As a business owner, you’re ultimately responsible for the success or failure of your company. With so much responsibility on your shoulders, your time should be spent focusing on the core activities of your enterprise.
In reality, however, most business owners spend their time picking up the slack and putting out fires. If you want to grow your business, increase profitability and boost your performance, take a look at how you can make better use of your time as a business owner:
1. Know where the time goes
If you’re routinely amazed at how quickly the time goes, it’s worth monitoring your activity and finding out what you spend most of your time doing.
Chances are it won’t be spent on critical business management. Once you know what’s taking up the majority of your working day, you can take steps to restructure your time and put your talents to better use.
2. Increase automation
Many business owners spend time repeating the same activities, day in, day out. However, it’s easy to save time by automating more processes. From document automation to marketing automation, you can save hours each week by taking advantage of the latest technology.
When you no longer have to perform these tasks manually, you can divert your attention to tasks which do require more input.
3. Take more breaks
Most entrepreneurs work long hours and don’t take enough breaks. While this might seem like you’re maximising productivity, you could actually be harming your efficiency levels.
When you work for too long without a break, you make more mistakes and tasks take longer. By factoring regular breaks into your day, you work at an optimal pace and get more done.
4. Outsource some tasks
If you’re running a business and you don’t need to hire full-time staff, or you don’t have the resources to take on employees, consider outsourcing instead.
By working with freelancers or third-party companies, you can access the specialist skills you need. What’s more – you can do so without having to hire employees or provide workspaces for extra people.
5. Stop multitasking
Doing three things at once seems like an effective way to get more done but, contrary to popular belief, it’s rarely effective. Instead, it results in tasks being left unfinished and means that routine jobs take far longer than they should. Rather than trying to multitask, give each job your undivided attention and get it finished on time.
6. Limit distractions
If checking your emails or responding to phone notifications is interrupting your workflow, change your approach. Schedule specific times to check your phone and/or emails and give yourself a time limit when it comes to compiling responses. This prevents interruptions throughout the day and enables you to focus on what you’re doing.
Transform Your Approach to Business
Business owners can find it hard to delegate, particularly if they’ve nurtured a business from the start. As your enterprise grows, however, you’ll need to learn to allocate some responsibilities to other people. By doing so, you’ll give yourself more time for critical business activities and facilitate faster growth for your business.
- DISCLOSURE – This post has been written by an outside source
