10 Reasons To Work “On” Your Business
Working “in” your business frankly is doing the “jobs” of your business - sales, operations, finance, HR etc. Michael Gerber in the E-Myth said it best when he wrote: “If your business depends on you, you don’t own a business—you have a job. And it’s the worst job in the world because you’re working for a lunatic!”
And while virtually all entrepreneurs have to work “in” their business during the start up phases, they eventually have to develop their own ability and their key leaders skills to work “on” the business if they truly want to scale, with a bonus of getting to fire the ‘lunatic’ from their various working “in” the business jobs!
10 reasons to Work “On” Your Business:
Time: free up your time for other passions & pursuits.
Purpose: Live out the reason why you became an entrepreneur - Entrepreneurs start scalable companies and don’t confine themselves to working 2 to 4 jobs in their business indefinitely.
Clarity: Get clear on your thinking.
Create a scalable company: The systems, processes and business practices that got you here won’t get you there. You are finite and not scalable whereas your business can grow exponentially if you put in place systems, processes and people to make yourself redundant.
Increase the value of your business: The value of your business is inversely proportional to how much you work “in” the business. Nobody wants to buy a job, but if your business is a ‘turnkey’ operation that has little to no dependency on you, your business valuation increases dramatically.
Get off the adrenaline hamster wheel: Finally kicking the habit of being addicted to the adrenaline of needing to put out all the fires in your business.
Become more strategic and long-term focused: Being out of the day-to-day tactical work allows you to gain the perspective needed to ensure your company is positioned to capitalize on market, business & technology trends.
Be the leader your company needs: Not everyone needs to work “on” the business, but its leaders do - otherwise you are not leading.
Making your vision real takes intentionality: To make tangible progress toward your long term vision will require spending intentional time & resources on activities that fall outside of working “in” the business. Your clients and customers care most about you delivering the product/service to them now, and really don’t care if you grow the long term value of your business.
Saying “no” to the less important: To free up the time & space to work on your business will require finally saying no to those less important priorities you know you should have stopped doing years ago.
The second best time to plant an oak tree
Just as “The best time to plant an oak tree was 20 years ago, the second best time is today”, so too today is the second best time to plant your seed of working “on” the business. This discipline will grow into an ‘oak tree’ over the long run.
About the Author
Tom Barrett is a Leadership Team Coach based in Nashville, and is a Certified Scaling Up Coach™, Certified Pinnacle Business Guide, & former Certified EOS Implementer™. He helps his clients build scalable businesses by clarifying their vision, simplifying their strategy and achieving their goals one quarter at a time.
