How Small Businesses End Up Miserable For Everyone

I remember starting my first business with excitement and vision about how great it was going to be.

Not only were we going to make money and create our own freedom, we were also going to have loads of fun and look forward to going to work every day.

But about three years that fun aspect started to disappear for me.

The business started feeling like a stress, like a responsibility.

It started taking more energy from me than it gave.

And as it got more stressful for me it got more stressful for my team too.

My experience since founding Better Happy and working with other owners, leaders and teams shows me that work feeling more like a stress than a joy is common, across the board - for everyone.

The data shows us that too.

Although the image above shows UK employee engagement and productivity levels from 2012 - 2016 the current picture isn't much better.

In the latest Gallup report UK employee engagement levels are 10%, one of the lowest scores in the whole of Europe.

But it's not just employee that aren't happy at work...

Business owners are highly stressed to. Year on year different studies from different organisations come to the same conclusions. Over half of small business owners are suffering poor mental health.

And again...

Multiple sources are showing high levels of burnout amongst managers .

So what we know is:

- Most employees are disengaged at work?

- Most business owners are struggling with their mental health

- Increasing percentages of managers are burnt out or at risk of burnout

When it's happening across the board we can understand work not being enjoyable isn't due to evil bosses or managers (most of the time)... but due to human emotion.

I didn't choose to start feeling more stressed than energised by my business... that would be silly.

But looking back I know I engaged in behaviours that led to it.

Why did I do that??

Because of emotion.

Generally owners, managers and employees are wired differently and have different motivations.

Those thinking patterns and motivations have tons of advantages for the business but when left to run free they create problems.

Owners constantly come up with new and exciting ideas. Although these ideas can be good for the business they also damage consistency.

Managers want to please owners and do a good job so they take on too much and don't push back on the owner.?

This leads to them being overwhelmed, stressed and busy.

Employees want to do a good job and can see tons of ways the business could run better but - as managers are so busy trying to juggle too many tasks - nobody has the time to listen to them.

Employees end up feeling like nothing more like cogs in the system and become disengaged.

What fascinates me the most is that all of these people end up unhappy BECAUSE THEY CARE.

The owner wants the business to be incredible that's why they are always coming up with ideas.

The manager wants the business to be successful that's why they say yes to too much.

The employee wants to contribute to making the business better that's why they want to be heard.

But the those human emotions get in the way of this happening effectively or at all.

Good news - a little bit of discipline and systemisation has a transformational impact on this.

Here's what has to happen:

Owners have to commit to working with their teams to PRIORITISE the best ideas that their is CAPACITY to pursue.

Managers have to become masters at understanding capacity and managing owners expectations whilst driving growth.?

This requires developing the confidence to say no, coaching teams and holding teams accountable to results.

Employees need to be open to being coached and moving outside of their comfort zones to pursue new and better things.

All of the above doesn't happen on autopilot.

It takes time and discipline but the payoff is a better business that you and your team enjoy - what could be more worthy of some time and discipline??

If you're not sure where to start head over to the Better Happy SELPH scorecard and find out what your current cultural strengths and weaknesses are.

From there you can use our free resources available HERE to start making improvements right away and start building a business that grows and is enjoyable.