In today’s guest post, Karen Southall Watts once again forces us to face the truth — no matter how painful — so we can achieve our business and personal goals.

The challenge of time management is not new. Increasing pressure to “do more with less” is the hallmark of modern life. At some point everyone faces issues about how much to do or how to prioritize the items on their to-do-list. And the resources we need are all around us. There’s a wealth of information on the internet (much of it free), thousands of self-help books and CD’s and legions of gurus willing to tell us how to get it all done.

So, what’s the problem?

Often we merely give into our excuses. It’s time to confront those ideas, thrash them and move on.

Excuse #1 – I work better under pressure.

Uh… no you don’t. The science simply does not back this up. Intense pressure and worry, like what you feel when you are about to miss a deadline, triggers the body’s limbic system. This is the part of your brain that sets in motion the famous “fight or flight” response. Once the body and brain get focused on survival you can forget about creativity or systematic organization. The fact that you sometimes manage to scrape by does not mean you are turning out quality work or managing your time effectively.

Excuse #2 – I shouldn’t have to do this.

Sometimes in my workshops I call this “magical thinking”. Many people resist learning to be more efficient because they feel they are being over worked or treated unfairly. It’s hard to get things done when you feel that “it’s not my job.” Not making an effort and waiting for the system to change is totally unrealistic. However sometimes people think they can out wait a boss, a client or a policy they don’t like. They refuse to try time management strategies because they are hoping and waiting for the rules to change.

Excuse #3 – I HAVE a system; I know what’s in all these piles.

If you find yourself defending your mess or your methods, that’s a sign of trouble. True, we are all individuals and have different personal styles for work. However, when you start making this excuse ask yourself who you are really trying to convince. Do you really know where everything is? Try giving yourself a test. Make a list of four to six important pieces of information you should be able to find (tax returns, client numbers, vendor contract, sales letter template etc). Now…try to find them within 15 minutes.

Excuse #4 – I really don’t spend THAT much time watching TV, surfing the web, snacking, texting, chatting  or posting to Facebook.

There’s a reason almost all time management books, seminars and workshops begin with some type of “record your typical day” exercise. Most of us simply do not realize how much time we spend in mindless activities that contribute nothing to our personal or professional success. If you’ve never done this, it’s time to give it a try. Social media and the arrival of smart phones have made this an even more attractive excuse. Think about it. If you are never, ever disconnected from information input and you’re constantly interacting with your online community, how do you have time to do anything else?

Excuse #5 – I’m too busy putting out fires.

Emergencies happen, but for most of us our jobs or businesses do not revolve around crisis control, or at least they shouldn’t. If you are constantly in emergency mode then either you or your staff needs to review prioritization. Not everything is urgent. Ask yourself if you’re addicted to the rush of saving the day. Be brutally honest. Unless you are a first responder (police officer, fire fighter, EMT) then you should not be too busy with emergencies to improve your time management skills.

It may seem harsh to strip away our favorite excuses, but in today’s competitive environment no one can afford to waste time.  Pour yourself a cup of bravery and confront these excuses and put them in the past.

Creative Commons License photo credit: h.koppdelaney

Karen Southall Watts is an entrepreneurship and management coach who focuses on practical and effective solutions for professionals. Karen offers workshops and one-on-one coaching. She is the author of the ebook, Sex is Good for Business: A Workbook for Couples in Business Together. Follow Karen on Twitter or find her at www.karensouthallwatts.com. Karen also teaches Business Ethics and writing at the community college level.

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Sleeping allows us to refuel and restore our bodies. Sadly, we often deprive ourselves of needed sleep time, thinking that reducing this time is the only way to achieve more during the 24 hours that we have at our disposal each day.

But what if our sleeping time could help us save time during the workday?  Would we then permit ourselves to enjoy a full night’s sleep?

Time management expert Kathryn McKinnon has provided us with a strategy to make sleep work for us during the workday in her best-selling book entitled Triple Your Time Today:  10 Proven Time Management Strategies to Help you Create and Save More Time!

Kathryn introduced me to the possibilities that lie within this concept in her answer to a question that I posed to her on LinkedIn.  She said the following:

We have, on average, 20,000 thoughts each day. Unfortunately, about 80% of those thoughts are negative. That means you spend a lot of time thinking unproductively. It’s your negative thinking that gets in the way of accomplishing what you want to do because these thoughts create doubt and fear, which then create hesitation and inaction. That means it takes you longer to accomplish your goals–in short, it takes more time.

If you . . . let your mind go to work for you, your mind will spend that time, while you’re sleeping, finding a way to deliver a solution to your problem.

Triple Your Time Today gives step by step instructions on how to utilize this powerful strategy. A combination of focusing on the positive things that have happened during the day just before “lights out,” suspending judgment on the ideas that surface upon waking, and journaling are the keys to success – they tap into the well of creativity that each of us possesses. I have already begun to implement it with positive results, and have also noticed that I’m sleeping better at night.

What would it mean for you to get more rest at night and enjoy greater productivity during the day? Read Triple Your Time Today and find out! You’ll get great value from Kathryn’s sleep strategy and from the other nine time management strategies presented in the book as well.

Kathryn will be my guest on a free teleseminar on February 9 to discuss this concept more fully.  To join us, visit GettingOverOverwhelm.com and enter your name and e-mail address so that you can receive the call-in details. (Note: I am not an affiliate of Kathryn McKinnon and have no financial stake in Triple Your Time Today.)

About the Author: Monique Y. Wells is the Paris Muse of Time Management™.  She helps women solopreneurs and women who work from home “get over overwhelm” so they can enjoy less stress, more income, greater job satisfaction, and have more time to spend with family and friends outside of work – guilt free!  For information on how you can get help getting rid of overwhelm in your business, visit her website at GettingOveroverwhelm.com.

photo credit: Casey David

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Today’s guest post is by Monique Wells – enjoy!

Not so long ago, I took on the responsibility for the PR and marketing for my husband’s book, Paris Insights – An Anthology.  Though I willingly stepped up to the challenge and followed Elena’s teachings and sage advice, I rapidly found myself in a state of overwhelm.

Why?

Because I was also running two home businesses and a small non-profit organization, and did not realize that I had just volunteered for a responsibility that would break the proverbial camel’s back. I imagined myself to be Wonder Woman – the invincible female force that was going to do everything for everyone and get it all right the first time!

I learned the hard way that it doesn’t matter how well you do things or how passionate you are about them if you have too many things to do.  I developed a stress-related illness and came dangerously close to burnout before I was forced to admit that I had to change my work habits and more importantly, my view of myself.

At this critical juncture, I experienced the life-changing force of a simple shift in mindset that set me free from the anxiety and stress of what I call “office overwhelm.”  And the change was amazing!  As soon as I adopted this mindset, I shed my Wonder Woman persona and was able to focus more clearly and effectively on high-value activities in my businesses. The result? Less stress, greater productivity, increased revenue, and more time off!

There are many different “brands” of overwhelm out there, and they are plaguing women solopreneurs just like you and me.  Aside from the Wonder Woman Syndrome (overcommitment), examples include inability to prioritize, external distractions like e-mail, social media, and information overload on the latest technology (web design, iPhone apps, etc.

FREE VIDEO SERIES ON GETTING OVER OVERWHELM

If one or more of these is creating a state of overwhelm in your life and your business, then you’ll want to learn about and embrace the simple shift in mindset that transformed my life.  To share it with you, I have created a free, tell-all video series (launch date – August 25, 2011) that reveals:

• The words that literally changed my life and inspired me to take the action to conquer “office overwhelm,” reclaim my health, reduce my workload, and still spend more time on revenue-generating activities
• The three most frequent causes of overwhelm among women solopreneurs, and several tips that you can use to counteract them
• The three biggest mistakes that women solopreneurs make in trying to resolve their problems with overwhelm, and an outline for the steps required to get rid of it forever.

To learn the BEST strategy out there for “getting OVER overwhelm,” increasing your productivity and income, and regaining control over your workday, access these videos at the Getting over Overwhelm Web site. Get ready to “get rid of your overwhelm” for good!

About Monique:

Monique Y. Wells is the Paris Muse of Time Management™. She helps women solopreneurs who work from home “get over the overwhelm” that they experience during the workday. Monique owns two small businesses and has over ten years of experience in maximizing productivity within the constraints of the number of hours available for work each day. Find her at understandingtimemanagement.com.

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Many small business owners and solopreneurs have one-person marketing and PR departments. A common complaint I hear is the lack of time to do PR. What a shame! PR, done right, has far-reaching benefits. This is why I’ve invited Monique Wells, a time management expert and coach, to write a guest post for us today. Monique tells us how we can MAKE time for PR.

So you’re a small business owner who wants to begin a do-it-yourself public relations campaign! You’ve got Elena’s arsenal of PR weapons at your disposal, and you are ready to get started.

Or are you? What about the errands that need to be run? The invoices that need to be sent? The phone and e-mail messages that need to be answered?

Don’t worry! There is a way of dealing with these mundane, repetitive tasks so that you will have time to devote to your public relations project.

I recently interviewed Brian Tracy, a time management and productivity expert whose principles and practices I admire. We talked at length about the concept of delegation for the entrepreneur or solopreneur, and what value it can add to your business.

When To Delegate

Brian spoke of what he calls “The 70% Rule,” saying, “If somebody can do [a task] 70% as well as you, [you should] delegate it, especially if it is not a major task…. As your business grows, you get someone to do the little things that are of low value so that you can do more of the things of high value.”

Given that solopreneurs by definition work alone, delegation means subcontracting or outsourcing, in today’s parlance.

Brian recommends casting a wide net when conducting your search. Tell people that you are looking for a virtual assistant or an on-site assistant and get referrals. Once you obtain a list of candidates, ask for references and follow up with those for whom the assistants have worked before. Be sure to ask about their work habits, their character, their punctuality, etc.

Never rely on your own judgment to make your hiring decision. Always solicit outside opinions. The end result – hiring the right person or team – will transform your life!

Brian stressed that the cost of outsourcing should always come from current revenues. If you don’t have current revenues, then you are not earning enough to hire a subcontractor.

Obstacles to Delegating

You may resist the idea of hiring an assistant for many reasons:

• Relinquishing power – you may want to retain 100% control of what goes on in your business
• Lack of trust – you may have had a bad experience with an assistant before
• Lack of time – you don’t know when you’ll find the time to train someone

But if you can imagine the benefits of doing so, and learn from the success stories of other entrepreneurs who have assistants, then you should put aside these concerns and decide that you are going to make the situation work for you.

Tips to Delegate Successfully

Whether your assistant is virtual or on-site, follow these steps to maximize the success of your relationship:

• Clearly define the tasks to be undertaken.
• State the expected results and explain their importance.
• Consider the resources required (if any).
• Identify the authority level that is being assigned – example: Does the person need to check with you before sending out an e-mail message for your business?
• Make deadlines clear.
• Inform those who may need to know that you have hired someone.
• Keep an open line of communication with the assistant and provide support.
• Evaluate performance periodically.
• Provide feedback on results.

There are many PR activities that an assistant can take care for for you, such as:

• Scanning traditional and social media for PR opportunities
• Sending out media pitches
• Collecting contact information for your media list
• Brainstorming story ideas
• Responding to PR-related emails and inquiries
• Updating your media kit
• Submitting press releases to traditional media and online PR sites
• Scheduling press interviews

As you can see, you don’t have to do all the PR work by yourself — even if you can’t afford to hire a PR professional or retain the services of a PR agency. You can delegate the smaller tasks to an assistant and free yourself to focus on your messaging, interacting with media, and giving interviews or content to obtain more exposure for your business.

What are your questions, concerns or experiences with delegating and outsourcing? We’d love to know what you think. Submit them as a comment below, or send them to Elena via Twitter or Facebook.

Monique Y. Wells is the Paris Muse of Time Management™. She helps women solopreneurs who work from home “get over the overwhelm” that they experience during the workday. Monique owns two small businesses, and has over ten years of experience in maximizing productivity within the constraints of the number of hours available for work each day. Find her at understandingtimemanagement.com

Top image by Kirstea

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I’m always on the look-out for the next great tool that can help me be more productive. With two businesses and two kiddos to take care of, my to-do list gets longer every day.

And I’ll admit, when I reflect back on my day, I find at least 4 or 5 things that I did that weren’t high priorities, like cleaning up the files on my desktop. These unimportant “busy” tasks are also the things that prevent me from doing the tasks that will move my business forward – like writing a client proposal.

So I’ve started using Teamly and have found it to be an incredibly simple and powerful tool for managing my productivity.

Teamly helps you to focus on what really matters by only allowing you to choose your top 5 priorities for each day, week and month.

Your Top 5 Most Important Goals

In my post Time Management Secrets for Busy Entrepreneurs, I talked about how the top things you accomplish in a day should be the activities that will really move your goals forward. By limiting your priorities to only your top 5, Teamly forces you to carefully choose how and where you’ll spend your time.

Although built for teams, which is great for entrepreneurs and small businesses, even a solopreneur can benefit from using Teamly for time management.

I like that I can list out my top 5 priorities not only for the day, but for the week and month as well. This lets me reflect on how my actions today will affect my overall goals for the month. Another great feature is a no editing policy after 20 minutes. Once that time has passed, I can’t go back and replace my task with another one that may not be as important. The only thing I can do afterwards is change the order of priority of my tasks, which still allows me to concentrate on only my most important goals for the day.

Be Accountable

I use Teamly both for myself and to manage some of my support staff. Everyone can view each other’s tasks (even their superiors), how far along they are with them (status: completed, started or abandoned), and even provide comments on these tasks. Teamly also provides statistics on how much of your goals you meet each day, week and month. I find it very useful to be able to track my team’s progress while also being held accountable for my own activities every day.

I also like that you can choose to get e-mail alerts on your top 5 every day at a certain time, every week or every month.

For the time-strapped entrepreneur and solopreneur that finds it hard to fit everything into 24 hours, I highly recommend giving Teamly a try. By saying No to the things that keep you busy but unproductive, you’ll be amazed at what you accomplish when you focus on the 5 things that will really build your business.

You might just end up working less, and achieving more.

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A few months ago, I was speaking at an event for women entrepreneurs and the topic they wanted to learn most about was time management.  Whether you work for a company or run your own, I think this is a topic that resonates with most of us because time is something we never seem to have enough of!

The Truth About Time

One of the most important distinctions I can offer you about time management is that it is…impossible. No matter who you are, or where you are in the world, we get the same amount of time in the day – only 24 hours.  We do not have control over time.

The clock continues to tick whether we are active, or inactive.  Whether we are productive, or not.  So really, in that sense we are all equals.

If that’s the case, how come some people seem to achieve so much more and with so much ease?

Well, it’s because they understand that the real issue is not around time-management, but around self-management. Because really, we can only control ourselves.

Isn’t it a lot more powerful to think of it this way?  We are powerless to control time, but we have all the power we need to take responsibility for managing ourselves around time.

Are You Busy Or Are You Productive?

We tend to assume the only way to get more time is to speed up.  Let’s be honest, next week I want you to walk around your office, with your cellphone in your ear, holding a stack of papers and start running.  People will think, “wow, she is really busy!”  That’s our perception and it’s almost like a badge of honor we wear, to be “busy”.

Unfortunately speeding up can actually slow us down, as anyone who has rushed out of the house only to realize their keys, wallet or important office papers get left behind on the kitchen table.

It’s not just our efficiency that’s reduced. The quality of experience suffers too.  Have you ever eaten an entire meal without tasting any of it?  Read a book without remembering a word?  Hurrying up doesn’t give us less time, it can also drain the pleasure and benefit from the time we do have.

The only way to do more, is to actually do less.  You have to believe that:

• Doing something unimportant well, doesn’t make it important
• Taking a long time to do something, doesn’t make it important

In a previous blogpost,  10 Ways To Say No Without Feeling Guilty, I wrote about how to say NO so that you’re not over-burdened and over-committed and have more free time to do the things you really want to do.

Planning is Key

To further manage time and increase your productivity at the office, I suggest starting your day by planning first and asking yourself these questions:

• What are the most critical things to accomplish today? You should never have more than 2-3 big things to accomplish in a day, and these should be the activities that will really move your goals forward.  Try to do these first thing in the day, when you’ll have the most energy and before interruptions set you off course.

• If you could only work 2 hours a day, how would you do it? Have you ever noticed when you’re on a deadline you manage to do it somehow and are intensely focused? You don’t tolerate interruptions, go on Facebook or waste any time getting things done.  Bring this focus into your daily routine and watch your free time grow – just don’t be tempted to add more to-do in the extra time you free up!

• What are you avoiding doing? When you avoid something it’s draining your energy always thinking about it.  Find a way to do it, delegate it, or dump it (decide whether you really need to do it at all).

Mono-Task, Don’t Multi-Task

Once you have a plan on what your priorities are, it’s time to get to work. If you’re a mom, you are a natural multi-tasker – how many of us have made dinner while helping children with their homework and carrying on a conversation with our husbands at the same time?

However at work, multi-tasking may not be the best way to get things done.  Tim Ferriss in the book The 4-Hour Work Week talks about a set-up time for all tasks, whether large or small in scale. Just think of printing as an example. Whether the printer runs a batch of 1000 business cards or 100, the set-up time is the same.  That’s why they give discounts on large volume orders.

There’s a momentum that’s gained in doing a task repetitively and when you are interrupted by a phone call for example, while writing a report or other more intense tasks – there’s a psychological switching of gears that can take up to 45 minutes to reset.

The solution is to “batch” or group the same task (cold calls, reporting, client meetings) and do it once a week instead of five times a week, for example, to gain that momentum.  Make sure and enroll others in your team so they know to minimize interruptions when you’re on a roll.

Check out my previous post on Time Blocking.

Stop Complaining And Take Action

Instead, use that obsessive energy to start ‘doing’ things. You’ll often find that when you start to take ACTION on something – anything – that feeling of helplessness lessens.

Of course, you can choose to complete your project in one go, just remember to take a few minutes break here and there. That way you focus on your end goal without overtaxing yourself mentally and physically.

Another variation is to work on a task until you achieve a specific output – laying out two pages of your product catalog, finishing the week’s expense report, or contacting 10 potential customers.

Don’t worry too much about finishing projects so you don’t get overwhelmed. Focus instead on giving undivided attention to each and every step.

Time Well Spent

There are many other time management techniques out there, as this issue has been around…well, since the beginning of time! While having ‘enough’ time may be an unreachable goal for most of us – what may be worth seeking in the end, is satisfaction with time, or even better, spending time on activities and with people that delight and bring us joy.

“Time is what we want most, but what we use worst.”
- William Penn*This article first appeared in my column for Working Mom Magazine

Image from Crestock Stock Photo

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Today I had to renew my passport. With such tight security at the embassy, I was asked to leave my cellphone and computer behind at the front desk.

I was horrified! What will I do while I wait? Fuming, I grudgingly took out pen and paper and started making notes. In 90 minutes here’s what I achieved:

1. A clearer vision of company directions, products, status and next steps
2. A revised PR and Marketing plan for the next 30 – 60 days
3. Two blogposts written
4. One press release written
5. Most importantly, clarity on the bigger picture.

I’ve been stuck on a few things and having the time away without distractions of emails, calls, Twitter and my kids running afoot made space in my mind for ideas to come through and connect in a different way.

In terms of boosting productivity and time management, I learned sometimes the office is NOT the most productive place to get things done, especially as a WAHM.

I’ll be scheduling a “get out of the office day” with just pen and paper at least twice a month and looking forward to letting my brain “work out of the box”.

Won’t you join me?

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As busy entrepreneurs trying to have it all, it’s really easy for things to get out of control. It’s therefore important to prioritize your most important tasks, and then set a schedule so you can be practical when planning your day. Try using a time management technique for entrepreneurs called time blocking if you have several large projects on the go.

Time blocking is about dedicating a fixed amount of time for a given task, then doing your best to complete it within the available time frame.

How to go about time blocking?
Set an amount per day to work on a project. For example, 30 minutes (or even 10 to 15 minutes as you wish) on a sales presentation. Set an alarm and when the alarm goes off, move on to the next project or task.

Even if you didn’t finish it and have to schedule it into another time box, it has allowed you to move forward one step. I find that entrepreneurs who are overwhelmed with so many things to do often become paralyzed and end up doing nothing but obsessing on what they need done.

Stop complaining, and take action!
Instead, use that obsessive energy to start ‘doing’ things. You’ll often find that when you start to take ACTION on something, anything, that feeling of helplessness lessens.

Of course, you can choose to complete your project in one go, just remember to take a few minutes break here and there. That way you focus on your end goal without overtaxing yourself mentally and physically.

The important thing in entrepreneurial time management is to follow your timer. For some reason, deadlines make it easier to focus. Think of when you know that you have to finish an important proposal in an hour because the submission deadline closes. Somehow you get it done!

Another variation is to work on a task until you achieve a specific output – laying out two pages of your product catalog, finishing the week’s expense report, or contacting 10 potential customers.

Don’t worry too much about finishing projects so you don’t get overwhelmed. Focus instead on giving undivided attention to each and every step.

What’s your favorite time management technique?

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