In a recent video, I spoke about the importance of destination, goal setting and planning; In the words of Lewis Carroll, ”If you don’t know where you are going, any road will get you there” The most common response I get from business owners is, “I am working 80 hours a week, I don’t have time for that”.
Really? Let’s go find some time, shall we?
Can we really manage time or do we need to manage ourselves to make the very most of the precious time that we have? Let’s break our challenge with time into two parts; organization and prioritization. Let’s start with the organization and ask ourselves two questions:
Do you read your email as it comes in? Worse yet, do you have visual or audio email notifications turned on to constantly pull you away from the task at hand?
Do you have an “open door” policy that just begs people to pop their head in and say, “got a minute”? (or 20 minutes)
I have two words for you…STOP IT!
After a distraction, “It takes (people) an average of 23 minutes and 15 seconds to get back to where they left off.” According to a University of California Irvine study
“Work Distractions can take up to 6 hours a day” According to a recent Washington post article.
What if you were to establish a default calendar that broke down each of your tasks into small manageable time blocks on your calendar? What if you scheduled time for email and team time?
Presto! Hours back in your day multiplied by days in a week and weeks in a month. Do you think you could find a few hours every month, quarter and year to put a solid growth plan together? Try this approach for 30 days. Have the discipline or, self-mastery, to focus on the one thing on your calendar for that block. That discipline will quickly become a habit no different than brushing your teeth before you go to bed.
Now let’s look at prioritization; How much is your time worth? What is your hourly rate? Just because you can perform all the tasks that you are currently engaged in, doesn’t mean that you should be doing them.
Evaluate your tasks by the skill level, (hourly rate) that it takes to perform the task. If you find yourself performing tasks of lower skill level, while not completing the tasks that you as the business owner needs to be performing, (goal setting, planning, marketing, team building) I have two words for you…STOP IT!
Delegate those tasks to the appropriate employee. And get ready to hire more people because when you focus on the proper areas, your business will grow!
Do you want to talk more about how you can batter manage yourself and find more time? Click below to schedule some time to chat.
To your success,
Dan
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