Doing the "unpaid" work

[604Pook]

One man shop question, when do you take the time to do the "unpaid" work around your shop. Be it cleaning up, rebuilding vises, to making/setting up things to make your life easier? I have worked many years doing whatever it took to get jobs done, I really missed many days and events of my older kids lives doing this because I had to. I am trying to be present more with my younger kids these days and also with my older kids.

The shop work to get done on my list never ends, so I often need to steal time away from the family, to do the work and to do upgrades or the organization stuff for the shop which benefits me down the road. Same with product ideas and prototyping of new stuff.

How do you manage your time? I am almost thinking I need to schedule a day a week for that stuff. It doesn't pay now, but can in the future. There is that saying that 10% of your work brings you 90% of your results the other 90% you spend your time on is just being a busy body and not getting real results. Figuring out what that 10% is probably would help. I know more time spent doing product development/prototyping could, with some luck bring bigger dividends then my current work in the future.

How do you guys manage your time in this regard?

 

[DouglasJRizzo]

When my kids were home, I would schedule certain things around the time that they were going to be with their friends, or visiting grand parents.
When that wasn't convenient, I tried to do PM, vise rebuilds, etc on a Friday. Always seemed to work out better for me.

 

[Stirling]

I’m a home based shop
i promised my wife 1 day off a week, and I try to have evenings reasonably free.
This makes her more understanding when I do have to work more hours.
PM’s in the evening when needed after the kids are asleep
That way it’s quiet and my wife can hang out with me.
I’m pretty tired in the evenings these days and I’d rather do pm than programming and have an oops.

One big thing to remember. Divorce is VERY expensive. Never forget to schedule lots of Maintenance hours to family
Too many small company’s fail because family is not maintained and then your be a miserable old grump and have less money to boot.

 

[Marvel]

It is the complete opposite for me, since I went on my own, I have more time with my family. It was a big part of going on my own fully. I was sick of racing home from work to get to my kids events.

I haven’t missed a single event, function if any sort and we actually take more vacations than I ever have as an employee at shops.

I think you need to decide why you went into business, was it to make more money? Work more, work less, etc.

I was perfectly fine with going into business and making the same amount I did as an employee if it meant I didn’t have to miss anything. There are definitely days, weeks I am busy and work well into the evening or weekends but I will never allow it consume my life and affect my family.

 

[Booze Daily]

I’m the same as Marvel. I did go in early on Sunday mornings sometimes, like 2-3 am so I could be home when the family woke up.

It’s a balance. Are you training your customers what to expect or are they training you.

 

[macgyver]

This was much easier for me to do when I wasn't nearly as busy as I have been the past 6 months, but quite awhile ago I resigned myself to the fact that I was OK with things taking longer and or not making as much money, missing out on some jobs, etc so I could take care of my personal stuff like family and even a few projects. I am fundamentally a machine guy so doing the maintenance or upgrades to my stuff is easier for me to justify and make it happen than some other chores I should be doing, but I do know that I have to pick the right time to do it. As for family life, I had my daughter late compared to most of my friends and I do whatever I can to be around for her (and the wife), I figure that if I do that right, not much else matters a whole lot. I think ultimately it will pay off better than many other things I can invest in.

I have only recently been consistently busy enough that it has been an issue for me and that has meant that I have been even more flexible as to when I work, sometimes it is shorter days but go in on the weekend too. Or it is weird offset hours. I know that is old hat to most business owners, but I haven't had to do it regularly before.

 

[Ox]

One man shop question, when do you take the time to do the "unpaid" work around your shop. Be it cleaning up, rebuilding vises, to making/setting up things to make your life easier? I have worked many years doing whatever it took to get jobs done, I really missed many days and events of my older kids lives doing this because I had to. I am trying to be present more with my younger kids these days and also with my older kids.

The shop work to get done on my list never ends, so I often need to steal time away from the family, to do the work and to do upgrades or the organization stuff for the shop which benefits me down the road. Same with product ideas and prototyping of new stuff.

How do you manage your time? I am almost thinking I need to schedule a day a week for that stuff. It doesn't pay now, but can in the future. There is that saying that 10% of your work brings you 90% of your results the other 90% you spend your time on is just being a busy body and not getting real results. Figuring out what that 10% is probably would help. I know more time spent doing product development/prototyping could, with some luck bring bigger dividends then my current work in the future.

How do you guys manage your time in this regard?

Mine's been put off and put off, for a few years on some things by now.
For the last 2.5 years as I haven't really had any "warm body" work to put someone on, so I have been working alone, and there is only so many hours, and even less ambition in a week, that everything is on the hot sheet. If it can be put off to keep a paying customer happy (less upset?) then that is what gets done.

I have had 2 sets of trucks here to put on one of the lathes since the first of the year.
Working around it yet...

Need a new screw in another lathe, and that will have to get to the top of the list this week.

"Schedule it in"?
It seems that my "schedule" is edited as much as the 14 day forecast.
Just gott'a roll with it...


I am encouraged tho to see that there are several guys out there young enough to be working around kids yet.
Personally I never got the whole "kids in this and that, and need to be watched" thing. I was perplexed when my mom showed up at a ball game in 7th grade. "What are you dooing here?" To me it is all a game, just sumpthing to doo in spare time, not a real thing.

I never seen anyone showing up and cheering me on at a soil judging contest, or a dairy judging contest.
Those things have a LOT more to doo with life than some silly "ball", but whatever makes your world go 'round I guess....


----------------------

Think Snow Eh!
Ox

 

[William Payne]

As an employee of companies who have failed dramatically at this. I am going to state the employee perspective. Don't underestimate 15-30 minutes at the end of the day to clean up. Obviously do a basic clean after each job. Don't be the people who just never clean up their chips and they just pile up and up the only "clean" spot is the vice jaws, why anyone would want to work like that is beyond me.

Obviously that would require set working hours, which many don't seem to have when self employed.

 

[john.k]

I had a lot more time working for myself .......when employed ,I found a lot of bosses and managers used to like a lot of overtime for little reason ,and lord it over anyone who had a family life,calling for overtime when they knew someone wanted a night for some family event.

 

[???]

I solved the kids thing by not having any that I know of. I was having what I call f**K around Fridays for cleaning and my own projects/new product development. I do find limited space makes it more difficult to clean easily, too many nooks and crannies. Another thing that doesn't help is the speed of modern machinery, you need to keep feeding the beast. I went through a phase where I would get stressed because my 3 CNC spindles weren't turning while I worked on a manual lathe, now I just go stuff it. Saying all this it's Sunday morning and I'm off to work to run a job for a new customer. I'm too old to change my ways but I do say to the youngsters life is a marathon not a sprint. I do have an excuse in that I left my homeland because of issues outside my control and had to restart my life in my 40's. Sorry for the rambling response.

 

[standardparts]

One man shop question, when do you take the time to do the "unpaid" work around your shop. Be it cleaning up, rebuilding vises, to making/setting up things to make your life easier? I have worked many years doing whatever it took to get jobs done, I really missed many days and events of my older kids lives doing this because I had to. I am trying to be present more with my younger kids these days and also with my older kids.

The shop work to get done on my list never ends, so I often need to steal time away from the family, to do the work and to do upgrades or the organization stuff for the shop which benefits me down the road. Same with product ideas and prototyping of new stuff.

How do you manage your time? I am almost thinking I need to schedule a day a week for that stuff. It doesn't pay now, but can in the future. There is that saying that 10% of your work brings you 90% of your results the other 90% you spend your time on is just being a busy body and not getting real results. Figuring out what that 10% is probably would help. I know more time spent doing product development/prototyping could, with some luck bring bigger dividends then my current work in the future.

How do you guys manage your time in this regard?

If the tasks you are able to put off for a couple months don't stop you in your tracks it's likely they will remain the same up 'till the day you call it quits.

Am a few months away from no longer paying the insurance bill which means I'm a few months away from no longer extending a lease. As I sell things off or look at a piece of equipment/machine that was intended to help me realize my dreams, I now find it would be easier to haul it off as scrap. Let's see, got the machine a few years ago...yeah...except it was over ten years ago.....Now it's more a case of "what was I thinking of?"
Keep your "to do" list simple and achievable and try not to take on anything until the simple stuff is a done deal.

 

[mmurray70]

Cleaning isnt "unpaid" work. If Im doing a job on the clock i include time to clean up. If im quote a job, same deal.

Why do it for free? The mess is part of the job your doing for the customer, charge them for the time to clean it up.

 

[john.k]

Its like the kids are going to live in a share house with three or four friends ........either one of their mothers comes and does the washing and cleaning once a week ,or the place quickly degenerates into a vermin infested dump with none of them doing anything but making more mess .

 

[alek95]

Personally I try to always do 10-15 minutes of "cleaning" or organizing before I leave for the night.

I put tools away. Sweep up a bit around the machines. Organize the papers on my desk.

It's not gonna make the place look like a hospital, but if you do it regularly at least it doesn't look like a bomb went off in the place.

 

[Doug]

Retired now, but when working I found a good way to take a family vacation that was mostly tax deductible. Westec in LA was in early spring. My wife and kids would go to LA with me, we'd either drive or fly. I'd go to the show for a day or two, the wife and kids would be go to Disneyland or other tourist things in the area. I might spend a day scrounging the tooling houses in LA (those are almost all gone now).

The expense for myself and my wife could be written off since she did office work in the business.

Sometimes I'd skip Westec and go to Hawaii which was not tax deductible.

The important thing was to get way from the business for a week or so. Before taking off for vacation I always felt everything would go to hell if I left. About 20 minutes into a flight I'd relax realizing whatever might happen will happen and it's too late to change my mind. Coming back it was like pushing the reset button, I was totally recharged and ready to go at it again.

 

[jccaclimber]

Cleaning isnt "unpaid" work. If Im doing a job on the clock i include time to clean up. If im quote a job, same deal.

Why do it for free? The mess is part of the job your doing for the customer, charge them for the time to clean it up.

You’re charging them either way, assuming you’re doing it. It’s either in overhead with a higher hourly rate or filled direct in the job at a lower rate. The total should be the same.

 

[Ries]

Only way I ever got everything done is by having employees. Often, after I do the first one and show em how to do it, the employees do the production work, and I do paperwork, order materials, make samples, fix equipment, and run errands much more than work in the shop. Because I cant pay people to do all the stuff that is only in my head, but I can pay people to weld 18 assemblies exactly the same, or drill 600 holes.

 

[Freedommachine]

@604Pook excellent thread starter. I have been wondering this myself.

The only thing I can add; you have to be careful with R&D and product development. I spend WAY too much time on that and not enough on production or expanding the sales side of my business.

 

[Glug]

Obviously that would require set working hours, which many don't seem to have when self employed.

Being self employed is the luxury to choose which 80 hours you work each week.

 

[artengineering]

The stuff you feel you lack being self employed you have to just actually "schedule" time to do those tasks, because it usually means they aren't on high priority or aren't one of the the more enjoyable things. Sometimes if you don't it's like those 15 min tasks will be pushed aside forever. Replying to an email, sending an invoice, PM on a machine, organizing the shop, etc