One of the most common reasons that people start their own business is to work for themselves. But all too often, being your own boss turns into becoming your own employee.

In this article, the Panthera team will explain why you should be working on your business, rather than for your business.

What does working on your business look like?

It is a lot easier to strive for something when you know what it actually looks what that something looks like. Here are some sure-fire signs that you are doing the right thing and that you’re actually working on your business.

You are delegating tasks

If you are the managing director of a company, then you should be actively managing your team. It sounds obvious, but it seems that quite a few business owners forget this.

One of the main reasons that people fall into this trap is that they think that they should do everything themselves. This is either because they don’t trust their staff members to do the job correctly (which is an issue) or they think that they can do a better job themselves.

By delegating tasks, you are not only demonstrating that you trust your staff members, but you are also freeing up more time for yourself to work on other elements of your business.

You can maintain a clear picture of your business

When you work on your business, you should be maintaining a bird’s eye view of everything that is happening on the ground. This is so that you aren’t neglecting certain parts of your business. Distancing yourself (in the correct way) means that you have the most objective view of your business as possible.

What does working for your business look like?

Here are some signs that you are spending too much time working for your business, along with the downsides that this could bring:

You don’t have time to expand

Growth is one of the most exciting parts of running a business, however, there are many factors that need to be factored in if you are to do it successfully.

When you are working for your business, all of the time that would be spent on deciding when you should expand is being spent on completing the tasks that you should be delegating to your workforce.

Your plans are confused

Not only is it more difficult to devise a plan when your head is buried in work, but actually acting on these plans becomes borderline impossible.

For example, if you have set yourself the objective of increasing the amount of social media interactions your business has by 10% over the next month but you are worried about your cashflow, you will spend all of your time chasing invoices rather than achieving the goals you have set. This can lead to empty goal-setting and a lack of direction in your business.

Why you should be working on your business rather than for your business

You can work better and faster towards achieving your aims

This leads on from our previous point. When you are able to assess what needs working on in your business, set a goal, and go on to achieve it, your business can survive a lot more easily and expand a lot more efficiently.

This helps you tackle your weak points and target specific areas of your business that need improvement. Additionally, you can better lay out your expectations for the future by properly setting goals.

You can work to your strengths

By delegating tasks to your employees, you can ensure that each task is being handled by the person with the most relevant skills. And once again, it frees up your time. As your business day becomes busier and busier, your time becomes more valuable.

We can help

If you would like to discuss anything that we mentioned in this article, our team will be happy to help. We also offer a professional accounting service to business owners across the country. So, if you are looking to save both time and money through accounting, get in touch with our team.

Call us today on 01235 768 561 or drop us an email to enquiries@pantheraaccounting.com – we’ll be back in touch with you shortly.