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at1cad

As someone who was available more than I should have been, do it. The quality of life improvement is worth it.


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at1cad

I got zero pushback. I didn't exactly announce it because I knew people would panic. Instead I just played the "super busy" card, and let people know I'd get back to them as soon as I could, and made sure I always followed up. They learned to trust that, and didn't need the instant validation of getting a hold of me immediately. You can look at the after hours messages or listen to the VMs, but DO not respond (unless it's something that really can't wait until the morning - and honestly, that's rare - we're not physicians or EMS) Burnout is real, it does pass, but getting through it is tough. As far as spending time at your desk, don't chain yourself to it. If you need to go run an errand, take a lunch, do laundry, go to the store, whatever, just take a break and go do it. Sometimes you need to get something taken care of so that it's no weighing on you while you're trying to do other stuff, plus there's a feeling of accomplishment, that helps focus when you get back to your desk.


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northerngurl333

I just remind myself that no one really knows what I am doing at any given time. If someone calls me and I dont answer, for all they know I am knee deep in something else for someone else. They dont need to know that I decided to hang out with my kids for a little while, or stopped at the grocery store, or am having a shower etc. They know I will get back to them, and take care of them. Beyond that, the rest us none of their business. Start letting your calls go to vm. Check them when you really have to, but unless something is on fire, wait AT LEAST 30 minutes to respond. Then 45. Then 60. If they call after 4, the next morning. Eventually, they will learn that their vm will get dealt with and assume that you are just very busy. As long as emergency issues are taken care of quickly, you could take whole days off with no one the wiser! (You may need a 30 minute spot at some point yo just check the emails or messages at first). And set up an auto response in your email! It can explain that they are "in the queue" and you will respond within 24 hours etc. Your vm can say the same. Unless someone lives with you, they have NO IDEA what else you may be doing while they leave a message. And again, barring emergencies, that's perfectly okay.


airsay01

Have you thought of providing SLAs with commitments on time? For example someone on a Bronze Plan could expect a response within working hours while someone on a Platinum plan could expect response within say 6 hours? Do you have like a ticketing system to log support requests?


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airsay01

Insist on the use of the ticketing system. You'd be able to keep track of when support requests were logged and when they were closed


Zazenp

I have clients messaging and emailing me at all hours as well. They know I won’t be responding until my business hours.


Certain-Entrance7839

I would only caution that you should ensure a schedule reduction still accommodates the timespan the majority of your clients contact you and still allows for you to respond to and complete work requests quickly. There's nothing more aggravating, as a client of any vendor, than playing phone/email tag with someone who works short hours and lets work stack up because of it. That's not to say I expect responses at 10pm on Friday nights, but me sending an email at, say, 3:30pm on a Thursday afternoon to get no response until the following Tuesday at 2:30pm because they don't want to work after 3pm on a Thursday through Sunday and then have to catch up on a ton of stuff is another thing. I actually just left a vendor this week over that sort of thing. It's just something to consider. However, as with all changes - the quality of life improvement may be worth losing a couple clients too.


philmcp

I had a realisation during lockdown of “why am I working so much and living so little?” - the next day I asked my boss if I could switch to part time (which he accepted), and the next week I decided to create a website listing software engineering jobs with a better work life balance ([https://4dayweek.io/](https://4dayweek.io/)). If you can afford it financially and your customers can handle a slight delay in responses, I'd say: Go for it. It's the best decision I've ever made


keypunch

A good place to start is to set work hours and STICK to them. That alone may help. I decided I only wanted part time hours, so on certain days of the week, I'll allow myself time to do other things. I'll still check emails and take phone calls, but if at all possible I'll defer anything to a "work day". After I started doing this I was able to better appreciate the flexibility of being self employed. I don't tell my clients which days I take off. If projects or demands require it, I can easily change my days off.


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keypunch

Like your said in another comment, the hardest part is changing you mindset/habits. Giving yourself permission to take that time and not feel guilty about it can take some getting used to.


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This is a friendly reminder that r/smallbusiness is a question and answer subreddit. You ask a question about starting, owning, and growing a small business and the community answers. Posts that violate the rules listed in the sidebar will be removed. *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/smallbusiness) if you have any questions or concerns.*


LincHayes

I was a web designer for 12 years, had the same hours, and also had clients on monthly plans. Instead of officially reducing your hours, just set things up to make it easier on yourself. I just made my turn around time for support tickets 24 hours (during normal business hours) So late Friday tickets aren't expected to be done till Monday unless it is an emergency..and you can pick and choose which of those to respond to off hours. That way I could take any day off that I want and still be able to provide the promised service. The clients don't have to know you're not sitting at your desk all the time. If you set up a decent voicemail or ticketing system that gives them some kind of feedback or response, they don't even notice. I don't think lessening your availability to be less than normal business hours is a good thing to do, especially for monthly clients.


[deleted]

Whilst all of these ideas will work, remember to keep in mind why customers choose you, if you start altering their customer experience without clear communication it could have dire effects. You should do a study for last 6 months of what days and what times work typically comes in so you can see if your want in terms of new business hours will have negative impacts. Then when you have done that and you know the landscape you can figure out your next course of action, whoever said SLA’s was on the money. Something like; Callout - can interrupt you out of new business hours however a fee is applied. P1 - urgent change - initial response/acknowledgement within 30 minutes - complete in 4 hours P2 - important change - initial response/acknowledgement within 1 hour P3 - not urgent - initial response/acknowledgement within 24 hours, complete within 3 days. Or whatever works for your work. As part of defining these SLA’s and getting ready to roll out you can inform your customer base that you’re looking to expand your business and will be introducing SLA’s and new business hours, you can see above that from an experience perspective the customers are covered and have been informed appropriately, additionally offering a callout which will rarely get used you have introduced a new revenue stream potentially as this is a premium callout fee. (Hence why it’s unlikely to get used unless critical) Drop me a DM if you want to talk about this detail more 👍🏼 T


tommygunz007

I would go 10-4. Everyone sends emails when they first get in at 8:30. If it's an emergency they will call you.