Sometimes the Best Tool Is Knowing Who to Call

Back in 1986, I was working at a car dealership.

One of the mechanics in the shop was getting ready to leave for vacation with his family. I remember him standing beside his toolbox before he left.

Naturally, some of us asked him a question.

“What tools are you taking with you?”

He owned an older car, and he was a mechanic. Therefore, we assumed he would throw a toolbox in the trunk just in case something happened on the road.

His answer was simple.

“A phone book and a quarter.”

You have to remember, this was 1986.

We didn’t have cell phones in our pockets. There was no internet to search for the closest repair shop. If you needed help on the road, you found a pay phone, looked through the phone book, dropped a quarter into the phone, and made a call.

His explanation has stuck with me all these years.

He basically said, “I’m going on vacation. If the car breaks down, I don’t want to spend my vacation fixing a car. I’ll call somebody.”

Here was a guy who absolutely knew how to repair his own car.

He simply understood something bigger:

Being able to fix the problem doesn’t mean you always have to be the person who fixes it.

Sometimes You Need a Break, Not Another Tool

Yesterday, I wrote about brakes being part of the success system.

That got me thinking about another kind of break.

The kind where you stop working.

Business owners aren’t always very good at those.

We take the laptop on vacation.

We check email from the hotel.

We answer customer messages from the beach.

Meanwhile, we’re telling everyone around us that we’re taking time off.

Are we?

If your body leaves work but your mind never does, you haven’t completely taken a break.

Research supports the value of actually disconnecting. A 2025 meta-analysis of 32 studies found that vacations have a substantial positive effect on employee well-being. In particular, psychological detachment from work was among the vacation experiences associated with better well-being.

That mechanic understood psychological detachment long before any of us used that term.

He wasn’t taking the shop with him.

He was taking a quarter.

Peace of Mind Doesn’t Mean Nothing Will Go Wrong

This is where I think the story becomes bigger than vacation.

We sometimes define peace of mind as knowing nothing bad will happen.

That’s impossible.

Cars break.

Customers have problems.

Websites go down.

Employees make mistakes.

Plans change.

Life happens.

Instead, peace of mind can come from knowing that when something goes wrong, you don’t have to personally solve every problem.

That mechanic wasn’t worried about whether his old car might break.

He had a plan if it did.

Find a phone.

Find a repair shop.

Make the call.

Then let somebody else use their tools.

There’s a business lesson in that.

1. Decide What You Don’t Have to Fix

Entrepreneurs become good at solving problems.

Unfortunately, that strength can become a trap.

Because you can fix something, you assume you should fix it.

However, every problem you personally solve consumes time and attention that can’t be used somewhere else.

So ask yourself:

What am I still fixing simply because I know how?

Maybe someone else can handle customer support.

Perhaps your bookkeeper should answer the financial question.

Your web person can handle the website problem.

A team member might be perfectly capable of solving an operational issue.

Delegation isn’t admitting that you can’t do something.

Sometimes it’s deciding that you shouldn’t.

2. Build Your Phone Book Before You Need It

The phone book and quarter worked because the mechanic knew help existed.

Today, the tools have changed.

Still, the principle hasn’t.

Before you take time away, know who you can call.

Who handles a customer issue?

Who can access the website?

Who knows how to process a payment?

Who can make a decision without waiting for you?

If the answer to every question is your name, you don’t have a business that can give you much peace of mind.

Therefore, start building a business backup plan before you desperately need one.

You don’t need a complicated emergency manual. Begin with the handful of problems most likely to interrupt your time away and decide who handles each one.

Then make sure those people have what they need.

3. Take the Break You Said You Were Taking

This might be the hardest part.

Once you’ve handed something off, leave it handed off.

Don’t delegate a task and then check on it every fifteen minutes.

Don’t take a vacation and spend the morning answering email.

Most importantly, don’t convince yourself that everything will fall apart because you’re unavailable for a while.

Even workplace safety guidance recognizes that people need recovery. The Occupational Safety and Health Administration notes that fatigue signals a need for rest and recommends schedules that provide opportunities for rest and recovery.

Rest isn’t wasted time.

It’s part of maintaining the person operating the machine.

A business owner needs maintenance too.

You Don’t Have to Carry the Toolbox Everywhere

I can still picture that mechanic standing beside his toolbox.

He had probably spent years filling it with tools.

Those tools represented experience.

Knowledge.

Capability.

Yet when vacation came, he left them behind.

That’s what made the lesson so good.

He wasn’t incapable.

He was intentional.

For that period of time, his job wasn’t to be a mechanic.

His job was to be on vacation with his family.

If something went wrong, he had his phone book and his quarter.

Sometimes that’s all the peace of mind you need.

Final Tune-Up

Look at your own life and business.

What toolbox are you carrying everywhere?

Maybe it’s your laptop.

Perhaps it’s your phone.

It could simply be the belief that nobody can handle things without you.

Before your next break, create a different plan.

Decide what can wait.

Decide who can help.

Then give yourself permission to step away.

You worked hard to build the skills that allow you to fix things.

However, real success also means building a life where you don’t have to fix everything yourself.

Sometimes the smartest tool you can carry is knowing who to call.

Next Step: If you want one practical idea each week to help you build a business that works better without consuming your entire life, join the Weekly Business Tune-Up. We’ll look at one part of the business at a time and make small adjustments that create momentum—and more peace of mind.