It can be difficult for small business owners to manage different daily tasks on their own. They may also notice that each day, they are welcomed with a pile of unattended tasks to accomplish, which could be a result of poor time management.
Furthermore, as a business owner, you may be involved in everything about your business. However, by doing so, you are being inefficient, which will someday take a toll on your business.
This article will present you with 10 time management tips. Moreover, it will highlight the golden rules of time management and the benefits you get from effectively managing your time.
What is time management?
Time management is appropriately allocating time to achieve a set goal without being distracted by irrelevant activities. Simply put, it is knowing what to do concerning your tasks and when to do them.
Moreover, it involves organizing your tasks, prioritizing them, and eliminating anything that could sway you from what you intend to do at the set time.
Time Management Rules Every Small Business Owner Should Know
There are rules to time management, and knowing what they are will help you apply the tips accordingly.
These five rules are often called “golden” because of their impact on your business when you know them. Here are the “golden” rules:
Rule 1: Equate time to money
Understand that the time you spend producing results in your work has a monetary equivalent. Additionally, it’s a common cliché when we often say, “Time is money;” however, that’s a fact.
Moreover, you will want to manage it well when you realize that every second of your time spent may be worth a cent, a kobo gained or lost.
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Rule 2: Be ready to change
It will be difficult to change an outcome when you are unwilling to change the process. Hence, you must be up-and-doing if you want to use your time effectively.
You should also be ready to make the necessary changes in how and where you spend your time. Moreover, you must ensure it’s spent doing the right things to help your business succeed.
Rule 3: Consider the consequences
Sir Isaac Newton’s statement from the third law of motion states,
For every action, there’s an equal but opposite reaction.
In interpretation, it means any action you take, positive or negative, has consequences.
Additionally, it shows that you cannot give your time to distractions, procrastination, and irrelevant activities and not reap the consequences.
Therefore, before you take an action, consider the consequences and let that help you make the necessary decisions to help you.
Rule 4: Attend to very pressing issues first
It is important to note that not every issue you face requires equal attention, as some may be urgent, and others may not.
Hence, you need to know which task needs your attention and when it needs it. When you attend to the most pressing issues first, you’ll save time that could go to waste if you did not.
Rule 5: Apply the T.A.R. principle
This principle is about knowing how to handle tasks. It’s called the Trash, Action, and Reference principle because it helps you focus on what needs it and trash what doesn’t.
If you are clogged up with work, consider this: are there things that have no use, such as irrelevant emails? If yes, then trash it!
Additionally, if, in your work, there are things you must attend to, then draw out a plan on how to attend to them and how to take action.
Lastly, if the work doesn’t require action, it’s referenced and kept in a file cabinet where you can take action anytime. Hence, by subjecting your work to this principle, you’ll effectively manage your time.
Tips to Effective Time Management as a Small Business Owner
As a small business owner, it becomes a challenge for you to do everything in your business all by yourself while still wanting to be effective over time.
If you consider time important, then you need to know the strategies that are available to you. Let’s consider the top 10 tips for time management:
1. Clearly define your tasks and goals
In effectively managing your time, you need to provide answers to questions such as, “What are the tasks that I must complete? What are my goals that I hope to achieve at the end?”
Moreover, clearly defining your tasks and goals will prevent confusion about what you want to do, which inherently could waste your time.
Hence, it’s all about having the answers to these questions that help you manage your time.
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2. Organize and Prioritize your tasks
If you want to manage your time well, you must learn how to organize your tasks and place priority on them. When I say organize, I mean categorize your tasks and place them into groups.
Those similar could be in one category, making it easy for you to work on them faster. Once you’ve done this, you can begin attending to the urgent tasks.
Moreover, placing priorities like this on your tasks will help you manage your tasks and time effectively.
3. Know how you’re spending your time
Another time management tip for a successful business is knowing how and where you spend your time. It’s a point where you analyze your time-spending habit—how you spend it.
Moreover, this helps you address the activities that waste your time and makes you intentional about how you’ll spend your time.
4. Have a Schedule and Follow it through
One time management tip that works well is having a schedule for your work, which helps you organize your daily tasks within an allotted time.
However, even if you have a schedule and do not follow it, you’ll procrastinate—and you know what? You have to add it to your next day’s work.
Things like this steal time and lead to ineffective use of your time. Hence, to avoid this, have a schedule and follow it through!
5. Avoid Multitasking
At this point, we’ve all learned that multitasking is a myth. As many promote, multitasking is not as true as being able to do many things simultaneously and still be effective in all of them.
Although you may want to multitask as a small business owner, know that you cannot be effective in all you do. Moreover, you will have to face the consequences in the long run.
Therefore, to manage your time effectively, focus on one thing at a time rather than doing too many things that will waste your time.
6. Delegate when you have to
The mindset many small business owners have is that they can and must do everything about their business.
Really? You know you shouldn’t do everything for your business all by yourself. This is why you must learn and master the art of delegation.
Additionally, you need to delegate the tasks that should be delegated to your employees so you can free up time for yourself to do other things.
The fact is that business owners who delegate tasks to the right employees have better time for themselves, allowing them to manage their time effectively.
7. Identify Distractions
Distractions are bound to occur in your line of work; however, they can deter work efficiency.
Hence, you must be able to identify those obvious and unseemly distractions from your time and remove them. When you can remove them successfully, you can use your time more appropriately.
8. Know when to take a break
Many small business owners are known to be workaholics, as they almost want to work the whole 24 hours of the day. Although they might have valid reasons for doing so, and that’s fine, they must know when to take a break.
In addition, you need to know when to take a break from work so you can breathe and refresh yourself.
Furthermore, allocate enough time that you can use to have sufficient rest that can prepare you for effective work again. This helps you save time you may spend on work by being unfocused and unproductive.
9. Automate the Process
Using apps and computer-based software to automate the different processes you carry out in your business will save you time.
From accounting and finances to scheduling, automation will eliminate some time-wasting errors in your business. Hence, automate your work processes if you want to manage your time effectively.
10. Balance your Time
Another challenge small business owners face is their inability to balance their time, which results from several factors.
When you are trying to multitask or don’t know how to delegate, you’ll have a balance challenge because you’ve shifted focus.
Moreover, you need to combine other tips to help you balance your time. When you balance the time spent on different tasks, you will effectively manage your time.
Benefits of Managing Your Time as a Small Business Owner
It’s quite glaring that you have much to gain from managing your time effectively. Let’s take a look at the top 4 benefits of time management:
1. Better Productivity
One of the benefits of managing your time effectively is that you and your employees become more productive.
Your productivity results from eliminating distractions, procrastination, and anything else that’ll deter your time. The time you save is then put into your productivity, resulting in better productivity.
2. Stress Levels Decrease
Stress occurs when you or your employees avoid rest, which could result from the immense workload that you have to complete.
When you can identify and eliminate those activities that give you stress, you’ll have more time to rest, reducing your stress levels.
3. The Quality of Products or Services Improves
When you have great control over time usage in your business, the quality of your products and services will improve.
You can now focus on delivering high-quality products or services by eliminating all time-wasting activities.
4. Better work-life balance
One thing that deters a work-life balance is when business owners and employees have so much work to do that they take work home.
This prevents them from having quality time outside the work environment so they can live their lives effectively. But with effective time management, you can have a better work-life balance that you’ll be proud of.
Conclusion
In drawing to a close, the tip above are substantial and can produce the results you intend for your business. All you need to do is be intentional about them, always allowing the golden rules to guide you in these tips.
When you do so, you’ll have the benefits of time management as a reward for effectively managing your time.
