My top 5 time management tips for small business owners.
We all know time management is key to running a successful business. It leads to greater productivity, a greater sense of achievement, and to you hitting your business goals faster and more efficiently.
So what are my top 5 time management tips that I utilise myself and recommend to clients?
Prioritise tasks: By this I don’t mean rushing through your to-do list. I often quote Stephen R. Covey here, who recommends not prioritising your schedule, but scheduling your priorities. What you want to do is identify the high-priority tasks that are crucial to your business and focus on them. Drown out the noise that can distract from this and stay laser focused on your goals and mission.
Use time tracking: If you follow me on social media, you’ll have noticed I speak a lot about this. That’s partly because I use it a lot to keep myself focused. When you are working with mulitple clients and with multiple priorities it’s absolutely key to track your time, not only to ensure you are billing and allocating time to your clients correctly, but to set yourself deadlines within which to complete work. It means you are less likely to procrastinate and more likely to actually complete a task. I use Harvest for this, which is an excellent time tracking tool.
Delegate EFFECTIVELY: This is key to freeing up your time to focus on strategic activities that drive growth. There’s a difference between delegating and doing it effectively, hence my emphasis on the word. Assess workloads and skills and delegate to team members or contractors who can complete the job for you efficiently and without too much input from you, otherwise you might as well do it yourself! By entrusting specific tasks to employees or contractors with the right expertise you will gain more time to focus on your skills and drive the overall success of the business.
Set realistic goals: There’s nothing worse that setting yourself unachievable goals, because when you inevitably don’t achieve them all it can lead to frustration and a lack of motivation. I set daily and weekly goals but keep them short, then if you have completed them and have time left, start on your other key goals. I have a list of goals I want to achieve more broadly and those are the one’s I will go to if I have hit all my other key goals for the week. Keeping this achievable also prevents overwhelm which can lead to a freeze response.
Avoid multi-tasking: Again this is a skill I talk about a lot. Multi tasking is not that effective, it means you are running around trying to complete multiple tasks without giving them the appropriate focus, which can lead to reduced productivity (see my other blog post for more info on this). Focusing on one task at a time and ensuring you complete it is much more effective and you’ll find you actually complete these tasks faster leading to greater productivity.
Effective time management is a cornerstone of business success. From a business perspective, it enhances productivity and increases efficiency. From a personal perspective that can lead to a greater sense of achievement, boosting confidence and morale, and promotes a healthier work-life balance. By managing time well, businesses can achieve their goals, satisfy customers, save money and reduce stress and exhaustion. If you want to know more about how I can help your business achieve greater productivity and growth contact me for a 1-1 strategy session to develop a personalised action plan for streamlining your operations and achieving your business goals.
