Time Management When Working from Home

May 18th, 2010

When starting out in a home based business, time management is an aspect of business management usually overlooked or ignored.

Surely everybody knows a friend in small business who races at it like a chicken with its head cut off all day, without enough hours in the day, all they do is panic and get overtaken - is it that this person is you! At the end of the week, when the rush settles, what have you completed? Do you replay the day and realise “what happened to the time, I didn’t get so much completed as I thought I would. If this sounds familiar, then you may simply have an organisational and time management problem.

Successful people rarely appear to rush, they always seem composed and unflustered. The difference between them and others is they have accomplished time management.

What is time management? It is just arranging the clock in your day in an organised and efficient scheme. Before we can really get how to time manage our day, we first need to ask ourselves what we are trying to complete today, this week, this year and up to ten years from now. This is “Goal setting”.

The most effective key in my opinion to complete goals is to write them down. You could reflect on your goals sometimes to know that they are appropriate and achievable but not so easy that you don’t need to put in the effort to succeed at them otherwise what is the point of those goals in the first place?

At the start of each new working year you can takethe time and plan what you wish to take away from this year. It could be that you desire to increase your profits by 20%, you perhaps decide to move into larger premises, you may want to get rid of your debt as much as possible. From the start of a new working week you should write down on a note pad or in your diary the signifcant tasks that must to be done this week, and reflect them at every day to check that you’re making progress and hopefully tick some of the jobs from the list.

You might hold your list on your desk or in a spot where you will be constantly reminded of what must be undertaken each week. Your list may be in order of importance so that the most important chores at the top of this list get achieved first. Any of the projects not finished this week must be put through to next week at a higher importance, this will make sure it gets finished.

The next thing you could be doing is creating a daily list of projects to do. This should help keep you on schedule during each day. Again, this list can be put where you can persistently see it and mark off the items completed. Writing off the chores will give you a pride of a job well done and remind you how you are moving throughout the day. Always stick to your list if possible and keep working from the top priority to low priority. I know issues can jump up over the day that might throw the whole day off track, but you must either take care of the situation and return to the list or if the new dilemma isn’t as serious as some of the issues on the list then list it later on your list and continue on with the item you were doing.

Every aspect of work you need to achieve should be written down for a couple of reasons. Firstly, so you don’t put off to do it and secondly, so you have the day scheduled and you realise your daily goals. Be wary of starting jobs and not completing them. This could come back tomorrow in a plethora of not completed chores and could cause “list blowout”.

You will end up with your list a mile long and you will throw the towel in in despair and change back to those habits of getting yourself in a fuss during your day and completing nothing.

Remember every day you achieve your goals and write off all the chores on your list, you get a day closer to reaching your weekly and soon your yearly and long term goals.

A few tips on Time Management:

Do it once and do it well, it’s fruitless returning to the item and having to redo it.
Learn to nicely inform people when you’re working and that you will speak to them at a later time.
Learn to delegate tasks that truly don’t demand your direct involvement.
Don’t embark on wild goose chases.
Don’t use up time by phone calls that aren’t going to accomplish something.
Don’t procrastinate.
Look back on your list of chores to do continually at times through your day.
“Map out your day” in the shower and schedule out your daily list right when you begin work. Don’t stop what you begin.
Prioritise all your work, always take care of jobs in their order of importance to you and your customers.

Be evasive with time wasters, people who merely decide to chat all day, and if they work for you, set them straight, or get rid of them.

For more information about self employment Brisbane, home business Brisbane, or work from home Brisbane, contact Lifestyle Switch. Make the switch to your own business today.

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