What Is Small Business Burnout?

As a small business owner, you end up juggling to keep all your balls in the air. You often have to do the work that your customers are paying you for. You have to keep your website updated (you do, don’t you?). You have to decide on how to market your business, products or services. You have to find and vet contractors, if you go that route, or employees, if you decide to hire.

It’s up to you to get a logo, use it everywhere and protect it. It’s on you to network, advertise and probably even keep the books. Solopreneurs face a danger of small business burnout. In fact, the numbers of businesses that fail are sobering:

• 18.4 percent of first-year businesses fail.
• Almost half of all new businesses don’t make it five years.
• More than 65 percent of businesses fail after 10 years.

How Can I Avoid Small Business Burnout?

Knowing your limits is great way to approach your business. While you want to succeed — everyone does — you can’t push yourself so hard and so long without physical, intellectual and emotional repercussions. Still, that’s easy to write and more difficult to implement. So here are some tips to protect your business’s greatest asset, namely yourself:

• Guard your time off. Everyone needs downtime. You can’t be a solopreneur 24/7. Take time away from the business and don’t encroach on it. Tell your customers, as well as your employees, that you’re closed on Sunday, for example, and stick to it. Don’t answer the phone. Don’t check email. Unless you have an emergency service, it can wait until the next day.
• Be conscious of how you spend your time. Spend your time doing the things that most help your business. Spend your time doing the things that only you can do. If you’re truly the most valuable asset of your business, make sure you use your time for the highest and best purpose. You don’t — and can’t — do everything yourself.
• Delegate your less-important activities. When a task needs to be done, but you don’t need to do it, find someone else to do it for you. Delegate it to an employee or find a third-party contractor to do it for you. Things like creating your marketing materials or monthly newsletter are perfect for someone to do while you work on more vital projects, such as your business plan. This tip may be the best way to avoid small business burnout.
• Streamline your business operations. If you have to do everything yourself, make it as simple for yourself as possible. That may mean downsizing your products and services. That may mean making your price list more standard (and sticking to it). That may mean focusing on only one or two social media sites. That may mean blogging monthly instead of weekly. These sacrifices may pay off in more time for the other business projects that are paying the rent.
• Review and prioritize your time. Every few months, step back and review how you’re spending your time. Is something important slipping through the cracks? Do you need to focus on other things? This is the time to evaluate how you’re spending your time, to make sure your business is running smoothly, and you’re not overworking yourself.

If you suffer small business burnout, your business is doomed. Don’t let your endeavor become a statistic. To beat the odds and create a successful business, take care of your greatest asset: you. Protect your time and discover how best to spend the time you have.

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