3 Productivity Hacks to Implement in the New Year
Productivity and efficiency are essential for successful business owners to make the most of their time during a busy day. No matter how hard you try, you simply cannot do everything yourself when it comes to running your business. Investing in your business not only decreases stress but it makes your business run more smoothly and increasing profits.
Try these three tips to improve your productivity:
Productivity Hack #1: Outsource to a Virtual Assistant
Rather than being saddled with monotonous tasks and expensive software you may have to learn, be a smart business owner, accept your limitations and find an expert service provider to take over these tasks. What takes one expert an hour to do can easily take a non-savvy business owner 5 hours to complete. Is that really a good use of your time?
To find the virtual assistant that fits your needs, start off by asking your business associates for referrals and conduct regular interviews, as though you were hiring an employee. Just because they are a virtual service provider doesn’t mean you shouldn’t have the same high standards you would expect from an employee.
Productivity Hack #2: Kick the Bad Habits
Are you stuck in the dark ages, doing things just because you’ve always done it that way? Analyze your business during the last year. Did you launch any programs? Were the results better or worse than you expected? Are there any new software programs or apps that will make your work more efficient? Are you still keeping your books in a handwritten ledger or are you ready to convert to a computer software program? Delegate tasks; find a new software; plan out new programs or updates; these are all things you can start doing today, not to spend money unnecessarily but to breathe some excitement into your business.
Productivity Hack #3: Create an Actual Plan
Use a project management program or an old-fashioned paper planner and put your projects onto a calendar then work toward achieving those goals.
Without a plan, your actions are meaningless. You might decide to work on something unrelated to your goals or you might delay your own deadlines in order to put client business ahead of your own work. A business plan is your blueprint for reaching your goals, no matter how lofty they may seem. Seeing this plan daily will give you something to focus on, therefore increasing your daily productivity.
The most important step of all: TAKE ACTION.
Reading this post and agreeing you need to do this will not achieve the results you want. Set your intentions and put them on your calendar then take action.