July 20, 2011
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As an entrepreneur, your time is your most valuable asset. It’s the only part of your existence you can’t leverage. You only have so much time in your day and you cannot add more to those 24 hours, no matter what you do or what you pay. This is why it’s critical to use these principles to maximize your time management.
1. Hire out your low-skill work
There is always menial work to be done around any office or business, including filing papers, running errands, and cleaning the facilities. Whether you do it yourself or have someone else do it, you will be paying for the result. The only difference is whether you pay in money or time. Time is the more valuable resource, so pay in cash.
Let me be clear that this is not you being too high and mighty to do the dirty work yourself. There’s no shame in mopping floors and running to Kinko’s if that is your highest skillset at this point in your career.
When you hire out this type of work, you are dedicating your time to income-producing activities, including sales, marketing, networking, and management. If you know that for every three hours you spend on the phone, you make your business $750, then it will always be more profitable for you to spend $50 on a cleaning service than taking time off the phone to clean. Most of the time, the specialists in the lower-skill jobs will be better at them than you anyway.
2. Plan out your day and stick to it
Many business owners hate having a to-do list. In my opinion, the resistance to putting your day’s plan on paper is that it reminds you of what it was like to take orders from someone else. When you said you wanted to be your own boss, you didn’t realize that you might not always get along with yourself as the boss and that you’d have to stay accountable and work even when you didn’t feel like it.
The best way to stay accountable for your day’s work is to have it written down the night before. One great way to do this is to write down a list of six things you are to accomplish that day. The next day, do them one at a time, in succession. This way, you never have to ask yourself “What should I be doing now?” It’s better to be easy on yourself with what you put on the list, rather than making it an intimidating set of items. The most important thing is that you complete all six items on the list by the end of the day, without having to put something over for the next day. Soon, the list becomes something like a machine where you know for a fact that anything you write down will be accomplished the next day.
3. Take care of your body
You may think you’re doing your business a favor by sacrificing hours of sleep, your diet, and your exercise program. The truth is that you’re doing the opposite.When Richard Branson was asked his top productivity secret, he said, “Work out.”
Your business’s success depends on your thinking, which depends on your brain. All too often, we forget that our brain is a spongy mass of cells that is connected to the rest of our body and feeds off nutrients, oxygen, and blood flow. If any of those are minimized, the brain won’t perform as well and your business will suffer. It’s much better to work for seven hours a day at peak performance than for 10 hours a day at half-consciousness. Get on a good diet, a good workout plan, and get plenty of sleep. If you don’t know how to eat well or exercise, there are plenty of resources for that. It’s fine to be off balance sometimes, but never forget the adage, “Sound body, sound mind.”
4. Allow yourself escapes, but keep track of them
There are some success gurus that say you should throw out your TV, keep your refrigerator free of alcohol, and disconnect from all social media that doesn’t feed your business. Most people are not wired to sacrifice every piece of escapism in their lives.
If you’re having fun on Facebook, don’t pretend you’re doing business networking when you’re just entertaining yourself. Instead, set a limit for twenty minutes, or any reasonable length of time, for you to goof off. If you have a TiVo, pick a few shows you like every week, and don’t turn on the TV except for those shows. If your friend calls you on the phone, set down a limit of how long you can talk to him or her.
It’s great to be social, and some experts think that some escapism is absolutely necessary to stay mentally healthy. The important thing is that you’re being honest with yourself and budgeting your time just like you would with your money or your junk food intake.
These are the four main ways I manage my time, but as you already know different tactics work differently for everyone. So don’t just try these methods, figure out what works best for you. And if you have any time management secrets, feel free to share them by leaving a comment.
Check your balance, review recent transactions and pay your bill on the go.
IBE forum 1 months ago
excellent inspiring to be more productive