What to Do If You Feel Like You Don’t Have Enough Time to Grow Your Business

Have you ever been at a standstill when it comes to growing or starting your business? Sure, you want to help more people, and maybe you even need to raise your income so that you can feel more financially secure. But there just doesn’t seem to be enough time.

Even on the days you plan to get a lot done, you find that there just isn’t enough time. Life pulled you in another direction and instead of being able to spend a few hours on what you know needs to be done, you only had a few minutes.

Most of us lead busy lives. Whether that has to do with taking care of your kids, your 9-5 job that takes up most of your time, or maybe your business is structured in way right now that keeps your schedule so packed that you don’t have time to focus on new projects.

This is great way to feel BURNT OUT and fast. I hear it all the time. You can feel like you don’t even have the luxury to breathe. Plus, sometimes other things such as finances can become a huge stressor as well. Even if you have the desire to start or grow your business, it can feel like there just simply isn’t time to actually put in the work necessary to build the type of business you desire.

I get it. I had this happen to me in my business as well. I would feel so drained dealing with clients all day that the thought of having to spend time trying to get more clients sounded exhausting. Sure, I wanted to grow my income and impact, but there just didn’t seem to be a way without staying up late and getting less sleep.

For a lot of dietitians and nutritionists, the hour that they spend with a client in the office isn’t the only time you’d need to put in to help the client. There’s the preparation, the follow-up emails, and of course any additional research you might need to do on top of that. A one-hour session very quickly can turn into three hours or more of work.

Though there’s several shifts that you can make in your business to relieve a lot of the pressure you might be feeling such as working towards a decentralized business model, I’m not going to be talking about how to put those into place yet.

You see all of the shifts you need to make in your business to increase your flexibility and increase your income take time. And right now, you probably wouldn’t even have the time or motivation to implement them.

So instead of overwhelming you with business tactics, I’m going to get to the root of the issue and help you free up time that you probably don’t even realize you have right now. I’m going to teach you about productivity. And no if you’re busy right now that doesn’t mean you’re productive. Busyness doesn’t equal productivity.

Trust me. I thought I was organized. I thought I was productive for a long time, and then I realized that most of my time during my day was wasted.

After I implemented these changes I’m going to teach you, my whole world opened up. With those few hours I opened up during the day, I was finally able to work on the things I needed to do to structure my business in a way that better fit my lifestyle.

Here’s 4 things you need to change to start having more time in your day:

1. Learn to Say No

One of the best lessons I ever learned was how to say no. But let me tell you, it was difficult. And for the longest time I thought you should always say yes. I wanted to make sure I was taking advantage of every opportunity that came my way. But often those opportunities were actually distractions from what I needed to be doing.

Sometimes it meant that I needed to learn to say no to family. That was hard. When I first started my business, my family thought that because I had my own business that meant I had a lot of extra free time.

I had a client who also struggled with this. She shared with me that her mother and sisters always wanted her to come to this family dinner, that family function, or to baby sit their kids since she worked from home. She hated to say no. She didn’t want to disappoint her family. But because she didn’t say no, her business suffered. She didn’t have time to work on anything but answering emails and client appointments.

It wasn’t until she learned to say no and tell her family that she worked normal hours just like if she was employed that she finally found the time she needed to work on her business.

It can be hard to say no… especially if the person you have to say no to is your family. But it’s important to put yourself and your future first for a while so that you can have more time for family down the road.

2. Get Rid of the Fluff

What do I mean by get rid of the fluff? Well one of the biggest culprits for why you feel like you don’t have enough time has nothing to do with giant gaps of time that you’re spending watching movies instead of working all day. I doubt that’s your issue. But most of the time, it’s tiny pieces of fluff that take up your day. It’s the minutes that go by that are actually wasted on things that don’t contribute to your day.

What do you do when you first wake up in the morning? Do you check your email? Check Instagram? Facebook? That’s actually the worst thing you can do. First off it puts you into a pattern. I bet you check your social media and email throughout the day multiple times a day. Do either of those actually contribute to your day?

A great way to tell if fluff in your schedule is your problem is to track your day every day for a week. Each hour, write down on a piece of paper what you were doing. Then look back. How many hours per day are you spending doing tasks to grow your business?

A lot of times what you’ll find is that your day is actually composed of you taking your dog for a walk, checking email, answering texts, and helping clients during the times they scheduled with you.

Next what you want to do is eliminate that fluff. Put your phone away when you work. Don’t open your email until the end of the day. Start a task and finish it rather than flipping between multiple different tasks. Then make sure you’re working every day on something that will help you to grow your business.

3. Learn to Plan Your Week by Grouping Tasks

So, first things first, you need to start planning your week period. But if you find that you do plan out your day and you still feel like you don’t have time, it could be because you are planning your day incorrectly.

I used to schedule my days with different various tasks that I would complete within an hour or so. So, for instance let’s say from 8-9am I planned to write an article. Then 9-10am would be a call with a client. Then 10-11am I’d plan to work on putting together this funnel. Then 11 to 12pm I’d have another client call. And so on and so forth.

Sure, it looked like I was productive. Every hour of my day would be planned out and booked up. But I didn’t get much done. That tiny time I scheduled to work on my funnel didn’t leave me with much time to get much done. So, a project I could have worked on in one day and finished went on and on for weeks.

Then I switched to putting projects on day. So for example, on Monday, I’d work on creating content all day. I wouldn’t post it all that day, but I would create a bunch of material. Then Tuesday I’d maybe work on client projects and managing my team.

Then I’d have days set aside just to talk to potential clients all day and put those appointments back to back (I know this sounds intimidating and exhausting to all the introverts out there, but from one introvert to another… you can grow into it with time.)

Trust me it’s soooo much better. Now instead of taking weeks to build something, I pick a day and get it done. You can get so much more accomplished by having several hours set aside at one time to focus on a project than a series of hours scattered throughout weeks working on that exact same project.

4. Find Deep Focus Using My Favorite App

This is in no way sponsored by this app at all. I just use it often especially on those days when I find it extremely difficult to focus. The app is called Brain.fm. It is essentially music that helps your brain focus more and block out distractions.

I find that if I really need to get work done, I’ll listen for around 10 minutes and then feel like I’m in a zone where I can keep working. I find that I spend less time getting distracted and more time on doing work which is essential.

They also take a science first approach to making sure that what clients experience isn’t just a placebo effect. You can read up on the science behind it here. I believe they have a free trial if you want to test it out for yourself.

To be honest though, even if it’s simply a placebo effect, all that matters is if you get more done and feel more focused.

Time can be a real challenge when it comes to starting or growing your business, but the first step is not always to start changing your business. You might feel like you don’t even have time to do that. The first step is to find more time in your current schedule. I bet you do have more time than you think you have. Then you can work on changing your business model, implanting systems, and using leverage to create even more time in your schedule.