Got a business? Get a life!
A few days ago I went with a colleague to see a prospect who had called and asked for some help with their manufacturing business. When we got to their premises it was clear that the MD was worried, sad and stressed.
Ten days before our visit a key member of his team had died suddenly, leaving not so much a gap in the skills of the company as a huge emotional hole where someone special and loved was now missing. The person they had lost had been with them seven years since college and the difficulties in separating the loss of the person from the loss of the employee were strong ones to bear.
Where we had thought originally we were going to an appointment to help a potential client with some training or consulting work, we knew that the best thing we could do was listen to this husband and wife team talk about their loss, drink a coffee with them and promise to go back again when they felt they could talk more.
They were booked for a holiday the next week and although they wanted to cancel it all together, we helped them think about simply delaying it for a week or so, pointing out how much they needed the break.
When you are in your business all day long sometimes it is easy to see only the micro details that you feel you have to manage all the time. Please believe us when we say this is not the case all the time. If you have created a good business then it will last for a week without you, and if you panic the first time you can always ring in for five minutes each day to justify your existence! If you have not created a robust enterprise and have been trying for ages, then you will already know that there is more to gain by stepping away for a few days and having that time to relax, reflect and regroup.
You owe it to yourself as much as to your staff and clients. Go on, I dare you. Get your life back on track.
Nick Sturgeon is a small business owner who has benefitted from the experiences of success, failure and financial recovery. The author of “Small Business BIG Profit” published by FT Prentice Hall, Nick writes and speaks from the heart about Risk, Reward and the Power of Personal Enterprise. nick@smallbusinessbigprofit.co.uk
