Time Management for HomeBased Business Mums
Working from home creates distractions. Time Management is essential if you are a busy home based business mum. Here are some time management tips from Carol,and the approach she took to her overall time management.
“Time Management has always been a challenge for me, I’m easily distracted, and have needed concrete systems to help me stay focused in the work from home arena. Having kids around is tough, also when my husband started working at home, too, I found his distractions much harder to deal with than the kids. C.Ross
Seeing the Big Picture
An excellent exercise I remember well about Time Management went something like this:
Using a blank calendar page for a given week, you color code your current activity in the following way:
- RED = Time you have to spend doing things unrelated to business, whether it’s a 2nd job, appointments, errands, housework, meals, etc.
- ORANGE = Business time unrelated to actual selling, might include: training, marketing, organizing, motivational exercises, planning, paperwork, etc.
- GREEN = Direct meetings with clients, whether over the phone or in person, only activities that have direct potential for $$$ go in this category.
- BLUE = Free time with family, children, or friends, relaxation, hobbies, watching TV, talking on the phone (non-business), etc.
Of course, this can be adapted to any colors, and the calendar we used started at 7 am till 11 pm. This is not intended to be ongoing, the idea is to simply do it for a few weeks or even just ONE week to get an honest view of how we really invest our time, and what changes might be made. Seeing the truth gives you freedom to choose more effectively.
I worked with a mentoring group once where we all kept track of this for a few weeks and it was very telling.
It was easy to glance at a colorful page and notice imbalances quite quickly. Many of us noticed a HUGE supply of ‘blue sky’ time, and that even though we thought we were spending a ton of time on business, for many of us it was all or mostly in the orange category, and very little green.
One who is serious about building a home based business must have consistent amounts of green time in their schedule, and plan ahead for it weekly. Make sense?
This was years ago, but still remember it as having a significant impact on all of us. We laughed at ourselves but also made efforts to focus more on our green time each week. Time Management for our homebased business each day/week is one thing, but in order for the your business to grow, you need that green time. ---------
I want to thank Carol for sharing these Time Management Tips with me. If you have any other tips that you have found useful and would like to share please contact me, I’d love to hear from you.
Here's a neat ebook filled with Time Management Ideas :139 Ways To Smash The Tyranny Of Paperwork, Emails, Telephone Calls And Meetings.
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