A Walk in the Woods for An Entrepreneur
A Walk in the Woods for An Entrepreneur
But this desire to keep the business within your personal domain creates the danger that you might become insular and lose the all-important sense of balance. Every waking moment seems to be part of your business. You worry over leaving the house for fear that the phone will ring and you will miss out on great opportunities.
Yet, there is great value in leaving the house, even if you have nowhere to go. It gives you a chance to stand apart from your business, perhaps even to think about something else.
I know one entrepreneur who has staff members in every nook and cranny of his suburban house. And every morning he leaves the house and drives somewhere. He thinks about his life. He thinks about what he should have done yesterday or what problems he didn~{!/~}t solve. Then he drives home, and arrives at the ~{!0~}office~{!1~} at the same time as his employees.
Helen Solomons, a former corporate executive who founded her own human resources firm, Harrison Associates, in 1986, believes that one of the best things about independence is that it allows you to follow your own style of work. ~{!0~}I was ~{!.~}on stage~{!/~} all the time when I was a corporate executive,~{!1~} she says. ~{!0~}I hated it. I wore clothes that didn~{!/~}t feel right to me. People worshipped my position, but I had no idea of whether they respected me.~{!1~}
Her most recent venture, a computer software system that helps companies to manage telecommuters, is a logical outgrowth of her interest in allowing people to work productively in their own ways. It has been extremely successful. ~{!0~}I~{!/~}ve succeeded in everything I~{!/~}ve set out to do,~{!1~} she says.
Part of the freedom she feels now that she is her own boss is that she can wake up in the morning, see that it~{!/~}s a beautiful day, and give herself some time off. ~{!0~}In a company, the boss often feels that if he can~{!/~}t see you at your office, you must be goofing off,~{!1~} she says. ~{!0~}They don~{!/~}t understand that employees learn to mentally leave their job by staring at the computer and a spreadsheet.~{!1~}
It~{!/~}s better, though, to escape into fresh air and sunshine. Helen lives near a large park, criss-crossed with hiking trails, and she frequently leaves her home office to take a five-mile walk. She believes the time is highly productive. She thinks about what she has been doing, and how to be better at what she does. She doesn~{!/~}t go out on the trail with an agenda; one of the benefits of getting out of familiar settings and moving around is that you jolt your thinking and get out of intellectual ruts.
~{!0~}Very often,~{!1~} she says, ~{!0~}I come back from a walk in the woods with the solution to a problem that had been a terrible puzzle.~{!1~}
A Walk in the Woods for An Entrepreneur - To learn more about this author, visit James Chan's Website.
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One of the benefits of being a entrepreneur is that the commute is short. For me, it~{!/~}s just a single flight of stairs. I know others who live and work in the same room, and still others who, as their business and staff have expanded, have created offices in the basement, the garage, and the garden shed as they have tried to keep home and business together.
But this desire to keep the business within your personal domain creates the danger that you might become insular and lose the all-important sense of balance. Every waking moment seems to be part of your business. You worry over leaving the house for fear that the phone will ring and you will miss out on great opportunities.
Yet, there is great value in leaving the house, even if you have nowhere to go. It gives you a chance to stand apart from your business, perhaps even to think about something else.
I know one entrepreneur who has staff members in every nook and cranny of his suburban house. And every morning he leaves the house and drives somewhere. He thinks about his life. He thinks about what he should have done yesterday or what problems he didn~{!/~}t solve. Then he drives home, and arrives at the ~{!0~}office~{!1~} at the same time as his employees.
Helen Solomons, a former corporate executive who founded her own human resources firm, Harrison Associates, in 1986, believes that one of the best things about independence is that it allows you to follow your own style of work. ~{!0~}I was ~{!.~}on stage~{!/~} all the time when I was a corporate executive,~{!1~} she says. ~{!0~}I hated it. I wore clothes that didn~{!/~}t feel right to me. People worshipped my position, but I had no idea of whether they respected me.~{!1~}
Her most recent venture, a computer software system that helps companies to manage telecommuters, is a logical outgrowth of her interest in allowing people to work productively in their own ways. It has been extremely successful. ~{!0~}I~{!/~}ve succeeded in everything I~{!/~}ve set out to do,~{!1~} she says.
Part of the freedom she feels now that she is her own boss is that she can wake up in the morning, see that it~{!/~}s a beautiful day, and give herself some time off. ~{!0~}In a company, the boss often feels that if he can~{!/~}t see you at your office, you must be goofing off,~{!1~} she says. ~{!0~}They don~{!/~}t understand that employees learn to mentally leave their job by staring at the computer and a spreadsheet.~{!1~}
It~{!/~}s better, though, to escape into fresh air and sunshine. Helen lives near a large park, criss-crossed with hiking trails, and she frequently leaves her home office to take a five-mile walk. She believes the time is highly productive. She thinks about what she has been doing, and how to be better at what she does. She doesn~{!/~}t go out on the trail with an agenda; one of the benefits of getting out of familiar settings and moving around is that you jolt your thinking and get out of intellectual ruts.
~{!0~}Very often,~{!1~} she says, ~{!0~}I come back from a walk in the woods with the solution to a problem that had been a terrible puzzle.~{!1~}
A Walk in the Woods for An Entrepreneur - To learn more about this author, visit James Chan's Website.
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Cheryl MatthynssensCheryl is a life skills coach, licensed Chemical Dependency Counselor and a 20 year entrepreneur. Cheryl's dedication to achieving a life of balance led to her expanding her teaching from the simple managing of life's daily challenges to adding financial well being as well. A direct marketer with DrinkACT, she is gaining ground in the online community with her concepts of making sure business owners, entreprenuers and employees have well rounded life styles. She opened up a small affiliate site - The Balance Guide- to help others find resources for mental and emotional well being. Visit Cheryl's blog to see more of the diversity beyond business she has began offering online at www.thebalanceguide.blogspot.com - Visit Cheryl Matthynssens's Website |
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Stephanie RobeyStephanie Robey is President and CoFounder of Pivot Positive, LLC - an Internet marketing business focused on helping people start work at home ventures. Previously, she was employed at The Search Agency with over 20 years experience in graphic design and 10 years experience in online marketing. She was responsible for launching the Conversion Path Optimization (CPO) unit where she and her team have conducted hundreds of optimization tests for online companies across multiple verticals. She is a successful entrepreneur having started and sold 2 companies and remains on the board of directors of the third, PhotoSpin.com Stephanie began her career in the direct marketing realm creating and producing direct mail for many of the major cable television companies and directly attributes her understanding of Internet marketing to those early offline experiences. Stephanie is a graduate of San Diego State University with a BFA in Graphic Arts and also holds an Executive MBA from the Graziadio School of Business and Management at Pepperdine University. Read Steph's Blog Meet Steph and Dave Sign up for our Free 7-Day BootCamp: Self Employed & Rich - Visit Stephanie Robey's Website |
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Jay Kubassek(Jay's Full Bio: EvanCarmichael.com/jaykubassek) In five years, Canadian-born entrepreneur Jay Kubassek went from selling mufflers at a Midas franchise to revolutionizing Internet marketing with the 2004 launch of CarbonCopyPRO, a online marketing education company, now worth over $20 million with customers in over 160 countries.
As an independent film producer, his upstart film fund Aliquot Films is currently producing a films with Spike Lee and Abel Fererra (starring Ethan Hawke and Dennis Hopper.)
Jay's entrepreneurial spirit is irrepressible. He’s the owner of five companies, a professional speaker and trainer, international real estate developer/investor, extreme sport enthusiast and emerging philanthropist. Jay resides in NYC with his wife Jamie, son Milo and dog Cooper. Visit Jay's official website: www.JayKubassek.com - Visit Jay Kubassek's Website |
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