Relieve the Pressure Before Business Stress Takes Over
Running your farm requires working in a dangerous environment—not physical danger but a different, more subtle threat. It’s the hidden stress inevitable in the life of every business owner or manager: Stress that can accumulate to the point of serious damage in both your business and personal life.
“Up to 80% of visits to primary care physicians are for symptoms directly or indirectly related to the stress response,” says Vicki Rackner, MD, co-author of “Chicken Soup for the Soul.” “While it’s true that we live in a stress-filled world, you can control your response to stressful stimuli. Manage your response to stress more effectively and you will have a happy, healthy heart. You will also have a healthier bottom line.”
Stress can build up, and it’s important to know when the pressure cooker of daily business is having a harmful effect.
“Some of the danger signals are weight gain, mental confusion, depression, suppressed immune function and constant fatigue and insomnia,” says nutritional biochemist, Shawn M. Talbott, Ph.D. Getting stress under control can help in each of these areas.
Here are seven tips to help you avoid the severe and often permanent harm that can result from uncontrolled business stress.
1. Analyze and organize competing demands
Among the major causes of stress in running a business are incompatible demands on the owner’s time and resources, according to management consultant and author, Jim Stroup. “If you don’t have the time or expertise to do a given task, you outsource it. However, if you don’t have the resources for outsourcing, you wind up doing it yourself.”
To cope with the dilemma, Stroup suggests you organize the flurry of competing demands on your time, being sure to include key functions such as cash flow and marketing.
“Next, analyze these tasks on the basis of their impact on your time and resources to determine which ones have the biggest impact on the success of your farm and which ones can be delegated or outsourced,” he says.
This simple procedure can help you prioritize business needs and in turn, reduce the stress that results from failing to understand how to assess and organize competing demands.
2. Know when it’s time to quit
“Learn how to turn off work and boot up life,” says Jennifer Kalita, a consultant with The Kalita Group. “Entrepreneurs often start businesses to get out from under an unreasonable boss, but now the only unreasonable bosses they’re working for are themselves. Make a commitment to business hours and stick to it. If you don’t, the line between your business and your personal life will become blurred. When that happens, it isn’t the business that will suffer; it’s you, your family and friends—all the things you need to keep your life in balance.”
Rackner agrees on the importance of turning off work.
“The stress-induced fight-or-flight response served our species well when we faced saber-toothed tigers,” she says. “In business it often feels like tigers are right outside the door. Adrenaline and other stress hormones help you run away from danger or face challenges square on.”
According to Rackner, however, stress-induced adrenaline becomes problematic when we use it as fuel for day-to-day activities.
“Our bodies are designed for surges of adrenaline, not the day-in, day-out, sustained-release stress regimen followed by so many business owners. That impairs not only the body’s ability to function; it also impairs business productivity and profitability.”
3. You know you need a vacation—but
You’ve been working hard, and now you need to refresh and renew. However, especially for livestock producers, the idea of walking away from the business for even a day or two causes anxiety.
“Take heart.” Liz Bywater, president of Bywater Consulting Group, LLC, says. “Vacations need not be an all-or-nothing approach to relaxation.”
Bywater says there’s nothing wrong with dedicating a small portion of each vacation day—even if it’s just a couple of minutes—to checking in.
“If you absolutely must speak briefly to an employee, or any business contact, so be it. Hey, one phone call could pay for your whole vacation,” she says. “Once your daily check-in is finished, you can put away your smartphone and laptop for the day and have some fun.”
4. Lean on friends
“Entrepreneurs working in a constantly-changing and often uncertain environment must deal with a host of stresses,” says Jeanne Hurlbert, professor of sociology at Louisiana State University. “Although many fail to realize it, one of their most valuable resources in coping with that stress is their social network.”
Hurlbert says entrepreneurs think of networking as building business contacts.
“While it’s important entrepreneurs’ social networks provide those resources, it’s at least as important their networks provide the social support that can help them reduce stress and cope with stress they cannot eliminate,” she says.
The contacts who provide that kind of support generally aren’t the same individuals who provide business advice.
“Our close friends and family provide the support that helps us cope with a business downturn or other negative events,” she says.
Build a balanced network that supports not only your business but also your personal life, Hurlbert suggests. “And remember that even close ties dwindle if they’re not maintained. That’s why you need to devote time and energy to the personal side of you network, just as you do for the business side.”
5. Enlist outside help
“It’s not unusual for business owners to feel they have to do everything themselves,” says Bywater. “Sometimes it’s about keeping as much money as possible in the business and minimizing expenses. Sometimes it’s about quality control. You may think that if you want the job done right, you have to do it yourself, but that’s not so.”
It’s true many aspects of a farm business are best handled by the owner, but there are also tasks that can be effectively outsourced.
To focus on what you do best, you must take some things off your plate, Bywater says. “That may mean hiring a reliable supervisor, or a top-notch bookkeeper. The key is to ‘farm out’ the kinds of work that take up a lot of your time but don’t fall within your areas of expertise. Do what you do best. Have others do the rest,” she says.
6. Make sure you and your significant other are on the same page
“If your home life isn’t running smoothly, you’re headed for Stressville,” says Steve Kaplan, author of “Be the Elephant: Build a Bigger, Better Business.”
Kaplan believes finding ways to involve your family is an important weapon in the fight to control business stress, but they need to be involved in the right way.
Involving family members lets them know you value their thoughts and advice. That, in turn, will help you keep stress under control, Kaplan says.
7. Reduce your own importance
The adage, “If you want something done right, do it yourself,” is a classic philosophy with an undeniable grain of poetic truth. However, when it comes to running a farm business, too many owners suffer from a dangerous overdose of do-it-yourself-itis.
“Every entrepreneur has three basic responsibilities,” says Andy Birol, founder of Birol Growth Consultants. “They are owner, president and chief sales person. No owner can do everything effectively in all three of these areas.
“It’s difficult for many farm business owners to trust responsibilities to others,” Birol continues. “However, it’s critically important to develop the ability to delegate some of your work to those around you. The penalty for failing to do that is an almost certain buildup of business stress that will eventually impose a harsh penalty on both the business and the business owner.”
Every expert interviewed for this article ranked the failure to delegate as a major cause of harmful stress. While it might seem difficult, reducing your own importance is a major step in easing the day-to-day pressures.
These suggestions aren’t the only techniques for minimizing the constant strains in your business life, but together they can go a long way toward reducing your exposure to the damage of uncontrolled stress.
