JavaScript is disabled in your web browser or browser is too old to support JavaScript. Today almost all web pages contain JavaScript, a scripting programming language that runs on visitor's web browser. It makes web pages functional for specific purposes and if disabled for some reason, the content or the functionality of the web page can be limited or unavailable.

Tuesday, February 18, 2025

Flexibility and fun can make you a better entrepreneur

by

20150507

I can't count the num­ber of stress­ful sit­u­a­tions I've found my­self in since I launched my first busi­ness over 50 years ago. We faced the threat of be­ing shut down a num­ber of times in Vir­gin's ear­ly years, and since then we've en­coun­tered what seems like a nev­er-end­ing string of chal­lenges.

Stress and busi­ness go hand-in-hand, and that's not a bad thing–high-pres­sure sit­u­a­tions can cer­tain­ly be mo­ti­vat­ing–but too much pres­sure can be emo­tion­al­ly and phys­i­cal­ly dam­ag­ing. I've found that the best way to man­age stress is to find a good work-life bal­ance.

Well-be­ing in the work­place has been a hot top­ic for a while, as em­ploy­ers search for ways to dis­rupt stale cor­po­rate habits and help staff stay fo­cused and en­gaged in a world where it's al­most im­pos­si­ble to switch off. In fact, we re­cent­ly host­ed a live­ly and in­ter­est­ing Vir­gin Dis­rup­tors de­bate on the top­ic.

For some peo­ple, achiev­ing work-life bal­ance de­pends on ad­her­ing to a strict rou­tine: eat, sleep, ex­er­cise, re­peat. How­ev­er, I don't have much of a set rou­tine. I be­lieve that flex­i­bil­i­ty is the an­swer for en­tre­pre­neurs. You can nev­er be cer­tain what to­mor­row will throw at you, so the abil­i­ty to adapt and pri­ori­tise is in­cred­i­bly im­por­tant. When a chal­lenge presents it­self, dis­rupt­ing your plans, you need to be able as­sess its im­por­tance and re­or­gan­ise your to-do list ac­cord­ing­ly.

And while every en­tre­pre­neur needs to be able to mul­ti­task, con­stant­ly shift­ing fo­cus isn't al­ways pro­duc­tive. To set pri­or­i­ties and give my­self the space to fo­cus, I write down lists of tasks that I need to com­plete and when I need to com­plete them, then or­gan­ise them based on their pos­si­ble im­pact on the com­pa­ny; this might work for you too.

Once you've pri­ori­tised your work­load, it's time to del­e­gate; if you can. If you're start­ing your busi­ness so­lo, you will be do­ing a num­ber of jobs, from man­ag­ing the ac­counts to prod­uct de­sign, yet you still need to make time to think about big-pic­ture is­sues. That's a lot of pres­sure!

This is where the im­por­tance of hav­ing fun comes in. In or­der to be re­freshed and ready to take on any chal­lenge, you must find time for play.

De­vot­ing time to the things that make you hap­py will fos­ter a pos­i­tive at­ti­tude and help you tack­le stress­ful chal­lenges. It's true that find­ing time for your­self or to think about the fu­ture of your en­ter­prise may seem im­pos­si­ble when you're just start­ing up a busi­ness, but re­mem­ber: you won't go far if you're run­ning on emp­ty.

So hav­ing fun isn't a re­ward for hard work; it's your re­spon­si­bil­i­ty and your job to find time to laugh every day, whether you spend time catch­ing up with friends, chat­ting with new peo­ple or shar­ing a joke on so­cial me­dia. Ditch any guilt you might feel about stop­ping work and sched­ule time for en­joy­ing your­self in your plan­ner.

Make this re­lax­ation time a pri­or­i­ty, par­tic­u­lar­ly in the morn­ings. I've found that it's not a good idea to dive straight in­to work when you wake up, so I ded­i­cate my morn­ings to ex­er­cise and fam­i­ly time. It helps clear my mind and en­er­gis­es me for the day ahead.

This is al­so con­nect­ed to my one piece of per­son­al ad­vice for bud­ding en­tre­pre­neurs. Have fun. This is of­ten un­der­rat­ed, but you are far more like­ly to suc­ceed if you are en­joy­ing your­self. If an op­por­tu­ni­ty doesn't ex­cite me, and if it's not some­thing through which I can make a dif­fer­ence in the world while hav­ing a lot of se­ri­ous­ly cre­ative fun, then I'd rather pass on it and move along to some­thing else that does in­ter­est me.

So good luck, Tam­my–a health and fit­ness re­treat in Cos­ta Ri­ca sounds like it has work-life bal­ance and fun writ­ten all over it. Just make sure you play as hard as you work, if not hard­er!

(Richard Bran­son is the founder of the Vir­gin Group and com­pa­nies such as Vir­gin At­lantic, Vir­gin Amer­i­ca, Vir­gin Mo­bile and Vir­gin Ac­tive. He main­tains a blog at www.vir­gin.com/richard-bran­son/blog. You can fol­low him on Twit­ter at twit­ter.com/richard­bran­son. To learn more about the Vir­gin Group: www.vir­gin.com.)

(Ques­tions from read­ers will be an­swered in fu­ture columns. Please send them to Richard­Bran­son @ny­times.com. Please in­clude your name, coun­try, e-mail ad­dress and the name of the Web site or pub­li­ca­tion where you read the col­umn.)


Related articles

Sponsored

Weather

PORT OF SPAIN WEATHER

Sponsored