{"id":36,"date":"2011-07-18T19:46:38","date_gmt":"2011-07-18T23:46:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/seamusmullarkey.com\/site\/?p=36"},"modified":"2011-08-07T14:12:22","modified_gmt":"2011-08-07T18:12:22","slug":"small-business-column","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/seamusmullarkey.com\/site\/small-business-column\/","title":{"rendered":"Small Business Column"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/p>\n

Seamus wrote a series of 12 monthly columns for Citibank\u2019s bizzed.com on the challenges facing small businesses. His piece on delegating led to a guest spot on NPR\u2019s “Small Business Minute.”
\n<\/p>\n

\nThe Downside of Do-It-Yourself<\/b>
\nFor your business to prosper, you may need to learn to let go…<\/i><\/p>\n

If you\u2019ve got a small business, you\u2019re probably a doer. You\u2019re in business because you think you can do things better. That\u2019s your competitive edge, the drive that keeps you going. You love the thrill of getting things done and that usually means doing it yourself. \u201cHands-on\u201d is your middle name.<\/p>\n

However, your biggest strength can also be a big weakness. You might be suffering from a fatal flaw that often keeps small businesses small. We\u2019ll call it NLG syndrome, or the dreaded \u201cnever let go\u201d malaise. You know the symptoms: \u201dif you want something done properly, you\u2019ve got to do it yourself\u201d; \u201dIt takes so long to explain this to someone else, it\u2019s quicker to do it myself.\u201d<\/p>\n

Doing it all can make you feel virtuous, but there are only 24 hours in a day. Try to do absolutely everything yourself and you risk burnout. Just as crucially, you risk losing your focus on what\u2019s important. \u201cPenny wise and dollar foolish\u201d is one of the oldest clich\u00e9s, but it applies perfectly to running a small business. You might save a little money by doing a lot of things yourself, but to really build a business you must make effective use of the skills of others, so you can focus on the big picture and higher-value activities.\n<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

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Seamus wrote a series of 12 monthly columns for Citibank\u2019s bizzed.com on the challenges facing small businesses. His piece on delegating led to a guest spot on NPR\u2019s “Small Business Minute.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":37,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-36","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-writing-samples"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/seamusmullarkey.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/seamusmullarkey.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/seamusmullarkey.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/seamusmullarkey.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/seamusmullarkey.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=36"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/seamusmullarkey.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":155,"href":"http:\/\/seamusmullarkey.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36\/revisions\/155"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/seamusmullarkey.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/37"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/seamusmullarkey.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=36"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/seamusmullarkey.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=36"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/seamusmullarkey.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=36"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}