Coaching Your Business To The Next Level Series Part 8 Work Life Balance

Writen by Leanne Hoagland-Smith

During the last several weeks, the six following tips have been offered from the original article that appeared in early March: Top 7 Tips to Avoid the Top 7 Mistakes that Small Business Owners Make. The other articles are:

• Tip #1 - Work on your business not in your business – Ezine Articles #156382
• Tip #2 - Assess your business both externally and internally – Ezine Articles #158170
• Tip #3 - Develop a strategic plan – Ezine Articles #159068
• Tip #4 - Work your plan – Ezine Articles #160132
• Tip #5 - Invest in your people – Ezine Articles #160887
• Tip #6 - Pay yourself first – Ezine Articles #163843

The seventh tip for many is the most important because of mistakes one through six.

Tip #7 - Keep balance between your personal and professional lives

Mistake: You are too busy to take the time with your family or friends. By attending to your work life balance and your personal and professional development, you will see incredible results happen within your business.

Through the executive coaching programs that I use with my clients, I have learned that for many of these highly energized and motivated individuals a social life is running from one networking event or volunteer organization to another. In some cases, these dynamic and driven entrepreneurs have actually taken a part time job just for the social interaction.

A truly successful life is really a balance between the different aspects or areas of what makes us a complete human being. Visualize for a moment your life as a wheel continually traveling down the road of life. If the wheel is balanced, the ride is smooth, but if the wheel is out of balance, the ride becomes very, very bumpy and consequently quite uncomfortable. Then our life begins to suffer and we embrace misery and scarcity before joy and abundance.

Now take a few moments of time to assess yourself. Grab a piece of paper and draw a fairly large circle. Divide the circle in half and then in quarters and then into eighths. Think of this as a clock and in the area near one-oclock write the word Career. Going clockwise fill in the next spaces as follows:

• Family
• Purpose/Passion
• Mental
• Financial
• Social
• Spiritual/Ethics
• Physical

This is just one example of a Life Wheel. What makes this one somewhat unique, is there exists a counter balances within the wheel. For example, Career is counter balanced against Financial and Mental is opposite Physical. What I have also learned in working with my small business owners and business executives is that keeping balance within the wheel is important and what may throw off that balance is two related areas.

For example, to continually keep up with business, the entrepreneur may spend hours reading and improving her mental development. However, in doing so, her physical development or health suffers. Or, the executive uses business social events and forgets about his family events.

This is why counterbalance is critical to the over all work life balance within the Wheel.

As mentioned before, these 7 tips will help catapult your small business in warp time. Of course, if you like where you are now, then ignore these tips. However, can you be sure your competition will also ignore these tips? And what would happen, if they just implemented one tip less alone all 7?

Leanne Hoagland-Smith coaches individuals, small businesses and large organizations to double performance in warp time. As the small business coach, Leanne shares the Secrets of Success and provides a free monthly newsletter. Please feel free to contact Leanne at 219.759.5601.

The Top 7 Tips to Avoid the Top 7 Mistakes that Small Business Owners Make is currently being expanded into an E-Book to be published in early April 2006. Contact Leanne to reserve your copy now.

One quick question,What would the value be to you to overcome that one ongoing business or personal challenge that is keepig you from being successful?Then, take a risk and give a call at 219.759.5601 to experience incredible success.