As a business owner, do you feel fulfilled by your work or consistently overwhelmed? How often do you feel “burnt out?” If you desire more freedom or more free time in your life, how can you be more strategic in where and how you invest your energy? You work hard and should enjoy the fruits of your labor. But if your days feels like a mad dash to beat the clock, having necessary balance in your life becomes impossible to achieve.

Hard work is an admirable trait, but work for the sake of work is a waste of your time. It is possible to run a profitable business while working less hours and enjoying more freedom. These are some of the ways in which you can reduce your workload and restore your personal time to a healthy level.

1.) Do You Have a Dream Team? 

Are you consistently clocking in long work weeks? While some circumstances may require more hours, utilizing your team members and trusting them to support you can result in one of your greatest returns on investment. 

Do you have a leadership team that strives to improve the company’s bottom line? Better yet, have you hired employees that make suggestions or recommendations on how to increase your business’ overall level of productivity? It’s impossible to do everything by yourself. So don’t! Successful leaders understand the value of hiring and working with people smarter than themselves to help them do a job right. 

2.)    Have You Established Clarity in Your Goals?  

Over 88% of business people don't accomplish their top three priorities on any day yet work well over 40 hours per week. At the end of the workday, do you feel satisfied in what you’ve accomplished or are you part of the 88% left to feel overwhelmed at the thought of all the tasks left unfinished?

Consider what distractions may be preventing you from completing your goals. By establishing your priorities ahead of time and finding solutions to streamlining the path to completing them, you won’t have to put in as many hours to get things done.

3.)    Are You Proactive or Reactive?  

Are you mindful and strategic about what kind of projects you take on or do you try and do it all? Unless there’s disciple and strategy in achieving your goals, your life becomes random and a scramble just to get by. As a business owner, you’ll never be able to control everything, all of the time. Planning ahead and carefully choosing how you utilize your hours in the day will open the door to more freedom and help you better manage the unexpected. 

Working long hours is part of being a business owner, but that does not mean it has to completely dominate your life. Implementing these ways to be more strategic about your workload will preserve your physical and mental health in the long run.