RULE 2

Find a balance

Starting your own business is pretty all-consuming. It takes up most of your time, and when you’re not doing it, you’re thinking about it. Of course it should be enormous fun – despite the intermittent worries – so you probably won’t begrudge the time you give to it.

Oh, yes, there are worries. They go with the territory up to a point. But aside from the question of whether you’ll clinch this deal, or how the new product line will go down, there is another underlying cause for anxiety. There is a level of insecurity which goes with being an entrepreneur that is like nothing you’ve experienced as an employee. No one is paying you, there’s no pension fund unless you create it, and there’s no absolute guarantee that the work won’t dry up tomorrow. If it all falls apart, you’ll not only be out of a job, you may also be left with sizeable debts.

I’m not trying to depress you. Some people thrive on this kind of life – they feel free and unfettered and enjoy controlling their own destiny – while others just can’t shake the feeling of insecurity, and they worry all the time, sometimes to the point where they simply don’t enjoy themselves even when things are going well. I’ve seen both scenarios many times, and before you launch your own business you need to be sure that you’ll be happy living without the trappings of a secure job. Otherwise your whole life suffers, and you may struggle to cope both in and out of work.

OK, so you’re feeling free to do your own thing, and happy to risk the ups and downs of running a business. Obviously the more hours you put into the business, the more confident you can be that all will be well. And there are always piles of things to get on with, because as an entrepreneur it’s your job to be proactive, to initiate projects, dream up new products or services, chase fresh deals. Yep, always lots to do.

If you’re young and single this is great. You can plough your soul into the operation if you want to. But what if you have a family, kids, ageing parents – they need some of your time too. It’s scary how easily marriages fall apart when one partner runs their own business. Or how often friends have told me they wish they’d spent more time with the kids or with their parents when they had their own business.

I’ve run a business with my partner. It doesn’t work for everyone but it does help to prevent the business breaking up the marriage. However, it doesn’t get you any more time with the children. You need firm boundaries.^* Our rule, when the kids were small, was no working after 6pm or at weekends no matter what. Which we (mostly) stuck to. You can pick your own system, but if you start to bend the rules, you’re on a downward slope. You have to be disciplined about this if you want your partnership to last and your relationship with your children to thrive. But if you can make it work, you’ll have the most fun and rewarding life you could hope for.