Client Magnets Official Blog

Posts Tagged ‘Synchronicity’

I was talking to a friend recently and she was describing how busy she was, and all the things she had coming up in her week. She was at capacity. As she rattled off the list of things she had to do, I started to get curious. She had important phone calls to make, errands to attend to, and a significant meeting. But all of the things she described to me amounted to about 4-6 hours worth of activity. And she had a whole week to get these things done.

Our conversation helped me realise how in my own life a few hours work can feel like a whole lot more. And how overwhelming this can be. Having reflected on this, I’ve come to the realisation that time is only one of the resources we use as we get things done. We contribute emotional and intellectual energy too.

For example, I experience this when I fly internationally to speak and attend live events. My speaking engagement may only be one hour long. I can fly in from Ireland the night before, and leave the same evening that the event takes place, so it only amounts to one night away from home. Time wise the cost is minimal. Yet emotionally and intellectually the cost is far greater. A short trip can feel like a major upheaval in my week. It’s only one hour of work, yet it can feel like two or three days.

In other words, we might tell ourselves that we are ‘too busy’ to do something, when a more accurate statement might be: ‘I don’t have the intellectual energy for that right now’ or ‘That tasks requires more emotional energy than I have available’. This also means that all the time management in the world won’t matter a jot if the resistance is emotional or intellectual.

Resistance stops the flow of energy. Resistance is the cause of stress. Resistance is like trying to drive with the brakes on. When you stop the flow of energy, you stop action – or you require tremendous amounts of energy to enable action.

You can push the gas pedal harder and harder, but as long as the brake is on it is difficult to move. And if you do move – and even if you make it to your goal – you have put great strain and stress on your engine. This often results in physical and mental breakdown.

Preparing for this newsletter is one of my favourite activities of the week. In this area, I am relatively resistance free (although I’ve also got plenty of areas where I’m not resistance free!) It typically takes me about 20 minutes to complete. (When I first started out it took me about an hour – but I have assistants helping me out now . Even though the newsletter only takes about an hour to prepare, I’ve heard lots of people say that they couldn’t possibly commit to writing a newsletter because they haven’t got time.

I now realise that it’s got nothing to do with time. Maybe they have limiting beliefs about their writing ability, or they doubt their ability to commit their thoughts to paper week after week, or maybe they are nervous about being ‘out there’. Week after week they would have to push the gas pedal harder and crank themselves up to overcome this emotional resistance, just to complete a one hour activity. The one hour activity would probably take 6 hours. 5 hours building themselves up to it, and one to actually write. And that would put strain and stress on their ‘engine’. Sure they might have a newsletter, but at what cost? Me bleating on about the fact that it only takes an hour doesn’t help them at all. We need to uncover the emotional cost and address that.

Have you ever been baffled by a colleague who kept telling you they were ‘too busy’ to complete what looked to you to be a highly simple task? Have you ever been frustrated by a client who was stalling for no apparent reason? Have you ever beaten yourself up for failing to get started on a project, or complete one?

In each of these scenarios, the obstacle was never time – or lack of it. Which is why attempting to coerce, coax or cajole your colleague, your client or yourself into any of these activities just won’t work long term. The next time you hear someone (including yourself) say, ‘I haven’t got time’, try to appreciate that what is really being said is ‘I don’t have the intellectual energy for that right now’ or ‘That tasks requires more emotional energy than I have available’. That awareness will elicit a more compassionate response to yourself or the other person.

Superconductivity is a great metaphor when we come to consider resistance. Superconductivity is a scientific description for when an electrical current travels with the minimal amount of its power lost to energy-robbing resistance.

My personal experience, and that of my clients, has taught me that there are two sides to becoming a Client Magnet. The first part is about recognising, reclaiming and honouring our natural magnetism and having the courage to let it shine. The other side of this is identifying and eliminating those places where we are resisting success, ease, and abundance. In other words, we need to become super-conductors. Free of resistance, it is possible to attract great things with ease and effortlessness.

One way to do this is to increase our capacity for intellectual and emotional stress. Time and energy invested raising these thresholds may yield far greater returns than the energy currently being expended to push past them.

So how do we ‘raise our thresholds’? Well here’s a start. …

Something for you to think about this week:

• You know that stuff that you’re beating yourself up for not starting or not finishing? Trust yourself. Somewhere inside you knew that forcing yourself would put a strain on your engine greater than you could bear. You aren’t lazy or procrastinating, and this is NOT ‘self-sabotage!’

• Identify areas in your life where you are most ‘resistance-free’. What do you love to do? What do you find easy to do?

• What are the main differences between the situations where you experience resistance, and those where you are ‘resistance-free’?

• Explore some of the different technologies which help you release resistance.

Bernadette Doyle is a marketing specialist who helps entrepreneurs become client magnets and attract a steady stream of their ideal clients. She publishes a free, weekly newsletter for trainers, speakers, coaches, consultants, complementary therapists and solo professionals. If you’d like to receive invaluable tips and advice on how to attract clients with ease, register at http://www.clientmagnets.com

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If you’re serious about getting more things done, it’s time for a major mindshift. It’s time to stop being a “doer” and start being a “producer.”  Here are 3 tips to get you started on changing your mindset to accomplish more in your life.

1.  Change Your Mindset and View Yourself Differently
Before you can make a change in how you run your business, you must first see yourself differently. Rather than clinging to the idea that you have to do everything yourself, consider how Oprah Winfrey runs her show. Can you imagine Oprah sitting down and calling prospective guests to book them for future shows?

Of course not! She has producers to line up each show’s content. Those producers, in turn, break down what needs to be completed and assign it to other people. They understand that Oprah brings unique skills to the show and it would be a waste to have her booking talent. Surrounding herself with great teams of producers to get things done is one reason Oprah has become so successful.

2.  Visualize and Plan Your Team
Even before you hire some help, you need to visualize and plan your team.   Think about those big projects you don’t have time to start. Outline how you’d like them to be. Break down those projects into smaller bites and imagine what kind of person could take them over. Imagine how much more smoothly your business would run if you weren’t taking care of every detail.

That’s an important point to reach, you need to visualize and plan what you can delegate.   Let go of the idea you’re the only one who can do every little task. That change shifts you from being the doer to being the producer.

3. Start Delegating
Once you’ve visualized and planned your team, start making it your reality. Get serious about breaking down the work you’re doing now into individual tasks. Let go of the idea that you have to do it all. Choose a task that’s wasting your time, that you don’t enjoy doing and that someone else could do easily. Find a way you can afford to have someone else to do it.

Take another look at projects you’ve been putting off. Determine what’s keeping you from getting started. Decide which pieces someone else should be doing. Visualize the project from start to finish, the way a producer would do. And then find the help you need to get it done. That’s the only way your business, and your income, can expand to the next level.

Being in business for yourself can be overwhelming, especially when you’re stuck in “lone ranger” mode. Allow yourself to visualize what life would be like with a competent team helping to achieve your goals. Learn to look at your business the way a producer would, and you’ll finally experience the satisfaction of getting it all done.

Bernadette Doyle is a small business marketing expert. Get more tips and advice at http://www.clientmagnets.com

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In any typical working day, most people have only two to three really productive hours. So, why not just cut out the other four to five hours and focus on the two to three that are really getting results?

You may be thinking that you need to work all the hours you do to get everything done. It may seem impossible for you to cut your working hours down. But it is possible!

Understand that the way you work comes from years of habit. It comes from having once been an employee, where you might have been able to get the work done quickly, but you still had to be present at the office because the boss would be upset if you went home at 10:30 am.

Well, you’re the boss now, and you can alter your business hours to suit yourself. You will be just as, if not more productive than you are right now, and you will buy back precious time for yourself.  Time is the one thing you cannot create more of, but in this case, you can.  Here are some questions to consider in your quest to buy back more time by being more productive ….

Are you over-servicing your clients?  Start by becoming really aware of the things you’re doing that keep you working harder and longer than necessary. Then take control, rein yourself in, and stop doing them.

If you’ve set what you think is a commanding daily rate for your services, are you subconsciously working more hours to justify that rate? Do you end up essentially doing three days’ work just to rationalize the higher rate that you charge?

Take a closer look here because, you’re still not making the money you think you’re worth. You are over-servicing the client. It’s not just about the rate. It’s about how much time you put into the service you offer.

Are you offering all sorts of extras that involve a lot more follow-up and that you aren’t being paid for? If your clients are perfectly happy and satisfied with what you’ve provided, your work there is done. Your clients aren’t going to turn away your free services, particularly if they were already willing to pay for your expertise. If you think you have more to offer your client, create an upgraded package and sell it to them. Continued access to your services should not be available for free.

Are you striving for perfection?  Do you continually work on a product or presentation that is already fine because you think it could be better? This is your own need for perfectionism coming into play, particularly if you are creating products or programs.

Perfectionism stops you from moving forward. You will be more productive by creating a product that satisfies your client’s needs and getting it into their hands, rather than tweaking it over and over.

Start to take notice of where are you creating extra, unnecessary work for yourself. It’s a habit that you have to break.   Change your habits to maximize those productive hours. Then spend the time you’ve bought back however you choose.

Bernadette Doyle is a small business marketing expert. Get more tips and advice at http://www.clientmagnets.com

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If you’re like many busy business owners, you likely have an outstanding project you’ve been wanting to complete.  But you just can’t find the time to finish it. Your calendar is packed and there’s no way to clear enough white space to complete the task from start to finish. There’s an easier way to complete a big project, and it doesn’t require going away on retreat.  Learn the power of scheduling to help you complete your big projects without feeling overwhelmed.

Focused Time is Powerful.  Learning to focus your attention on one thing is the key, but you must schedule in that focused time. It may seem contradictory to say you must schedule in time when you can’t clear your calendar. But scheduling becomes most powerful when you set aside regular blocks of time devoted to a single task.

Suppose you have a product in mind that will benefit your clients greatly. The problem is that you know it will take two solid weeks to create and package the product. None of us has that kind of time to devote to a single business activity.

Instead, schedule an hour each week to work on a key part of the process. Regularly scheduled time with a consultant to help clarify the project may be a good first step. Never underestimate the power of expert help to move things forward. But no matter what piece of the project you’re completing, dedicating focused, scheduled time to it is easier than clearing your entire schedule.

You may not have two weeks of uninterrupted time, but you do have an hour a week. Over time, those one hour blocks can add up to a completed product. The secret is not to get hung up on never having time for the whole project. Instead of giving up on completing the project, schedule it in blocks of time and get it done.

The power of scheduling doesn’t just apply to big projects. It can be helpful with every other aspect of your business. If your virtual assistant needs monthly input on your newsletter, have her add it to your schedule so it’s ready when she needs it. For tasks only you can do in your business, set up a system and a schedule so you’ll know when it needs to be done and when you’ll do it.

Capture your time in this way rather than scrambling to get it all done. You’ll soon see that it’s so much more effective. Focus completely on the task at hand until it’s time to do something else. Embrace this as a saner way to bring order to your days. No matter what it is you never seem to find the time to do, you can create the time by learning to schedule.

If you’re struggling to find the time to create products, meet with staff or finish large projects, try harnessing the power of scheduling to get it all done. Small blocks of time, regularly scheduled, and the added assistance of an expert when needed, will put you in control of your days and make you more productive than you ever dreamed.

Bernadette Doyle is a small business marketing expert. Get more tips and advice at http://www.clientmagnets.com

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There’s nothing worse than staring blankly at your computer screen, with no idea how to finish a big project. Did you know there’s actually an effective way to prevent that from happening? It’s called “time blocking” and it’s one of the best tools for making sure the time you spend working is productive.

It’s All About Cycles
Tony Schwartz, author of The Power of Full Engagement, talks about people as being “oscillatory beings in an oscillatory universe.” What he means by that is that our energy flows in natural cycles of about ninety to one-hundred-twenty minutes.

Eben Pagan, an enormously successful entrepreneur, carries this concept further in his “Wake Up Productive” products. He teaches his clients the art of time blocking in order to get more done.

What these men have learned is that the secret to getting things done is to capture that cycle of energy. Does that simply mean working as hard as we can for a couple of hours at a stretch? No, there’s actually a more productive way to get things done. Here’s how to harness your energy effectively:

• Use a timer. To help stay focused on the task at hand, set a timer for forty-five minutes. That’s a reasonable block of time to work productively.

• No distractions. During that block of time, turn off the distractions. No television, email, cell phone or chatting with friends. Give what you’re working on your total focus until the timer sounds.

• Take a break. Break up the blocks of time in which you’re focusing with short breaks. After forty-five minutes, get up and walk around for five minutes. Get something to drink. But don’t jump into another task or project, and stay away from those distractions we mentioned!

• Jump back in. After a short break, set the timer for another forty-five minutes. This allows you to capture that optimum ninety minute cycle of productive energy. Work straight through until the timer sounds again, then get up and walk away.

• Rest. After focusing completely on the task at hand for a full oscillatory cycle, it’s time to rest a bit. Take a walk outside, lie down for a nap or eat a snack. A twenty minute break will refresh your mind and body and prepare you for another ninety minute block of productive work.

• Repeat. You’ll have to decide how many hour and a half to two hour time blocks you can manage in a day. Commit yourself to focusing completely on work, with appropriate breaks, for that many blocks of time, then stop working. Really. There’s no point in staring at a computer screen or trying to be creative when you’ve moved beyond your natural energy cycle.

Working Less, Doing More
It may seem contradictory, but you really will accomplish more in two or three ninety minute blocks of totally focused time than you used to accomplish in a full work day. Here’s the paradox: working less time with complete focus nets more productivity than hours of unfocused struggling.

You may be saying to yourself, “But aren’t we supposed to be able to multitask?” It may sound ideal, being able to do a dozen things at once, but the truth is that when you focus on one thing, you do it well, in less time.

And this doesn’t just apply to big projects. Use time blocking to get emails answered, phone calls returned or proposals written. Anything that needs to be done can be done better with your complete focus for short blocks of time.

So, are you ready to work less and accomplish more? Incorporate time blocking into your schedule and see for yourself how much more productive you become.

Bernadette Doyle is a small business marketing expert. Get more tips and advice at http://www.clientmagnets.com

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A lot of people have a favourite meal that they like to cook. Because you’ve made it so many times before, when you’re standing in front of the stove stirring the saucepan your mind switches on to autopilot.

But if someone was to ask you how to actually go about making this meal, it might take a little while for you to put into words exactly how to serve up the dish.

The same probably applies to your business. While you know what it takes to operate your business, explaining this to someone else can take some effort.

Many small business owners make the decision to outsource, which is great, but then don’t know where to go from there. Finding the right people to outsource to can be one of those things that can quickly fall into the ‘important but not urgent’ category. It’s so easy to keep putting it off, especially when you’re on lots of short term, pending deadlines. You tell yourself that next week, next month, next year you’ll get around to doing it. It’s just easier to say, “It’s quicker for me to get on with it myself, because it would take me longer to find someone, train them and explain how my business works.”

And actually, I completely agree. It’s very labour-intensive to find and train someone the first time you do it. You need to set up a system, make sure that someone knows how to operate the system and how to complete a task the way that you want it done. It definitely takes time.

One of the challenges for me in starting to find people and outsource work was that there was so much that I just did automatically. It was frustrating even for me to start to put that into a process, to explain all the steps to another person. In my mind, I knew how to do things but it was a different matter trying to articulate this to someone outside the business.

And each business does things their own way, so no matter how experienced your assistant is, they won’t ever have worked for a business like yours before.

To assist with getting external help, what you should be doing is starting to document your processes from day one. This way, when you hire external help you can easily refer them to this document.

And you’ll be surprised when you do this. The first time I did this, I developed a process map for how I sent out a newsletter broadcast, I got such a shock when I realised how many separate activities there were that led to the successful outcome of sending a newsletter, and it helped me identify how much time I was spending on this activity.

I’d like you to think about the systems that you’ve currently got in place in your business. Chances are you don’t have any systems. But don’t worry, that’s okay. You don’t have to have all your systems in place. That’s part of why you’re asking for help. In fact, you might be looking for someone who can help you set up those systems.

One of my team members spent several months working on an operations manual for my business. This means that if something should happen and she couldn’t work for me tomorrow, I now have a manual that documents all the systems in place in my business. I could find someone else and slot them right in where she was. I can also give this manual to new virtual assistants, and they’ll be able to understand how my business operates without needing me to explain it to them. It wouldn’t take hours of my time to train someone else, and I wouldn’t have to be physically doing the work myself while training them.

It can take time and it can take a lot of effort. But once you put that effort in, the benefits are amazing. Your business will grow in ways that you had never anticipated.

Bernadette Doyle is a small business marketing expert. Get more tips and advice at http://www.clientmagnets.com

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Have you been in the situation where you notice that your computer is a lot slower than it used to be? It takes longer to boot up, takes longer to carry out simple tasks, and takes longer to switch between programs. Something in the background seems to be chewing up all the computer’s capacity to process the information you’re feeding it.

It’s frustrating, because suddenly you can’t rely on your computer as much as you used to. It just doesn’t seem to be working as well.

There’s a simple solution: increase your PC’s random access memory, or RAM.

It’s a quick job, and you’ll be amazed at how much more efficiently your computer will be able to work.

The same step can be applied to you. You can increase what I call your ‘psychic RAM’.

Sometimes when we’re doing too much at work, one of the challenges we’re faced with is psychic RAM. I don’t mean psychic as in a medium or clairvoyant, but your mental space. When you’re doing too many tasks, too many parts of your brain are tied up.

See if this scenario sounds familiar: You need to edit the weekly newsletter. The chances are that throughout the day, before you actually get around to editing the newsletter, it pops into your mind five or six times. When you’re in a sales meeting, on the phone to clients, or working on a new project, your mind jumps to the newsletter. While you should be focusing on other parts of the business, your brain decides to focus on something else.

It’s a type of psychic disturbance that has the power to disrupt your train of thought, putting you off more important work. When you’re overloading yourself with too many tasks, you put amazing amounts of pressure on your mind to keep functioning at its usual top speed. It’s so easy to lose focus when you have too much to focus on.

Doing too many tasks yourself affects your energy. It’s having a direct effect and impact on your business because it’s draining your energy. It’s pulling you away from your unique ability – the things you love to do, the things you do best, the places where you add most value.

But if you start to delegate aspects of your business, and when you know that someone else is taking care of them, you start to free up mental space. This makes more of your brain available for creative thinking, for coming up with new ideas, for solving other problems.

Even if you decide to delegate just some of these tasks, it will free up your psychic RAM and increase your productivity. It’s quite amazing how it just happens. Every time I delegate or outsource an aspect of my work, I’m amazed at the leap in my productivity and new ideas. I suddenly have so much more mental capacity to focus on the core areas of my business.

Increasing your psychic RAM will give you so much more energy, and will allow you to focus more on what you do best.

Isn’t it time that your mind had an upgrade?

Bernadette Doyle is a small business marketing expert. Get more tips and advice at http://www.clientmagnets.com

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Are the edges getting blurred between your work life and home life? If you work from home, it’s really easy for those edges to get blurred. You might, for example, find yourself checking for responses to your tweets when you should be spending time with your family. Or maybe you feel the pull of work because your office is right there at the top of the stairs. Whatever your situation, you must set some “hard edges” between work and personal time if you’re going to work from home successfully. Here are three rules for defining hard edges between work and play.

I. Set Firm Work Days: Working seven days a week is a common mistake of work-at-home entrepreneurs. That’s a real mistake, because no one can maintain that level of intensity long-term.

Decide how many days per week you’re going to work, and stick to it. Here’s why this is important: the work you have to do will fill the time you spend doing it. In other words, if you allow yourself to be sucked into working late nights and weekends, you’ll adjust your workload because you know you’ve got lots of time to do it.

On the other hand, if you say you’re going to work just three days each week, you have to adjust your focus to get things done in less time. If you want to have time for something besides work in your life, create a hard edge between business and personal time by setting firm work days.

II. Reserve Time for Yourself: It may not seem logical that setting aside time for yourself each week actually improves your productivity, but it does help. An important aspect of setting hard edges between work and play is allowing time when no one requires anything from you.

You should especially pay attention if you’re a work-at-home parent. By setting a time when someone else is minding the children and you’re not working in your business, you allow yourself to refocus. It also gives you time to do those things you never seem to get scheduled in your personal life.

Whether you take a whole “You Day” each week, or just a few hours, decide now to set firm time that’s all yours. It will make you a happier and more productive person.

III. Stick to the Schedule! It’s all well and good to say you’re only going to work four days each week and take Wednesdays for yourself, but sticking with that schedule takes resolve. It’s so easy when working from home to read “just one more email” or let a project stretch into family time.

There’s no amount of money that can replace time with your family. Allowing your business to encroach on that time probably won’t even improve the strength of your business.

For your own health, and the health of your business, delineate a hard edge between work and play, and then stick with the schedule you set. You’ll be amazed how much you’re able to get done when you have less time to complete it. And your family will benefit from the time you set aside just for them.

When you work from home, you have the freedom to call the shots, to decide when and how you’re going to work. That is, after all, one of the reasons you own your own business, isn’t it?

Rather than allowing your business to control your life, decide what work schedule suits your situation. Let hard edges, not blurred edges, define how your business and personal lives blend. Doing so is a big step toward being truly successful.

Bernadette Doyle is a small business marketing expert. Get more tips and advice at http://www.clientmagnets.com

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The beginning of a New Year is a traditional time for change and improvement. Most of us attempt to make some sort of change for the better. Quitting smoking, losing weight, making and saving more money are all common examples.

Unfortunately, many people fail in their attempt at change. They don’t realize that before any tangible and visible change can happen, less visible and harder to articulate changes must first take place. Their mindset needs to shift.

If you are seeking to increase your business and your financial success, recognize that the change that you need to make must occur first on the inside.

There is a definite connection between mindset and money. I learned this as I was growing my own business. So, if you feel like you know what you’re supposed to be doing, but you’re not getting results, you may need to discover the connection too.

If you are doing all the right things and still bumping up against a brick wall, there is a good chance that it’s not what you’re doing that is the problem. It could be that there is some pattern of sabotage that’s blocking you from getting the results that you deserve to get.

If you’ve been frustrated, working hard, dreaming about having more, and maybe even feeling guilty about wanting more, sometimes a kind of desperation can take over.

And that can lead you to looking for that one thing, the quick fix. Feeling that sense of urgency, that need to know that one thing, can actually become an obstacle for you. Your own impatience can be a pattern that blocks you from getting to the answer as quickly as you would like to.

So, even if you’ve read The Secret, taken courses, and done the affirmations, the results that you desire may still elude you. Why? Because sometimes the workshops, trainings and books aren’t always helpful at bringing about the change on the outside.

Sometimes all you really get from them, if you’re not careful, is just a better way of articulating your dysfunction.

They just give you more labels for describing your limitation.

“Let’s explore your abundance or your scarcity mindset” or whatever,

Having an intellectual conversation about your beliefs isn’t going to effect the change that you want. You already recognize that if you’re doing all the right things and still not getting the results that you want, something going on inside of you needs to change.

And to be honest, if you’re not getting the results you want, how do you really know you’re doing all the right things? Maybe that’s part of the problem. If you feel “I know that. I know that,” but you’re not producing results, you really only know something on an intellectual level.

It is only when you have that knowledge on the deep down, gut level that you can translate it into results in your life.

If you’re not there yet, try to have a bit more open-mindedness. Maybe there’s something left to learn.

Looking back from where I am today, it’s easy, with hindsight, to see different points of the journey.

I recognize that what stopped me from getting here sooner was arrogance – a feeling that I’m intelligent and I’ve read the books and I’ve got this figured out. I didn’t have it figured out. And it wasn’t until I admitted that to myself and the people around me that things started to change for me.

You need to focus on what that change needs to be for you. Focus on what’s going to make the difference for you.

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Bernadette has launched her new programme Stepping UP, and 2010 promises to be an exciting and profitable year! You can hear all about it on her teleseminar http://is.gd/6iiNS

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So you’ve made the decision to start outsourcing. Congratulations!

You’ll soon notice the positive impact this will have on your business, and you’ll wonder how you ever managed without it. Outsourcing is so important, because if you want to grow a profitable online business, you’ll need more than one person!

It’s time to build up a network of people around you that you can outsource routine tasks to.

But where do you start outsourcing? For some people, deciding which aspects of their business they could or should outsource is really simple. To them, it just makes sense which routine activities to outsource.

But for other people, there doesn’t seem to be an obvious answer to the question of where to start outsourcing. No part of the business stands out as being more easily outsourced than any other.

Something that will help you to identify what to outsource is to keep a log of your day. Try to keep a track of all your work activities on a daily basis, ideally for a week. It may seem very labour-intensive to start with, but this will help you to save time in the long run.

Once you’ve done this, sit back and look at this time log. Start to identify any activities that you would like to hand over, things that could be done by someone else. Highlight any tasks that, in an ideal world, you would handover.

Say, for example, you really dislike doing the accounts, or you wish you could get someone else to do your monthly newsletter mail out. Highlight every time during that week you spent on accounts or on organising the month’s newsletter. You’ll probably be amazed at how much time you’ve spent on tasks that aren’t part of your core business.  Tasks that you could hand over to someone else to deal with.

This is where you should be starting to outsource. The routine jobs that immediately jump off the page at you are where you should concentrate, as these are the tasks that you have readily identified as not being part of your core business.

When you start doing this, maybe you’ll only highlight a few tasks on your log. While you might want to hand over other things on your list, at the moment it might seem like too much of an impossible dream.

But I promise, once you start this process you’ll be hooked. And the longer you do it and the more things you’ll start to observe, you’ll begin noticing all that you’re doing that you could be delegating.

The great thing about doing this is that once you’ve got your list of tasks and activities that you would like to handover, you can start to group them together. Ask yourself if there are skill sets that go together, and if you can outsource a group of tasks to one person or team.

For example, your list might contain several activities relating to editing and publishing, or website maintenance, or data entry. These groupings might not occur to you if you just thought about a regular business day. But actually going through each minute of your day clarifies exactly what you do to keep your business going.

I still find myself monitoring my daily routine, because it’s so easy to fall into the trap of doing things that I could be delegating. Whenever I sit down to look at exactly where I’m spending my time, I immediately experience a boost to my efficiency and productivity.

So, your challenge is to keep a log of your activities next week. For those who aren’t outsourcing, you’ll be amazed at how much of your day you will be able to delegate to someone else. And while you may already be outsourcing, think of it as a ‘tune up’ for your business.

Get ready to feel that boost of productivity!

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