Controlling A Tight Schedule
Are you taking on too much and sabotaging your creativity? It happens. Take a look at your time schedule today. Is it so jam-packed that you don’t have room for lunch or even a bathroom break? Something is wrong if you answered “yes.”
You are part of an elite corps of business managers who work long hours, take little or no vacation time and work during your time off. In a recent study of tire dealer owners and managers, more than 50% of those polled said they worked more than 40 hours a week. While that is not necessarily unusual, the line between company and personal time is fuzzy. Check out these statistics:
• One in five (21%) work while eating dinner.
• More than a third (37%) couldn’t remember their last vacation.
• One in five (18%) admit to reading work-related e-mail and documents while in the bathroom, and nearly half (49%) work while driving.
Can you relate? With increasing demands from consumers, the Internet and globalization, a long day every once in a while is almost a guarantee for most successful business owners. With the 24/7 nature of our society, everyone is trying to do more with less time. Even children, whose schedules are so full with extracurricular activities, don’t seem to find the time to go outside and play.
It’s true that packing your schedule to the hilt may offer a short-term solution to getting work finished, managing responsibilities and handling growth spurts, but it can and will generate diminishing returns for you and your business. You will undoubtedly feel rushed, cranky, distracted, forgetful or simply burned out.
Here are some suggestions to help tame the beast:
• Delegate. Hand off some of your responsibilities to your most trusted and qualified employees. Even if not knowing every detail of what is going on in your business drives you crazy, you may still need to let go.
• Just say “no.” If you want to grow, you must take advantage of new opportunities. But, unless you set priorities, you stretch yourself so thin that you will eventually ‘deep six’ your productivity. Be willing to say “no” sometimes to extra work that won’t enhance the bottom line or to goals that don’t match your own. Throw out work plans that drain you and your staff and are no longer useful. Update or trash them.
• Practice balance. Sometimes marathon days, even marathon weeks, are necessary to wrap up a business plan. We already know that Americans spend more time working than people in any other industrialized country.
But, being a workaholic, while necessary in your youth, will soon take its toll on your passion and creativity. Make room for other interests and people in your life besides your business and employees. As you schedule your day, allow some flexibility for interruptions, surprises, rejuvenation and relaxation.
• Take a vacation. A weeklong vacation on the beach or in the mountains can be an invigorating escape that will give you the clarity of thought and inspiration you need to reclaim your productivity. Sometimes the best ideas come when you’re doing nothing. If you can’t afford to get away, take a mini-vacation. Often, a long weekend helps. Don’t take your Blackberry, and don’t call the dealership. Be unreachable.
• Hire or ask for help. If your business is growing, and you have the budget, hire more employees to handle your schedule. Yes, you’ll have more staff to manage and people to pay, but you’ll thank yourself down the road when you feel comfortable enough to take a long lunch with a business prospect or spend a few days at a workshop you’ve always wanted to attend in another city. This is all about staying fresh. Come back to your people ready to brainstorm, have fun and make money.