September 2005

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2005</I></div> <div> <I>The following article was first published in the Eastern Daily Press' 'The Business'  on 14 September 2005</I></div> <bR> <div> <B>Dividing your time profitably</B></div> <div> Does this sound familiar?  The business you started a few years ago is doing all right, but it's taking every minute of your time. You don't have enough hours in the day to do everything you'd like to do. You don't get to spend much time with your family or to relax with a favourite leisure activity.  And, if you're like many small business owners, you spend the vast majority of your time every day working `in' the business - making or selling products or providing services to your customers - personally.  Using Michael Gerber's terms that I introduced in last month's column, you're being the Technician, not the Entrepreneur or Manager. You're doing whatever it was you probably did as a job before you decided to become your own boss and establish your own business.</div> <bR> <div> But is it really a business?  Even though, by now, you may employee other people and have a reasonable turnover, if your business depends on you - if it simply won't work without you being there - you don't own a business.  Gerber would say that you still have a job.  He contends that `the purpose of going into business is to get free of a job so you can create jobs for other people.'  A tough definition, perhaps, but one to get you thinking.</div> <bR> <div> `But I don't have enough time!', you cry.  I know what that can feel like, but there is an old adage that if you're spending too many hours getting the work done there are only two possible explanations:  either you're no good at the job, or you need help.  I prefer to think that most small business owners I meet are perfectly capable, so the focus must be on getting help.  </div> <bR> <div> Last month, I mentioned the option of using a `virtual assistant' to take on some of the administrative chores involved in running your business - in other words, to fulfil some of the Manager's role.  You can find help with the Entrepreneurial role, too, at least for a while.  Ultimately, like any successful business owner, you will have to develop your own skills, but by all means, to start with, think about using outside advisors for help in such things as marketing and planning.  Buy yourself some time to systemise things in your business so that you can delegate some of your Technician tasks to others.  And, think hard about just how much time you should spend being a Technician.  As the owner, your time should be more valuable than that of your employees and should eventually be used in planning the future of the business, deciding how to grow it and finding and leading the right people in achieving those plans.  </div> <bR> <div> You will find that some time invested in developing yourself will pay big dividends later, so think about leadership development programmes or other management skills training.  Remember, if you continue to spend too much of your time as a Technician and don't put enough effort into the tasks of the Entrepreneur, your business will never fully develop, nor will it build the value that you would presumably like to realise at some point in the future - either through selling the business or by taking passive income from a business in which you retain a partial interest.  In either case, you need to think carefully about whether you really want to own a business, or whether you merely want to remain in a self-employed job.</div> </td> <td valign="top" width=180 BGCOLOR="#CC3333" TEXT="#080000"> <bR> </td> </tr></table></body>