“Discover How To Lead a Happier and Healthier Lifestyle While Becoming More Productive and Efficient!”
Find Out The Exact Steps And Methods You Can Use To Change Your Lifestyle and Improve Your Health
- Struggling to cope with your workload?
- Feeling stressed from your job or business?
- Do you wish that you had more time to spend on activities that you enjoy?
It’s completely normal for any business owner to experience these issues.
When you’re working hard your lifestyle and health can sometimes take a back seat.
Lifestyle. It’s literally in the name. Life.
When you’re spending a significant proportion of your life working you want to ensure that you enjoy it as much as is possible!
Can You Design a New Lifestyle?
A lot of people plan their lives around the work that they do. It’s no surprise that they aren’t fulfilled.
Try putting your lifestyle first!
Choosing your own working environment that suits you
Saying no to work that bores you and isn’t worth it
Improving your productivity by leading a happier and healthier life
Deciding to start your own business is probably one of the most important decisions you’ll ever make, so it’s important to take time to decide what business type is best for you.
Do you want to basically do your old job, but for yourself, or are you looking to get into something new? Are you looking to do something online, or offline?
Do you prefer working with your head or with your hands?
Are you looking to create your own products, provide a service, or are you going to sell other people’s stuff in return for a commission?
You need to think carefully because if you change your mind later it can be VERY expensive to start all over again.
Likewise, you need to decide if this is going to be a full-time venture, a part-time venture, or just a “money hobby” to pass the time.
For most people, the best approach is to start your business part-time while you’re still working at your old job, then scale things up to the point where your making more from your business than your job.
So your task for today is both simple and difficult: Decide what sort of business you want. Don’t rush into it. Take your time.
Discuss it with your spouse and your family – after all it’s going to have an impact on them too.
Once you’ve made your decision, get started. Don’t procrastinate! Start building your healthy business and your healthy life.
Now you’ve decided what sort of business you’re going to have, the next step is deciding what equipment you’ll need to make the business run.
There are a few things every business needs: You’re going to need a phone to take orders and communicate with customers; a website so people can find you online; a computer and printer to do things like write letters and keep track of all the financial stuff you’ll need for your taxes; and somewhere to work from.
But what else?
That’s going to depend a lot on what kind of business you’re starting. If you’re a landscape gardener, you’ll need tools like shovels and rakes.
If you’re starting a bespoke dressmaking business, you’ll need a tape-measure and a sewing machine; if you’re going into business as a web designer, you’ll need web design software; if you’re an affiliate marketer, you’ll need an autoresponder account.
So your task for today is to draw up a list, and work out how much it’s all going to cost.
Don’t rush out and buy a lot of stuff, though!
The best advice I was ever given about buying things for my business was this: Never buy anything until you really need it, and then get the best quality you can afford.
If you’re not sure you’re going to use a piece of equipment more than once, consider renting it.
I don’t advise renting something you’re going to use every day, but if it’s just a one-off then it should be fine.
Another good piece of advice is to get my Healthy Business Healthy Life guide from this site here https://businesshatch.com/HealthyBus/index.html.
It’s crammed with all sorts of information to help make sure your life rules your business – not the other way around.
Do you know what the BIGGEST problem new entrepreneurs face is?
- Raising finance? Nope!
- Deciding what business to run? Maybe.
- Cashflow? Sometimes – but that’s not a problem for everyone.
No, the biggest problem new entrepreneurs face is learning how to set boundaries. This is particularly a problem when you work from home.
You may be at home, but as far as your clients are concerned, you’re at work.
You may be working, but as far as your family and friends are concerned, you’re at home.
Your client may think nothing of calling you at 10:00 pm on a Sunday night because he/she has just thought of something to add to their website.
Your spouse may think nothing of asking you to pick up something from the supermarket because “you’re home all day.”
Friends who have the day off from their jobs may think nothing of just stopping by because they know you’re going to be home.
You can save a bundle on childcare, but if your kids are constantly interrupting you for one reason or another, you’re not going to get much work done.
You need to set boundaries, and learn to say “no” without feeling guilty.
Some boundaries are easy to set: A separate phone line with out-of-hours voicemail will take care of unwelcome calls, and telling the kids that when your home office door is shut you’re not to be disturbed unless it’s an emergency will take care of interruptions, but other situations are not so easy.
You need to impress on people that even though you’re at your residence, it doesn’t mean you’re not “at work”. There will be times when you’re unavailable.
OK – you may have to go to the supermarket for your spouse, but do it at lunchtime or when you would have been coming home from your J-O-B.
You CAN’T do everything yourself – there just aren’t enough hours in a day.
Sure, when you’re just starting out and maybe only have one or two clients you’ll have plenty of time to be both “chief cook and bottle-washer”, but the time will come (and you’ll know it when it happens) when you’ll be overwhelmed, working until late at night, and your work:life balance will be seriously out of whack!
That’s the time to think about outsourcing.
In a way, outsourcing is just delegating. Perhaps when you had a job, you had people you could delegate stuff to.
Outsourcing is no different – except you have to pay for it ;-).
Draw up two lists of tasks you currently do. In the first list, write down all the stuff that you’re good at, enjoy doing, or can do efficiently.
In the other list write down all the stuff that you’re no good at, hate doing, or find time consuming.
That’s the list you want to outsource.
If it’s a task that can be done on computer or over the Internet, you can look on sites like http://freelancer.com or http://elance.com to find suitable freelance workers to do the job for you.
You can hire a part-time bookkeeper to do your accounts (ideally you’ll want someone local for this, so ask around or look in the phone book) and you may reach the point where you’ll be able to take on a full-time or part-time employee to work for you.
As your business grows, you’ll probably need to outsource some of the things you enjoy doing. That’s hard, but a sign of how successful your business has become.
When you’re just starting out in business, it’s easy to say “yes” to everything.
It’s understandable because you want to get out there and you probably need the money, too.
The only problem is people will sometimes ask you to do things that you’re not qualified to do, or that you may not have had enough experience doing.
For example if you’re a landscape gardener, someone may ask you to build a brick wall.
You may have laid a couple of courses of bricks around a flower bed, and feel it’s something you can do to keep the customer happy.
Perhaps you’re a website designer and a customer asks you to write a sales-letter for them. You figure it can’t be too difficult, so you say “yes”.
In both situations, you’ve fallen into a trap. In trying to please your customer, you may end up making them very unhappy!
If that brick wall you’ve just built falls down, or that web copy you’ve just written doesn’t convert, it’s going to reflect badly on you and the work you REALLY do.
You may have created a fantastic garden, or designed a stunning website, but what’s the client going to remember: “That &@#%* wall fell down!
It’s a wonder nobody was hurt.” or “Their web-copy was useless. It cost me a fortune to sort it out.”
THAT’S what they’ll remember, and that’s what they’ll tell others.
It’s human nature I suppose, but it can do your reputation considerable damage at a time when you can least afford it.
So don’t try and do too much, and if you want to keep your customer happy, outsource the job to someone who REALLY knows what they’re doing.
If they do a good job, you can bask in the reflected glory. It really is a “no brainer”.
I want to share some resources I use every day to help maintain a healthy business and a healthy life – some are free, some you’ve got to pay for, but they’re all useful.
- Office Suite: LibreOffice http://www.libreoffice.org/ the free, multi-platform alternative to MS Office
- Project Management: Basecamp https://basecamp.com/ helps to keep everything coordinated and stress-free. Very useful when outsourcing tasks to freelancers.
- Phone Calls and Video-conferencing: Skype http://www.skype.com/en/features/ . Make free Skype to Skype calls over the Internet, have online chats, make group calls (video conferencing) or have a land-line number in various cities and route calls over the ‘net to wherever you are.
- Avoiding RSI: Workpace http://www.wellnomics.com/workpace/ stops you overdoing it when you’re at the computer, and forces you to take breaks from the screen.
- Maintaining a healthy work/life balance: https://businesshatch.com/HealthyBus/index.html My complete guide is available to download now.
- Time management: Manic Time http://www.manictime.com/ helps you to keep track of billable hours and time spent working on projects.
- International payments and payment processing: PayPal http://paypal.com You’ve probably already got it, but are you making use of all the new features? Some of them can be very labor saving. They’ve even got a low-cost way to take credit/debit cards offline.
What’s the name of the most demanding boss you’ve ever worked for?
No, it’s not him.
No, it’s not her either.
The most demanding boss you’ve ever worked for is….
YOU!
That’s right, you can be your hardest taskmaster (or taskmistress)!
Why? Because you’re YOU 24/7, and you can give yourself a much harder time than anyone you’ve ever worked for.
It’s true. It happens to lots of business people, they live, sleep, eat and breathe their businesses until their brains just can’t take it anymore.
Cut yourself some slack!
Set proper boundaries like I explained a few days ago so you can separate your work and your life.
Don’t answer work e-mails in the middle of the night or check the office voicemail out of working hours.
And it’s fine to goof-off a bit during working hours, too. If you find you’re getting tired (either physically or intellectually) then stop and take a break.
It’s OK to go for a walk or have a day off every once in a while.
Now you’re your own boss, you can be the sort of boss you always wanted. Let your life run your business – not the other way around.
