When you set up a business, very quickly it can run away with you. Your career can take number one priority in your life and those 16 hour days, 6 day weeks can far too rapidly become the norm. You spend a lack of time with family and friends, your hobbies go out the window and daily duties around the home end up being done in a hurry on your one day off. You don’t care for yourself either, you’re the bottom of the ladder of important things and that is when your wellbeing can take a knock. Is that the life you wanted? Is that why you set up your business? This isn’t living.
The work life balance can be a hard one to find. Of course you want to make your business a success, that is the reason you set it up. But who ever said on their death bed that they wished they’d worked more hours? No one. The mentions we do hear include spending time with family, travelling, enjoying life. This is where flexible working can help.
If you choose to work for yourself, why not choose the hours you work too?
Implementing flexible working into your career let’s you focus on striving for success, without compromising other areas of you life. This could mean working two longer days instead of five ‘normal’ working hour days, allowing you time off on a Friday. Or taking time with the kids after school and then working an hour or two in an evening when they are in bed once a week. You could even break your day up with a mid morning trip to the gym, allowing yourself time to focus on something else and boost your health and wellbeing. What better than using flexible working hours to enjoy enhancing your flexibility with yoga? It’s amazing what returning to a project after a break does, looking at things with fresh eyes works wonders and helps you see errors in your work.
Delegation can also help you. Hiring an accountant can take something off your list of things to do, remove a folder from your pile of files. Focus on the key parts of your business, those bits of it you love and thrive when doing, whilst your accountant uses their skills to produce your numbers quickly and efficiently.
There are many tips which help to improve your work life balance. These include eating, drinking and sleeping well. Without these things our health suffers. Ensure you find time for friends and family, especially if you have young children. You can always make more money but your kids are only little for a short amount of time.
Finding a way to relieve stress is also important. Stress can damage your mental health and put extra strain on you. Whether you enjoy a walk in nature, rely on meditation, faith or popping some gloves on & laying into a punchbag, these are things that help. Work your stress relievers in around your flexible working hours.
Time management is key in any career but flexible working hours can actually give you some life back. It’s a short time we spend on this Earth, live it!
