Be The Boss Of You First
Entrepreneurship and being the boss of you is the in thing. The blog world is rich with articles on how to start out on your own, and if the increasing number of “Under 30 CEOs” is anything to go by, those articles are a reflection of reality. Employment isn’t very attractive to our generation, which is a good thing. However, one thing that’s critical for life success and isn’t getting as much airtime is how to master yourself before you master your business. It is relatively easy to get to the top but to stay on top,you must ensure that you have achieved self masterly on your journey there. Today we look at 4 things that are critical to mastering yourself, or being your own CEO:
1. Have a plan. Someone once said, if you fail to plan your life, someone else will plan it for you, and if no one does, nature will. With every passing day you grow older, options are taken away, and denial doesn’t reverse this process. Planning your life may seem mundane, boring, the kind of thing old people do, but to make anything of yourself, you’ve got to have a plan.
It may be cool to be in “Adultescence” through your 20s, 30s and 40s, but bear in mind that those are your strongest years physically and mentally, invest in developing yourself then. My grandfather once told me it is better to work hard when young and you have a choice and the energy for it, than to have to work hard in old age when you’re ailing.
One benefit I have seen in having a Life Plan is the amount of freedom it gives, a contradiction to the common misconception that planning restricts. Planning actually frees you up. Since you know how you would like your life to turn out, you are a lot more flexible and can take several options today because one eye is on the end goal, as opposed to a plan-less life, where you have to agonize over every small decision, because you don’t know how it fits in with the big picture.
Take some time out this weekend and draw up a Life Plan. It doesn’t have to be perfect or final, but it helps you think.
2. Formulate goals: Once you have a plan in place, what you can call the “big picture”, translate it into goals that help you achieve it. Let’s say you’d like to work in philanthropy in your 50s. That is a great thing, but now you need measurable steps to get there. What do you need to do to be able to do philathropic work? Maybe achieve a certain level of savings and investment so that day-to-day expenses aren’t a problem, spend at least a year in a foreign firm doing what you would like to do, maybe start familiarising with the field today and doing small tests? All these are goals intended to get you where you want to be “when you grow up”.
Formulate the goals and break them up into “bite sized” chunks. Most people work with annual goals, but I’ve found seasonal goals work better, and save me from the new year resolutions fatigue. A season can be a couple of months, or even a couple of years.
3. Translate the goals into daily action: Most of us are good at the first two steps, but we fail when it comes to translating our goals into daily action. How is what you’re doing today fitting into your big picture? Success comes from daily habits, not natural talent. If the habits you are feeding today aren’t geared towards the big picture, then you need to change them or change your big picture.
Just like we track our expenses to make a good budget, it helps to track your time to know what you’re spending most of your time doing. If the things that take up most of your time have nothing to do with where you want to be, then you need to budget your time better. Starting Monday next week, I will be tracking my time for a week, hopefully I will have the guts to post the results on here. 🙂
4. Constantly review your goals: A good CEO knows that strategy is fluid, and changes with the times. To be a great CEO of you, you should embrace change, and factor it into your goals, without losing sight of where you want to end up. While the end game may not change, your goals should be flexible especially where factors that aren’t within your control come into play.
5. Take measured rest: Rest is good, and keeps your body in top form. However, the body loves to rest and will rest for as long as you let it. Use your 20s and 30s to build physical endurance, of course without burning out. Get your 6 hours of sleep, and maybe a 20 minute nap during the day, then use the rest of the time productively.
I do not advocate for taking entire weekends out to “rest”, and I do not believe vacations should be spent on the couch watching TV or on the beach in a comatose-like state. No matter how exhausted you are, your body needs only so much rest, and most times lazing in your bed for an entire weekend leaves you more sluggish than energized. I’ve found that my body and brain rests best when I alter the nature of activity, as opposed to passively lying on the couch. For example, after a long week at work that leaves me mentally exhausted, it helps to spend the weekend doing physical work that doesn’t engage the brain much like cooking, hiking, cleaning the house etc, since my day job isn’t physically taxing. And vice versa.
Final note on rest. Do not be afraid to push the limits sometimes, your body could surprise you by what it can take, as long as you are keeping healthy.
6. Keep the right company: Finally, you need to be very conscious of the voices you let into your life. We tend to underestimate 
the influence the company we keep has over our success or failure. Have a good mix of people in your life, most of whom should challenge and question your decisions. As much as it flatters you, avoid spending too much time with people who are in awe of you, it could easily get into your head. Ensure that you have one or two people how are on a good path to where you are headed and be open to learn from them. I have found it very beneficial to have friends who have succeeded in areas I consider important speak into my life. Everyone has a different path, but with time you realize our paths are more alike than they are different.
Most people fail to benefit from counsel because they spend time with people who are in the same boat as they. It is comforting to know we are in this together but it is not very helpful toward the quest to be the CEO of you.
Finally, be open to learning, realize that you do not know as much as you think you do.
Everyone starts out as ordinary
