In a meeting with some business women the other day, I heard a comment that blew my mind for the sheer boldness of it. 

One of the women who owns and runs her own business, recounted when she faced one of those the life changing points in her career.  She had a young child and new baby and was already juggling the demands of motherhood, her marriage and her business career when she realised that one of her children had serious health issues that required more attention than she was able to give at that moment in time.

I am ashamed to say that while I listened to her story about to unfold, I was quickly trying to work out what she gave up, because I knew her business was still going strong, as was her marriage, but surely in order to give more attention to one area of our lives, we have to give up something else.   But what she said next taught me such humility that I felt like I should go back to Business 101.

“I knew that I was the only one who could take care of my child.  I am the mother.  So to take care of my child and my family, and not lose my business, the only solution was to expand my business.” 

How many of us would do the exact opposite?  Contract the business?  Pull back.  Put things into maintenance mode until we can come back and grab the reins again.  Instead she outsourced, delegated, trusted and brought people in to take her business to places that she wasn’t able to go to at that time.  It grew bigger while it was out of her immediate control.  When she was ready to come back, she did reshuffle things, but she took the reins of a bigger and better business than she left.

Now that is the example of a big business thinker; someone who is not afraid of taking a risk and whose risk is paying such awesome dividends now. 

Are we prepared to trust the people we work with to that extent?  Have we hired well?  Have we partnered with the right kind of people?  Are we strong enough to recover if we haven’t done so?  But we certainly cannot do it all ourselves and survive anyway.  She would have lost something had she held onto it all, but in giving up some control and trusting others whom she had already mentored, she was rewarded with exponential business growth and still has a happy and strong home life.  

As for me; I take Jim Rohn’s advice seriously: make sure you are not the smartest person in the room.  I am privileged to learn from people far smarter and more experienced than I am.