MBA: Mompreneur in Business Administration

I don't have an MBA - well not the kind that one gets from a university. I don't even have formal training in website design or administration.

Everything I know and everything I've learned, I've gained through self-study and research; through listening and talking with others who know more than I do. I am a self-taught MBA.

One of the most helpful things that I've learned as a mompreneur is what I call The Management Equation. I didn't come up with it - I learned it from the orientation session for self-employment benefits.

It goes like this:TIME MANAGEMENT + RELATIONSHIP MANAGEMENT = MONEY MANAGEMENT.

As every mom and mompreneur knows, time management IS key to getting things done -- all the things that we need to do, done in a timely manner. It is no easy task to meet deadlines on time when you have a toddler or two or three who also needs your attention right away. So we prioritize and reorganize our time and tasks. I reserve the things that can wait until after my daughter has gone to bed for my night-work-hours and only tackle the must-do-during-business-hours during my official office hours at home (official to me and my girl, that is) or when my daughter is in school (which is when I schedule my meetings).

Relationship management encompasses all the relationships that we have: personal and business. As busy as our days get, we need to make sure that we remember to nurture our relationships. Return our phone calls, answer our emails, setting dates and meetings and playdates and lunches and just-hanging-out times. After all, the people who have invested in us -- emotionally and personally and financially -- are also the people that we care about, and we need to take care of them too.

Finally, when we are able to get the addends right and are able to manage both our time and our relationships, then we get the sum of the equation and we succeed...we can have the pleasure of managing some of that money.

Of course, this isn't ALL that we need to do and know in order to succeed in our businesses, but without these management skills, I imagine it might make navigating the road to success trickier than necessary.