If you’ve known me for any amount of time, you know that I love four letter words. But there is a four letter word that I do not love. It is a word that I hear a lot of entrepreneurs use as a badge of honor. The word is “busy.” This word makes me angry because people think that doing more somehow makes them more successful, more profitable, more valuable, and more impactful. However, busy does not equal successful. Busy does not equal profitable. Busy does not equal valuable. Busy does not equal impactful. If you are tying your success and your value and your impact to how much you are doing, you are heading for overworking, burnout, and feelings of not being enough.
To achieve your goals, you may actually need to do less, not more. Let’s explore this idea and how to build a business without the trap of busyness.
Watch the full episode here:
Listen to the full episode here:
Busy Does Not Equal Productive
We stay busy because it gives dopamine hits, making us feel productive. However, busyness does not necessarily accomplish the key tasks that will propel your business growth. Busyness is often a distraction from what truly matters. We want to choose the right actions over random busywork for maximum impact with our precious time and energy. No more hollow dopamine hits – they don’t translate to dollars.
Ask yourself – are you truly ready for entrepreneurship to feel differently than just being busy? You can keep going as you have been, but know that if your bank account does not reflect your packed calendar, something needs to change. There is a better way available to you.
How do you know the difference between busywork and legitimate productivity? Look at your results. What outcomes are you getting from your efforts on social media? How much time are you spending there? If it’s not generating sales aligned to the hours you put in, either get more strategic or eliminate it. Ultimately this comes down to time spent working on versus working in your business.
Working on your business is the big picture strategy – development and implementation. Working in your business is all of the busy tasks associated with day-to-day operations. Imagine a pie shop owner. Working in the business would be baking pies all day to fulfill orders. Working on the business would be marketing, partnerships, customer incentives – driving bigger picture revenue.
Many service providers fall into this work-in trap. While we get to deliver our service (work in), if we don’t also spend time on revenue generating activities (work on), pretty soon we won’t have a business left.
Quality Over Quantity
In entrepreneurship, quality always beats quantity. It’s not about checking tasks off a list but rather the value and impact created for your audience and clients. By ditching busy in favor of effectiveness, you can elevate your work quality, deepen relationships, and achieve greater success.
Unfortunately, society glorifies being busy, making us think our worth ties directly to output. Look around – it’s everywhere. The antidote? Remember that you do not need to be busy to be successful. In fact, decreased busyness often leads to increased success.
Scarcity vs. Abundance
Busyness stems from a scarcity mindset – fear of missing out, needing to prove yourself daily, believing time and customers are limited. However, embracing abundance allows confident, strategic focus on what matters most. Instead of scrambling, we can channel our energy with intention for our biggest, boldest goals.
How? By remembering – what’s meant for you will not pass you by. You don’t need to prove yourself constantly – you are enough right now. With 7 billion people on this planet, you’ll never serve everyone. And you don’t need thousands of customers – just your ideal fans.
The resources mentioned in this episode are:
????Visit https://briseeley.com/reset to get free access to The Reset, a five-day business makeover to evolve your business from acceptable to exceptional.
????Join the free entrepreneurial community at https://briseeley.com/community for opportunities to connect with powerful women aiming towards big dreams and visions.
????Subscribe to the Entrepreneur Coach podcast for more upcoming episodes and valuable wisdom.
???? If you need support on your entrepreneurial journey to strengthen your resilient mindset and set yourself up for success in uncertain times, consider submitting your application to work with The Entrepreneur Coach Bri Seeley here: https://briseeley.com/apply
Subscribe to ‘The Entrepreneur Coach Podcast’ on….
Hey Entrepreneur… Are you overworking and underliving?
It’s like you’re running a marathon on a hamster wheel each day, and the results you’re getting just feel…. meh.
I mean, they’re acceptable results. For all intents and purposes, you’re technically a successful entrepreneur.
The problem? You want exceptional results that allow you to work less and live more.
Welcome to The Reset: A Business Makeover. This FREE 5-day training will help you go from overworking and under living to a balanced schedule that allows you to actually LIVE (and enjoy!) the life you’ve built for yourself!
Sign up now to get your access to this free training: