Self-employment & time management

Henry Dunfield, H.D. Energy Inc., Calgary, AB, CYBF Mentor

In my many years of mentoring and self-employment, one of the biggest hurtles I have seen entrepreneurs face is the challenge of self-discipline. One challenge is just getting to work and putting in a “productive” day, when you don’t have a boss pushing you to do so. What I have seen as a bigger challenge is doing accurate work that creates genuine value in a “timely” fashion.

Most of the entrepreneurs can easily fill up their time strategizing, doing market research, building spreadsheets and searching the internet. But, when is it time to go sell the product or deliver the service?

Several of my mentees have gone through all their working capital getting organized to get the business going. In these cases, when the money ran out the things that they spent their time doing were done very well. Unfortunately, the working capital they needed for the next step of their business was now burnt up.

Lesson learned: Set timelines, deliverables and milestones for your own performance. A sense of urgency is paramount.