Small Business Hindsight: Keeping Your Worries in Check

Being a small business owner means you are truly a jack-of-all-trades. Having such a wide variety of skills often leads to having your hand in a little bit of everything, and therefore also having a lot on your mind. With small business top of mind in the US this month as the nation celebrates National Small Business Week, we asked members of the Citi Business Advisory Board in the US - a private online community of small business owners and decision makers facilitated by Communispace - about what keeps them up at night and, in the spirit of paying it forward to entrepreneurs everywhere, what are their tips and tricks for tackling these worries. Here's what we learned.

 

In terms of the things weighing on their minds, the top 5 worries are:

 

1. Cash flow (expenses, accounts receivable, etc.)

2. Gaining new business/customers (sales and marketing)

3. The unexpected/unknown - things outside their control, such as the economy or government regulations

4. Work/Life balance - making sure they're still happy

5. Employees - hiring and retaining good people

 

Most turn to peers, business partner(s), professional advisors, mentors in the industry and friends and family for advice. When it comes to ways to keep one's worries in check, here's what they recommend to aspiring entrepreneurs:

 

• Focus on what you can control.
• Think solutions not obstacles.
• Trust your gut and see your decisions through.
• Let the past be the past - learn from mistakes and push ahead.
• Prioritize - deal with critical issues first.
• Have a "success" scorecard and pay attention to the numbers.
• Keep up-to-date on marketplace trends.
• Have a solid plan, but be flexible - adapt your based on new information.
• Keep pulse on your customers' needs and wants - deliver a consistent quality product/service and experience.
• Pace yourself and stay healthy - business ownership is a marathon not a sprint.
• Step away - pray, meditate, exercise, go out and dance and/or listen to music.

 

For more tips and resources to support your path to business ownership, check out the Citi Small Business Resource Center and Citi's Women & Co. Your Career topics page.