10 Time Management Hacks Every Entrepreneur Needs To
Know
Entrepreneurs lead a busy and overwhelming life, whether
you’re just starting out or already leading a company – you know how much your
time is worth to you. But do you know where your time goes? Turns out, most
people don’t, we all end up staring at our phones way too often and wondering
just how we spent all day working without really achieving much. With life
getting out of hand daily, everyone wants more control over their time. This is
where time management comes in, a topic much raved about but still rarely
practiced. Here are ten tips to get you started:
1. Track your time
The more you know about where your time goes, the more
you’ll be able to hold yourself accountable. If you’re into time sheets,
block out your day in a notebook and start writing down what you spend time on.
If however, you’d rather save time tracking time, try one of the time tracking
tools available out there and finally get a
sense of your time. Time management expert, Laura Vanderkam suggest tracking all of your time for a week
(precisely, 168 hours) to get a better sense of your habits. It’s a great start
and the results are bound to dazzle you.
2. Stop guesstimating
Now that you’re tracking time, you have a lot more
insight into what tasks take the most of your time and how long certain tasks
take. Set goals for every week and try to estimate how long will these take to
accomplish. Your goal for next week will be bringing estimates as close as
possible to reality. If you’ve ever worked in a management
position, you know how hard it is for some people to estimate the time
it’ll take for certain tasks. Now, try it for yourself and don’t worry if
you’re way off – you’ll get better, that’s what time management is about
anyway.
3. Plan ahead
Apparently, every minute you spend on planning saves you
at least ten minutes in execution. If this sounds too good to be true – try it
for yourself. Start your week on a Sunday, grab a pen and paper and think
thoroughly about everything you want to achieve this week, think about bigger
goals but also try to line up the steps needed. Make sure you’re ready to start
work on Monday, rather than spending your morning trying to figure out where to
start from.
4. Make a smarter to-do list
Don’t just list our everything that needs to be done and
expect to cross things off the list as they come. Organize your list by
priority, make your goals realistic, and set a daily focus for each day of the
week. This will help you clear your head and make your to-do list a bit more
bearable, it also will help focus and stop wasting your time on reorganizing
the list.
5. Batch related tasks together
Since focus is key to productivity, be smart about the
things you choose to dedicate your time to and what time of day you spend on
these. If you try managing your company internal stuff while emailing investors
and discussing new feature requests, you’re bound to lose focus on at least one
if not all of those things. So try to divide your weekly tasks in categories –
internal, fundraising, development etc. Your brain can’t do context switching
full time, try to keep focus on similar tasks to stay on track and save time.
6. Schedule time for interruptions
You have a team of employees depending on you, you have a
hundred unread notifications on your phone, you have meetings that require
follow-ups, and the cleaners also need you to let them into the parking lot
once they arrive. You’re an entrepreneur, you get interrupted a lot. This is
why you should never schedule your day 100%, make plans for being interrupted.
This might sound counterintuitive make sure you to optimize your schedule so
the interruptions don’t disrupt your entire workflow.
7. Make use of prep time
Whether it’s a meeting or a phone call – anything that
might go on forever and eat out your time while you helplessly try to get back
to work – plan it out. Make an agenda for every meeting or phone call you have
scheduled, make sure you lay out the goals you want to achieve with this, start
with an introduction to everyone involved, be a leader of every conversation
you’re in, and once everybody’s gotten what they wanted from it. Start with
your exit strategy and don’t let small talk take over.
8. Take breaks
Contrary to popular belief and modern business culture,
breaks are not a waste of time. Breaks help restore focus and give you a
fresh start for any task you have on hand. Be generous to yourself and take
breaks often, don’t let the feeling of burnout get to you. Whether it’s a walk
to the nearby park or a quick round of Candy Crush, you’ll feel refreshed and
as good as new when back to work. Alternatively, try the Pomodoro method and see how it fits
into your workflow.
9. Make use of incubation
Incubation, in terms of psychology, is one of the four
stages of creativity and it starts when you’re not actively thinking about
whatever problems need solving or ideas you’re trying to develop. Don’t think
about work all the time. I know it might seem hard for someone that is supposed
to always be working toward their goals but you’re actually more likely to get
new ideas and think of solutions to problems you’re facing when you’re not
actively thinking about the solutions. Many entrepreneurs boast about not
taking weekends off or bringing their work home. The truth is you’re far more
productive when not constantly keeping busy.
10. Calm down
Have you ever noticed how time goes by so slowly when you
just calm down, clear your head and stay in the moment? Yoga, meditation,
mindfulness are all methods of taking back some control over present, rather
than planning for the future or thinking about the past. However, you don’t
have to turn into a zen guru to feel the moment. It’s enough to try and not
think about anything for a few minutes, enjoy a view, play with a pet, enjoy
artwork or simply gaze at the sky. Be present and don’t let your time be taken
over by the numerous distractions of the modern world and you’ll be happier and
more productive in no time.
http://www.lifehack.org/349741/10-time-management-hacks-every-entrepreneur-needs-know?mid=20160114&ref=mail&uid=687414&feq=daily
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