Reclaim your time: 5 work-life balance tips for entrepreneurs
Work life balance tips for entrepreneurs, by an entrepreneur. Get ready to set boundaries and reclaim your time.
Let’s go back to the beginning. Why did you become an entrepreneur in the first place? I’m guessing that it wasn’t so that you could work longer hours and be more stressed out. If you’re like me, you were probably hoping for freedom to focus on what you love along with the flexibility to prioritize your own mental health.
Mental health was a big part of the initial “why” behind Author Brand Studio. After watching both parents suffer from cancer at the same time, losing a parent AND working a demanding job, my mental health was totally shot. I was burned out, and I knew that I needed to leave the corporate grind. I learned that it actually was possible to make good money doing something you love and uphold your personal boundaries. When I left my job and started this business, the boundary I resolved I'd never cross was running my mental health into the ground again.
But then, a few years into owning my business, I noticed my free time slipping away. Because I loved the work I was doing to create beautiful brands for amazing clients, I felt the pull to work more and be more available to clients in ways that went against the boundaries I had initially set. It's been a journey of continually returning to that core value I set for myself so many years ago (cue "it's been 84 years" meme from The Titanic) and fine-tuning what works best for me. I’ve learned that being your own boss affords you an incredible amount of freedom, and it is up to you whether you use that freedom to set boundaries or let your business take over your life.
Do you want to work to live, or live to work? If you’re ready to prioritize your mental health so that your business works in service of your life (and not the other way around), keep reading for my best work-life balance tips for entrepreneurs!
1. Become an expert on your own capacity.
Boundaries are the key to preventing burnout. Having good boundaries with your work starts with knowing yourself and knowing what you need.
Every entrepreneur has a different capacity. Some feel great about working 60-hour weeks, others need to stick to 20-hour weeks. Some can take on dozens of clients; others prefer to work with a select few clients who they can give their undivided attention.
The only way to know your own capacity is to pay attention to your energy level and your mood. If you feel energized by having a lot of clients, then it may work for you to keep a lot of projects going at once. If you feel stressed out by multiple projects or need margin time in order to do your best work, it may be wise for you to take on less.
Most of the time, when we’re taking on too much and saying “yes” too often, it’s coming from a scarcity mindset. When we start to believe that opportunities for work are limited, we’ll grasp for clients that were never meant for us in the first place.
But when we work from a place of abundance, believing that we have enough time, enough work and enough money, it becomes easier to say no and let things go in order to honor our own capacity.
I’m the kind of person who needs margin and breathing space in my life. Once I made peace with that fact, I was able to build my business in a way that was sustainable for my long-term wellbeing.
I carefully consider my workload (and my team's workload as well) when taking on new projects, often working with clients to choose start dates that are mutually beneficial. I've had to learn to be comfortable with letting people know when I'm able to start a new project, which is usually several weeks in advance, and be okay if they say no and move on to work with someone who's available sooner.
One other way that I like to maximize my capacity is to plan my tasks on a month-by-month basis, depending on what I have going on in a given month and how much energy I expect to have. I always do vision casting and creative work earlier in the month, when I know I’m going to be more fresh and inspired. Later in the month, when I know I’ll start to have less energy, I plan to do internal business development tasks that require less creative energy.
2. Set clear work-life boundaries with your time.
Most of us are trained from the time we’re young that our time is not our own. From age five or six to eighteen, we spent seven hours a day in school. In a full-time work situation, we worked a minimum of 40 hours a week, spending the majority of our daylight hours on the job.
Unlearning these work structures is tough work and so is time management for many entrepreneurs. But the beauty of being self-employed is that you get to work when it works best for you.
As a business owner, you get to set your hours and your days “in the office.”
For the first few years of my business, working five days a week was my norm. But as we’ve gotten busier and maintaining my boundaries gets trickier, I recently decided to close the studio one day a week, on Fridays. This allows me time to rest, recharge, or catch up on solo work if I choose without any pressure of emails, interruptions or calls.
I share this example to show that your business boundaries should work for you, not against you—and that if something that worked well a year ago isn’t working anymore, there’s no shame in making a change.
I’m also a huge advocate of protecting your time, especially if you do creative work. I always set aside 11-1:30 or 2 as my hours to get work done, and having these hours unavailable for calls on my Calendly makes that easy.
Try this: On your calendar, block off the hours that you’re working, the hours that you’re doing quiet work and are not available for calls, and perhaps most importantly—block off the days or hours that you are NOT working at all.
If you’re anything like me, taking days off requires a lot of planning ahead. It’s easy for entrepreneurs to get so immersed in their work that they never take a vacation, especially since we don’t exactly have vacation days or PTO. Let this be your reminder that you will do more inspired work if you are refreshed and rested. Take a Friday off here and there, and be sure to plan at least a few weeks unplugged every year.
Ultimately, the boundaries you set with your time teach people how to work with you.
If you answer calls that aren’t scheduled, people will keep calling you. If you send emails on evenings or weekends, people will email you on evenings and weekends. But when you uphold your boundaries, the people you’re working with will get the message loud and clear.
3. Over-communicate expectations and boundaries on the front end.
You may have just read that last section and think “Amy, that sounds nice but I have clients/employees who need me every day of every week, so I really can’t unplug.”
This is where clear communication comes in: Whenever there is a contract being signed, your availability should be part of that contract. As an entrepreneur, you have the power to dictate when you are available, when you are not, what you are doing for a client, what you are not doing and when you expect to be paid.
Every time Author Brand Studio kicks off a branding project for a new client, we send them this detailed page that outlines how and when we work. By communicating this on the front end, we create a better experience both for ourselves and for our clients.
Here’s the beautiful thing about setting clear boundaries with clients: It helps them to feel taken care of, because we’ve thought ahead for them.
As Brené Brown says, “Clear is kind. Unclear is unkind.”
Communicating with your clients on the front end—and as you go—ensures that they’re never left wondering what you’re working on or what comes next. And it protects you (in most cases) from issues like scope creep or excessive emailing.
4. Prioritize what you love outside of work.
I’ve noticed that a lot of entrepreneurs, especially those of us who do creative work, can forget to prioritize the creative outlets we do just for the sheer joy of it.
If you monetize all of your talents, everything will become work.
This is the surest path to entrepreneur burnout.
There is so much beauty and peace to be found in expressing yourself creatively without any expectation attached. I’ve really been enjoying punch needling lately, and it’s a great way for me to take a break from my work and to remind myself that my creativity is important even when it’s not bringing in revenue.
I don’t know what that creative outlet is for you—maybe it’s watercolor painting, salsa dancing, gardening, or photography—but I encourage you to create space for your hobbies. They will refill your creative well and make you better in your work.
5. Find people who can support you.
Being a solopreneur is great. But here’s the truth: No one can do it all on their own!
I would guess that most of us are taking on too much and doing too much of it ourselves.
The first step to take is to automate as much as you can. Schedule social posts in advance, invest in a call-scheduling program like Calendly or create email campaigns that you can repurpose.
After that, it may be time to think about adding more people to your team. One of the best business decisions I ever made was proactively hiring a part-time designer before I fully felt like I needed help. This allowed me to scale Author so much faster than I could have otherwise. The voice of fear in my head kept saying “What will happen when business slows down?” but instead the opposite happened—I needed to increase her hours because we were winning so many new clients! Once I had the help, I couldn’t imagine doing it all on my own anymore.
Maybe it’s time for you to hire a part-time virtual assistant or to contract a writer who can ghost write your social media posts. Maybe you’ve been building your own website and DIY-ing your brand for too long, and you need to invest in a full-service branding agency. (Hey, that’s what we do!)
At Author Brand Studio, we love working with busy entrepreneurs to take branding off of their plate to create a beautiful, cohesive brand that your ideal customer won’t be able to resist.
We manage all of it for you from start to finish so that it requires minimal time and effort on your end, allowing you to focus on what you do best. Take a look at our About Page to learn about how we work. If you align with these values, we may be a good fit for you.
Click here to schedule your first free consultation with me, Amy. Let’s see what we can take off your plate!
