Since I’ve started running my own business my thought patterns have definitely changed from being an employee. As an employee you never really question the motivations for what you do. And you don’t question the methods often either. However, having said that, I’m pretty sure most employees would say they question both.
Just this morning I was thinking about how long it should take to complete a new blog entry. The actual answer depended on the kind of blog entry and on what I expected in return for creating that blog entry. What I’ve found with blogs is that you can get into a habit of posting even though your goals aren’t being met. Or you can get into a habit of spending more than your allotted time on them, usually because you haven’t thought about what that allotted time actually is.
If you generalize this to all tasks, not just blog entries, you can start to see how employees don’t often think about it. Even a higher level manager with a budget and a time limit often doesn’t think about whether that’s the right budget or the right time limit. Even executives often run on autopilot choosing the next obvious task without really thinking if it’s the right one. This is how companies go out of business, which they often do, at least the modern version of going out of business, selling or restructuring.
When you own your own business though, the metrics are always right in your face. Can you pay your rent? Are you happy with how much you’re working? Do you feel you’re getting the return on investment you desire out of your work? If not, then it’s time to start rethinking things and this can happen on a daily basis, or even more often. The questions are tough, and correct answers are required.
Employees don’t need to ask those questions because the answers for an employee are usually constant, and they can’t usually change the answers anyway, except to find another job, and even then it’s probably going to be mostly more of the same.
I love it. These challenges are what I’ve been waiting for. But I can’t help but think that most other people wouldn’t like it at all.
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