Microbusiness Mentor

I’ve found that many people take the technology that’s meant to make them work smarter, and simply increase their workload so they end up working even harder.

Entrepreneurs and corporate executives and working professionals are connected to their work 24/7 because they and their “crackberries” are turned on 24/7.

People are multitasking to the point of losing their short term memory and concentration. I experienced short term memory loss 5 years ago from multitasking! (Now I have short term memory loss from being a mom, but that’s another story…)

The few times I went to conferences, most people are texting instead of listening to the speakers – talk about wasted time and money of attending such an event when you’re not paying full attention.

I don’t run a global organization so I can’t speak to the international travel demands, but when I became a parent, I made the conscious decision to cut back 90% of my old business activities and that meant 95% of any travel. Yes, it also meant a 90% cut in my revenue because my old revenue model wasn’t working for my life choices.

Now I’m looking at ways to change my business model and sticking to my life priorities is forcing me to innovate.

In the past I’ve dealt with my workaholic tendencies by:

• scheduling in family time
• hard stop. meaning, ‘puter’s off. phone’s off. leaving the premise i.e. office/home office
• simply deciding that no amount of fame or fortune would be worth being alone by myself with no one to share and enjoy with.

Now what I’ve done include:

• 100% remote conferencing or virtual conferencing/skype
• changing my biz model to increase $ per work hour effort
• simply saying no to projects that conflict with my life priorities. Difficult? Heck Yes especially in today’s economy!!! Doable? Yes! Worth the trade-off? Absolutely.
• hard stop on Fridays. meaning, leave premises on Fridays to prevent temptation to work. Phone is off. Only email check during the morning before heading out the door to spend the day with my son. Full engagement, giving my boy full attention. No multitasking.

I have to admit that LinkedIn discussion groups, including one I created on Personal Leadership/Conscious Following have started to suck up a lot of my time mainly because I really enjoy them. Soon I’ll need to ration my time on these groups!

Jane Chin