by Suzy kew

Created on: June 07, 2010

You know it is time to close your home business when it is all consuming you.  You wake during the night with deadlines and dates circling in your head and reassuring yourself that your ordered everything you needed to today so you can work to meet all the deadlines that are haunting you.  When your child walks in after a day at school hoping to share some time with you and you give her the usual answer, "sorry I have to work"...again.

Owning your own business can be amazing but there are many challenges that come with it.  When you are the only one doing the work and books and marketing and every other aspect of the business.  Then you find yoursef involving your spouse and your children and you are all working just to meet deadlines.  The deadlines that, perhaps, could have been more reasonable if your client was a little more organized and realized that what you do takes time on your end too.

More often than not, when you own your own business, you have a problem saying no to clients and they learn that fast.  They tend to leave things on their end to the last minute which leads to you working in a panic to complete the job in the time frame you promised you would.  This is really not always the client's fault.  They don't know your business as you may not know theirs.

When you start to wake up dreading the day ahead of you it is time to close the business.  If you find yourself just not into it anymore and you end up making mistakes because it is really something you would rather not even be doing.  Sit down and write a list of all of your abilities and try to think of a way to either change the focus of your business so you will love it again or prepare to shut it down and opt for a career change.  Life is short and you should make the most of yours.

You will find yourself feeling that you might be letting your clients down but, sadly, they will move on to another distributor or supplier or whatever service you provide for them.  You will be quickly replaced and they will probably miss your service but it is better to leave on a high note rather than making mistakes and having your business remembered as such.  Hold your head up high and be proud of what you built but also look forward to what is ahead.  You know what you are capable of.  Remember how scared you were when you decided to start your business in the first place.  Many business owners go through a few businesses in their lives so join those ranks and carry on...forward.

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