On the face of it, running your own business looks like a fantastic career choice, promoting your product, dealing with clients, managing staff and ultimately making money are very attractive propositions. In spite of the glamorous side of running your own business, the truth is that it is a very tough position to hold. My friend Lloyd Claycomb has ran a building business for over 40 years and he was telling me recently how he managed to cope with the pressures that come with heading up your very own firm.

If you have your own business and want to better cope with the strains, here are some tips to help you out.

Mission Statement

It is important that as a business, you have a mission statement which details who you are as a business and what your beliefs are. The reason why this is important is because it gives you a credence to stick to when times get tough. The world of business can be dirty and unfair, especially when it comes to competition and a mission statement will enable your business to stay true to what it set out to do.

Relax

As a business owner you have to find ways to relax away from work, this is vital in terms of your effectiveness in the business. When a business is first starting out, it is a given that you will have to work extremely long hours in order to turn it into a success. The temptation however is to continue working at the same pace throughout the life of the business, something which is simply not viable. As a business leader you have a responsibility to the business to be at your best and in order to do so, you must find ways to relax. This could be anything form a daily workout to a walk in the park, a massage or listening to music, the thing that relaxes you is not important, what is important is that you make time for it.

Circle of Trust

You cannot afford to have anyone on your team who is not on board with what you want from the business and by creating a circle of trust you will be able to lean on people in order to help you better cope. There is nothing worse when running a company than feeling as though you need to do everything and for that reason you need to have the right people by your side to take off some of the strain. It could be a task that needs to be completed, some advice around a decision or a meeting to attend which can cause you unnecessary stress, having people on hand to take these tasks on for you will help you greatly in terms of dealing with the running of a business.

This is not to say that running a business isn’t tough, it is, but you can find ways and means to better cope with those stresses with a smart approach.