One of the things I like about September, as you might expect, is that everyone seems to reappear in the office all at once. I suppose some of them do it for family reasons, but since relatively few of my staff have kids, I can only assume that there’s some kind of subconscious back-to-school thing going on. Admittedly if they had any sense they’d all be going away in September when prices go down, and them not having any sense is bad. On the other hand, when they get back it means I can stop doing their job as well as my own, which is very, very good.

Covering for people who are on holiday have always seemed like a pretty thankless task to me, even before I was running a small business. You just have to squeeze more work into the same number of hours, while getting absolutely nothing in return – either in terms of cash or appreciation. One of my senior managers has been off for most of August, and I’ve got to say it’s been a nightmare. Instead of August being a nice quiet month, where all I have to worry about is convincing everyone else that it shouldn’t be a nice quiet month, I’ve instead spent the last few weeks chasing my tail.

The main problem is that this guy has several direct reports. So in his absence, I’m the next in line to look after them. Since one of the major reasons for his appointment was so I could get out of doing that – not least, if I’m honest, because I find it pretty boring – this prospect always fills me with cold dread. Inevitably, some stuff will kick off while he’s away, particularly if he’s knocked someone back on something and they figure I might be able to over-rule him. So I always end up spending most of my time dealing with various HR issues and management hassles, which is not my cup of tea.

Don’t get me wrong: I appreciate the importance of this stuff – the coaching, the hand-holding, the ego-massaging. It’s just not really my thing. I don’t really enjoy it, and I figure that relatively speaking I’m not very good at it. I like to think my skills are on balance more on the big picture side, which is why I appoint managers to manage, and try to spend my own time working on the business, rather than in the business (if you’ll permit me to slip into jargon for a moment). That’s a better allocation of resources, right?

There is an upside though: you get to spend a bit more time with some of your more junior staff; they feel like they get to know you better (and you get to know them), while you get to see how good or bad they are at closer quarters. So although I always dread it every time it happens, it is actually pretty useful. Not that this will stop me moaning about it, you understand.