The Drive: What challenges have you overcome?
The challenges are daily backing yourself and knowing you have a business that can either drain you or drive you. Challenging moments, whether they are related to clients, staff, cash flow, referrals, resources or momentum are always going to be part of the week-to-week moments. The times that I let challenges drain me are where the small and insignificant things become the worry, instead of positive problem solving and using that energy for bigger problems. Learning to manage the day-to-day client and staff moments well, keeps the emotions in check for when I really need to act on more significant issues. My mentality is to put things in place first, to prevent those smaller challenges now before we have to intervene. The reward of managing the right way overcomes challenges and spurs the drive to keep pushing forward.
For better or worse: What are the pros and cons of running your own business?
The best part of running my own business is knowing that I am able to lead people as well as work with my clients. The marriage of client work and business owner is now part of who I am and pros and cons often work together like the balancing of a scale.
On one hand, the business provides flexibility of hours where I can manage time out and allow breaks for family and business development. But the con is that this often means I work in large blocks of business outside work hours before there is a break. The business allows for me to learn new skills in areas I wouldn’t have otherwise done, such as marketing skills, promotions, event management, seminars and finance. But these things sometimes happen with trial and error and are not always successful. In the same way, having a clinic requires a larger responsibility that can bring more opportunity and open doors but requires more time and effort to get things off the ground.
If I see something as a con in the business I will always find the balance of the pro to get perspective of how I can manage my own time and expectations wisely and reduce overwhelm and stress. I have learnt that my business will not mimic or match others and I have to run my own race to find the success true to ourselves.
Hopes and dreams: What next?
The next phase is to continue to establish a solid team in both speech and occupational therapy so that we can grow that to the next level of staff and resources. From there online workshops, parent webinars and coaching, speaking events, writing articles and continuing to service our clients with excellence are all on the vision board!
The business is in a new phase at the moment with my role as mum to my sweet six-week-old daughter, and learning to lead with mum and business is a great journey ahead! Whatever the days look like, I know that if we stick to the basics well, everything else will follow.
To learn more about what Sydney Therapy Co have to offer your child, visit the website – www.sydneytherapyco.com.au
