In order to make the millions, you have to scale the un-scalable: time.
Your time is the most precious resource of all. We’re all given the same 24 hours in a day, but working for more of those hours is not the way to get more done. It’s not just a matter of how much time you spend, but how you spend your time.
Just like any investment, your time should be working for you. But if you’re like most people, your time gets eaten up by any number of things in a day – and probably not those that are the most effective and important for growing your business. Use these tips to figure out where your time is being spent inefficiently, and how to get back on track for a more productive, more effective work day.
- List all of your tasks for the week. As you complete each one, note how long you spent accomplishing each task. This will give you a general sense of where the major time sinks are. The patterns might surprise you.
- Take a closer look at how many interruptions you have. My work as CEO of wealth management firm LexION Capital is always client-focused, so to some extent I am always reacting to important client matters that can arise anytime. Yet my day is not completely inbox-driven. Are you allowing “urgent” things to derail your focus on the tasks you meant to accomplish?
- Then, apply the 2-minute rule. If an interruption generates a task that you can complete in 2 minutes or less, do it. That will get it off your plate and out of the way. But if it will take longer than 2 minutes, schedule a time to accomplish the task later, as needed.
- Automate as many recurring tasks as you can. Just like you can set it and forget it when it comes to growing your money (via an autotransfer into your investment account!), automation is your friend here. If you spend the time once to set everything up, then you’ve freed up a great deal of time every week or every month after.
Have you applied these tricks in your own work? What are your most successful strategies for working more efficiently?
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