Faith, fear and fatigue: how to manage the many feelings of running a photography business
Hey honey,’ I typed, ‘I thought I’d dump some thoughts on the photo business… I really want to get this thing rolling.’ I was on the 8:49pm train back from London. All the regular commuters had returned home hours ago. The ones still out in town for drinks and dinner would be staggering into seats on later trains. This carriage was full of IT consultants like me, the ones working crazy hours for demanding clients in return for six-figure salaries.
It was 2006 and I was totally disillusioned. I enjoyed the work I was doing, but it left me with very little time left for my family.
By this point, friends of friends had seen some of the photos I created of my own children, and were paying me to capture their own family’s milestones. I was convinced that photography offered a way forward.
In that email I sent to my wife, Sarah, I listed why I loved creating portraits so much, and what I wanted from the business. It was full of lofty ideals and big ambitions. I believed the business would be successful and provide us with a sustainable income. At that point in time, I was fuelled by my faith that it would all work out in the end.
I signed off the email with a question and a little bit of reassurance: ‘What do you think? See you in half an hour. P.S. I’ve only been drinking coffee.’
That email marked the birth of our business. I started getting clients beyond two degrees of separation. Those clients recommended me to their own connections, and the bookings increased steadily. A few years, awards and qualifications later, and our business was no more a baby, or even a toddler, but a full-grown adult.
I was no longer one person with a camera. Now there was a small team behind me, depending on the business for their livelihood. At first, it was just my parents and a few friends following our social media accounts. Now there were tens of thousands, and my irreverent social media posts suddenly seemed a bit… risky. What I said, how I looked and the photos I created were no longer just about me: they either strengthened or undermined our brand.
Perseverance
Over that same period, the faith I had in the business was elbowed out by a new, stronger emotion: fear. Fear of losing what we had worked so hard to build.
Suddenly, I had a lot to lose if I said or did something off-brand. Whenever things in the business didn’t lead to the result we expected, we amended our processes. We were no longer led by our hearts – how we felt things should be done – but motivated by avoiding potential client problems or damage to our brand. Our business was now its own entity, with a reputation all of its own, and we wanted to…