I get together bimonthly with a group of women entrepreneurs from various walks of life. The group’s founders have two simple rules: You need to show up on time, and you need to come prepared to share both a challenge you’re facing in your business and something you’ve learned. It’s a smart format because it encourages mentoring, collaboration and learning, and it helps people talk through and get advice about some relatively common business challenges.
My latest lesson learned: You have to know when to stop.
The best small business owners are constantly innovating—rethinking a product, adding a new service line, redesigning our websites, tweaking our marketing approaches, testing new communication and productivity tools and technologies. It’s what we do. It’s in our DNA. We’re also pretty good (at least most of the time) at cutting our losses when something just doesn’t work. Failure is an option because we learn from it.
But we’re really bad at stopping the things that are part of our routine but shouldn’t be anymore. Like advertising in the yellow pages. Or sending a telex rather than a tweet. Or culling through 25 e-newsletters a day rather than unsubscribing from the 20 that provide little or no value. These might have been useful or cutting-edge at one time, but now they’re just eating up your resources and/or your attention.
Are you in this rut?
Shortly after I started my business I joined an industry group mostly composed of high-powered Washington, D.C. women. The meetings were substantive—but the real benefit was an annual membership directory that had bios and contact information on everyone. In the pre-Internet days, it was a great resource (and a great way for me to get my name out). And I took advantage of it, slowly reaching out to the best prospects, building up my network and gaining some terrific clients in the process.
Then my business focus started to shift, and these weren’t my best prospects anymore. But I still paid my dues for another three years, finally cutting the cord around the time I joined IABC. In fact, when IABC’s 500 Club opportunity arose (which at the time required paying the equivalent of about five years of dues up front), I joked that I might as well take advantage because it takes me at least that long to quit a group.
Now I’m at a crossroads again, and I’ve come to the difficult decision to shut down this column.
Letting go
I started “Independent Thinking” because I wanted to share what I’ve learned in business and I wanted the opportunity to interview and learn from other smart entrepreneurs who have walked the walk. IABC, with its large contingent of freelancers, independents, entrepreneurs and small business owners, was the perfect place to house my business column.
And it’s been awesome. I’ve learned a lot—and the interaction with fellow IABCers, the friends I’ve made, and the questions you’ve asked me, have challenged me to be a better businessperson.
But times change, and the way we do business has fundamentally shifted over the past seven years. My company didn’t even have a website when I started this column. Now I’m blogging, tweeting, Skyping and talking about the business of running a business in other forums. I’ve also committed to doing an e-newsletter. And I’m a contributor to a couple of other blogs.
For the past year, I’ve been struggling to figure out what content belongs in this column versus my blog (let alone anywhere else). Because blogging is more constant and immediate, that’s where I test out ideas—so the column sometimes feels like I’m recycling material even if the audiences aren’t the same. It’s one more thing to do, but without seeing a compelling business purpose to put the time into it anymore.
The column has become the business outlier for me. It’s time to let go.
So I’m going to head into 2012 with some new initiatives in the works and one less obligation on my plate. But I leave with a big shout out to my two terrific editors at IABC—Jessica Burnette-Lemon and Amanda Aiello Beck—who have provided support over the years and made sure that what ends up on the page is always on point and articulate.
As we close out 2011 and ring in the new year, I’m leaving you with a final challenge: What are you doing today in your business that you need to let go?
