After half a dozen tests recently, my physician could find no reason for a symptom I complained about and suggested (to my horror), “external stress.” To put it gently, I did not need a calculator to do the math. I’m a veteran of four startups. Stress is so commonplace that I don’t even mention it anymore; it’s just part of the terrain.
Next day, on a run-of-the-mill 6:40am flight (yes, that’s ironic,) I clacked out an email to a journalist who had requested a topical quote from me. As I wrote, I realized that it was I who needed to heed my own rant.
If I could tell every entrepreneur one thing, it would be the novel reality that we define our lives, create our success, and earn our fortunes by deciding what we are not going to do.
In working with entrepreneurs over the years, I have realized that almost none need worry about motivation. Instead, most of us need tools for moderating our motivation and focusing it on what matters.
Priorities compete and the criteria continually change, even daily in many cases. And there will always be an endless stream of opportunity. (“Opportunity” is what you call work in the startup world.)
Since we’re hyper-motivated and since the work will never stop appearing, more than 99% of entrepreneurs spend their careers caught up in the momentum of administrivia, the continual whir of perfunctory tasks that blind us to the essence of why we began our businesses in the first place. The only possible result is burn out and disillusionment.
But this is all chatter without some tangible guidelines to put into practice. So here are the ones that have emerged for me over two decades in business.
(1) Don’t love your business.
Love your family. Enjoy your workday. But your business does not love you and you must never pursue that unrequited affair. The advice to do something you love is fine. But if you make the well-intentioned mistake of loving your business, you’re sunk. Although your business stems from a craft that you love, you must delineate between your craft and your company. Your craft may be your passion, but remember that your company is a math exercise in which you make rational decisions based on sound economics.
(2) Keep a mentor.
Finishing my second decade in my own businesses, I would still never be without a mentor. You need a reality check and those men and women a few years further along the path can provide it better than anyone. Intending no harm, your mate and friends will unfortunately tell you only what you want to hear. So find a business person whose career you want to mirror and meet with them regularly.
(3) Leaving work is good business.
The beginning of the end is announced with the phrase “My business is my life.” If your business is your life, then you have no life with which to energize your business. Last week, when I asked 2-year-old Samantha if she wanted to carve pumpkins, she replied “No, I have to go to work.” Ouch. How many times did she have to hear that before repeating it? To test whether your operation is designed correctly, take the battery out of your cell phone for 24 hours and see if your business is still there when you get back. If it is not, then it was not a business. If you cannot leave the office, shop, or plant, then either the system is badly designed or else your ego is unchecked (or both!) Go home.
(4) Have a deadline.
Require your business to be accountable to you. Set a deadline by which it must be stable, then profitable, then self-sustaining without you. Otherwise, your business owns you instead of vice versa. If it cannot turn right-side up in a reasonable amount of time, then it is not a valid business concept. If this stings, refer to rule #1.
(5) Remember: there is something after this.
Without an exit strategy, your business is just a job. There is nothing wrong with this if a job is everything you want. But for the many who wish for a high quality of life stemming from a home run, continually remember that this is a chapter, not a permanent identity. Remembering that there is something after this will prompt you to consistently observe the relationship of your business to the market, your other goals, and the horizon. And observing those relationships is the substance of that elusive thing we call balance.
As I reflect on how important these guidelines are to me personally, I remember that this year brings me to be 83% of the age my wonderful father was when he worked himself to an early death.
My hope for the coming year is that literature will gain importance compared with publications on economics and business wisdom. That family will steal focus from networking. And that ‘external stress’ will fail to become a part of daily vocabulary.
And I’ve asked my friends to hold me to it.