How do you balance entrepreneurial responsibilities with personal life, especially during the summer months when kids are back in school?
Living Fast Forward, An Entrepreneur’s Journey
We’re starting something a little different with this episode. We’re exploring what’s it like living in ‘fast forward’ mode—not just in business, but in real life.
As the summer winds down and kids head back to school, we’ll discuss how this annual transition impacts entrepreneurs, particularly those juggling the demanding roles of parenthood and business ownership. We share personal anecdotes, tips on maintaining routines, and strategies for balancing work, family, and personal growth.
Living Fast Forward Takeaways
Balancing Personal and Professional Life – Entrepreneurs often struggle to balance their personal responsibilities with professional ones. Especially for parents, managing the diverse demands can be overwhelming but is crucial for sanity.
Importance of Routine and Schedule – Routine and schedules can provide a sense of stability and organization, especially during the school year. Entrepreneurs can leverage this structure for better productivity.
The Challenge of Summer for Working Parents – The summer months can present significant challenges for working parents. Without the structure of school, managing children’s schedules and maintaining work productivity can become difficult.
Teaching Kids by Example – Immersing children in a parent’s entrepreneurial world can be educational. It can inspire them and provide early lessons in business and work ethic.
Effective Time Management – For entrepreneurs, effective time management is critical. Utilizing every available moment productively, even waiting times during kids’ activities, can help in managing a busy schedule.
Gender Differences in Parenting Roles – Traditional gender roles can influence the division of responsibilities between men and women in entrepreneurial families.
Kids’ Extracurricular Activities – Engaging children in sports and other extracurricular activities can foster discipline, confidence, and reduce idle time that might lead to trouble.
Seasonal Adjustments in Work-Life Balance – Different seasons (like the school year vs. summer) require different approaches to managing work and personal life. Flexibility and adaptability are essential traits for entrepreneurs.
Self-Care and Stress Management – Entrepreneurs need to prioritize their health and well-being by slotting time for exercise, hobbies, or downtime to manage stress effectively.
Utilization of Education Savings Plans – Entrepreneurs should leverage education savings plans like 529 and Coverdale accounts to maximize tax benefits and support their children’s educational expenses.
Running a business doesn’t have to run your life.
Without a business partner who holds you accountable, it’s easy to be so busy ‘doing’ business that you don’t have the right strategy to grow your business.
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Transcript
Hello, everyone. Welcome to an why is it so funny? Welcome to another edition of Empowering Entrepreneurs podcast. I'm Glenn Harper.
Julie Smith [:Julie Smith.
Glenn Harper [:What's so funny? Am I a comedian today?
Julie Smith [:Well, I just didn't I didn't really know it was gonna come out because we're gonna try something a little different.
Glenn Harper [:Do you think I know what's gonna
Julie Smith [:happen today? It's not satisfying. Laughing.
Glenn Harper [:Well, we're gonna mix it up a little bit today, and we're gonna, do a little Living Fast Forward, An Entrepreneur's Journey. What's it like in real life, not work life? What is the other things that one must deal with? And, of course, this week, most of the world is at least the US is going back to school. What does that mean in an entrepreneur's journey? What's the pros and cons? What does that look like?
Julie Smith [:You mean we're gonna allow people to take, like, a peek behind the curtain here? Like, things that are in our life that are happening that we believe everybody can relate to?
Glenn Harper [:I think everybody's relating gonna relate to it. And there's, there's gonna be some fun stuff to talk about. There's gonna be some ironic things to talk about. But most of the time, these things are real. And maybe you don't even know they're happening, but we're gonna try to bring them to the attention.
Julie Smith [:So the whole back to school thing, I for me as a working mom
Glenn Harper [:Entrepreneur.
Julie Smith [:Entrepreneur, however you wanna phrase it, of responsibilities. I love routine and schedule. So I thrive in that environment. So the summer environment to me is is chaotic and hectic, and I'm ready for it to end. Not the summer part. Right? But the kids going to school part.
Glenn Harper [:It's the Wild Wild West because you're trying to spend the quality time with the kids. You're trying to do everything you plus you're trying to work, plus the kids. Everybody's got any there's no schedule. They're coming, you know, sleeping in, getting up late. How does that affect your lifestyle? As an entrepreneur, we're very good at schedule and planning things. It's impossible in the summer months when they have kids.
Julie Smith [:Well, my poor kids get an education in going to the office. So it's like, you know, you get them up. You get them going. You allow them to to do what we do at home, and then we gotta go to the office kids, you know, some of the days just to some things have to happen.
Glenn Harper [:Just think, you know, 20 years from now, they'll be on in a podcast about how they got started in entrepreneur. I'm like, oh, I remember watching my mom do this. So it'll be it's all good. It's all good life lessons.
Julie Smith [:Yeah. No. It's a great educational thing. It's just it's it creates a little more angst, I think, for the moms out there that are trying to multitask, I guess, in their world. And what that means for those 3 months or 2 months or 1 month, whatever it is that you have your summer vacation, what does that mean to be able to achieve both? Right? And I think when kids are in school, it's a lot easier for moms to back into. What does that look like? What time do I have? How do I get all of that done? Like, I I keep saying, like, if you give a busy mom 4,000 things to do, they'll figure out how to do them. You give someone who's not in that realm 4,000 things to do, and they're, like, excited they got a 1,000. And we're like, wait.
Julie Smith [:What about the other 3,000 that had to get done? So
Glenn Harper [:Well, the good news is if as a dude, dudes never worry about that stuff. Everything just kinda always works out, which is important to note. So whatever the reason is, the chicks gotta deal with that, the moms, because there's so much detail has to happen, and dude, just that's not what we do. We're just there to support and do the things we're supposed to do, but it is nice to see everybody get on the routine. I think the hardest part we we think it's routine. Right? But there's always gonna be an unexpected. You know, the school's closed. There's a holiday.
Glenn Harper [:There's a, you know, a kid gets sick. The anxiety I remember when I was writing notes to this teacher is how do you spell diarrhea? So we just would say upset stomach. Oh my gosh. And so that was the biggest stress is how do you get the get out of jail free card for your kid being sick? Today, I think you should send an email, and you don't have to be specific. Is that how
Julie Smith [:it works? Just an email.
Glenn Harper [:If it got crazy anymore.
Julie Smith [:But I also think, you know, that what comes with school is all these activities. Right?
Glenn Harper [:Before, during, after?
Julie Smith [:Yeah. And so how do you schedule those and make sure that you're able to achieve all the things. Right?
Glenn Harper [:That's probably one of the big things, that's happening today is the the the entrepreneurs as high achieving people, they expect a lot of their kids. And as they expect a lot of their kids, that usually means keep them busy, keep them activities, keeping those things. Well, that's a big huge commitment, and they're so busy keeping people busy, they don't have time to just kinda hang out and be kids. But if you don't keep them busy, they're probably gonna get in trouble, and you can't have that. So you put them on sports, you put them in things that will do better, and those things help develop your kids even better than they would have, either they're working or they're in athletics or some sort of, you know, band or whatever that is that they have to have a discipline.
Julie Smith [:Well, I think that's a whole another podcast, which is I hope someone's taking notes here of, you know, kids in athletics and what does that turn into as an adult. But you're right. I think kids are a lot busier these days than, you know, maybe when you and I grew up. But I definitely think it breeds confidence too for them is, you know, knowing and achieving what they can and being delved into all of that. But as a mom, it is, you know, I wanna turn on my Uber light and, earn some money for all those trips back and forth to the practice field, to the school, to this, to that. And, you know, I think I'm gonna laugh about something as I'm thinking. I'm literally visualizing my life in that is I got a gift as a a desk in my car because my car has Wi Fi. And so I can whip out my iPad while the kids are at air.
Julie Smith [:I'm in between things, and I can get some work done. And I think, as moms, that's just how we think is there's no dead time. How do we make this work? Well, for me, making it work is maybe responding to the 100 emails in my inbox between 6 and 7 while someone's at soccer practice.
Glenn Harper [:Yeah. That's another struggle as as dues. We're probably not gonna do those things. We'll probably do calls, but we're like, we're just sitting there. We're gonna just veg out and watch and shut our brain off. Chicks, you gotta keep it busy, and you get it's all about that high efficiency. And, again, there's some lots of entrepreneurs that probably use that time wisely, but most of the times, dudes just are gonna zone out because we need that time and we don't get that time. So just watching your kid compete and enjoy the moment, a dude can do that.
Glenn Harper [:It's really hard for chicks sometimes to do that because the list is never ending.
Julie Smith [:Right. But I think, you know, also as we talk about routine and schedule, I think for, you know, for me, it's being able to back into when do I have that working time. So even as the kids are super busy in activities, they're in school, I at least know the time frame in which I can log on to do some work or I can schedule calls or whatever that is. I at least have that time frame built out once school's back in session and all the activities are back up.
Glenn Harper [:Right. It's like, if you're not have as an entrepreneur, we all know there's schedules, there's timings, and there's when you're gonna do it. But, like, if you don't work out at, like, 5 AM or 4:30 in the morning, how can you possibly do that if you're trying to run a business to get people where they need to be, take care of kids, take care of spa like, how do you do it? There's only one time you can do it. But if the kids are sleeping in, you can't get out out of the house to go do what you need to do, or they got practice afterwards, Like, it's gonna help you as an entrepreneur really prioritize those things you have to do, the the self time, the study time, the learning part, the athletic part to get work out because you gotta get rid of stress somehow. And then, ultimately, try to be the best parent you can be, and then try to be there for your team for the office.
Julie Smith [:So yeah. So I think the takeaway is, you know, for us, I think we're excited about school being back in session. For me, I'm really excited for that routine and schedule. That's the environment that I thrive in and to be able to back into when those calls can happen. When can I log in? What can everybody kind of expect? You know, I'm I'm the curtain's gonna close on the Wild Wild West here for the next few months.
Glenn Harper [:Which is sad because, like, the pool isn't even closed yet. But yeah.
Julie Smith [:Restricted hours.
Glenn Harper [:This is true too. So, again, I think, again, everybody gets excited. We we were talking a little bit about, school being, more year round and just have breaks versus having a full time summer. I don't know. I just know old school. I just think summertime should be about being a kid and not have to worry about anything. But today's environment, you kinda gotta do things if you wanna get ahead because somebody else is working harder. Yeah.
Glenn Harper [:Well, there you have it. Well, hopefully, those are some good thoughts to have as as entrepreneurs going back to school. Don't forget, you know, back to college. Make sure you're using the 529 and the Coverdale Educations. And the kids, make sure you can take your 529 for the some some of the schools that do it for private schools. Don't forget about the cool tax things you can do, which is important. And, hopefully, this this is, resonates with some of you. So until the next time, live and fast forward, the entrepreneur empowering entrepreneurs podcast.
Glenn Harper [:I'm Glenn Harper.
Julie Smith [:Julie Smith.
Glenn Harper [:We'll see you.