Kevin W. McCarthy

The Professor of On-Purpose

Home Office

Is It Lonely At The Top? Delegation Can Help.

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Chapter 20 of the 1998 version of The On-Purpose Business is titled The Micro-Business, a term I coined then to describe a growing trend of the workplace moving into the homestead. SoHo is a subsequent term that means “Small Office, Home Office.” In the updated version of The On-Purpose Business Person, I decided to go with a new term: Solo Owners. This term includes the one person shop as well as the single owner or couple with employees.

All of these terms describe a growing percentage of the working population who are setting up business from their home either by design or by necessity because of being out of work. These are the brave men and women who tackle the many challenges of owning a small business.  book cover - the on purpose business person

Typically, it is best to think of Solo Owners as one-person shops with support that is either virtual or in close proximity.

  • Professionals such as doctors, lawyers, CPAs, architects, and engineers
  • Skilled trades like carpenters, plumbers, and landscapers
  • Independent cottage industrialists, inventors, counselors, coaches, consultants, and salespersons
  • Creative persons like artists, musicians, writers, and songwriters

Many operate micro-franchises such as those found in the direct sales industry with MLMs and party plan companies.

Solo Owners are diverse, but their challenges are actually quite predictable.

They share a common ailment: what they imagined it would be like and what it is really like are different from what they anticipated.

If you are a Solo Owner, you’ll probably relate to the challenges of getting things accomplished, managing your time, and the constant learning process. The absence of co-workers and mentors is frequently mentioned as well.

What to do? Here’s a simple business leadership growth plan:

  1. Learn about business
  2. Learn to lead yourself and others
  3. Learn how to cooperate and work with othersHellegation - overwhelmed

Solo Owners easily fall into the trap of what I call Hellegation™ – the inability to delegate that creates a living hell on the job. You have a choice: delegation or Hellegation! Follow the advice above and you’re on your way to salvation.

If you’re really stuck, then invest in On-Purpose Executive Coaching to find the freedom business ownership promises to provide.

So, what are your challenges with being lonely at the top and the bottom?

Please share a tip for other Solo Owners below in the comments section. Or ask a question and I’ll add what I can to answer your questions, direct you to resources, or point you toward someone else who can assist you. Others may help you as well. We solo owners need each other. Let’s start now.

Be On-Purpose!
Kevin

How Do I Focus My Small Business?

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As you stare at the walls of your office, your mind swirls with a hundred different items on your mental To Do List. You haven’t got a clue what to do next because everything seems important. By default you open up your email so at least you’re keeping up with something. A couple of hours pass at the keyboard and your list is only longer and you’re further behind than when you began. A sinking feeling leaves you even more overwhelmed and disappointed with yourself. Ugh! How do I go about organizing the business? How do I get more focused and productive? I’ll deal with it … tomorrow.

Admit it, you know this scenario all too well. And it bugs you because it is sabotaging your business, your dreams, and your finances. With so much on the line, you wonder, How can I be so stuck? 

Over the decades of working with business owners, this shallow pattern of performance is most often associated with an ill-defined or out of focus business. While brilliant ideas abound in your brain, there’s no blueprint to build the business. Would you hire a home builder to construct your house who didn’t have blueprints? Yet, you’ll build your business without the most basic of plans.

There’s a reason most SOHO (small office, home office) business owners don’t write their plans. It is called flexibility and responsiveness to opportunity. Unfortunately, keeping your options open typically results in a cycle of learning, but not one of earning. The secret to building your business is to create an economically efficient engine of profit. Once the engine is up and running, you can afford to invest in your other ideas. Depth, not breadth, is essential. This takes discipline and commitment … to a well designed, thoughtful, written plan.

Here are three On-Purpose® tools to help you gain focus and sustain it:

  1. Use The Discovery Guide to clarify which of your many options is the best. This “Want List and Tournament” tool is a free download and can be used for many situations, such as clarifying which opportunity makes the most sense for you and why.
  2. The Service Model is a simple tool to map out why and how to design and build your business on one page starting with purpose. 
  3. My On-Purpose Folder is a self or small group guided process to develop your personal leadership capacity. When you’re in mental disarray, your business will reflect it too.

You may think you have a plan, but you may not. Candidly ask yourself, Just how isFocus my plan working? If you’re not obtaining adequate results, speed to market, or profits, then please consider a small business advisory package. Let us help you bring order, focus, clarity, and direction to your business enterprise by guiding and documenting your business plan and model. Organizing the business is a couple of clicks and a few hours away.

On-Purpose Profile: Carrie Wilkerson, The Barefoot Executive

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Photo This morning, I kicked off my shoes and listened to Disney Entrepreneur Center. 

Carrie plays in the noble space of helping professionals, business owners, those in career transition, and other self-employed persons work more successfully from home.  She trailblazed her way and is marking the path for others to follow in her footprints. 

If you’ve followed me for any length of time, you know that I’m a fan of the creativity, productivity, profitability, and contribution that starting and owning a small business offers.  Business can be a pure vocational expression of your purpose, and, therefore, an opportunity to be on-purpose.  Because of a similar heart to Carrie, my On-PurposeME program is designed for the SOHO (small office, home office) start-up or running business owner.  You just can’t know enough.

Carrie is a great model for creating on-purpose work at home business.  Sitting in the front seat and I could see it in her eyes. She’s having the time of her life doing good while doing well with maintaining defined personal boundaries and a strong commitment to her marriage, family, and clients.

For years, I’ve been teaching that life balance is a myth.  Carrie shared those nearly identical words with those in attendence.  Coincidentally, my On-Purpose Minute on Tuesday was entitled: Do You Want More Balance In Your Life?  (Be sure to look for the link to my poem: A Balanced Life.)

Here’s my recommendation to you, visit Carrie’s website (click the banner below).  Subscribe to her email and video messages.  You’ll find that she brings a fresh encouragement and spirit similar to me when it comes to being true to yourself and taking the leap into business ownership.

Watching Carrie in action was educational and engaging.  If you are a fan of On-Purpose and fit the target audience of wanting to be a work from home business owner, then jump bare feet first over to Carrie’s website and get a little cyber sand between your toes.

Brand Backstory:

Carrie shared that in 2003 her husband, aka Mr. Barefoot, tagged her as the “Barefoot Executive” while she made the career transition from high school teacher to stay at home business executive / owner.  She was running around the home conducting business in her barefeet and he lovingly made the observation.   Carrie made note of his term of endearment.  Three years ago, she birthed her business of helping others make the great escape from the corporate world.

I had to chuckle when she said, “I’m from Texas.  We understand branding.  It is the way we keep track of our cattle and keep people from stealing them.”  It was a great reminder that business branding is rooted in some pretty practical stuff!  With Carrie’s help perhaps you, too, can leave your footprints in the sand… on-purpose, of course.

PS – yes, Carrie Wilkerson spoke to us in her jeans and barefeet!

PSS – Special thanks to my friends Wendy Kurtz and Roy Reed for organizing and inviting me to the event at the Disney Entrepreneur Center. 

Wendy Kurtz is President of Elizabeth Charles a niche PR firm that helps authors, speakers and executives get their message and medium into the media and into people’s lives.

Roy Reed is a Partner in Consensus Communications, a strategic public relations firm whose currency of choice is trust.

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