How Are You Spending Your Time?

Have you ever gotten to the end of a busy day and said to yourself, "what did I actually get done today?"  You feel like you've been running for hours but you have not accomplished the tasks that you really needed or wanted to have done.  We've all been there.

According to the 2011 Intuit Small Business Survey, average small business owners are spending their time in this way:

• 14 hours per week conducting business services (i.e. travel arrangements, document preparation, etc.)
• 6 hours per week on sales
• 5 hours per week on communications
• 3 hours per week on financial management
• 3 hours per week on web marketing
• 2 hours per week getting paid
• 2 hours per week on contact management
• 2 hours per week on employee management
• 2 hours per week on other marketing activities

All of this time is money.  One in four business owners believes that having just one extra hour per day would be worth more than $500.  But with all these different roles and duties, how do you squeeze that extra hour out of your busy schedule.  A simple way to figure out where your time goes and how to fix it is to complete a time management tracking exercise.  Administrative Business Consulting offers this form for download on our website (www.adminbizconsulting.com).

First come up with five to ten activities that you do during your day.  Split the day in to half-hour intervals and keep track of how many of those intervals you use for each activity.  You will need to dedicate yourself to tracking your time usage for a couple of weeks.  This will give you a more accurate picture of how you are spending your time.  Now look for patterns that show what you are avoiding and what activities are taking away from you accomplishing your goals.

Now you are ready to start determining how to get that extra hour per day you need.  Using a task list each day can keep you focused on what the priorities for the day are.  Outlook has an excellent task function that will even allow you to assign those tasks to others.  Another way to gain time is to delegate or outsource those activities that you do not like to do or are not good at.  Administrative Business Consulting has monthly retainer contracts for administrative services and social media maintenance.

Use these simple techniques to gain insight on where that time goes each day and how to get it back.  There is time to get back in to your business and what made it fun in the first place.