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The mind set of a boss and running your own business is different to an office job working for a wage just to reach your KPI. It is also different than being a labourer working for a wage. However, I feel that it is easier for a labourer to become the boss of their own business. I will explain how I got to this idea during this blog.
Lets start with your priorities first. When you have your business going and you are getting an income, you need to make your business your priority in life. everything comes second. Your wife, husband, boy friend girl friend, comes second. your wife becomes your mistress, your husband becomes a toy boy that you use on your days off. If you get a day off. If you have kids, the only way you can spend quality time with them and not fall asleep while being with them is to have them involved in the business and teaching them life skills that school cannot teach them. Like a work ethic, principals, and morality, and they get to earn their pocket money. They will learn the value of money, this means that they will not take it for granted that they can spend and not put any effort in making the money. I have seen it my self, the child will not place care or value on anything that you have given them. Anyhow, the business is first priority in your life. If you have been a wage earner for a long time, your own business is not a 9 to 5 gig. You cannot watch the clock and just set tools down at 5pm and then go home and not put thought into your business. If you need to work till the next day, you keep working. Don’t forget that even if you put your tools down and go home, you still nee to do the paperwork. You need to type those invoices up and keep a record of how your business is going, if not for your self for the Tax man. The paperwork in the engine of the business, if you do not keep the invoices going out there will not be any money coming in. This is why it is so important to love what you are doing. If you don’t do any of this it only becomes a hobby or a whim. This is something that you need to work at for years, you cannot just quit when it gets a bit hard. Sure you can close up shop and go back to what you were doing, there is no shame in that. if you do not try, you will regret it for the rest of your life. This is a hero’s journey. It takes guts to start your own business. Banks will not want to lend money to you till you prove your self for a few years. It will be easier for your employees to get a loan that the boss.
I may add to that latter in the future when I think of more to put there. So what is next? Lets pick on what ells is important in a relationship, Trust. Trust is a very important reputation to have with everyone, your customers, your partner, your wife, your husband, your kids. Never make a promise that you cannot keep. You may have good intentions when you make the promise, you need to think hard before you make a promise. Have I got the time? Have I got the resources? Have I got the tools, have I got the know how? If you make a promise and do not keep it, you get a reputation of not being able to fulfil your commitments. You will loos customers. You can pay for advertising as much as you have the cash for, but word of mouth is the best advertising. Money cannot buy that type of advertising. Unfortunately, bad news travels faster that good news. Trust in your own abilities is the next best thing. If you know you can do something be confident in your abilities. There is another type of trust we need to talk about.
Trust in your employees is the next best thing. Just as you need to have build a reputation of trust with others. you need to have trust in the people that you employ. If you don’t trust them, why do you let them work for you. You give them a job with the parameters that surround that job and you need to trust them to do that job. If you know your workers well, you will see that job that needs doing and you can give a quote accordingly. If they take longer you need to trust them and have the fortitude to hear them out and let them explain the reason of why it took longer. Then you have to cop the loos in that quote or if you did the quote correctly you will not loos on the job but the profits will not be as large as you thought. Trust of this kind cannot, will not be, will be impossible for you to be a micro manager. Micro managers do not show trust in their workers. Micro managers, loos their employees and get a bad reputation so that when word gets around, no one would want to work for them. What does a micro manager look like? The give the employees a job with the parameters, time, budget, or presentation. Then hover around giving instructions, orders on how to do the job and what not to do, and give constant criticism. Then just to top off the anguish on the employees, the micro manager will change the goal posts, the parameters all the time. Trust in your employees will pay off. Your employees will want to do their best for you, they know that by looking after your business they will have a job to come to. They will know that you are all a team to make the business work. You are the captain of the team and you are the one at the helm. Your employees will have trust in you to be reasonable with your demands, and trust that you will pay them accordingly. The employees will trust you to have their best interest in mind.
We talked about good morals and work ethic that you want to teach your kids. Let’s take that to the next level. You do not make the rules just on paper or with the words you speak. You make the rules with what you do. How you behave and the morals you display. If the workers see you drink on the job, they will drink on the job, they see you steeling from the worksite, they will do the same. Your workers are your children, the ethics that you live you will receive them in same. You will soon see that you will not just teach the workers to do the same you will build a reputation of those ethics. Reaping what you sew, that sort of stuff. Unfortunately this happens way to much, and the funny thing is that the boss does not even realist that they started the ball rolling in the first place. I have been able to see many bosses, work with other bosses and work for bosses. The good ones are consistent with their decisions, trust the judgment of their employees, and back their employees up and fight for them if needed. The good boss knows the value of good workers. If the boss becomes their own best customer, the workers will see this and then start to abandon the sinking ship. I know of a person that owned a vineyard, and he drank his profits. Workers saw what was going on and one by one found other jobs. In the end he lost everyone, and every think. I have seen the same thing is about 4 other bosses, they all were or are drinking their profits, openly in front of the workers. Like I said, the workers will follow your lead, and if they don’t follow you they will be looking to find another job. The reasons may vary why they would want to leave, it could be that they can see the ship sinking, or that they do not want their reputation tarnished by the boss, or the feeling of respect is no longer there because it is their hard work to help the bosses addiction. Morals and ethics are important, your reputation depends on them.
Your relationship with the employees are very important. Like I heard on a comedy show, good fences make good neighbours. In the work place, good boundaries make a good work environment. Like I said before the workers are in a way, your children. you as a boss need to guide them and help them, and teach them. you do not treat your child as your best friend, because if you do you loos all your authority. Your child is not your confidant, children do not know how to keep a secret. The child is not your drinking buddy, you not just loos your authority, but the worker will also brag how he is so buddy buddy with the boss that he will be able to get his mates good deals. You need good boundaries. If for nothing ells but to keep your business, your business. This is the same with your customers, they need to know that they are doing business with a person that they can respect and admire not a person that has no boundaries. You cannot trust a person that has no boundaries or that does not respect other peoples boundaries.
The Boss is the leader, the captain, the helmsman, the buck stops here person, the one that makes the executive decisions. If you want to have your own business this sound grand, but you are the one that puts out all the fires, faces all the hard facts, and take the responsibility when the proverbial poo hits the fan. It all sounds great, looks great, and appears to be grand in the eyes of those you want to brag to. In fact it is hard and unforgiving and a thankless job.
If you do not love what you are going to do or the reason you are serving. Do not do it, otherwise you will resent each moment you need to work for your self. If you just like the idea of being a business owner, then start the business, and put in a manager and let them run it for you. There are a lot of people that would love to have their own business but do not have the resourses to do so. Thus they are managers, that will run your business as if it were their own. You as the business owner can sit back and do the paperwork to keep the business working for you, and not the manager. Remember, the office paperwork is the engine of the business. Governments get toppled when the bean counters stop doing their job, and so can businesses.
In short if the Boss is incapable to step in to any role within the small business if an employee cannot make it to work. Then that Boss should never be a boss. It is different for a large business. If the Boss does not know what is involved in a job that they are responsible for, I will show you an easy person to lye to.
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