9 Proven Principles for Increasing Productivity, Profit and Peace of Mind
September 11, 2008
Do you feel guilty about all the publications you purchase but never read — or the articles you read with great ideas or opportunities you never implement? Are you spending time recreating marketing materials because you cannot find what you wrote the preceding month or year? Do you run out the door for an appointment at the last minute because you could not find your keys or the directions you needed to get where you are going? Are you frequently feeling tired and overwhelmed? Do the people you care about express frustration at your disorganization or want to spend more time with you? If so, "getting organized" should be high on your priority list!
One of the continual frustrations in my career as a professional organizing consultant has been people’s misconceptions about what it means to be "organized." Visions of unrealistically tidy desks and impossible mandates such as "Handle a piece of paper only once" conjure up feelings of frustration and impossibility. Fears of being imprisoned by a specific work style eliminate the reality of the freedom resulting from true organization.
How To Better Handle Your Mail
August 4, 2008
Letters, magazines, bills, flyers, what to do with them all. There should be only two responses to every piece of mail or e-mail, do something with it, or toss it!
The best way, as always, to deal with it all is in an organized fashion.
One of the quickest ways to do this is to have the following folders:
A red one for things that must be dealt with immediately. This would include anything that needs an immediate response, something that has to be done today. A letter you must respond to, a meeting you have to schedule, a report you need to do, a telephone call that needs to be made. Within this folder you will need to prioritize what needs to be handled first, second, etc.
Bills that come in and need to be paid should be placed in your tickler file a couple days before their due date to account for mailing time. So as you are opening your bills that come in the mail, check the due date and place them in your tickler file. If it has to be paid upon receipt, put it in the red folder so you can deal with it immediately.
31 Ways to Get An Extra Hour Out of Each Day
June 28, 2008
How can you get an extra hour out of each day? For many small business owners this is a daily challenge.
I myself have often wished that there were 27 hours in the day. I’ll even settle for 25.
Here are some tips to help you squeeze those extra minutes out of your day. Of course, you can adapt these so that they will fit in with your situation. I hope these are helpful to you.
1. Get up earlier
2. Watch less TV(I mean how many Law & Order spinoffs does one need to watch?)
3. Avoid allowing others to waste your time
4. If you don’t have to drive to work, use that time to study or planIf you do drive to work listen to a motivational tape on the way to work instead of that mindless dj talk.
5. Organize your work; do it systematically.
6. Make creative use of lunchtime.
7. Delegate authority if possible.
8. Spend less time on unimportant phone calls.
9. Think first, then do the task.
10. Do what you dream about doing, instead of just dreaming about it.
The Ultimate Time Management Tips: 5 Steps To Reaching Your Goals With Minimum Work
May 23, 2008
Would you like to know how to get 10 times more done in a day than most people do in a week, with less work?
Then listen closely. You’re about to discover the ONE time management and productivity secret that really works.
This little technique is the ONLY thing you need to master if you want to reach all your goals with minimum work and free up your valuable time.
Have you ever had a hundred things on your to-do list, tried to do them all, only to get so tied up in your work that you couldn’t seem to finish any of them? Do you remember how frustrating it was?
Then you know the feeling I’m talking about. And you’re not alone - millions of people suffer from it every day.
I’m talking about a monster called information overload. It’s responsible for more failed projects than all other factors combined, and if you want maximum results from your efforts you need to get rid of it - especially if you’re in a home based business.
Here’s a simple 5 step formula for eliminating the problem forever. When mastered, it will help you reach any goal you may have. It’s quite easy, really:
Living Life In A Time Starved World
April 17, 2008
Recently I saw an advertisement for a time management booklet: “Shorter deadlines, competing priorities, endless meetings, interruptions and even higher quality expectations are just some of today’s time challenges. And yet the number of hours in the day remains the same.”
As entrepreneurs we all struggle sometimes with managing our time effectively. I once heard an entrepreneur say that of the people he knows, his entrepreneur friends are the worst people when it comes to managing their time and priorities. Too often we fall prey to the misguided notion that being busy is the same as making progress.
There are many areas involved in effective time management:
? your attitude
? goal setting
? setting priorities
? planning
? scheduling
? analyzing your progress
? dealing with interruptions
? meetings
? paperwork
? delegation of tasks
? taming procrastination
? time teamwork
KEY PRINCIPLES
Here are some key principles I have found to help me manage my time more effectively:
1. Good habits are the key to good time management.
Time Mastery vs. Time Management - Knowing the Difference
March 10, 2008
How much time do you spend on Mastering Your Time? I don’t mean managing time. There is quite a difference between managing and mastering your use of time. The goal of managing your time is to be more efficient, to squeeze more productivity out of your day. There are a lot of benefits to being a good time manager, especially in a rushed and frenetically paced culture.
The goal of mastering your time, however, is to live better, to savor your time?. which is just another word for your Life.
If you accept that your time is non-renewable, precious, then it makes sense to take this most valuable personal resource seriously, and devote to it the attention it deserves. Look at Time Mastery as a way of actually lightening your load ? even if it paradoxically takes a little bit of time to lighten up.
Whats Keeping You At The Office (9 Tips To Get Home Quicker)
February 4, 2008
“Work smarter, not harder” is a cliché that has darted in and out of the workplace for years. But it’s still as true as ever. And it’s often overlooked advice that truly works. “Working smarter” means think strategically about how to improve your productivity. For starters, think about how you spend a typical day. Then eliminate the time robbers. How? Like this…
1. Discourage excessive visitors. Move the candy dish. Put it far away from your desk. Why? Because food is a friend when you’re trying to attract or meet your peers but it’s also a foe that cuts into your time. If 12 people stop by your desk for sweets and initiate a five minute chat each, you’ve lost an hour of your day.
2. Train your family. Set limits on personal calls. I once worked beside an executive assistant who received at least ten calls daily from her teenage daughter. Use the three or five rule for family members who like instant input: Wait until you have at least three (or five) items to discuss with me before calling my workplace, unless your request is an emergency or timely. (’Mom, the sale ends today’ falls under neither of these categories).
Is the Goal to Reach the Goal?
December 31, 2007
In this fast and crazy world, we want to multi-task at every given moment. After all, how else can we accomplish all that needs to be done in only 24 hours? We’ve been taught that if we reach all of our goals in a day, week, month, or year, we are successful. What we haven’t been taught when achieving goals is that quality counts and so does the amount of effort exerted.
Our tendency is to set many goals especially at work for any given day or week, and then we feel discouraged or disappointed when we don’t achieve all of them. In fact, we usually have to carry them over to the next day or the next week. The first step in feeling a sense of accomplishment and completion is to set only 3 goals for a day, for a week, for a month that HAVE to be accomplished. Why only 3? In an average day, we can’t anticipate all of the other things that will snag our attention. We get called into a meeting, we get a time-consuming phone call, we get a request that requires some searching, we notice an article of interest that we want to read, etc. If we don’t allow for these other time-consuming things, then we’re not being realistic about what we can accomplish in a day. Same goes for a month ? unexpected family situations, travel, illness, new projects, etc.
Doing Things We Dread
November 21, 2007
As I sit here in front of the computer I am breaking through on something that I have been tolerating for weeks now? actually sitting down to write this newsletter. I wasn’t blocked for ideas ? I had a list of them. I simply couldn’t (yea right? wouldn’t) sit down and put my thoughts on paper. The irony, of course is that I coach people through these very same issues and my clients have great success. Ohhhh coach heal thyself! Well the breakthrough came the other night when I was using a wonderful miracle of modern technology? The George Forman Grill! Let me explain.
I love to cook. It is an amazing creative experience for me? and let me give you some advice? remember presentation is everything. A meal can go from fair to fantastic simply by arranging the food on the plate? you sort of fool people into thinking it is actually better than it is? the French have known this for years. But I digress?
Handling Procrastination
October 17, 2007
"TIME CANNOT BE ‘MANAGED.’ THE WHOLE CONCEPT OF TIME MANAGEMENT IS A BIT OBSCURE. THE ONLY THING THAT CAN BE MANAGED IS YOUR ACTIVITIES WITHIN THAT TIME."
I am quite confident I have never had an original idea in my entire life. What I have done, however, is create new ways of expressing old ideas. In this respect, I now invite you to approach, with a new perspective, the way you manage your activities.
Need-to, Ought-to, Can-do
Say it a few times to yourself: "Need-to, Ought-to, Can-do." Tongue-twisting aside, it represents three categories, within which falls everything that you are presently capable of. (Any activity that you are not presently capable of would perhaps fall into a forth category of "Can’t-do," and yet I would submit that if you are spending much time considering what you cannot do, you are not only mismanaging your time-you’re throwing it away!)
