserable in a traditional employment position, and I wish that people knew how healthy and fulfilling being your own boss can be. You know, a lot of people look at freelance as super risky, but in my eyes, it's riskier to be an employee. They could fire you at any moment. They're your only employer, whereas for me, if I lose one client, I'm okay. I still have a half dozen others.

Rai Cornell: 17:18

And likewise, people think, oh, w-2 employment, that's the only way that I can get health insurance benefits or a retirement plan. That's not true. My husband retired when he hit the 20 year mark at FedEx and has since come to work with me, and now we have our own self-funded 401ks. We have our own health insurance, which is incredible. We actually had an incident a couple of weeks ago where we had to use our health insurance and we were blown away by how much it covered. So you can really have all of the things that you see as positive in the employment world on your own and helping people be self-sufficient in that way, because that also protects their mental health and their quality of life. That's something that I mean, as you can tell, I can't stop talking about and I love that and I think that passion bleeds through.

Dr. William Attaway: 18:09

right, I really do. I think that's something that people listening are leaning in on. I know there are people listening who are not. They haven't yet made that leap Because of fear, because of fear, because of fear. And fear underlies so many things. But overthinking the overwhelm of what could be, what might be, they don't even know. Like, how do you, how do you price yourself, how do you price your service? How do you, how do you market yourself? And they're so overwhelmed by those things. For those folks who are listening, who are in that spot, what would you say to them?

Rai Cornell: 20:16

Trust your gut. You know a lot of people, especially with the pricing question. They go to Google and they type in how much should I charge for a blog post? Or how much should I charge for a logo? If you're a designer, how much should I charge for Facebook social media management? And you're going to see every number imaginable. You'll see people who end up pricing what ends up being $5 an hour on Fiverr and Upwork, and then you're going to see huge agencies that charge $20,000 a month for social media management. You're going to see this immense range. And so what do you do? You have to trust your gut. And so I have a whole workshop on how to price yourself and a whole spreadsheet and a whole system.

Rai Cornell: 20:59

But the quick and dirty version of it is think of a number, any number, and then look at that number and say how does that make me feel? If it makes you feel heavy and slowed down and sluggish, it's not enough. If it makes you feel nervous and out of integrity and like, oh, I don't know if I should be doing this almost maybe a twinge of guilt it's probably too high. If it makes you feel excited and energized and motivated and ready to get started. You've hit the nail on the head. That's the number you should be charging. The financial exchange you get for your creative services should energize you and allow you to do more of it. It shouldn't weigh you down and make you feel vertical. I love that.

Dr. William Attaway: 21:44

I think that's so practical and anybody listening can go do that right now. You balance a lot of different things every day. Yeah, I mean we've we've talked about the two things that you're involved with, but you're way more than that, and I think a lot of people struggle with how do I, how do I get it all done? Like, how do I do that and not neglect the relationships that are most important to me? What would you say? How do you do that?

Rai Cornell: 22:11

So it's tricky because one of the big factors, I would say, is making sure you have the right people around you. So you know you ask how do I balance all these important relationships? It's about making sure that the relationships you have are important to you and you know I'll be the first to admit that I've had people in my life who are either not supportive of me, not being a traditional employee and going in on my own. I've had people who are just downright exhausting and you know I think this word is overused, but I think people listening will know what I mean Toxic. You know, I've had people in my life who are just unhealthy and usually when we feel drained by having to split our focus between our work, our clients, our team, our family, our friends, whatever the case may be, it's because one of those factors is not healthy for us.

Rai Cornell: 23:11

If you're trying to maintain one relationship that's just a black hole to your energy, then nothing's going to, whereas if you make sure that every area of your life is actually something that you want and that's adding value for you, then it all fuels you and splitting your focus among them is more like getting these little boosts of recharge, no matter where you turn. You know, if I turn to my best friend, jody, who's up in Indiana and who I don't get to see very often, I still get this like jolt of love and support from her. Whenever I talk to her, and likewise with my team, I don't feel like they're draining me. I feel like, oh, I love getting to talk to Chelsea or Melissa or Kira or whoever I'm talking to on Boxer or Slack. We all kind of feed each other and fuel each other, and as long as you have that, then there really is no risk of being spread too thin.

Dr. William Attaway: 24:10

I think that's fantastic and again I applaud the intentionality of it. You know, I think too many people are just simply reacting to whatever the day brings whatever, the demands of other people are.

Rai Cornell: 24:22

They fall into the shoulds. Oh, I should talk to this person because I've known them since elementary school. Or oh, I should talk to this person because we're at the water cooler. But really I know I'm going to be exhausted after you know, trying to have this small talk, pulling teeth, chit, chat. You know, if you set your standards high enough to where you feel like everything that you're doing is actually good for you and you're not just succumbing to the shoulds, then you'll be fine.

Intro / Outro: 24:54

Oh good.

Dr. William Attaway: 24:56

Let me ask you about you and your growth. You know you're you're. Both of your companies require you to lead at a different level today than they did five years ago, and five years from now you're going to have to lead at a different level still. How do you stay on top of your game? How do you level up with the skills that your team and your clients and your business are going to need you to have in the years to come?

Rai Cornell: 25:26

I think that all comes down to being able to set aside your ego. I know a lot of people think, oh well, if I admit or show some signs of not understanding something, then that's a weakness and nobody's going to trust me or want to hire me. That's not the case. You have something that is exceptional, that you are naturally good at, that. You have maybe spent years honing your skills around, and that doesn't mean that you have to know everything and have every skill.

Rai Cornell: 26:00

I think a big part of being able to constantly level up is reflecting and understanding. Oh, I feel like maybe I'm out of the loop on this area. You know, for me it's and this is just the nature of what I do as a organic content marketer is Google. Google is always changing. I feel like I'm always behind in terms of what's new and thankfully I know how to pick up on the cues of oh, this isn't working the way it's supposed to. Let me go do some research and figure out what's changed recently. I care more about getting it right than being right. That if they're constantly letting their teams down or not elevating the people around them, it's likely because they care more about being right and it's that ego that comes into play. But if you focus instead on getting it right, even if you have to admit, hey, I don't have the answer to this thing, let me go do some research and figure it out or learn this new skill, then everybody would.

Dr. William Attaway: 27:09

I hope everybody listening wrote down what you just said Focus more on getting it right than on being right and, by the way, I believe that advice applies in pretty much every relationship in your life.

Rai Cornell: 27:21

Yeah.

Dr. William Attaway: 27:23

That's so good. You know, often people who are successful at the level that you are have books that they have read that have influenced them in a pretty significant way. If you could think about one book that has made a big difference in your journey so far that you would recommend to the leaders listening, what would that book be?

Rai Cornell: 27:45

Man, the hesitancy is just choosing one. Oh man, there's so many. I think the one that always stands out to me and now I'm second guessing myself on if this story came from this book. I'm just going to say it. And if people end up doing research and finding that this isn't the right book recommendation, message me and I'll find you the correct one. But I think it was the one thing.

Rai Cornell: 28:09

And in the book, the one thing at the beginning, there's a story about a guy who I believe he's either an accountant or a bookkeeper and he knew exactly what he needed to make for the entire year and he worked his butt off for eight or nine months, made that amount and then spent three or four months surfing, because that's what he was super passionate about.

Rai Cornell: 28:35

And that story has always stuck with me because what that story tells me is you don't have to constantly be working and growing and hitting new quote unquote goals for the sake of it.

Rai Cornell: 28:49

You know a lot of people think, oh, I need to be a million dollar business to be successful, or for freelancers, it's often I need to hit six figures in annual income in order to be successful. That's not true. Those are just numbers with lots of zeros in them. So they look all nice and round and you know, like a lofty goal, but really what you should be aiming for is what do you need in order to be really happy in this one life that you have? And if that means understanding how much you need to make for the year, so that you can knock that out of the way and then go spend four months surfing and doing what you love, or traveling or, you know, being off in the summer when your kids are home from school, or whatever the case may be, your definition of success is going to be very different than what society tells us success looks so good.

Dr. William Attaway: 29:40

What do you want your legacy to be?

Rai Cornell: 29:42

Oh boy, um, I think you know and this probably sounds odd coming from me, from for the people who know me I'm a very structured person. I'm a very organized. I create my own systems and my own rules and my own organization and processes. It's a very type, a kind of thing. But at the same time, despite the fact that I am so like structured and I follow my own rules, I wish I want my legacy to be people maybe looking at my story or looking at what I've built and seeing that they don't have to do it the way that everyone else has done it. They can do it their own way, they can break the rules, they can break the mold, they can go outside of the traditional system and achieve what they want their own way. And I think that's the most important thing, because if you get to an end goal but you were miserable along the way, what's the point of the goal?

Dr. William Attaway: 30:46

It's not worth it so true I could talk to you for another hour. This has been so fascinating and I love that you have been so generous today, sharing what you've learned so far in your journey and I know the best days are still to come. I know folks are going to want to stay connected to you and continue to learn from you and more about what you do. What is the best way for them to do that?

Rai Cornell: 31:10

Best way is probably on LinkedIn. Despite the fact that I run a marketing agency, I'm not the biggest fan of social media, so if you reach out to me on Instagram or Facebook, I'm never going to see it. So reach out to me on LinkedIn, or you can email me directly at rairose at cornellcontentmarketing. com. We'll have all those links in the show notes, thank you.

Dr. William Attaway: 31:29

Rai. Thank you again. Thanks so much. Thanks for joining me for this episode today.

Dr. William Attaway: 31:34

As we wrap up, I'd love for you to do two things. First, subscribe to this podcast so you don't miss an episode, and if you find value here, I'd love it if you would rate it and review it. That really does make a difference in helping other people to discover this podcast. Second, if you don't have a copy of my newest book, catalytic Leadership, I'd love to put a copy in your hands. If you go to catalyticleadershipbookcom, you can get a copy for free. Just pay the shipping so I can get it to you and we'll get one right out.

Dr. William Attaway: 32:08

My goal is to put this into the hands of as many leaders as possible. This book captures principles that I've learned in 20 plus years of coaching leaders in the entrepreneurial space, in business, government, nonprofits, education and the local church. You can also connect with me on LinkedIn to keep up with what I'm currently learning and thinking about. And if you're ready to take a next step with a coach to help you intentionally grow and thrive as a leader, I'd be honored to help you. Just go to catalyticleadershipnet to book a call with me. Stay tuned for our next episode next week. Until then, as always, leaders choose to be catalytic.

Intro / Outro: 32:52

Thanks for listening to Catalytic Leadership with Dr William Attaway. Be sure to subscribe wherever you listen to podcasts so you don't miss the next episode. Want more? Go to catalyticleadershipnet.