Taking Care of the Nuts and Bolts of Small Business
If you’re like me, taking care of the nuts and bolts of small business can feel like work sometimes… which makes it not so fun to do.
What’s that you say, the cat needs a bath? Sounds good if it’ll get me out of doing this stuff!
There’s a certain amount of nutsy-boltsy work that needs to be done to keep your business running – things like:
- Answering email
- Paying bills
- Making phone calls
- Tracking project hours
- Invoicing clients
- Asking for referrals
When this type of work feels like work-work, it’s time to change things up.
Look deeper into each task, and ask yourself why it feels worky, and how you might reframe the conversation you’re having around that task.
I’ll give you an example: checking email feels like work-work to me. It takes me what feels like forever to read through them to see what’s important, then another millennia for me to figure out what to do about it, then I have to decide what to say in reply to the email… the process of checking email can take hours, even if I only have a few things to take care of, and it drains my energy, ruining me for other tasks until I’ve recovered.
Alternatively, if I approach checking email as not work (it’s a mindset thing), I can breeze through it quickly, see what’s important, and decide when and how I want to handle it, parking the follow up in another part of my day. The process takes about three minutes for the email once over, and I’ve got a plan for what to do next, freeing me up to do a higher value task, one that feeds my soul.
Today, try taking the work out of work, and see how you can approach things more lightly. You’ll be amazed by how much easier, and quickly, you can get your nuts and bolts taken care of.
Below are a few ideas to help you with the nuts and bolts in small business:
- Reflect on the importance of this task in keeping your business humming along. Does that improve your desire or ability to get it done?
- What are the consequences of not doing this task? List them now. How does reading the consequences change your relationship to the task?
- Can you make the task easier, or more fun? Think about things like doing your writing on your phone, recording voice memos rather than typing emails, blocking off a certain time of the day that are better for the task, standing in your kitchen when making phone calls, shifting your mindset, etc.
After you’ve tried several approaches, notice which ones make things feel easier, and use them on more tasks until it feels like all the things on your list are doable. Taking care of the nuts and bolts of your business means more ease, less cat baths!
Enjoy working on these foundations in your business. And if you want some company along the way, we have a group for that! You can check it out here: https://kristinecarey.com/community.
