How do you feel about your day-to-day activities? Do you feel like you\u2019ve got a plan for every day? Got a plan but it gets blown out of the water on a regular basis? No plan- just stressed and overwhelmed? Or my favorite\u2026. Where did the day go and why is it already 5pm?!<\/p>\n
As business owners many of us live and die by our calendars. Maybe you have every minute accounted for. Maybe you\u2019re using a time blocking strategy that \u201cbuckets\u201d your activities. Personally, I have everything on my calendar to get it out of my head\u2026 \u201cPick up books at the Essex Library\u201d, \u201cChange the cat litter\u201d. Our calendars are an organizational tool but if it is not working well for you perhaps it\u2019s time to re-evaluate how you\u2019re using it.<\/p>\n
Winning with Prioritization<\/strong><\/p>\n Business owners are busy. We wear many hats, and we are pulled in many directions. Working from home can make that even harder with more distractions than ever. With all that we have going on it can be hard to prioritize. Look at your to-do list every day and consider what your top 3 priorities are- what are the things that either have a deadline, will make the biggest impact to your business, or are the most important to you (factor in your family!). Work on those first and then tackle the next highest priorities. As things pop up during the day, weigh them against the activities you\u2019ve already prioritized. Are they important but not urgent? Are they just a distraction or an opportunity to procrastinate? Prioritization is a key to increasing organization and decreasing stress in your business.<\/p>\n Eliminate Distractions<\/strong><\/p>\n Distractions like texts, phone calls, social media (!), emails, and employee and coworker interruptions can all be productivity killers. Work to eliminate distractions so that you can focus and be more productive. Multi-tasking is NOT an effective way to work. You may feel like you\u2019re accomplishing more but really, you\u2019re losing time and focus as your brain switches from activity to activity. Consider when you are most productive \u2013 are you a morning person? \u2013 and schedule the most difficult tasks for that time of day or day of the week. Try calendar blocking to give you a set time of day to read and respond to emails. Turn off the notifications on your phone and computer so that you\u2019re not interrupted by an alert every time there\u2019s a new email. Turn off all<\/u> the notifications for social media unless you\u2019re using the platforms to generate sales. Consider using the social media timers on your phone to limit or control when you can use the platforms to break the habit. (It\u2019s an option in your phone settings). Social media is training us to respond and spend more time on the platforms by sending alerts and notifications and generally instilling Fear of Missing Out (FOMO) to keep us engaged. If you can, hang a \u201cdo not disturb\u201d sign on your office door for blocks of time so that you can work uninterrupted.<\/p>\n If you need help taking an objective look at your schedule and productivity, consider exploring how a business coach can help you take control and maximize productivity.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" How do you feel about your day-to-day activities? Do you feel like you\u2019ve got a plan for every day? Got a plan but it gets blown out of the water on a regular basis? No plan- just stressed and overwhelmed? Or my favorite\u2026. Where did the day go and why is it already 5pm?! As…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":19,"featured_media":1015,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[26,27,25],"class_list":["post-1014","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-time","tag-priorities","tag-prioritization","tag-time-management"],"aioseo_notices":[],"featured_image_src":"https:\/\/advicoach.com\/slewis\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/16\/2020\/12\/apple-1867752_640.jpg","featured_image_src_square":"https:\/\/advicoach.com\/slewis\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/16\/2020\/12\/apple-1867752_640.jpg","author_info":{"display_name":"sklewis","author_link":"https:\/\/advicoach.com\/slewis\/author\/slewis\/"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/advicoach.com\/slewis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1014","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/advicoach.com\/slewis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/advicoach.com\/slewis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/advicoach.com\/slewis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/19"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/advicoach.com\/slewis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1014"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/advicoach.com\/slewis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1014\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/advicoach.com\/slewis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1015"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/advicoach.com\/slewis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1014"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/advicoach.com\/slewis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1014"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/advicoach.com\/slewis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1014"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}