One of the things nobody tells you about when starting a business is that you’ve unknowingly signed up to play the bank.  Every time you provide credit to a customer you always risk having someone like Wimpy from Popeye who will promise you the world for that hamburger today!  So knowing how it feels to have some customers ask you to play the bank, is it OK for you to do the same thing to them?

One of the common refrains you’ll hear whether it be in business or life is something to the effect, “If you’re not growing you’re dying.”  A phrase like that can put a lot of pressure on a business owner to constantly be growing.  But what does this really mean to grow?  How do you plan for all of this growth?  And is it possible to have too much growth?

One of our favorite things about small business when compared to big business is that small business allows you to have a heart.  Big organizations can often feel cold and impersonal.  But with that “heart” of small business also comes a lot of emotion.  Our topic today covers one of those emotional reactions that is pretty common for a small business owner, trying to figure out if something is a fireable offense or not.

Chances are if you’ve been in business for yourself for a little while at some point you’ve wrestled with the thought of throwing in the towel.  Many things could trigger this thought.  Anything from losing a big customer or key employee or it could just be that you're tired and worn out.  Whatever your situation, understand you’re not alone.

So what do you do?  What do you say when someone asks you this question?  Chances are you’ll talk about your business and what your business does first when responding to this question.  But if someone is asking what it is that you do as the business owner in our business, what do you tell them?

Warning, this may get a little uncomfortable!  It’s always awkward for a business owner to think about this question, let alone ask it out loud.  Yet we know it’s a question that many business owners wrestle with at a variety of times with their business.  Is there a right time to step away from your business?  And what does “step away” really mean?

One of the biggest things we do for our business owner coaching clients is help them ask the right questions.  Our topic today about trying to not think about your business is one of those questions that isn’t the right question to be asking.  It’s really not even the question our clients and other small business owners mean to ask because it’s really not possible to stop thinking about your business.  The real question is more along the lines of what things should I be thinking (or worrying) about as it relates to my business.

If you’re a business owner, chances are you’ve either been accused of being the bottleneck or you’ve recognized it in yourself.  It’s tough when you’re the one who started the business and it was basically you doing everything at the start.  As you grow and add more people to your team, it can be difficult to let things go and entrust your team to get things done.  Especially to do things the way you’d do them.  So what’s a business owner to do?

One of the most common frustrations we hear from small business owners is that they feel like they are tied to their business.  Like they can’t leave for short or long periods of time without significant angst or stress as they wonder how things are going.  So how do some business owners manage to be away from their business yet still have a good sense for what is going on while others are afraid to leave their business?  Would you believe that much of it comes down to a few simple reports?

It seems these days that everywhere you look a new podcast is popping up.  It’s to the point now that there are over 1 million podcasts currently available.  And that number continues to grow.  Even fake people have podcasts…Ron Burgundy anyone?  So the question we pondered today during the show is, should your small business have a podcast?