The Rigors Of Small Business Ownership

I’ve just learned several lessons that I’d now like to share with you, so as to keep you from making the same mistakes that I did. If you later feel the need to thank me, your gratitude can be expressed in a monetary fashion, or with baked goods.

I’d just picked up my mail, and I noticed that I'd received something from a local Dodge/Jeep/Ram dealership. Usually, I never read mail like this, but on a whim I tore the letter open. The first line read as follows: “From one small business owner to another, I am contacting you today about the…”

That’s as far as I got before my head exploded.

Wait, I’m a small business owner? When did this happen? Was it on that one Saturday night I still don’t remember very well? Or did somebody drop their small business on the sidewalk and it got stuck to my shoe when I later passed by?

What is my small business? What do I produce? I hope it’s not golf clubs, because I don’t know a thing about producing golf clubs! Or pacemakers, or industrial fans, or greeting cards! Oh boy, unless my small business makes semi-edible toast, I’m in big trouble here!

Does my small business have a cool name? If not, how hard is it to change a business name? I’ll bet it’s a lot of paperwork. I hate paperwork!

Do I have any employees? If so, how many? Will I be able to walk that fine line of being a no-nonsense executive while still being able to connect to my workers on a human level?

Does my small business have a vision? If so, can I change it? If so, how could my small business possibly succeed when its new vision would most likely focus exclusively on taking vacations and napping?

Do I have a corporate headquarters? Do I have my own office? Is it a corner office, with a beautiful view of some city skyline? Do I have a huge desk? Can I put my feet up on that desk all day and smoke cigars?

Wait, do I need to wear suits all of the time? I only own one suit, and it’s too big! Where can I get more suits? Or can I just change the dress code? What would that dress code be? Could it include tank tops and not be considered tacky?

As you can see, this was a quite stressful several seconds of my life. Then I read a little further down in the letter, where it stated this: “If you are a small business owner, you qualify to receive the enclosed…”

If I'm a small business owner?

My head unexploded, and my stress levels immediately fell to their prior levels. What a relief! I didn't own a small business after all!

After I swore at the misleading letter for several minutes, life went back to normal, and the strain of leading a small business through today's murky economic waters ended.

This leads me to the lessons that I learned. They are as follows:
1.)    Never open junk mail from Dodge/Jeep/Ram dealerships.
2.)    If you do, read them all the way through before freaking out.

These two lessons should definitely be directly applicable to you at some point in your future, and it’s my pleasure to have lent you a helping hand. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to go stare out of a window wistfully. I miss my office with the city skyline and the desk that I used to put my feet up onto while I smoked cigars. It made me feel special.