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| You can't control time - but you can control how you use it |
A question
that you’ve probably reflected upon as a business owner is
how can you achieve more in the time that you have available. The success of
your business relies very much on how effectively you use your time.
Have you
experienced days where you’ve been running around frantically in your business
- so busy and overwhelmed that it seemed like you could hardly pause to take a
breath? And yet when you looked back at the end of the day you wondered how
much you had actually accomplished, and
how much of real significance was achieved? ….. Just because you’re busy, doesn’t mean that
you’re productive.
Personal
productivity is about ensuring that you are focusing your time and energy on
the things that will add the greatest value to your business. It means ensuring
that that you are using all of your resources wisely - including your staff,
materials, tools, data and equipment - and that you are completing the right
tasks efficiently. There is a limit to the number of projects you can optimally
work on in any given week – so you need to be selective.
Recently I
had the opportunity to chat with Steuart Snookes, who runs a consulting business
called Solutions4Success in Melbourne, Australia. He is a specialist in the
field of personal productivity and effective time management in the workplace. He agreed to share some of his
experience – and offered some priceless tips …..
1. You’ve been running your
own consulting business for many years – what have you found to be some of the
major challenges and frustrations associated with being self-employed. And what
are the compensating rewards?
One of the
major challenges running a consulting business is that old chestnut of
achieving a continuity of bookings. Almost all self-employed consultants
struggle to even out the ups and downs of revenue and keeping a steady stream
of income that can be totally relied upon. Juggling the many hats that have to be worn to cover all bases is another major challenge as a sole operator .... Prospecting for clients; marketing activities; sales meetings; preparation, delivery and then follow up of workshops, presentations, coaching sessions, webinars; ongoing research, development and updating of content; catching up with peers; and all the administrative tasks such as invoicing, banking, database maintenance etc. Of course, some of this can be outsourced but how much of it depends of solving major issue number one!
And a third
major challenge is that it can be very hard to ever really feel ‘off duty’ and
to switch-off. I just had my first real holiday in a long time (three and a
half weeks) but even then, work-related activity was constantly at the back of
the mind.
The
positives of running your own business include the huge benefits you gain with the flexibility and freedom of how you choose to allocate your time, which allows
me to enjoy a number of personal interests I could never pursue if not
self-employed. Along with that is the pleasure of travel (which I mostly find
enjoyable) and meeting lots of people, many of whom are truly inspiring. And
the highlight is probably the feedback received that the work I am doing is
having an impact – it is very satisfying to know that I am making a positive
difference.
2. Steuart, you’ve worked in
the field of personal productivity improvement for more than a decade. You’ve
consulted with small business owners and coached senior executives ...... What are some of the common mistakes
that people in business tend to make in the way they go about managing their
time on a daily basis?
It may seem
surprising but the common issues and difficulties are remarkably similar amongst most of those with whom I work. They are largely a result of our human nature. Most of the
effective time management techniques and strategies are the opposite of human
nature. So it takes lots of self-discipline, effort and energy to establish and
then maintain good habits. Chief amongst these is the need, in most roles, for
reasonably large chunks of uninterrupted time (on a regular basis) to focus on
a high priority task.
"Single-tasking" allows the task to be done quicker and to a higher standard
than if it is attempted when interrupted. But time, attention and focus is
becoming increasingly fragmented in the modern workplace due to our
ever-changing technology. Each of us is now so much more accessible to others
and to sources of information than ever before. We have a wide range of devices
distract our attention, causing us to work in a constant state of multitasking.
Some of
these interruptions will sometimes have a high value. But when
they interrupt an activity we are already engaged in, it compromises the
attention we can give to either one. An example that highlights this comes from
a controlled pilot program in San Francisco where a nurse who is preparing
medications wears distinctive clothing or stands inside a clearly defined space
whose meaning is “I’m doing critical work and you may NOT approach, speak to or
interrupt me”. Results showed not only reduced interruptions, but also a
significant reduction in medication errors.
Other
common issues include inadequate planning; attempting too much; ineffective
delegation; procrastination; ineffective meetings; and unrealistic and/or
uncontrolled expectations, especially around timeframes (which reminds me of
the saying “there are no unrealistic goals, just unrealistic timeframes”).
3. Email overload has become
a problem and source of stress for many business owners and managers – what are
some simple strategies that can be used to gain some control with this?
Mastering email overload revolves around getting control of the three ‘W’s –
WHEN to address your email, WHAT you do when you are addressing it and WHERE
you place it once dealt with. With email arriving in a constant stream these days, it is a major source of interruption, so it’s critical to control WHEN you allow it to get your attention. In a special report I’ve written on this subject, I’ve listed the 7 critical impacts of email and information overload – interruptions; loss of focus; multi-tasking; poorer decision-making; lack of ‘think’ time; degradation of crucial business activities such as meetings, manager-subordinate interactions, workload planning and communication effectiveness; mental health; and ultimately, quality of life (worklife balance).
So much of
the negative impact from email results not from WHAT it is, but WHEN it
arrives. And it really is so easy to control, by scheduling specific times to
address email and turning off all alerts so that it doesn’t interrupt time
doing other important tasks (many of which arrived by email themselves).
Even those
people working in roles where they need to look at email on a frequent basis
will be more effective by addressing email in a focused block of 5-10 minutes
every half hour (16 times per day) or 15-20 minutes once per hour (8 times per
day). Other roles allow checking email less frequently. Once the WHEN is under
control, it becomes much easier to apply the WHAT and the WHERE more
effectively.
4. Forward planning and
forward thinking is often said to be one of the keys to running a productive
business. But there can be so many different types of changed conditions that
can prove disruptive to one’s plans – staff who become ill, customers who turn
to a competitor, unexpected cash-flow problems, equipment or technology
crashing – is it better to avoid planning too far ahead?
Yes. It’s a
good idea to have plans for the long, medium and short term and then adjust
your focus according to the current situation. For example, year-end is a
logical time for longer term planning but when you’re in the middle of a busy
season you might refer only to short term plan. It’s good to regularly refer to
medium and long tern plans to help keep perspective – it’s very easy to get
caught up with the immediate and short term activities.
We tend to
overestimate how much we can do in a day but underestimate how much we can do
in a year. A longer term plan sets the compass bearing for the direction you’d
like to be travelling in and that’s why it’s good to check it on a reasonably
regular basis. It’s so easy to get off track when your focus is only on the
immediate and short term.
As Stephen
Covey said, we can often be very busy focusing on each rung as we climb a
ladder only to get to the top and find it’s standing against the wrong wall!
It’s also important to have 30 and 90 day plans and refer to these on a very
regular basis (say weekly). These time frames give enough of a sense of urgency
to keep moving.
5. What can the business
owner who employs staff do to ensure a productive workplace – how can they
ensure their employees are working in the most efficient and optimum way?
I think you
hit the nail of the head when you say ‘ensure a productive workplace’. So much
can be done by controlling the environment rather than trying to control the
people.
Most of us
want the satisfaction of working hard, achieving results, making a contribution
and feeling we’re part of a team but the space we work in so often mitigates
against this. Most roles these days are multi-faceted and require different
types and levels of thinking and conversation, but we attempt to do all of
these various types of tasks and activities in the same workspace (usually a
desk or cubicle).
Yet there
is a real case for ‘different space for different activities’, especially if
the usual workspace is highly interrupted. With most of us having access to
mobile computers, smart pads and smartphones, we can now much more easily
relocate to a space that suits the type of work we are doing. Move to a shared
workspace for collaborative work; move to a closed space for individual work;
move outdoors to free up creative thinking and so on. Most of the highest value
work that can be done as a small business owner is what happens between our ears, often when we are in a reflective,
thinking or ‘musing’ mode. It’s at these times, when we involve both the
sub-conscious as well as the conscious mind, that we gain powerful insights,
break-throughs, solve problems and have those special ‘aha’ moments.
Yet this is
exactly the sort of ‘thinking’ time that has been squeezed out of the modern
workplace due to overload, interruptions, attempting too much etc etc. There is
great value in having more control (and flexibility) on where and when we tackle
our key tasks and activities.
6. Any final personal productivity tips for small business owners?
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| Ongoing learning & improvement |
Given that
so much of good time management and productive practices and behaviours are
nearly the opposite of human nature, we need to be working on them constantly.
Workshop participants often say to me after a time management training session that not much of the
material was new to them but that is was great to ‘refresh’. Most of us know what’s
required but don’t implement it on a regular basis. One of the essential disciplines is to
consistently plan, prioritise and schedule specific time for your high priority items.
By putting
the ‘big rocks’ in place first, much of your other activities will then fall into place.......
Hope these thoughts have been helpful.Thank you to Steuart, for sharing some of his experience with us. And here's a short video clip that reinforces the point about learning to focus on the top priorities in your business ...
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Time management tips; Stress management tips; Self-motivation tips
