Shark Tank’s Kevin O’Leary is remembered for saying, “If you want to get rich, start working 25 hours a day, seven days a week.” He’s not wrong in thinking that. Unless you give 110% of yourself daily, your business won’t stand a chance.
It is not only full-time work; it is your life. A New York Enterprise Report survey found that small business owners work twice as much as regular employees. The study also found that 33% of small business owners reported working more than 50 hours per week, and 25% said they work more than 60 hours a week.
Any small business owner will be able to understand that a regular 9-5 pm schedule is not what owning your own business is about. Especially when you start from scratch. The fantasy of working your own hours and setting your work schedule goes out the window the minute you step into the field of entrepreneurship.
You are the captain of your ship and will do everything you can to ensure it does not sink.
And if you are starting from the ground up and have a small team, then in most cases, you are shorthanded, and it is all hands on deck. It can become frustrating, nerve-wracking, and at times overwhelming.
“When you’re an entrepreneur, the hours you work are a meaningless measure,” said Christine Baker, co-founder and director of Strategic Nudge. “You work until you achieve what you need – whether that’s your first product launch, first customer sale, the first year of $100,000 turnover, or whatever. If that takes 20 or 70 hours a week, so be it.”
So it’s important to remember a few things in the initial phase of this awe-inspiring journey. From the numbers above, it is clear that you are not alone if you feel overwhelmed by the time spent on your new venture. These extra hours you’re spending are shared by other entrepreneurs and start-ups who are trying to maintain work-life balance.
Is it sustainable, and will it take a toll on your physical and mental health? Research says consistently working long hours can decrease productivity and physical and mental health. Popular opinion may suggest that you try and put in 60+ hours a week, but science disputes this.
Everyone has their limits and potential to go long runs without taking a break. It is important to monitor your physical and mental well-being rather than trying to copy what someone else is doing or advising. The important thing is to remember that unless you take a break, recharge, and reset yourself, you will not be bringing your best to the table day in and day out.
A few tips on how to keep yourself on your toes and reset when the long hours feel overwhelming:
- Rest and Regroup – This is one of the hardest things for business owners to do. But your state of mind will not be able to focus for endless hours on the same set of problems and needs to reset. Walk away, call a friend, or watch a movie. Do something to help you turn your attention away for a while. When you return to your work, you will be able to focus better.
- Sleep – Get your 8-10 hours in. Sleep is one of the things that will take a hit when you start your business. You are eating, breathing, and thinking constantly about how to scale up, but unless you recharge physically, you will not be able to go the extra mile.
- Health is One of Your Assets – Your health, as the Founder and CEO of your new venture, is just as important as one of your company assets. Without it, your company will not survive. Take time to make that annual checkup or see that doctor when your health is not 100%.
- Make Time for People –.Take time to connect with your loved ones and friends. It cannot be all work and no play. You need to ensure you are not forgetting about the support system that got you to this point. They are an incredibly important part of your journey. Make time for them.
- Don’t Let Your Business Take Over – My last piece of advice: do not let yourself be overtaken by your business so that it becomes everything your life is about. Make a schedule, chalk out time for your short-term and long-term objectives, and create a task list to achieve them. In the end, it is a job, a form of employment, and a source of income, and you need to learn to turn it off when it needs to be turned off and get back in the game when required.
Ultimately, you are here because you believed in a concept, a product, and most importantly, in yourself. You will get up each morning with the drive to do better, to create something people will buy and remember. That energy is what drives us to work more than 60 hours a week, not take breaks and keep charging forward. That is not a bad thing. As long as we can sustain it and create a system where we give ourselves opportunities to reset.
Entrepreneurship is living a few years of your life like most people won’t, so that you can spend the rest of your life like most people cant.
Anonymous
Managed Digital Marketing for Your Business
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