What Is the Four Hour Work Week?

I recently read Tim Ferriss’s Four Hour Work Week, and got rather excited afterwards. He talks about outsourcing, creating better processes and removing yourself from your business so you can do the things you actually want to do with your life instead of working. Great ideas. I have also been reading the Personal MBA, and Getting Things Done.

However, after trying a few of these ideas I have some thoughts on why it might not be suitable for my web design business – which above all is a service business.The 4HWW method talks about automating and outsourcing everything. Great ideas – but the reason a lot of my clients use me is that we work well together. I explain all the technical stuff in plain English, or talk in business terms instead. I aim to smooth out the often troublesome process of doing design work for people that have not employed designers before.  I do good work, and usually over-deliver. I am also good value due to my low overheads.

Things That Have Worked

Pareto’s 80/20 rule that people keep trotting out does seem to work quite well when used specifically.

• I looked at the small number of clients that were not profitable or stressed me out, and stopped working with them.
• I made myself less immediately available via phone and email, and nothing bad happened. I could then focus on doing paid client work instead of constantly answering calls or replying to emails all day.
• I batch phone calls, emails, errands, design work and development work so I do similar tasks when in that frame of mind. That reduces the “cognitive switching penalty” when changing tasks too often.
• I am developing affiliate blogs and creating informational products to give me a passive income. However, the time needed to do this properly and make decent money is probably not worth the effort from what i’ve experienced. If i logged my time taken, my hourly rate would be appalling doing this kind of work.
• I recently stopped doing mobile PC repairs, as the time spent travelling and fuel costs made them not worth doing. I was often switching between web design and PC repairs, which caused the “cognitive switching penalty” again.

Why 4HWW Might Not Be Right For Web Design Businesses

If I remove myself from the process and use freelancers, then that reason to use my business dissolves. If I want to make the same profit, I must put my prices up to pay the freelancers. I don’t compete purely on price, but must offer good value to my clients, who are mostly small businesses. I also need to brief freelancers and then check their work afterwards, all adding to the cost.

I have written guides and processes after reading Mr Ferris’s 4HWW and Michael Gerber’s E-Myth, but used them with only limited success.  A checklist often doesn’t carry enough background info to do the job to my requirements. Am I doing it wrong, or does it just not work so well with service industries?

If I was selling WordPress themes or a web application/service, then I could remove myself from the equation more easily. If I am the product or service provider, then that no longer works. There is also a part of me that wonders why anyone would want to take direction from me and follow these processes that I set out. I certainly wouldn’t want to follow someone else’s processes, but then that’s why I am running my own business and not working for a company.

What Are Your Experiences with the 4HWW?

I’d be very keen to hear what experiences other web designers and developers have had with using 4HWW or E-Myth techniques in their businesses, and how well it worked. Sound off in the comments or drop me a line at nick@ferretsdomain.co.uk if you’d rather not have your comments published!