Are you right- or left-brained? You’ve probably taken a quiz at one time or another that has indicated whether you’re right-brain or left-brain dominant. Right brainers tend to be creative, out-of-the-box thinkers, while those who are left-brain dominant tend to be more analytical, relying more on facts and data than on emotion and intuition. In reality, most of us have some characteristics of both brain types, and the most successful people can switch from creative to analytical thought as the situation warrants.
When you are responsible for your own business, you need a mix of creative and analytical thought processes in order to succeed. If you lack foresight and follow-through, you may become too distracted to maintain good business practices. On the other hand, if you don’t have the ability to go with the flow and make changes based on nuances of what’s going on around you, your lack of creative flexibility can cause you to not be able to relate well to your clients or keep your business moving in slower times. Creativity and analysis are both important characteristics and, like many things, they’re better together. Here are some real-business situations that call for you to use either your creative side, your analytic side, or both:
- Invoicing and billing. As someone who tends to favor the creative side of my brain, billing and invoicing is a task that I find boring and difficult. If you are an entrepreneur, though, you do need to get this done regularly. Instead of billing as projects are completed, I usually get all of my invoicing done weekly; some business-owners might find it easier to do it each month, instead. Dedicated billing software or a service such as Paypal can make this task less time-consuming, and it will handle the details; don’t forget to enter payments as soon as they come in.
- Handling client concerns. No matter what your business, there are going to be times when your customers need you to do something out of the ordinary for you. This is when your creative side will need to take over; you will need to think outside the box in order to make your client happy, as customer satisfaction is an important part of your continued success! If you’re feeling stuck, brainstorming with a creative friend may help, as may mind-mapping.
- Planning ahead. Whether you’re just starting out or have been in business for a while, you should have a plan in mind for the future. Looking ahead requires both analysis and creativity; you should be able to both look back and decipher previous trends while applying those to the future. You also need to have back-up plans in mind just in case your projections don’t take place.
If you find that you have a hard time performing tasks that are either analytic or creative, you might want to look into developing the appropriate side of your brain. You could try some of these
Right Brain Workouts or these
Left Brain Exercises. You could also collaborate with another professional with the opposite tendencies from you; if you’re more of a creative type, a left-brained entrepreneur in a similar or complementary industry might be willing to work with you, each of you taking on tasks that you find enjoyable.
Are there any ways that you’ve overcome the tendency to be either right- or left-brained? Share them with us!
