Is your career wearing you out? Are you too tired to enjoy
your family and friends on the weekends, or what little
part of the weekend you have? Well, I have a secret to
share about the blind spot that just might have got you
there. It certainly was mine. The secret is this: Your job
is only part of your workload. You’re not tired because of
your career. You’re tired because of everything else.
This is particularly true for women. Many of us hold
ourselves up to mid-20th century ideals while working 21st
century careers.
Two years ago, I was just exhausted. Between my business,
the house, eldercare issues, and other responsibilities,
there just wasn’t any time to relax. Something had to go,
but what?
I was sick and tired of hearing from the “experts” that the
solution to my exhaustion was to just stop doing most of
what I was doing. I wasn’t doing anything that wasn’t
important. I had eliminated all that I could, including
many things I enjoy, and there was still no time for a
life. That’s when I realized that I had to start hiring
people to do things for me.
I think you should consider doing the same. It’s your life
you’re talking about. You are in your peak years, both
mentally and physically. If you’re spending your time doing
something you can pay someone $15, $20, or $40 an hour to
do, you’re not spending that time with your kids, partner,
family, or friends, or even a good book. To me this is a
waste of all your education and hard work on the job if all
it gets you is no time for the rest of your life. Will you
really look back on your deathbed and feel satisfied that
you personally pulled all of the weeds in your yard?
It wasn’t easy. Like most entrepreneurs, I love control. I
liked to pretend that I didn’t, but the truth was that I
did. All of my excuses, like “I can’t afford it” really
just came down to one thing: I was afraid to give up
control.
For some tasks, I even had an added layer of rotten
thinking: believing that if I didn’t personally handle
household responsibilities like menu planning and laundry,
I must be a pretty lame wife. What was I thinking? Old
messages still float around our heads, and once we surface
them, we have to whack them on the head until they are
dead. So I did.
My first baby step was the vet who makes house calls. Why
traumatize Bill with a car ride to the vet’s when there’s a
vet who will come to him? Not to mention that it saved me
the time getting out his carrier, driving him to the vet,
waiting, and driving him home.
Then came the bookkeeper. What a fool I was to wait so
long. I meet with her every other week to hand off bills
and receipts. She does the rest and keeps me informed. She
handles bill paying and expense and income tracking and
stays on top of all the accounts for my business, for my
mother-in-law, and for us.
We actually have a household P&L now. I think it’s a ton of
fun. Others think it’s just sick. Either way, I have more
time, and I have better focus at work, since, “Oh, crap, I
wonder if I transferred enough into the personal checking
account to cover that Key Bank automatic payment” never
floats across my brain while I’m at work. I know that
Laurie is all over it. It was heavenly to come home from
almost three weeks away and have NO bills stacked up
waiting for me. None.
It was the bookkeeper who suggested the gardener. She was
right. Kirk hates mowing, anyway, and I was so bored
pulling weeds. Now when I work in the garden, it’s the part
I enjoy, like tending to my herbs and vegetables. It’s
relaxing. It sort of reminds of…oh, what is it…it’s
like having a life!
Finally, I took the biggest step of all: I hired a personal
assistant. She handles the 1,000,000 little things like
laundry, grocery shopping, making appointments with the
plumber, meeting him at the house, and so on and so on. She
saves me a full 40 hours a month. I was pretty shocked to
realize that 10 hours out of every week had gone to
managing the household, some of them during the workweek.
I get really worked up when I hear a reasonably successful
professional say, “Oh, I can’t afford a luxury like that. I
don’t make enough.” I couldn’t either, you could say.
While it’s true that I make more money now because these
wonderful people have freed up time for me to be more
focused and productive, for the first few months, I carried
the expenses without a return (on my business line of
credit, in case you’re interested – real debt, real skin in
the game, no fooling around). I was confident that the
return would come, and would far exceed the investment. It
has.
Even for employed professionals, the return will come if
you (and your partner, if you have one) at least farm out
your most hated tasks.
For the self-employed, it’s absolutely essential to manage
your business from where you want it to be, not from where
it is now. Investment in resources that make you
successful, whether on the personal or business side, is
essential to having a profitable and sustainable business.
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Jennifer Selby Long, Founder and Principal of Selby Group,
provides executive coaching and organizational development
services. Jennifer’s knack is helping clients navigate the
leadership and organizational challenges triggered by
change and growth. She knows firsthand that great plans
often fail because companies don’t take into account the
human factors that come into play when implementing them.
Visit Jennifer at: http://www.selbygroup.com
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