All too often entrepreneurs start businesses with dreams of more freedom and work/life balance. Then they find they’ve somehow given up their lives to grow their businesses. This is a recipe for illness, frustration and burn out.
While I offer tips, tactics and ideas for helping entrepreneurs find better work / life balance all the time; I always like to hear what others have to say on the subject. So recently I solicited tips from experts. And wow! I got more than 100!! Many of them terrific and different from what I’ve shared before.
I included the first few in last week’s ezine and on my blog. Today I’m including a few more. And I plan to keep ‘em coming in the weeks to come. I hope they help you enjoy your entrepreneurial life more and more.
Don’t be a slave to your email (So true and helpful!)
Only check your email every few hours. Don’t be a slave to other people’s requests – as a business owner, manage your time for yourself.
Stephanie Mansour – CEO, Step It Up with Steph www.StepItUpwithSteph.com
Make time for taking care of yourself
Pencil in time for a workout for yourself. Put your workout on your calendar and view this as an important appointment…with yourself.
Stephanie Mansour – CEO, Step It Up with Steph www.StepItUpwithSteph.com
It’s all about the three A’s
There is a key to business/life balance that can be described with 3 A's:
- Awareness – that you need to achieve this to have success in work and in life.
- Accountability- that it is totally up to you to make this happen and there will never be a 'perfect' time – so do it now!
- Attitude – if your attitude is such that you can't, won't, shouldn't take time to balance your schedule it need to shift to an attitude of YES, I CAN, WILL, NEED Stephanie Staples
Stephanie Staples – Motivational Coach, Your Life Unlimited www.YourLifeUnlimited.ca
Steps to achieving work / life balance
Work/life balance is essential to well-being. First, clarify your vision. What do you want your life to look like? Write it in detail, review it daily, consider it your ultimate guide. Next, inventory your activities, personal and professional, and ask yourself if they move you closer to your vision. Those that don’t need to leave your life. Those that do need to be scheduled. Seriously, if you don’t schedule things they wont happen. Make appointments with yourself for both work tasks and pleasure. Leisure time is critical, it refuels you so you can be a better business person.
Kelly Jayne McCann – Professional Organizer & Productivity Consultant, PERFECT ORDER ORGANIZING www.perfectorderorganizing.com
Block out personal time first.
If I don’t say Ill cook dinner with friends between 6pm – 9pm on Tuesday, it doesn’t get done. If I don’t agree to meet a friend for lunch in three days, I end up working through the meal. Take your highest priority personal items and put them on your calendar first. Your work can fill in the rest.
Kathryn Minshew – Co -Founder / Editor in Chief, Pretty Young Professional www.prettyyoungprofessional.com
Take the weekends off (I am SUCH a fan of this one!!)
From midnight to midnight (Friday or Saturday) completely abstain from email, blackberry, reading anything pertaining to work, work of any kind and allow yourself to enjoy your life with your family and friends. If you start thinking about work, stop yourself immediately. Allow yourself to do activities that are fun and joyful. It is amazing how your Mondays will be creative, productive and power packed! When you are plugged into work 24/7, you lose enthusiasm and creativity. Give yourself time to maximize the value of your time off.
Connie Kadansky – Sales Call Reluctance Coach and Trainer, Exceptional Sales www.exceptionalsales.com
Do you have more tips to share? Or thoughts on these? Please do leave a comment below…
it’s important to use repetition but not to the point of monotany. Always attempt to refresh daily “chores” with fresh content and ideas
and program your expectation before taking actions.
Any busines requires hard work of an entrepreneur. So, when you are working hard you will not manage to spend a lot of time with family. When you begin to dedicate yourself to family life you business will definitely begin to suffer. So, the task of an entrepreneur is to optimize the work to provide the most effective results and find the golden mean between family life and business.