How entrepreneurs can achieve a work-life balance

Ramesh Sharma is CEO of TPG UK and founder of Tech City News. In this article, he discusses how entrepreneurs can achieve a work-life balance.

For many entrepreneurs, starting and running their own businesses requires long hours and hard work, but that doesn’t mean that you can’t still achieve a healthy work-life balance without compromising on productivity levels.

In fact, as a leader, promoting a good work-life balance can not only help you on a personal level, but also feed down to your employees, creating a positive work culture.

But how can this work-life balance be achieved? Is it as simple as downing tools at the close of business? No of course not, but taking small steps to gain some perspective on whether you’re living to work or working to live can be a good starting point to figure out how and what will help you achieve a good balance between your job and your personal life.

Recognise and express your needs

First of all as an employer or employee, you need to start by being open about what your needs are and voicing what is really important to you.

If you’re open with yourself and those around you on what your needs are, you’ll find there are plenty of solutions to accommodate them and make a more honest and open work culture.

Implement and respect boundaries

Creating boundaries is important for building a work-life balance. If you’ve said you need to leave the office at 5:30pm on a Friday because you’re going away for the weekend, do it.

Once you’ve put boundaries in place, it’s incredibly important to stick to them. Naturally this will be difficult at first, but if you respect your boundaries, others will respect them too.

Prioritise what Matters

Time is a commodity that can’t be bought, so make sure you’re not wasting it on things that don’t matter.

Prioritising is something most people struggle with, but figuring out where you should spend your time to grow your business will help manage your time more effectively and improve productivity.

Take a step back from the day to day business operations and consider the real objectives, then plan a strategy to prioritise your workload to maximise your output.

Hit the off switch

With technology so prevalent in today’s culture, the thought of turning off your phone, tablet or computer can seem daunting, but once you start it can be very liberating.

If you make use of the ‘off switch’ on your devices or put your phone away for the evening, you’ll find you have greater perspective on the bigger picture and that you’re not a slave to your business every waking minute of the day.

The art of the work-life balance isn’t something that happens overnight, it takes time and dedication.

But if you put in the effort to organise, prioritise and create boundaries to suit your individual needs, you should reap the benefits of a longer, happier and more fulfilled life in the long run.