Most business owners like yourself spend a large amount of time and energy in your business and are very closely involved in the day-to-day management of your business. What most of you fail to recognise is that you need to work on your business and not in it.
Working on your business involves things like creating a detailed vision or making sure your team is empowered enough to handle certain tasks themselves. And even though some of you may recognise that change is needed, you just don’t know how to make the shift.
The 3 Hats Business Owners Wear
While it’s true that most entrepreneurs like you wear different hats, it is important to know which hat to wear in certain situations. Let’s take a look at the three hats you are possibly wearing now:
- The Entrepreneur – You are a visionary, the brains behind the business and the captain at the helm.
- The Manager – You are overseeing all day to day activities, making sure systems are optimised and are looking over the operations of your business.
- The Technician – You are on the tools, the craftsman, the hands on man, the person who is actually doing the work.
All businesses need these three different roles to function like a well-oiled machine. Most of the time, the owner of the business is actually ONLY wearing the technicians hat when they should be wearing the Entrepreneur one.
If you want to run your business optimally and efficiently, you need to recognise these three different mindsets and personalities, distinguish one from the other and be aware of the role you are playing in your business.
The 3 Perspectives
The Entrepreneurs Perspective
Time equals Equity equals Freedom. When you are in this mindset you have an eagle eye view of your business. You look at your business and think of ways to work ON it. You think of strategies that will give you profits, financial freedom and the freedom to make choices without any restraints.
A Managers Perspective
Time equals Systems equals Leverage equals Profit. When you think like a manager, you are overseeing projects that need to be done, systems that need to be in place and are looking at ways to establish processes and strategies that work. You look at improving effectiveness and efficiency that will increase your output while saving money, which in turn increases profit. However, when you are wearing your “Managers Hat”, you should be thinking you ways you can ultimately step back, delegate your tasks, and leverage off the people working for you.
A Technicians Perspective
Time equals Work equals Money. Everyone has the same number of hours in a day. But if you are busy working in your business and on the tools, then there is little time left for you to work on your business.
If you want to run your business efficiently and profitably, you need to decide which hat you want on. And if you are wearing all three hats, something most new business owners do, then you need to learn how to switch seamlessly from one mindset to the other and how to do this consciously. This will help with focus and give you time to work out strategies that will ultimately leave you with one hat – “the entrepreneur”.
