Make Every Day Productive

How to Minimize Time Wasting in Your Small Business

Stacy helping another
home business entrepreneur

When it comes to a small business, time is often a business owner’s most valuable asset. But, what many owners come to realize after their business is up and running is that there simply is not enough time in the day. It is important to ask ourselves this important question when it comes to proper time management – “Do I really have this much to do, or can I manage my time better?” The thing about time is that it is not a tangible item that we can buy, sell or trade for – time is something we simply need to reclaim as small business owners. Here, we will discuss different ways to reclaim that precious time.

Do a Better Job Managing Your Email

An email box is often where business owners begin to work and somehow lose so many precious hours of their day. The tricky thing is, although it is supposed to streamline communication and save time, it often pulls us away from what we should be working on for an extended amount of time. When the email alerts to a new message, it often takes someone 10 minutes to answer, and then another 15 to 20 to get back on track with what they were working on. In order to manage this time better, and save it from getting lost in a black hole, designate times throughout the day to read and answer emails and, when working on other projects or tasks, shut off the notification feature so as to not get distracted.

Do Not Believe the Myths about Multi-Tasking

Many business owners, and really all business professionals, believe that multi-tasking is a great way for them to save time and get more work complete. Doing payroll, expense reports, answering messages and have a million applications open on your computer or phone may make you feel like a lot of work is getting done, but are you really getting anything accomplished? The truth is, this is completely the opposite of what we all think and only two percent of people can multi-task successfully. Instead of striving to do more than one thing at a time, schedule out blocks of time and focus on one project or task. Believe it or not, 15 minutes of complete focus is more productive than trying to complete two tasks at one.

Minimize Unnecessary Distractions

Technology, in many ways, has made running a business much easier and much simpler. But, every ring, ding, ping, and other noise that our computers and cell phones make can be a huge distraction to getting more important items complete. While these notifications are sometimes important to make sure that critical items are handled, the truth is that not every email, text message or phone call needs your immediate attention. In order to minimize unneeded distractions, think about using different filters on your email boxes and text message cues so that only the most important messages are alerted during different times of the day and, like mentioned before, only check messages during specified times.

Do you need help running your small business or in making your home business more profitable? Did you know that Stacy O'Quinn has served as a small business mentor to dozens of entrepreneurs using the techniques he learned from Dani Johnson training? If you would like to see how Stacy can help you, please click here.