From the course: Small Business Secrets

Managing your time

From the course: Small Business Secrets

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Managing your time

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When I speak to small business owners, often I'll ask them, what's their biggest challenge. Now the first biggest challenge for most small businesses is getting more sales. But the second biggest challenge is finding more time. It seems like business owners can never keep up with all the different things that they need to do in their business. Now, in this video, I'm going to share with you a few tips to help business owners, in particular, with time management. That said, there is no substitute for going through a full time management training, and I certainly recommend my course here on lynda.com, on time management fundamentals. Now, let's talk about the tips. Number one is, avoid multitasking. Many people still believe that multitasking will help them be more productive, and business owners are probably the biggest culprits, because you have so many different things to do. The reality is, when you multitask, you're not getting more done, you're getting less done because your attention is switching rapidly back and forth between all the different tasks that you're trying to do. Whenever your attention switches, there's a switching cost involved and the average business owner loses an entire work week, every single month, just due to switches and switching costs. Stay away from multitasking and encourage your team to do the same. Number two is, focus on what you do best. Knowing that there are many different hats that you might were as a business owner. We'd like to think we're just the business owner, but that's not the reality, is it? No, you're also the manager and the sales rep and the graphic designer, and the webmaster, and the janitor, and the list goes on and on and on. Well of all the things you do, which two of those things are most valuable? I call these your MVPs, your most valuable positions. Identify those two things. Typically, they're going to be in the area of creating a vision for your business, and getting big sales for your business. And schedule time in your calendar to focus on those most valuable positions. That will do more good than almost anything else for raising the value of your business. Number three relates to this, which is rely upon your calendar. Because you have so many different things that you are trying to do within your day, the temptation may be to stop scheduling things in your calendar. You don't really want to look at how busy you are, right? Well the problem is you'll start to get a distorted perception of time and get less done. Because when you overspend time, you have to pay interest on it just like when you overspend money. Instead get one calendar, and put everything you need to do into that one calendar. And when you see the budget clearly in front of you, this time budget, it will help you be more realistic and actually get more done. Number four is, delegation. Now, this relates to that concept of focusing on what you do best. Many business owners act as jack of all trades, in particular because they believe that no one can do things as well as they can. And to a degree, it's true. No one can do things as well as you can, but in this case the truth doesn't set you free, it shackles you to your business. This is especially damaging because of a little concept called Blue Sky. If you were to sell your business at the point of sale, the question is going to be asked. How much of my business is Blue Sky? Blue Sky is anything that cannot be transferred to the person buying the business. In other words, it's only attributable to your efforts as the business owner. If you're the one doing everything in your business, then your business is full of Blue Sky and is worth less as a result. And number five is the most powerful word in an entrepreneur's vocabulary. No. Say no more than you say yes. Make sure that your To-Don't list is bigger than your To-Do list. Entrepreneurs see opportunity around every corner. And while that's a wonderful trait, it can get you into trouble. Because you'll over commit. The most successful entrepreneurs that I've met, are ones who have mastered the art of saying no. Both to themselves, and to others. Hopefully these tips will get you on the right path on getting better with your time management, and protect your valuable time as a business owner.

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