How to create more time so you can focus on building your business

The one thing you can never buy back is time.

If this is true, why do so many business owners really struggle to get enough time to dedicate to growing their business?

What’s the answer??? Money!

As a business owner, cash is king. It’s the lifeblood of your business and without it you do not have a business at all.

The problem comes when your business focuses too closely on making small amounts of money quickly, instead of larger amounts over a longer term.

So, if you have a job to complete, which will give you ￡100 but takes 1 hour, does this take priority over completing a strategy which will give 10 jobs at ￡100 each which will last 5 years but gives you no instant return?

 In the short term, the answer is yes. The profit from the job pays the bills.

In the long term, the strategy will give you a return on your time investment of 50 times the short term, one off job.

I speak with many business owners, all of which are extremely intelligent people. Virtually all of them have fallen into this trap and probably will again in the future.

How do you ensure you stop falling into this trap and ensure you get to the most important job you should be completing?

Is there something you can do which gives you a really quick indicator of when you are falling into the habit again?

Three steps;

1)     Prioritise your schedule

 The easiest method to follow is to ask yourself which box you are working in.

The 4 boxes represent all the work you could be completing, with box X being low value and box XXXX being very high value.

The trick is to understand that you could spend your time in boxes X and XX. These are always comfortable and you could complete easily for a quick return on investment.

 However, if you focus on completing the tasks in boxes XXX and XXXX, these are the game changers! These are the boxes which push you and are tricky but give the biggest long term return.

For example, creating a marketing strategy and system to bring in a regular flow of new leads would be box 4. This is because, once completed it no longer needs your involvement meaning you can share with your team. 

Completing a meeting with a potential new client to showcase your offerings would be box 3.

If you focus your time on boxes X and XX too often over time, your business will stagnate and plateau.

 Define your work using the boxes to then move onto step 2.

 2)     Create a time schedule

Block out your working week with blocks of time for each piece of work you need to complete.

The split will depend on the number in your team but a good starting point is;

-         33% of time on day to day work, so the compliance work you have been paid to complete

-         33% of time on strategic planning to move the business forward

-         33% of the time on historic results, such as your key performance indicators, team performance figures, profit margins and analysis of how to improve these.

Without a clear definition of what you will do each day, the most difficult tasks which need your time, will be moved back for the quick wins.

3)     Turn off the emails!

Once you have a prioritised schedule you can stick to, now is the time to break the mould.

Turn off your email for the first 1 to 2 hours of your day.

 It’s bold, scary and feels completely alien but it works!

If you focus your first 1 to 2 hours of your day on your box 3 and 4 jobs you eventually create a habit. This new habit has the potential to create 28800 minutes of time per year for you to focus on your game changing tasks.

The best bit about this is step is that your emails will still be waiting for you when you have finished your 2 hours.

Many people believe that a quick response to an email is a sign of great customer service. This may well be true when selling a product on a huge scale.

Most smaller businesses sell their time and expertise. If you receive an email, it tends to be a problem a customer or potential customer needs your help with and wants to move on so they can get on with their tasks.

A response to this too quickly and too often can sometimes mean you are knocking their focus and at times, rushing a response. When you sell time, you are often dealing with extremely complex and delicate situations. A quick response is not the best approach.

Many companies now use an auto response (you may have seen these from time to time from every major company in the world). These are automated and always say the same thing – thanks for your message; we have received it and will get back to you in a certain timeframe. Why not create this for your business?

Next steps

By following these three steps, you will start to create time and focus on your key tasks to push your business forward.

Much of this approach will feel like the opposite approach you have used over your working life, so will be tricky. You will fail and fall back into old habits.

Don’t give up! 

Start again and stick to the three steps. 

Help needed?

Once you get this right, perhaps you wish to use an approach which will give you certainty at the foundation of everything, reliable and predictable growth then evolution so your business is more than just you.

Find out more by contacting me either by;

• Connecting using the blue button on above
• Emailing me on [email protected]

Over the past 15 years I have worked with professionals on the usual accountancy compliance work you'd expect, however over the past 5 years I have been much more focused on helping HR consultants such as you grow their businesses. I have written articles and created videos on scaling your HR consultancy business.