I had a meeting last week with an aspiring young entrepreneur who asked me whether there were times when I felt burned out.
It was an intriguing question because when you work at a small company or for yourself, it is difficult not to be, given the long hours that make working nine to five look like a country club existence.
Truth be told, I rarely feel burned out, although there are times when the gas tank is running near empty after a day of meetings, writing, selling and talking. There is rarely a day I feel as if I haven't been working hard the whole time.
Yet there is a difference between working really hard and being burned out. When the work is all about your success, it is different than slaving away for someone else. When you're excited about what you are doing, work doesn't seem like work, so it is not a matter of being burned out as much as being happily tired.
Entrepreneurs and small business owners still have to be cognizant about avoiding burnout, given it is so easy to work, work and work some more. Working for yourself and enjoying the spoils of your success is an excellent thing, but too much work makes Jack and Jill dull people.
So how do you avoid burnout?
The best tip is to be disciplined about not working all the time. I have fallen into a routine of working until 5 p.m., then taking time to be with family before maybe getting back to work for a couple of hours after everyone has gone to bed.
Another important technique is to have outside interests - something that was hammered home when I heard Tony Viner, the former president of Rogers Media, talk about how his late boss, Ted Rogers, had no interests or hobbies other than work and family. When you're at the helm of a cable and media conglomerate, spending all your time at work can be justified but not for the rest of us. The best way avoid burnout is to escape work and do something else - whether it's playing hockey, bridge or poker, reading a book, cooking, running, walking, or watching movies. Do something that is not only enjoyable but a complete distraction.
And here's a radical idea: Take a day off during the week or perhaps schedule a day without meetings. Give yourself permission to leisurely read the paper while drinking coffee, meet a friend for lunch, or play pick-up hockey at noon - without worrying about rushing back to the office. Maybe declare Friday a slow work day that ends when you pick up your children at school or meet a friend for a late-afternoon beer.
Truth be told, it can be difficult for entrepreneurs and small businesses owners to take their foot off the gas because there is no safety net or weekly pay cheque to rely on. That said, there are negatives to working all day. After a while, your effectiveness and productivity starts to decline because you get tired. If that happens, burnout is just around the corner.
Make sure you stop and smell the roses. It is important to realize that running your own business is not about working all the time, it is about working enough to keep moving forward while still enjoying family, friends and things other than work.
Special to The Globe and Mail
Mark Evans is a principal with ME Consulting , a content and social media strategic and tactical consultancy that creates and delivers 'stories' for companies looking to capture the attention of customers, bloggers, the media, business partners, employees and investors. Mark has worked with three start-ups - Blanketware, b5Media and PlanetEye - so he understands how they operate and what they need to do to be successful. He was a technology reporter for more than a decade with The Globe and Mail, Bloomberg News and the Financial Post. Mark is also one of the co-organizers of the mesh, meshUniversity and meshmarketing conferences.