15 lessons from being my own boss for 15 years

I’m not sure anyone could have foreseen the last year we’ve had but the ability to cope with the unexpected is certainly on my list of the 15 lessons I’ve learnt since working for myself.

Here’s more about those 15 lessons in the order in which I wished I’d learnt them!

Think about your thinking

Mindset wasn’t such a hot topic 15 years ago but it’s the biggest reason that I’m still here.

When faced with low mood, no work, menopause, loneliness, failure, criticism and the myriad of other things that can go wrong attention to what my thinking was doing, and checking to see if it was being helpful or not, was key.

Working on my own I certainly could have found it easy to spiral down into unhelpful thinking, and to believe that thinking was correct rather than remember it was just a reaction to external events that I had choice over.

No surprise really that this resilience around mindset is something I share in my work with clients as a coach and trainer.

Believe in yourself

I’m not saying I’ve managed this for every day of the last 15 years as there have certainly been times when I’ve got caught up in not believing in myself.

My ability to sell my services, however, needed me to believe in me – for me to enthuse about the services I was offering and why I was the perfect person to deliver them.

The biggest hurdle for me has been the unconventional nature of some of my work and how I do what I do.

All my life I’ve had to grapple with being Alisony vs conforming to the business stereotype and fitting in.

Being Alisony always wins but it’s not been without the occasional wobble and internal struggle.

Understand your why

Perhaps this should have come in at number 1 as understanding why you do what you do helps with decision making. Knowing your why helps you to say yes to things that support your why and no to things that don’t.

For example, being very specific about the why also helps. For example “making a difference” might have me saying yes to everything. Whereas, “helping people identify and release the blocks to getting back on track” provides more focus and “helping managers and their teams identify and release the blocks to achieving their success” more so.

Niching is an emotive word and yet the more specific you can be for yourself and others the easier life and business will be – however I might like to fight it ??.

Enjoy what you do

15 years would be a long time if I didn’t enjoy what I do.

When faced with the 2008 financial crisis, and Covid lockdown, enjoying what I was doing daily was key.

I made a decision at the start of March 2020 lockdown that focusing on my why and doing what I enjoyed would help get me to the other side.

It’s why:

• my focus changed here on LinkedIn to sharing insight more broadly to help people be more resourceful, positive and resilient at this time.
• webinars were developed with titles such as: motivation in unprecedented times; soft skills and mindset for unprecedented times; the keys to having a flourishing team in turbulent times; building resilience in your team; disrupting habitual thinking; and finding joy in the unexpected (boy did we need that).
• poems were written to help people understand where normal had gone (blog and vlog), and what paths and destinations they might need to be revisiting (blog and vlog).

Focusing on my why and what I enjoy has certainly helped keep me motivated to get out of bed every day over the last year whilst stuck working from home.

Here's me enjoying my work - although you may want to turn the sound down first.

Be good at what you do

It goes without saying that being good at what you do is helpful. You can be ok for a while but sustained turnover comes from being good at what you do.

Although I’d suggest it’s not just about being an expert at the task in hand, but having the language and attitude that builds trust that, at the very least, you’ll do what you say you’re going to do.

I’m not still here working for myself just because I am good at speaking, training and coaching – I’m here because people trust me to do a good job too.

Know your numbers

When the financial crisis hit in 2008 I didn’t know my numbers and that was a mistake which nearly had me heading for bankruptcy.

These days I have an excel spreadsheet that identifies all home and work expenses by month for the next 12 months. I also have a forecast for turnover.

I therefore have a very clear idea of where I am at any point in relation to profit/loss and at times the impact that might have on my savings or money put to one side for HMRC.

That said, the sort of business I’m in often means visibility of work isn’t months and months ahead. Which means being ok with that level of ambiguity is something that needs to be cultivated – daily stress due to lack of work needs to be minimised.

Know your walk away position

I’d strongly advise being very clear what your walk away position is around the numbers and impact on your daily lifestyle.

If you need ￡x per month to survive how many months are you prepared to go under this figure before you decide this level of ambiguity is not for you?

If you have family commitments requiring you to be home so many days a week - how many weeks are you prepared to miss these commitments before you decide this is not for you?

Understand yourself and what makes you tick

Perhaps earlier lessons pointed to the need to understand what makes you tick to successfully work for yourself.

Your why, level of risk aversion, financial security needs, ability to work alone, ability to motivate yourself, need for feedback and so on all need to be assessed when deciding whether to set out working for yourself.

Asking others how they experience you can also be a great place to start - here's the words that came back to describe me.

Embrace work life balance

Not an easy one by any means and living on my own has certainly allowed for some flexibility about my life balance.

What I have learnt is trying to adopt the same working patterns as when I worked for an organisation doesn’t work for me. I wonder whether those working from home during lockdown have similarly had to adapt their working patterns to support their mental, emotional and physical wellbeing?

For example, the ability to go for a high tide swim in the middle of the morning when meetings allow has kept me sane over the last few years. So too the ability to take a half day and go for a walk in the middle of the week.

Yes, there are days when I’ve worked at a weekend or into the evening but I have certainly not put pressure on myself to work at full capacity every day I possibly could.

Look after your own wellbeing

This lesson obviously links to life balance and yet I believe deserves its own lesson too.

When working for ourselves our wellbeing is even more important. I certainly don’t get any income if I’m ill and unable to work.

Mind, body, emotions and spirit all need to be nurtured – I won’t say much more on this although it is something I speak often here on LinkedIn about and manages to find its way into most workshops – whether procurement workshops for Future Purchasing as an associate or my own soft skills and mindset sessions.

It may also explain why I am an associate for Headtorch who offer programmes to help organisations build a positive mental health culture.

Learn to say no, and say it often

Here I may disagree with some people’s advice.

Money is not enough of a reason to prostitute yourself by saying yes to something you know will compromise any of the lessons mentioned here. You can try if you want but your inner wisdom’s displeasure will make itself self-known one way or another.

Which might mean saying no to work: you don’t enjoy; are not an expert in; where there’s a culture that doesn’t support life balance; the wellbeing of individuals and so on.

NOTHING is worth saying yes to if it seriously and negatively impacts your life.

That said, that might mean getting really clear that you’re prepared to sell your house if things don’t work out – something that resonated in the post earlier this week.

Learn to say yes, and say it often

The opposite it also true – in the paths and destinations poem there’s a line that says

Other paths: A means of getting to a better vantage point. To higher ground. To enable the observation of all possible destinations currently unseen.

The insight here is that it is really easy to stand at a vantage point that is familiar, known and only shows you what you already know. Or you can make a different choice and say yes to moving to an even higher vantage point that offers a view of destinations, options and opportunities currently unseen.

It usually requires a yes to get over any resistance to reach that higher vantage point. My do something different every day for a month challenge supports the development of saying yes and also helps with dealing with the unexpected and increases our ability to adapt.

Expect the unexpected

Life will throw you curved balls, the beast from the east will descend, seeds will fail to germinate, the birds might eat every seed that dares to show itself and so on.

As I wrote in the introduction to my book – trying to control life is like trying to control the weather. We can only pay attention to the forecast and ensure we have clothing and other tools to help us deal with what weather arrives.

And then repeat that strategy the next day, and the next.

Develop a support network – for mind, body, heart and soul

You might manage to do some of it on your own but eventually you’ll need support even if it’s for accountancy and other administrative tasks.

Judith Keys my wonderful business support manager has written an outsourcing guide if that’s something you’re ready to think about at this time. There’s certainly very niche support out there at the moment including for: marketing, sales, content writing, social media, pitch preparation (written and presented) and so on.

Having other people working on your business for you will help keep you accountable, develop your business, and allow you to concentrate on what you are good at, at the same time as allowing others to do the same for you.

Support networks aren’t just for your business though. For example, my personal trainer has been part of my support network for 14 years! My cat for 22 years!

Don’t be afraid to adapt

“Alison I love that you will try things and if they don’t work out you just move on to the next thing” was something my graphics guy said to me many years ago.

He’s right - I’ve tried many things over the years – the purchasing coach, passion in life, passion in business, joy in the unexpected, and zag when others zig just to name a few.

What I would say is they all had the same underlying why – to help people to overcome their blocks and to get back on track. They were simply different ways of articulating this.

Interestingly the one aspect that never went away has been Landscaping Your Life (LYL) – using nature’s landscapes as metaphors to help traverse the paths and destinations in your life. It may have been hidden from view for a time and yet it’s always been there.

Since LYL is a toolkit that is very well suited to dealing with post lockdown problems and challenges it’s an area I will be focusing on for the rest of 2021.

I’ve even got a shiny new website that went live this week.

Here’s to the next 15 years.

What of these 15 lessons resonated the most with you, and what action can you take to ensure it helps you to demolish a block(s) to your business success?

Do get in touch if you’re interested in the coaching, training and speaking available to help your team identify the blocks to their success and get back on track.

Alison Smith, Landscaping your Life, www.alisonsmith.co

Do pop along and have a look at the new website – sign up for the newsletter, to receive updates when I write a blog, find out more about my book, or find out about some of the exciting new developments using the poems I’ve written to help teams to identify and demolish the blocks to business success.

We’ve also made available three PDFs to download to help you get back on track if you: can’t see the wood for the trees; are stuck in a rut; or are going round in circles.

Do follow me on LinkedIn to be kept up to date with weekly LinkedIn Lives, and a new series of Landscaping Your Life Podcasts interviewing guests about the paths and destinations in their lives using the P&D’s poem as a basis for the conversation.

If vlogs are more your thing then why not follow my YouTube channel with playlists for vlogs in a wetsuit, from PT, the poems and using nature as our mirror.

#backontrack #businesssuccess #mindset #success #problemsolving #insight #nature #teamworking #selfemployed #smallbusinessowner