Talking Cents

Do your run a small business or does your business run you?

Most small businesses start out with an individual, or couple, having a passion for a chosen vocation and a vision on ways they can do it better and/or differently than everyone else.

For anyone who's been running their own business for any length of time, it's quite easy to lose sight of the initial drive and passion and become jaded with the whole process. More often than not, this reason comes down to the fact that running a business on a daily basis and satisfying the compliance aspect of regulatory bodies such as the ATO, ASIC and OSR can quickly become a chore if not handled well.

So the message of today's blog, is to take stock, sit back and regain that initial passion. Don't let your small business run your life, starting a small business is often a lifestyle choice as much as it can be about making money. Here's five simple tips on how you can take back control over your life, by getting your business to run itself, and not your life.

1. Take advantage of professional relationships. Sure it may cost a few extra $$$ to pay your accountant, but the time you get back can be priceless. Either by getting your life back, or investing more time into doing what you love.

2. If you employ staff, empower them to take charge of the business in ways such as allowing the free flow of new ideas. Don't just give them a run sheet to follow.

3. Mobile tablets such as iPads can more often than not be used in one way or another to improve your lifestyle. From accepting mobile payments, cloud based bookkeeping to promotions via social media can all be done from such devices.

4. Set a regular day and time to perform the necessary compliance work such as bill payments and meetings with accountants/solicitors etc. Select a day that you know is the least busy for your chosen field.

5. Actively seek out business networks and connect with like minded people to bounce ideas off and to offload about some if your frustrations to people who will get your lingo. LinkedIn and local chambers of commerce are a great starting point.