How many of you made your escape from the corporate world to start your own business having every intention of working less hours each week?
Of course being your own boss means that you have total flexibility about your working hours but why is it so many business owners end up clocking up more hours running their own businesses than they did in their corporate job?
The answer isn't rocket science: when it's your own business, it's your baby and you are passionate about wanting to make it work so you put in all the time you possibly get to make the business a success.
However, just how effective are you being with your time?
I recently re-read Timothy Ferris's The Four Hour Work Week (brilliant book BTW!) and I was struck again by his section on Parkinson's Law - The 9-5 Illusion.
Essentially, when you are an employee and you work the traditional 8 hour day, you fill up all 8 hours of your time completing tasks and working...
However, if you suddenly found you had to reduce your hours by half but all the tasks had to be completed, somehow it manages to get done!
Think of all those part-time return to work mothers who claim that they are more effective and achieve more working less hours than they did before they had children and worked full time...
So by applying the same logic to those of us who run businesses, what if we limited the number of hours we spend working on our business (Ferris lives his 4-hour work week...) would we still achieve the same results and have a better work/life balance?
That's my challenge to you!
Review your list of tasks for a week and estimate how long it's going to take you to complete them all, in your current working pattern and then maybe cut down your time by a third or if you are feeling brave by half...
How will you approach your list of tasks now?
Let me know how you get on....
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