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Which do you manage more closely: your personal finances or your business’ finances?

Last week's poll question: Which do you manage more closely: your personal finances or your business’ finances?

2 min read

Leadership

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SmartPulse — our weekly nonscientific reader poll in SmartBrief on Leadership — tracks feedback from more than 220,000 business leaders. We run the poll question each week in our newsletter.

Which do you manage more closely: your personal finances or your business’ finances?

  • I manage my personal finances much more rigorously: 29.7%
  • I pay much more attention to my business’ finances: 30.6%
  • I strike a good balance on managing both equally well: 36.1%
  • I don’t manage my personal or my business finances well: 3.5%

Money matters. Most of you report paying a lot of attention to business finances, but be careful that attention doesn’t come at the expense of your personal finances. If your own finances get messy because of mismanagement, it can cause issues with job performance. This isn’t only about making sure your checking account is full and retirement plan is maxed out. Take care of all aspects of your financial well-being. That includes protecting yourself from identity theft and fraud. Those two items alone can cause you problems when you go to get a job, move or get a loan. Protect your identity from theft, and manage your credit carefully. With all the high-profile security breaches of late, it’s probably a good idea to pay some attention to that part of your life.

Mike Figliuolo is managing director of thoughtLEADERS. Before launching his own company, he worked at McKinsey & Co., Capital One and Scotts Miracle-Gro. He is a graduate of the U.S. Military Academy at West Point. He’s the author of three leadership books: “One Piece of Paper,” “Lead Inside the Box” and “The Elegant Pitch.”