Seven Odd Things that Business Owners Believe

We all come to our endeavours with unique history, values, experiences and biases. Many owners, new to being responsible for everything in the business, have no point of reference other than the examples they have seen during their own life and career.

If they are lucky, the example they try to follow will be a flexible, motivational, emotionally resilient and successful leader. But even an outstanding example comes with benefits that you may not be able to replicate.

·       They have a unique personality, suited to the environment you saw them in.

·       They undoubtedly made mistakes that have helped inform how they do things.

·       The make-up and personalities of their team fit with their leader’s particular style.

·       They may have a complex give and take relationship between them all that took a long time to develop.

Sadly, one of the strong drivers for people deciding to set up on their own is the urge to get away from a boss they have no respect for. And now they find out that being in charge is a lot more complicated than they thought.

Some of this is because they’ve had poor role models and some comes from their own beliefs and values. Wherever they originate they are expressed in strange and unhelpful behaviours.

How many of these behaviours do you recognise in yourself?

1.     Micromanagement is the only way to get the job done right.

There’s a lot of responsibility riding on your shoulders. And that can breed insecurity and even fear. Perhaps you’ve been let down and it has caused real problems.

But ask yourself what you want from your staff. People who are self-motivated and productive who you trust to get things done, or sheep that need to be driven every step of the way?

Learning to trust involves developing respect for the abilities of those you work with. Will there be mistakes? Of course. But start by reducing the number of times you check in and you’ll be able to increase the gaps as they grow in confidence and ability.

Often, when you give people autonomy and space, they repay your trust by exceeding expectations.

2.     New staff should hit the ground running.

Your expectations are probably in direct proportion to the amount of pressure that has led to your recruiting them in the first place.

The business is growing fast, someone has left unexpectedly, you’re desperate to be able to take some time off. The reasons for the panic are varied, but they all lead to two problems.

First, you haven’t time to do a proper recruitment process, so you grab someone without doing any real due diligence. And secondly, because of the same pressures, you just don’t have time to ‘waste’ bringing them up to speed.

Time for a little empathy. Remember your first days somewhere. You don’t know the processes, you hate disturbing busy people with silly questions (often more than once), you’re so desperate to fit in that you are hyper-sensitive to rolled eyes and heavy sighs. Give them time and support. You’ll be rewarded with loyalty and commitment.

No-one is perfect on the first day, for the first week or during the first month. Live with it.

3.     Feedback is a one-way street.

I don’t suppose you have many relationships where you’re the sole provider of judgements, good and bad? Yet many business owners feel they are the sole arbiter of what is acceptable and what needs correcting.

On top of that, much of their  feedback is given in the heat of the moment and sometimes includes intensely personal comments in the hearing of colleagues.

Time for a little humility. Step one. Apologise – sincerely and in the hearing of the same people. Step two, acknowledge that you too get things wrong. Third, find a way of getting genuine feedback from those you employ. And finally, act on that feedback.

You’ll be astonished at just how much showing your own vulnerability and being willing to change will boost team spirit. And how much more willingly people will then listen in turn to your comments to them.

4.     The sun will shine when….

When you start a new enterprise you have a dream of how things will turn out.

And now you are putting any sense of achievement, pride or even happiness as conditional on some arbitrary measure of success. ‘I’ll be doing well when….’

Imaging what it’s like working for someone who’s only measure of success is somewhere in the future? Someone vulnerable to despair at any setback, to feelings of failure when the plan isn’t working out.

Time for a bit of realism. Your outcome is not guaranteed. Waiting to be happy one day is a way to be miserable every day. Enjoy the journey and celebrate the little achievements every day. You’ll become a boss people enjoy working with and they will become the people you cheer with.

5.     Everyone should care about the business as much as you do.

As Chris Evans (the ginger whinger) said in one of his biographies, ‘don’t expect anyone who doesn’t earn as much as you to care as much as you do.’

The key word here is ‘expect’. Be grateful for any additional effort people make. They don’t have to stay late. They don’t have to answer your calls at the weekend.

But if you work to create an environment in which they are happy to contribute extra (discretionary) effort, than you may be helped when you really need it most.

Be interested in them as people, give them opportunities for challenge and growth, make small adjustments to help them with their responsibilities outside work, treat them as individuals and with respect. And never forget to acknoweldge the things they don’t have to do.

6.     Rules are for other people.

Being your own boss comes with privileges. But they come because you work harder and longer than anyone else in the business, not because of who you are.

A sure way to undermine commitment and be sure people are coasting when you’re not present is to insist on lots of rules being followed but ignore them yourself.

Make policies you can justify for the smooth running of the business but be prepared to follow them yourself. If they prove not to be workable, be open with your reasons and be prepared to grant the same (or similar) flexibility to others as you grant yourself.

7.     The Boss has to know everything.

Every idea has to be your own. This is your business, your responsibility and you know what is needed in every circumstance. At heart, you know this is nonsense. But you worry about losing control or losing respect if you can’t come up with the answer.

Either you reject good ideas, undermine initiative and create a slightly worse outcome, or you try and pretend the good idea actually came to you first.

Nothing undermines confidence more quickly than seeing a leader pretending to know what they are doing when it is obvious there is a better way. Nothing adds more to the feeling of shared enterprise than being trusted with the true situation and being asked to contribute to the solution.

One day, as your success grows, you will need people who can take decisions in your absence. Start that process now.

Dealing with these ideas can be challenging because they often come from deep down inside our personalities. But these and all our other behaviours are actually choices. And we can choose to do things differently.

If you’d like some help discovering which behaviour you need to change first, contact us at

 information@thirdphasecoaching.co.uk