Need More Time in Your Day?

(Adapted from an article by Trent Hamm, March 2009)

If one of your New Year resolutions was to spend more time doing _______ , (you fill in the blank) just how will you find the extra time to achieve it? One way is to stop doing some other activity, but that is not always practical as it may be important and necessary for the successful running of your business.

Another way is to get better organized and find some “extra” time in your day to use as you see fit. But how do you do this? There are many books and systems around on time management. Some are good and some are not. Rather than investing a lot in new software, try a few of these no cost ideas, implement them CONSISTENTLY, and together they should enable you to find some of that extra time you need to help achieve your New Year resolution.

1. Avoid multitasking like the plague.
Research has shown that multitasking has a similar level of effectiveness to someone smoking marijuana (without the benefit of feeling good). Switching from one task to another makes it difficult to tune out distractions and can cause mental blocks that can slow down your progress

Focus on only one task at a time. Pick the most important one and let the rest slide. Work on that one task in bursts – at most an hour in length. Then stop and catch up on any incoming messages you need to deal with, take a break, and so on. To optimise your results, bunch similar activities together and block out dedicated time in your calendar to complete them. If you have client calls to make, set aside a regular time each week in your diary, then commit and follow through, without getting distracted by any other activity.

2. Keep a notebook with you and write down your ideas.
We all have lots of good ideas float through our heads throughout the day: things we need to do, ideas for future directions, facts we need to look up. Many people try to just trap these in their conscious mind until they can do them, but doing that makes it harder to concentrate and really bear down on an important task.

Instead of doing this, keep a pocket notebook with you at all times to jot down any small things that pop into your head. This enables you to quickly clear the mind and return your focus to the (more important) matter in hand.

3. Process documents/mail/ideas once or twice a day.
Take some sort of action on all of those stored-up items – toss them in the trash, file them away, take care of the task, pencil it in on your calendar, or so on. I have a small sticker on my monitor saying R.A.F.T. This reminds me to handle a piece of paper only once and do something with it: get RID of it (give it to someone else), ACTION it, FILE it or TOSS it in the bin.

The goal needs to be eliminating everything in your “inbox”. You should strive to get to “empty” once a day, with everything in there dealt with in some capacity. If you let it build up, it will grow out of control.

4. Keep a project list – and focus on it at least an hour a day.

Keep a “to-do” list that is a maximum of thirty items long for projects that are perhaps not urgent but you would like to get done. Order it by the date you thought of it so that the oldest one is always at the top of the list. If the list has thirty projects on it and you want to add another one, you need to decide on which one to delete. It probably will be the oldest one as it will be the project you are least interested in.

5. Stop procrastinating

Procrastination in itself isn't bad. What's bad is what happens to whatever you're procrastinating about when you do it. Problems grow. Misunderstandings multiply. Rubbish piles up. Dealing with things when they're smaller not only saves time but makes it much easier on yourself too.

6. Learn what your personal time wasters are and eliminate them. Personally, I can easily spend forty-five minutes browsing the internet in the morning checking out the Herald online, Metservice and other “essential” information sites. Guess what? It will make NO positive difference to my business and I will eliminate it. Once you know what your favourite personal time wasters are, it's usually easy to come up with a strategy to stop doing them. Can’t decide on what to wear in the morning? Decide the night before and lay it out.

5. Keep a PRIORITIZED to-do list for each day.
Keep a to-do list and review it each day. Decide on the 5 MOST IMPORTANT things that need to be done and then rank them from most important to least. As a guide to deciding what to start on use the self-question, “if I could only work on ONE item today, what would that item be?” This will be your #1 item. Start on it and try to finish it (or reach a logical stopping point) before moving on to the next item.

The most important task may not be the most fun or the easiest. In fact it may be the worst one and one that you would prefer to avoid. Suck it up and as Brian Tracy suggests, Eat That Frog! Look at your lowest pay-off activities and consider delegating to someone else, or contracting these out. Consider a bookkeeper for example to process your day-to-day accounts.

6. Check email only twice a day.
Email is almost always a major time sink. It’s rarely a simple matter of just reading messages. Many messages demand responses, and some messages demand follow-up tasks. Leaving that email window open throughout the day ensures only one thing – your concentration will be interrupted constantly by messages that come in that need responses.

The solution is to simply close the program. Open it only two times a day or so and do an email session, where you deal with everything in your inbox. Then, close the program completely (including notifications) and move onto something else. If it’s truly urgent, someone will come directly to you, so don’t worry about missing out on something vital.

7. Create Procedures and Check Lists

Document the specific way you do things and begin to standardise your processes. Creating ‘How-To’ guides for your core activities will make it easier for you to tweak them over time and hand them over to someone else. Plus, by using your processes, you can start to repeat your successes time after time.

8. Automate Actions

Creating ‘set and forget’ systems will save you buckets of time. Assess each activity to determine how you could put it on autopilot. For example, when people sign up to your online newsletter, you can automate the thank you message they receive. You could set up a series of autoresponder messages to provide clients with information at pre-determined intervals. Or create a FAQ page on your website to direct people to, rather than repeating yourself.

9. Take lots of microbreaks (or at least switch to very different tasks regularly).
One of the biggest enemies in a workday is lethargy. It’s easy to find yourself in a low-energy period, sitting there having trouble keeping your eyes open or concentrating on anything. Once you’re there, it’s often very hard to pull yourself out of it – you’re running on low energy for the rest of the day, even if you do rebound a bit.

The best way to combat it is to never let your energy level get that low. That means not sitting at your desk or your work area for long periods. Get up and move on a regular basis. Instead of eating a big, heavy lunch, eat smaller snacks throughout the day. Stretch. Drink water. Do this as often as you can – bookend task sessions with a microbreak where you do these things.

10. Become fitter.
I know that I perform better and can get through work faster if I am feeling good and physically fitter. Do not ignore your personal well-being and schedule some time (ie. book an appointment with yourself in your diary) every day for some physical exercise.

A bit of short term pain will have tremendous long term gain, both for your work and your personal life.

There's a saying, "It's better to light a candle than curse the darkness". The good news is that these strategies to leverage your time and get more done in less time will help you light the candle in your business and help lower your stress. For help in implementing any of these strategies contact me at andyburrows@iconbusinesssolutions.com or phone me on 09 912 1901 for a no obligation chat and further information.