You Weren’t Made to Carry All of This: How to Know When It's Time to Hire an OBM
In the book of Exodus, Moses was doing everything himself.
He sat as judge from morning until night. The people stood around him all day, waiting for his attention, decisions, and guidance. His father-in-law Jethro watched for a while before he said something so important: "The work is too heavy for you; you cannot handle it alone" (Exodus 18:18, NIV).
Moses was faithful, gifted, and beautifully devoted to his people. But he was missing something big. He was doing work that was never supposed to belong to him alone.
I think about this story a lot as an online business manager.
It's the feeling of being tired of being capable. When someone says, how does she do all of that… and it feels kind of insulting.
You’re running the client work and managing the team and noticing the billing issue nobody else caught and replying to the question that just came in. By the end of the day you’re exhausted and disconnected from why you began this work in the first place, you’re just trying to get through the week.
The women I work with aren't struggling because they're bad at what they do.
They're overwhelmed business owners doing remarkable things and somewhere along the way they became the CEO, the operations manager, the project coordinator, and the person who catches every problem in the backend, all at once.
The weight of all of that eventually becomes the thing that slows everything down.
If you've been wondering whether it's time to hire an OBM — or whether you're "there yet" — this is for you.
What Being "Ready" Actually Means (it's Not About Your Revenue)
There's a question I get asked regularly, usually phrased something like: "I think I might need an OBM, but I'm probably not big enough yet."
And I want to gently push back on that.
Readiness isn't about crossing a revenue threshold. It's not about the size of your team or how many offers you have or how many years you've been building. Those things are context (they're not the deciding factor).
What tells you the timing is right is something simpler: what are you carrying and is this the season that calls for this kind of support.
If you're still getting clear on what an OBM does, What Is an OBM? is a good place to start. And if you're figuring out the difference between an OBM and a VA, this post covers that.
But if you already have a sense of what OBM support looks like and you're wondering if it's for you — keep reading.
Readiness looks different for every woman. And the most important thing I can offer before we get into the specifics is this: being ready to hire an OBM doesn’t mean you have everything figured out, it just means you’re ready to get support for the operational layer of your business (so you can focus on the things only you can do).
You're Ready to Hire an OBM If…
Your systems are running, but nobody's watching them
I was working inside a client’s Stripe account and while I was there I noticed something: a customer had been double-charged for two months. Two active subscriptions, one account, nobody had caught it.
Receipt confirmation emails had been turned off. The duplicate had been sitting there, running in the background (for eight weeks).
We resolved it that day. But it had been sitting there.
This is one of the clearest signs you're ready for an OBM: your business has automations, billing systems, and backend processes running while your attention is everywhere else, and there is no one whose job it is to check them. To keep an eye on the whole picture so problems don’t become crises.
You're carrying your operations entirely in your head
I worked with a woman who described herself as scattered. Her clients loved her, her vision was clear but she felt like she was carrying all of it in her mind.
Every single day she was trying to remember details about her clients, systems that were mostly manual, her team relied on her for every process, and future projects… they just stayed in the future until she had more space. She was afraid to delegate because she didn't trust anyone else could follow through.
After a few months of working together, she wrote that she felt such peace from getting my support. It can be an adjustment for a CEO from being the person everyone relies on to the person who relies on her OBM.
She thought she needed help with tasks. What she needed was her mental space back. When you’re the CEO and the operations manager and the person who remembers everything, you’re spending creative and strategic energy on a layer of your business that isn’t meant to live in your mind.
You have a team, but no one is leading it
One of my clients had been hiring contractors on her own for months. I’d been supporting her and setting up systems so she wasn’t doing everything by herself anymore. But even a few months into our retainer I realized she was still in business protection mode (doing everything herself, even the things that were supposed to be mine now).
Sometimes as a business owner you don't realize that managing contractors and turning ideas into actionable projects is OBM work.
Before I came on, there was no operational leader. Every question and decision came back to her so she was functioning as her own OBM without the title, the time, or the training for it, on top of everything else.
In almost every case like this, the team is fine. What's missing is someone whose job it is to carry the coordination layer so it stops flowing back to you.
You're in a Launching or Sustaining season
On a discovery call not long ago, I listened to a woman describe her business (what she was building toward, what kept slipping, where her energy was going) and I named the season her business was in before she could. She was sitting right at the threshold between Rebuilding and Launching, and she didn't quite have words for it yet.
The season your business is in matters more than most people realize.
In a Launching season, an OBM is there to build the infrastructure your launch depends on, so you're not improvising your systems while also trying to bring something new into the world.
In a Sustaining season, an OBM's job is simpler: keep what's already working from slowly starting to slip.
The fruit of a Launching season is discernment. You know what to pursue, what to pause for later, and what’s a no. Part of that discernment is deciding when it's time to bring someone in.
If you're not sure which season you're in right now, The 4 Seasons of Business Framework is worth reading before you make any decisions about support.
Your vision deserves systems that protect it
The version of your business you imagined when you started and the version you want now are probably not the same.
When most women begin, the vision is simple: I just want this to work.
A few years in, it gets more specific. You know what time you want to close the laptop. You know what kind of growth feels right and what kind feels performative.
You have a clearer picture of how you want to show up in your work, at home, in your actual life, and you can start to see the places where your business isn't reflecting that yet.
This is life-first operations. Your business runs in a way that supports your life, not your business running you (ragged).
Part of that is taking an honest inventory.
What does growth look like for you right now, in this season?
When do you want to be done for the day, and is your business built to let you get there?
If one thing could be completely off your plate (not just delegated but genuinely someone else's) what would it be?
Scaling is a great goal. So is scaling without the burnout.
What matters is that you know which one you're building toward, and that you're not just defaulting to hustle because no one is holding the operational layer yet.
Whether your vision is a peaceful, simple business with a clean structure, or something more layered with a growing team, that vision is yours. It deserves to be protected with clear boundaries and systems by someone whose job it is to run the backend so you can keep focused on other areas of work and life.
You're Not Quite There Yet If…
I’d love to be extra honest with you here that bringing on support isn’t the same as bringing on the right support. Here are some considerations for when it might not be aligned.
Your offers or direction are still shifting
An OBM's job is to build and protect structure. If you're still figuring out what you're selling, who you're selling to, or what your business model is building structure is premature. There isn't enough that's settled yet for an OBM to build around.
Many women in a Rebuilding season are here, and it's exactly where they're supposed to be. The right move is usually getting clear first, and then bringing in support once there's something stable to operate.
You're in a Simplifying season
A Simplifying season is about pulling back, not adding more. If you're intentionally reducing your client load, streamlining your offers, or stepping back from growth for personal reasons, bringing in an OBM right now will likely feel like more, not less.
The timing matters. Your season is telling you something, and it's worth listening.
The investment isn't accessible yet
An OBM retainer is a real financial commitment. If stretching to make it work would create stress rather than relief, that's worth paying attention to.
I always factor this in when having conversations with potential clients. You might think it’ll be ok but in the back of your mind if money is a potential factor for pressure, it’s not the right time.
The right timing is when the investment frees you from something that’s worth more than what you're spending. If you're not there yet, that's honest information, not a failure.
What you need right now is task support, not operational leadership
Sometimes what's missing isn't a leader, it's an extra set of hands. If your systems are solid, your direction is clear, and the main bottleneck is bandwidth for specific tasks, a VA might be the better fit right now.
An OBM leads and builds. A VA executes and supports. Both are valuable. The question is what your business actually needs in this season.
What if You're Somewhere in the Middle?
Not every woman reading this is ready for a full OBM retainer.
Some of you are almost there but not quite, some are in a Rebuilding season and want strategic support while you get clear, and some just need someone to think with (not a full operational leader, not a task list, something in between).
If you're not sure whether a retainer or something lighter is the right fit, the best next step is a conversation. You can apply to work together and we'll figure out from there what actually makes sense for your season.
In the meantime, the newsletter is a good place to stay connected, sign up here.
Ready to Find out if it's Time?
If something in this post landed, that's worth paying attention to. The next step is a simple conversation.
FAQs
How do I know if I'm ready to hire an OBM?
You're ready to hire an OBM when what you're carrying operationally needs its own person, not just more tasks delegated, but someone to lead the backend of your business. The clearest indicators: your systems are running without anyone watching them, you're carrying your operations entirely in your head, you have a team with no operational leader, or you're in a Launching or Sustaining season that needs real infrastructure. Any combination of these means there’s a potential real benefit to finding an OBM to support you.
What's the difference between an OBM and a VA?
A VA executes tasks. An OBM leads operations. A VA follows a process; an OBM builds one. If you need bandwidth for specific tasks, a VA is likely the right fit. If you need someone to own the operational layer of your business, like managing your team, running your systems, keeping the backend running while you focus on your work — that's an OBM. OBM vs. VA: What's the Difference
Do you need to hit a certain revenue level before hiring an OBM?
Revenue is context, not a threshold. There's no universal number. What matters more is whether your operational workload has outgrown what you can carry alone, and whether the investment would unlock more than it costs in time, mental space, and capacity to grow. Some women are ready at $80K. Some have passed $200K and the timing still isn't right. Focus on what you're carrying, not just what you're earning.
What does an OBM actually do?
An OBM manages the operational layer of your business so you don't have to. That includes running your systems and processes, managing your team, overseeing projects, and building the infrastructure your business needs to grow. The key difference from a VA is leadership: an OBM is making decisions about how things run, not just executing tasks.
What if I'm not quite ready for a full retainer but I need support?
The most important thing is knowing what season you're in — because your business season tells you what kind of support will actually make an impact. If you're not sure where you fall, applying to work together is the best next step. We'll figure out from there what makes sense for where you are.
