bradleyjoyce [dot] com

Derek Sivers published a well-written and insightful piece on learning to delegate as business owner. In it he makes a statement that I absolutely love:

There’s a big difference between being self-employed and being a business owner.

I’ve always hated the term “self-employed.” To me, it’s always seemed to conjure up the notion that no one else wanted to employ me so I employed myself. Business owner sounds a bit more respectable in my mind. Sivers goes on to make an important distinction though:

Being self-employed feels like freedom until you realize that if you take time off, your business crumbles. To be a true business owner, make sure you could leave for a year, and when you came back, your business would be doing better than when you left.

Can you, as the business owner, step away for a moment without the whole thing falling apart? This is actually an interesting question. On one side, it would be pretty nice to know things are humming smoothly without your involvement… but on the other hand, it might hurt a bit to knowing you’re not 100% important to the business… right? I think Sivers has got it right. As a business owner, your business should be able to operate on a normal basis without you. However, as the business owner, you had better be the person who is pushing the business to innovate an grow. For myself, I feel I am at the point in my own business where I need to begin delegating where it makes sense. This is going to be a big challenge and I’m certain there will be some “growing pains,” but I’m definitely looking forward to it.