Prioritise, Delegate and Schedule your way to better Work Life Balance

All Business owners would attest to facing many stresses each and every day. ‘It’s not easy, but it’s worth it’ is a saying we hear regularly!

Amongst meeting goals and sales targets, increasing productivity, finding and building a good team, ensuring you are keeping up with latest technology and finding time and new ways to market your business (just to name a few), there is the issue of work life balance. It is increasingly being found at the top of many business owners and entrepreneurs list of challenges!

Australian small business owners are now working harder than ever, with research showing a quarter are working 7 days and more than 50hrs/wk, with 16% more than 60hrs/wk.

Why? Because entrepreneurs are wired to focus on complex, creative tasks. With a higher than average brain dexterity that allows them to switch easily between left and right brain activities and solve problems more creatively, this often makes it harder for them to delegate complex problems. And  because in most cases, entrepreneurs are lucky enough to be extremely passionate about what they do, so they allow the business to take over their lives.

Main reasons to strive for Work Life balance –

• Working more doesn’t necessarily mean getting more work done! More hours doesn’t mean higher productivity. Re-organising your life will give you more downtime to recharge, and allow you to focus on priorities, forcing you to get more done in a shorter time frame. Successful and efficient people are often found to have the following in common – prioritization of sleep, relaxation and taking breaks.
• Negative impact of overworking on health! The link between overworking and bad health is clear with several studies linking working too much with everything from depression and sleep disorders to heavy drinking , diabetes, memory loss and heart disease.
• Negative impact on relationships! We all know running a business puts immense stress on yourself and your family. Time to give those ‘big rocks’ the priority. Re-evaluate the importance of family and friends and give yourself back some time to improve those relationships.

3 Simple tips to help create this elusive Work Life Balance –

Prioritise – Be honest with yourself! Look at every demand on your time, picking out the most important items and cutting everything else out! This doesn’t come naturally for a lot of us, so don’t feel bad if you find this difficult.

Delegate – Take a look at your remaining list of priorities and see what you can hand off to someone else. Feeling stressed managing your staff? Hire an Office Manager. Overwhelmed by content marketing? Contract a Marketing business, or hire an additional staff member to manage. And once you’ve found a solid support team, don’t hold on to the idea that you’re the only one who can handle complex business problems. Share your ideas and ask for creative solutions from your team. A strong team will always bring fresh ideas and perspective to our many business challenges!

Schedule – Schedule every single aspect of your life! Choose your favourite calendar system and add your family and personal time as you would everything else.

Entrepreneurs and Business Owners are the life blood of our economy – creating jobs, training the next generation and providing our local products and services. You are strengthening our community and our country, so please take notice of these few simple tips and start decluttering and re-organising your life today. Your business, family and friends will thank you for it!

If you need help with any tasks that are taking your precious time, please contact us for a free chat to see if we’re a good match! Call 1300132811 or email hello@stikky.com.au today.