If you’re running a business you’re likely dealing with a lot of stressors.
One of the big issues that can arise is impatience. You feel that you should be further along with something. Maybe it’s an internal thing with yourself. Or maybe you see a competitor and you think that they’re getting ahead of you and doing it faster.
Yet if you read stories written by successful businesspeople you often see them discussing the importance of patience. It’s not that they don’t take action. It just seems that their best decisions were made patiently. They waited to gather information. Once they had it, they took action.
And they also had patience when it came to their growth. They found a good mix of pushing forward while also not pushing too fast. Because there are many dangers that come for businesses that grow too fast.
If you’re looking to be more patient with your business, here are a few things to try…
1. First Things First
Jackie Burke is one of the greatest golfers in history. After winning over a dozen times on the PGA Tour including the 1956 Masters and PGA Championship, he started his own golf club and taught hundreds and probably thousands of people about the game.
One of the key things he focused on was, first things first.
In golf, you can only play the next shot. The moment you start thinking about the upcoming holes or even the upcoming shots, you take focus away from what you need to do next. Losing even a little focus in golf can lead to bad shots and bad shots can lead to costly penalties such as hitting it in the water, woods or even on the short side of the green.
In business, many people are dreamers. They have big ideas. It’s a struggle to work these dreams backwards to small steps. And then it’s even more difficult to do one thing at a time on the way to getting to the big dream.
If you’re losing patience with your work, focus on first things first. Get back to the present and only focus on doing the very next thing.
2. If An Employee Errors, Consider Yourself In Their Shoes
It’s easy to forget our own shortcomings when it comes to the various tasks in our business. If we make a mistake we quickly work to fix it. We don’t dwell on the mistake itself. That doesn’t usually lead to anything good. We recognize the mistake, fix it and try to learn from it so we don’t repeat it.
But when it comes to employees, vendors and partners, we often find ourselves dwelling on the mistake and the fact that the person made it.
In general, it’s good to give some leeway here. When someone makes a mistake, take a moment to think about a time when you were working on this task. Did you make a mistake early on? Odds are good that you did.
3. Do You Have Negativity Bias
Humans seem to have a general negativity bias. It was likely good for our ancestors to be suspicious of all the negative around them. Something negative could likely lead to death. So being on high alert was a good thing.
But today there isn’t too much that will lead to instant death. But the negativity bias is still around. So we notice the negative things in our business. This can make us anxious and impatience.
If you’re feeling this way, take some time to readjust your focus on the positive things happening with your business. This readjustment can lead to a better patience for yourself and the company.
4. Avoid Overnight Success Bias
When we read stories about others in our industry we often only get the most recent info. So it can seem like everybody else is somewhat of an overnight success. But this is almost always a myth. In fact, even if someone has reached quick success it’s likely that they are working on their second, third or even tenth business. They might be an overnight success with the new business, but they’re building it on top of all the other experience they built up previously.
You can’t skip ahead of all that experience. You have to put in the time. But the good thing is that if you’re taking it step by step, the years will go by pretty quick and that experience will accumulate.
5. Find A Mix Of Patient/Impatient People To Be With
You want to have people around you that push you. This is a good thing. Most successful people seem to have this. But you also don’t want the mix to be too much. This can lead you to make poor decisions. You also need to have overly patient people around you to slow you down.
Assess the people you spend the most time with. Determine how they push or pull you. If you need to make adjustments so it’s more even then do it. These decisions can be difficult, but it’s necessary for success.
Conclusion
Patience is a near universal key for success in business. If you read or learn intimate details about successful people you will often see that they are patient in very important ways. Often, when someone experiences failure, it’s because they lost their patience and started making poor decisions.
Hopefully the tips here can help you to use more patience with yourself and your business.