I’m sorry that this week’s weekly roundup is late, but I hope you’ll still enjoy reading it nonetheless. I went on a short holiday with my cousins to Barcelona over the weekend, which actually provided me with a great opportunity to reflect on myself and my business.
Having a team to support your business
The first thing that came to mind was a sense of relief. That’s because I don’t need to worry about my clients while I’m away as I have someone to watch over all my accounts. I invested into a support team early on and I’ve never regretted that decision. It means that I have to sacrifice a bit of my own income to pay someone else, but I wouldn’t have it any other way now.
Having a network of trusted service providers, freelancers with specific skills and partners is really important for business growth . If it’s only you in your business, you’ll soon reach the limit of your time, energy, skills and other resources. Partnering with other people will allow you to do more and grow quicker!
But dealing with people isn’t always easy. While you’re building a team, there’s a fine line between being demanding and bossy and between clearly communicating what your expectations are and what success looks like for you.
Learning to be less judgemental
My holiday was really eye-opening in that I realised how judgmental people can be and how much it can hurt others. Since I moved to the UK and especially since I started running my own business, I’ve learnt a lot about being open-minded, compassionate and non-judgemental.
I’m seeing how much I’ve changed every time I meet with my friends or family from the Czech Republic. Only now I’m realising how closed-minded, prejudiced and judgemental Czech people can be (I know that this is a huge generalisation as I can tell only based on my own experience). Be it commenting on the way people dress, how they look or behave, what choices they make in their lives, my Czech friends are really opinionated and brutal in their judgements.
Later on I realised that this affects their own insecurities, as they believe that everyone else will judge them too. And they might! But in the end, it doesn’t matter what other people think about you. The only opinion that should matter is your own. Very often we project our own thoughts about ourselves onto other people to avoid the harsh truth, that we are our own worst critic.
Finding time to live a healthy life
I’ve mentioned this topic in one of my earlier roundups, but I have to get back to it as I think that I’m still far from conquering this side of running a business – maintaining healthy eating habits!
I used to be really good with never skipping breakfast, having homemade lunches and light dinners. Since I started freelancing, all my previous routines have been destroyed and I’m scrambling to find some balance. I still exercise regularly, but with my busy schedule I’m finding it hard to eat properly.
The good thing about exercising in the morning is the feeling of ‘raaaaa’ afterwards, when you feel that you can conquer the world! That’s the best productivity booster that I’ve ever experienced. Unfortunately, exercising in the morning is still my weakness, though.
Do you have any tips on how to train yourself to be a ‘morning’ person and build healthier habits?
Book Corner
On my way to Barcelona last week, I started listening to Return on Relationship: Relationships Are the New Currency: Honor Them, Invest in Them, and Start Measuring Your ROR by Ted Rubin.
“ROR: Return on Relationship™, #RonR… simply put the value that is accrued by a person or brand due to nurturing a relationship. ROI is simple $’s and cents. ROR is the value (both perceived and real) that will accrue over time through connection, trust, loyalty, recommendations and sharing.”
Recently, I’m finding that lots of business owners still think that marketing means advertising and that social media is just another challenge to broadcast their message to the masses. This book explains simply and easily the benefit of building relationships and focusing on customer engagement.
Have you read Return on Relationship? I’d love to know what you thought about this book!
