First time #Mompreneur for @bullseyeplans

As soon to be first time mother, Julia Pronin has been learning the challenges of carrying a child while working full time, working on her new marriage, and juggling a large close-knit family. With her husband as her centre of support, and a family that motivates and cheers her on, Julia has used the strength of those around her in order to stay determined and learn to multi-task effectively.

Creating schedules and to-do lists have been among the most effective organizational tools, along with creating an office at home in order to cut down on travel time and be able to make healthy meals at home. Julia Pronin has discovered Twitter as a great outlet to stay connected with other mompreneurs and to learn about the experiences of other successful women, thus creating a virtual environment of colleagues.

In the months to come, Julia will find herself in a predicament that many mompreneurs experience; taking care of a new born while nurturing an established business.

For mompreneurs who started their own businesses either before having kids, or before having a second or third child, the arrival or a new child can be a testing time for a business. Business does not wait for anyone, therefore developing a strategy for continued client care, and seamless industry presence is key. Julia Pronin has made necessary changes to her business plan in order to accommodate for the changes in the business management strategy by hiring industry professionals and training well in advance, allowing her to move away from working in the business, and to concentrate on working on the business, while still maintaing interaction with clients, and providing clients with superior service and value.

A business is always only as stable its foundation, therefore taking into account the challenges of a mompreneur allow a business to be flexible and resilient, by planning the strategy to combat challenges, and creating sustainable growth plans.
__________________________________________________________________________________
Julia Pronin is the owner of Bulls Eye Business Consulting. For individuals who are new to entrepreneurship, advice is key. Bull’s Eye Business Consulting offers free consultations for individuals who are simply looking for guidance.

Bull’s Eye Business consulting offers consultancy services for the successful funding of businesses, including Government loan and ...Grant applications. At Bull’s Eye, you can also obtain consultancy for developing strong business architecture, as well as obtaining a business plan or a marketing plan.

The team at Bull’s Eye Business consulting is composed of passionate entrepreneurs actively seek business solutions to propel businesses forward and achieve longevity and success.

The consultants at Bull’s Eye Business Consulting are critical as well as conservative, however like the sparkle in the eye of every entrepreneur, they possess the unique spirit of the entrepreneur, which is accompanied by the key to the door that says, “Everything is possible.”

Bull’s Eye Business Consulting will help you identify your goals, and to map out all the possible roads to achieving those goals allowing for smooth, progression growth.

Our clients range from small to medium businesses, as well as entrepreneurs who are in the seed stage of their business.

I am fortunate to have clients operating businesses in the full spectrum of Canadian Industries. Our consultants are experienced in business involved in everything from retail, to research and development, to manufacturing, and beyond.

Bull’s Eye Business Consulting applies a methodology of combining strong research in order to build a solid foundation for the businesses from which to build the architecture of the business, with a study which models the business throughout the first five years in order to achieve a realistic projection. We place a strong emphasis on identifying achievables and deliverables and creating a project plan. In this way, a business plan becomes the blueprint to your business. The financial projections of a business must always be conservative, as seeing a best-case scenario is the driving force for an entrepreneur, however planning for the worst is the insurance policy.

After creating a business plan, our consultants continue working with clients to obtain the finances required to start the business through Government financing programs, or investors when appropriate. When embarking on the daunting task of financing your business, having someone who will speak for your business is key, as an unbiased professional presentation of your business provides for greater chances of success.

Our consultants continue to work with my clients through all the lifecycles of their business, by assessing potential grants that they are eligible for, created an analysis of how their business is doing in comparison to the business plan, and making recommendations of how the business can propel itself forward.

Bull’s Eye Business Consulting welcomes anyone who is interested in embarking on the exciting journey of entrepreneurship, or anyone who is seeking advice for their existing business, to contact our consultants for a free consultation, and to discover their potential.
See More

Phone	+1 647.866.1680
Email	julia@bullseyeplans.com
Website	http://www.bullseyeplans.com

Balance @ArianeGriffiths wonders if it exists?

Balance – Does it even exist?

Dictionary.com defines balance as a few things, but only two definitions really stuck out to me:
- A state of equilibrium or equipoise; equal distribution of weight, amount, etc.
- Mental steadiness or emotional stability; habit of calm behavior, judgment, etc.

How do you achieve balance? Is always a popular question among entrepreneurs and one that usually creates a flurried conversation about different ways to create balance (“Make sure you schedule proper office hours!”, “Don’t answer your phone or check your messages after hours”, “Do your work once the kids are in bed.”)

From my experience, the conversation rarely unveils a NEW way to achieve balance and my belief is because I don’t think there IS a way to achieve Balance.

If you’re attempting to achieve the first definition “Equal Distribution” then MAYBE you can set your hours, turn off your phone and do your work after the kids go to bed, but let’s be honest here, will that happen? No! Ok, maybe for a day if you’re lucky, but then a frustrated client calls and talks way longer than your “scheduled hours” and by the time you’ve put the kids to bed, you can barely tell up from down, let alone make sense of the tasks that are waiting for you.

Now, if you’re attempting to achieve the second definition “Mental Steadiness or Emotional Stability”, the likeliness of you succeeding falls even further down the line because THAT is a hard thing to do for ANYONE (Entrepreneur or not!) There are too many factors playing in this situation.
Please don’t get me wrong, I believe you CAN achieve balance, but in order to do so, you first have to identify a few benchmarks.

Determine your goals
I say this not in terms of numbers/sales/etc. But what goals do you have for your life? When you look back do you want to remember that you spent every evening going back and forth from the dinner table to your email inbox? Probably not.
Write down what you “want” out of this life (and don’t use the word Balance) As per any goal, be specific, “I want to go on every school trip with my kids.” Or “I want to make sure I am here for them if they’re sick and need to be off school.”

Take a step back and look around
Take a look at what you’ve built as an entrepreneur. Is it honestly making you happy? Are you finding joy in the work / life that you have created? If something is nagging at you, bringing you down and you dread doing it, chance are good it’s got to go.

Again, write a list of what is dragging you down and (again) be specific, “I hate answering emails.” Or “I can’t stand cleaning the house on the weekends; I’d rather be tobogganing with the kids.”

Now that you have your list of “wants” and your list of “don’t wants” think of ways to implement and/or banish. For your “don’t wants” ask yourself if it would really break the bank if you got a cleaner in to clean the house once/month? What if you gave the kids an incentive to clean up? I’ve heard of parents hiding money around the house so the kids clean up in order to find said money – now that’s smart!

Think of making a day that you never get any work done (like Monday) the day where you do mundane niggling tasks (like replying to emails) so that you get that hated task out of the way, AND your day is still productive.

My point is to think REALISTICALLY and figure out what YOUR balance is.. Looking at another person’s form of balance is in no way going to come close to helping you achieve yours because it’s not your life, it’s theirs.. so right off the bat, it won’t work for you. Find solutions that work for YOU and YOUR family.
When you finish doing that, only then will you find balance. BUT keep in mind that when you find that balance, it will only be for a day or so.. ;)

Ariane Griffiths is a freelance Web Developer, Designer and Small Business Advocate. You can find out more information about her and her multitude of projects over at www.arianegriffiths.com where she talks about everything to do with web, social media, entrepreneurship and her “other” business as an Epicure Selections Rep.