As a business owner, you’ve got a lot on your plate and it can be easy to feel overwhelmed when thinking about everything you need to get done. Excellent time management is an entrepreneur’s secret weapon against endless to-do lists! Bring your dreams to life with these tips to maximize your time and keep your business running smoothly.
1. Get Organized & Focused
This tip may feel like a given, but it’s the most helpful baseline for completing your tasks for the day. Keeping your space clean and organized helps you stay focused and eliminates time wasted looking for documents, resources, or other details. Plus, there are countless studies on the positive effects of a clean workspace on our productivity!
Where you do your work can be just as important as how you do it. If you’re in a space with multiple other projects or clutter, it’s far easier to get distracted. Before starting your day, take a few minutes to clean, tidy up, and put things away so you can focus on the tasks at hand.
2. Know Yourself
In addition to getting and staying organized, it’s helpful to know your habits and identify when you feel the most productive. Are you an early-bird or a night owl? Maybe you do your best work right before lunch. Harnessing your natural motivation is key to completing your priorities, so try scheduling your most challenging or time-consuming tasks during your personal productivity windows. You’ll be amazed by what you can accomplish when you’re not fighting yourself!
Use your natural rhythm to plan your breaks. There’s no use bullying your brain through a hard new task when you know you’re less focused at certain times.
3. Avoid Multitasking
Though it’s sold to us as the gold standard for productivity, multitasking is actually a bad strategy for most projects. Jumping between topics and projects actually increases downtime, mistakes, and brain fatigue as you force your mind to switch gears. Instead, dedicated time for a single task helps you dive in, stay focused, and finish faster with better results.
The Pareto Principle (or 80/20 Rule) is a great way to prioritize tasks. The 80/20 rule suggests that 80% of your outcomes stem from just 20% of your efforts. To make the most of your time, identify the tasks that deliver the biggest impact. Focus your energy there, and either delegate or minimize time spent on the less productive activities.
4. Plan Your Schedule
As a business owner, you’re in charge of your schedule (for the most part). Take advantage of this freedom and use it to your advantage! Create a weekly or daily schedule for yourself based on your current priorities. This is a great time to practice the points above by scheduling more difficult tasks when your brain is ready to focus.
Time blocking techniques help many entrepreneurs focus their attention and efforts on the task at hand. By setting aside designated blocks of time for certain projects, you can help yourself focus and eliminate outside distractions. For example, if you know you’re planning to work on a presentation from 2 p.m. to 4 p.m., your mind will be less tempted to focus there earlier in the day, allowing you to complete other tasks with clearer concentration.
Don’t forget to schedule breaks for yourself! Resting, thinking about non-work plans, or stretching your legs are crucial to avoiding burnout, excessive fatigue, and brain fog.
5. Set Goals with Realistic Timelines
Stay productive without burning out by setting realistic deadlines for yourself. When planning your schedule, take into account the actual time and resources each task will require, and be careful not to overload yourself with overly ambitious goals.
- Break it down: Divide larger projects into smaller, manageable steps to better estimate how long each part will take
- Build in buffer time: Leave room for unexpected hiccups, revisions, or interruptions
- Commit wisely: Prioritize quality over quantity. It’s more effective to meet a few well-planned deadlines than to scramble and fall behind constantly
By pacing your work thoughtfully, you’ll stay on track, reduce stress, and maintain steady progress over time. This approach will also help you tackle your long-term goals for your business — by breaking down your dreams and lofty goals into smaller, actionable, and achievable pieces, you’ll make more progress while feeling less overwhelmed!
6. Take a Class or Attend a Seminar
If implementing these techniques for yourself sounds daunting, take advantage of the many professionals specializing in time management to learn what works for you and what fits your business. Countless seminars, classes, and workshops exist to help you take control of your time and become more efficient. Seeking the help of a professional or a mentor is never a bad idea!
Portland Business Resources
For business owners in the Portland area, there are dozens of online and in-person resources available to help you maximize your time management skills.
- The Time Professionals
- Portland Community College
- Portland’s Office of Small Business Assistance
- Portland Metro Chamber
7. Learn When to Delegate
One of the hardest lessons to learn as a business owner is that you can’t effectively do everything yourself. There’s simply too much to focus on, between your actual operations and all the administrative and behind-the-scenes work. As you build your business, it’s important to also build a team you can trust to tackle the things you don’t have time for.
Delegating tasks can feel intimidating at first, but it becomes much simpler once you understand who on your team excels at what. Consider bringing on a bookkeeper to manage your financial records, a marketing professional or team to oversee your online presence, and a reliable manager to handle day-to-day operations at your physical location. Handing off these responsibilities not only reduces your workload but also gives you more space to concentrate on the areas where your leadership is most valuable, such as high-level decisions and long-term strategy.
8. Stay Caught Up on Finances
Businesses run on numbers and the money flowing into and out of your accounts. Of all the tasks that can occasionally take a backseat, your financial health shouldn’t be one of them. Keeping your books organized and up to date helps you track your progress toward your goals, as well as assess the success of projects and the effectiveness of implemented strategies.
If numbers aren’t where you excel or want to focus, hiring a bookkeeper or financial team may be high on your priority list and one of the first things you delegate. Whatever works best for you and your business!
Here at All About Businesses, we specialize in taking your financials off your plate so you can focus on other areas of your business. Our team offers flexible options that you can customize to fit your unique needs. Contact us today to discover how our bookkeeping and accounting services can help streamline your time management!]
