Finding the Time

One thing I often find with small business owners is that they feel they never have enough time! They completely accept that they should be focusing more on marketing, strategy and financial analysis but instead find themselves at the coal face and performing necessary administrative tasks which the business requires.

Of course the easy solution would be to hire additional staff - but in this economic climate, who really has the money to do that? And think of the time involved trying to find that extra person?

In my experience, this is a chicken and egg scenario. The most successful small businesses are the ones that stop making excuses and instead find ways to work within these constraints. It is absolutely imperative that you do make the time to be able to work on your business. You just need to be efficient and in the right mind set for these additional tasks so they don't take up any more of your "productive time" than thy should.

The trick is to start small, and let the results do the rest. Right now, you should open your calender and block out a small segment of time, every week to do some of the other stuff. If you do have a naturally slow period in your week, maybe you could schedule it then, however - make sure it is also a time that you normally feel fresh. If you don't really get going mentally until mid afternoon, don't schedule your time for 8am!

I suggest one hour per week to start. If you have staff or customers, let them know that you are completely unavailable for that time. No excuses. People respond well to consistency and will easily work their schedules around yours. They will become disgruntled if you apply an ad hoc approach and change the timing regularly.

Now that you have created this hour of blue sky, make sure you use it constructively and efficiently  It is not a time to get on top of the paperwork, or catch up on other jobs. It is a time to look proactively at your business.

- How are you marketing to your customers and how do you know if they are receiving your message?

- Which areas of your balance sheet are showing improving trends, and which are negative? What are you doing to stop these?

- What is the long term plan for the business - do you have the right resources or do you want to diversify into new markets?

Once you have the time to look at these and other areas of your business, you will also start to work on and implement solutions. This will in turn improve performance, enabling you to free up even more time to continue to work on and improve your business.

Your time and energy are the greatest gifts you can give your business so stop making excuses and block out that first half hour, right now!