12/02/2025
Every business owner has two lists: 1) What they thought they’d be doing… 2) And what they actually do.
Spoiler alert: List #2 includes fixing the printer, playing therapist, and wondering why the same guy is late every morning.
And somewhere along the way you realize: “Oh. Nobody warned me about ANY of this.”
When I started running Faithful Disaster Restoration, I thought the hard part would be the work. Nope. The hard part was everything around the work.
I learned things the same way most business owners do: By messing them up first. Professionally. Aggressively. Repeatedly.
Like the time I hired someone because “they seem nice”… Or the time I tried doing everything myself… Or the time I ignored cash flow like it was a bad text message.
Let’s just say — God gives His toughest lessons to business owners who think they already know everything.
Here are 5 things I had to learn the hard way as a business owner:
1) “Being busy” is not a personality trait. I used to brag about being slammed. Now I brag about not being needed. Systems > Stress.
2) Hire slow… or pay for it fast. You can spend 3 weeks finding the right person… or 3 months undoing what the wrong person did in week one.
3) Communication solves 97% of problems. The other 3%? Solved by coffee. Strong coffee.
4) Delegation is not “giving up control.” It’s giving someone else the chance to do it better than you. (Yes… it stings the first time.)
5) Cash flow is king, queen, president, and the entire board. Ignore it, and your business will humble you quickly.
Bonus lesson: Employees don’t leave jobs. They leave leaders who act like they’re too busy to lead. (Another one I learned the spicy way.)
If you’re still learning some of these lessons — congratulations. You’re officially a real business owner.
Stick around. I’ll be back tomorrow with more things I learned by doing them wrong first.
— Nick
𝗣.𝗦. Want to skip a few years of painful lessons? DM me. 𝘚𝘶𝘯𝘥𝘢𝘺 𝘕𝘰𝘵 𝘚𝘰𝘮𝘦𝘥𝘢𝘺 was literally built for that.