Being self-employed means you do so much yourself! I have these moments when I grip the desk and say, “Should I really be the one doing this? I mean, who is in charge here?! Oh crap. It’s me.” With so many tasks to do, it really makes you confront your perfectionist tendencies! So when it was time to do my first press release, I had to tell myself, “OK, this is not the time to do a perfect press release. I’ll do that next year. For now, I’ll do one that is good enough.” So I did two things. I ordered Nancy Juetten’s Media-Savy-To-Go Publicity Tool Kit. Then I went to www.prfree.com and ordered their ezine on writing press releases. I gave myself one week to digest the material (I had to schedule in the time to read all of this in my calendar) and then I sat down to write a press release celebrating the first year in business for the Women’s Earning Institute. I had Googled “Press Releases” and found www.prfree.com, so I decided to use them. So I signed up and spent my $72 to distribute my one page “imperfect masterpiece”. The result? Well, Oprah hasn’t called me yet to discuss why women undersell themselves, but the press release is popping up under Google in a couple of places. So that is good. Good enough. Good enough. Good enough.

Years ago, I heard Woman Business Owner of the Year Mimi Kirsch speak at Seattle Women Business Owners. She owns Paradigm Communications (they produce the in-flight magazines Alaska Airlines and Horizon Air) and she was addressing working mothers. I remember her message very well. If stay-at-home mothers like being at home, their children are happy. If they don’t like being at home, their children don’t do as well. If working mothers like their work and communicate this to their children, their children are very well adjusted. If they communicate that they hate having to work etc, their children are not as well adjusted.

Once, when I had to work in the evening, I communicated to my young son that I didn’t want to go. I just want to work that night. Oh my gosh. My normally self-reliant kid glommed onto my leg and pleaded with me, “Momma, pleeeese don’t leave me”. The picture was complete with big eyes and a tear or two. The next time I had to work in the evening, I communicated how happy I was to go do what I was doing, and how interesting it was going to be for me. He was a totally different kid. He looked up briefly from his Legos to say “Bye mom! Dad and I are having pizza!”

The lesson—if you have children, communicate to them that you like your work. They will be happier and better adjusted. Kids pick up on our discontent and it affects them. Kids need to see positive examples of working women. Share your frustrations with your friends, not your kids.

This is just not working. As my final client for the day was writing me a check, I sent a quick instant message to my husband asking him if he could pick up our son from school today, even though it was my day to do it. He couldn’t. So I pulled it together, picked up our seven-year-old, raced back to my home office, and got back on the computer. I also supervised math homework, produced an after school snack and directed a change of clothes, all while sending out emails and revising a talk I would be giving the next day.

This is not working. Our son is in after school care two days a week, and we pick him up the rest of the time. But my “quality” time with him on those days isn’t quality, and the motherly guilt mounts. As I was meditating on this situation in the shower (we have a huge water bill, and well worth it), I decided that I could commit to picking him up one day a week, and that would be a “quality” afternoon. My husband agreed to one afternoon (we are both self employed) so that left one day that needed to be filled. Of course he also wants to take swimming lessons (I had visions of balancing my laptop at the poolside) so I decided to ask my mother’s best friend, who often baby-sits him and adores him, if she would consider picking him up from school one day a week, supervise his homework and take him to swim lessons. Since she could use the extra money and they adore each other (she doesn’t make him eat his vegetables….) it looks like it will work out.

The lesson– the joy of self-employment is flexibility. But it still takes us a while to figure out when things aren’t working. So what isn’t working for you? Get creative. There is usually more than one solution.

The time has come to lease outside office space. I’ve seen clients out of a home office for nearly a decade. I set it up that way on purpose. When we were looking for a house, we chose a certain layout so I could see clients in a home office. On the whole, I’ve enjoyed it. There are ups and downs though. The upside is that I have no commute, I can wander into the kitchen for lunch and I can still work in my office when my son is home (though he is gone during “client days”) The downside is that we have to keep the house looking neat, it requires a larger house, and I finally seem to be losing some of my work-life boundaries. I’m big on boundaries, and for years I simply shut the office door at 5pm. But the Women’s Earning Institute is growing so fast and there is so much to do! I seem to be working all the time. If I’m not with clients or my groups, I’m with subcontractors working on various projects. And I am renting a lot of outside space to run all of my groups, which is getting expensive. (I’m paying $20/hour to rent “conference space” at various places in Seattle.) A home office can no longer contain the Institute. So I’ve put the word out to my network. The dilemma is that I need full time space. A lot of people are subletting space a few days a week. I’m already beyond that. And people have advised me to “look around” in the neighborhoods where I want my office. Yes, in my spare time, I drive around the city…. I should have tuned into this need sooner, really. I need outside/larger office space three months ago! The launch pad doesn’t even fit in here! Stay tuned. Arg!

Having a personal business metaphor is extremely helpful. For example, I have always loved space travel. I read science fiction (yes, I’m a Trekkie!) and I follow what NASA is doing. So for me, when big things are happening in my business, when I am struggling, or when I am starting something new, space metaphors abound. Like I wrote previously, I feel like I am sitting on top of a rocket, launching my business into space. This metaphor works for me, when I think about what stage my business is in. It helps me frame the larger picture of what is happening.

Last week I had a very difficult thing happen in my business. I was very upset, depressed and embarrassed by something that had happened. I stayed in this dark gloomy place for a day and had a long good cry. (Well, I don’t know about a “good” cry, as crying gives me one heck of a headache!) But the next morning when I woke up and thought again about what had happened, I said to myself, “I am going to take what has happened and use it as fuel for my rocket. This is rocket fuel!” And for the next week, every time I thought about what happened, I repeated to myself, “Rocket Fuel”! I suppose it’s a version of taking lemons and making lemonade. It works for me. A lot of my clients use very rich gardening metaphors. What metaphor would work for you?

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I feel like I am sitting on top of a rocket. The Women’s Earning Institute is growing quickly and I feel it is poised to do many great things. I am excited, and I am nervous. I am almost too busy, struggling to keep up with the opportunities that arise and to make the most of the opportunities I diligently create. (What is that saying? Luck is where opportunity meets preparedness?) I feel a great power underneath me, but at times I feel like I am still locked down to the landing pad. The rocket has been lit and wants to surge forward. The locking clamps are straining. How do I gracefully release them? I feel I am being sling-shotted up into space. And at times I fear that this rocket will explode on the launch pad, or in mid-air. What a wild ride I’m on.

In the middle of my busy schedule, I dropped everything to help birth a baby. My friend Mary went into labor on Thursday, so I rushed over to her house to be with her and her husband. The three of us had been “training” for this time for many months. We called ourselves “Team Mary”. Her husband Eric and I took turns helping her relax, rubbing her back and counting contractions. It was a long process, as this was their first baby! By the time we got to the birth center, (the next day!) the midwives took over her coaching, and I faded to the background. But she still wanted me there. I was a witness to her pain and her triumph.

I am reminded of how much we need support in our businesses. Could Mary have done this alone? Perhaps, but there would have been a lot more fear! We can do great things, but we need help and support. In fact, I believe it takes a village to birth a business, and a village to raise a business. Of course no one can run your business but you. But when you have support, the way feels easier. There is less fear. Who is your support team? Who are your witnesses? We need people who can hold our hands through the downtimes and rejoice with us when things are going well.

Mondays are my day to work “on” my business, as opposed to “in” my business. As such, I don’t see clients on Mondays. But it is one of my busiest days! After working on my to-do list for the week, I worked with a teleconference company on the access codes for my upcoming tele-classes, exchanged about five emails with my web developer (sometimes answering his questions with “I have no idea”), sent a round of edits to the editor of my upcoming ebook How to Set and Raise Your Rates, prepared a web blast on my latest “transform your relationship to money” women’s support group, talked to a client who was having an issue that just couldn’t wait, registered a woman into the new support group, talked to a potential client about my services, and continued working on finding new lease space for my office.

How do I get so much done? Every Monday morning, after I drop my son off at school, I head to a coffee shop and work on my to-do list for the week. This hour is the most important hour of my week. I can’t imagine not spending this hour thinking and planning. I sit with my work journal (a spiral notebook that contains my latest thinking and all my to-do lists), my agenda and a good cup of coffee. I review my to-do list from last week (with boxes that are either checked off or not) and then re-write a new list for the current week. I look at my calendar for the week and slot in time to do different projects, in between clients. Then I head to my office, download email and dive in.

 In preparing a goal-setting mini-seminar for the business support groups I run for self-employed women, I ran across this from the American Society of Training and Development (ASTD) (My own business group facilitator Mary Allen handed this to us at one of our Vistage meetings.)

Probability of Completing a Goal:

• Hear an idea—10%
• Consciously decide to adopt it—25%
• Decide when you will do it—40%
• Plan how you will do it—50%
• Commit to someone else you will do it—65%
• Have a specific accountability appointment with the person committed to—95%

What will you do with this knowledge? How can you use it to set some effective goals for your business this year? Remember, if you are self-employed, it is up to you to push yourself. Take your business to the next level

Today I don’t like being self-employed. I think I am feeling rejected. I do a lot of speaking, which I love. So I decided to call up two places where I would like to speak this year. One venue I had spoken for before. Another was a large women’s networking organization that I admire a great deal and have always wanted to speak for. The upshot is that they both turned me down. One woman emailed me to say that there were no open spots on the speaking roster this year. Okay. That is fine. The other simply turned me down, giving vague reasons why I wasn’t a fit for their speaker series. Of course I wanted to protest. Don’t they know that I am the perfect fit for them! What women’s organization doesn’t want a proven speaker who can speak to women’s earning issue?! And truthfully, I took it a bit personal. It probably isn’t personal. (But maybe it is?) And then I had to remind myself of my own advice. Stop measuring success by the end-results. We can’t always control what happens. Start measuring success by whether or not we put ourselves out there and ask for what we want. Sure, we want it to work! But the key is to keep trying. The key is to say, “I am successful! I did it! I really put myself out there and asked for what I wanted!” I guess that makes me feel a little better….