Entrepreneurial Lessons From My J-O-B
When you mention a full- or part-time job to people in the home business arena, you usually are met with scowls, howls, and sometimes, blood curdling screams. Just the thought of a J-O-B can make most Enterpreneurs go screaming into the night.
But not so fast.
There are lessons to be learned here.
Even with two so dramatically opposing business models, there are lessons that can and should be applied to both the 9-5er and the independent Entrepreneur.
Let’s focus right in on the biggest one…..
SETTING A WORK SCHEDULE
As an independent home business owner, you have a freedom that most never know —-> You can set your own hours. You work when you want to work. There is no boss breathing down your neck with the next deadline. There is no one watching the clock, docking your pay when you are late or leave early. It’s YOU — ONLY YOU.
Some people do quite well with this freedom. Others crash and burn.
Especially if they’re not used to it.
The biggest culprit that brings new business owners down?
PROCRASTINATION. I call it the “I’ll do it later” syndrome.
Many of you know it well. I know I did.
I was an all-star procrastinator, and in my weak moments I still can be.
Any of these sound familiar?
“I’ll write that blog post after the news.”
“Let me run to the mall first, then I’ll start writing that article I’ve been putting off.”
Or my favorite….
“I’ll call my prospect tomorrow, when my head is clearer.”
It’s called PROCRASTINATION folks, and it can torpedo a home based business.
How do you combat it? There are volumes written on the subject, but I’ve found something that works well for me —-
SET A WORK SCHEDULE WITH PROJECT DEADLINES.
Just like my 9-5 JOB used to be. Start work at a certain time. End work at a certain time.
The advantage, of course, is that I can set the hours I want to work.
I determine my work for the day. I set my priorities and my deadlines.
But they are there staring me in the face none-the-less.
And if you’re like me, you will probably me harder on yourself than any boss could be.
To your success!
The Two Biggest Killers of Entrepreneurial Productivity
Distractions can kill your network marketing business. No doubt about it.
Welcome to Day 13 of the 30 Tips in 30 Days Blog Special.
Today’s topic is on DISTRACTIONS. It would be impossible to list all the distractions that can cut into your productivity as a budding entrepreneur, so I am going to limit this blog post to the TWO that I consider to be the most prevalent and most draining on your business.
You see, the people who make the most money in this industry are the ones who, among other things, are LASER FOCUSED on their business activities. They are masters at time management and, most importantly….
They run their business, their business doesn’t run them.
Think about that for a minute, and think about your present situation.
Are you managing your time effectively and getting the most productivity out of your day? This becomes even more important if you are doing your business part-time, where being organized is absolutely essential. When you only have 2-3 hours a night to work on your business, you damn well better make them count.
From my experience in the industry, the two biggest productivity killers are:
Email and Phone Calls
Be honest. How many people are slaves to their emails? How many of you check your email dozens of times per day?
I know I used to.
Not anymore.
Same with the phone. Whenever the phone rang, I would be the first to answer it. With the advent of Caller ID, I might be more selective, but if it was a business-related call I would ALWAYS pick up.
Again, not anymore.
Why?
Because in order to be productive, you need to block out significant blocks of time to work in any one area. That means no disruptions and no distractions. And the primary disruptions in today’s society and email messages and phone calls.
I was listening to a friend of mine and a top earner in the industry, Greg Davison talk about this very subject in a company webinar tonight. Greg had these guidelines about emails and phone calls that I would like to share with you.
- Go through your email messages only ONCE PER DAY, usually at the end of the day.
- Spend only 30 minutes at the most on email each day.
- Answer your email as succintly as possible, preferably in 3-4 sentences, and move on.
- NEVER pick up the phone unless you have scheduled a call back from a prospect or team member.
- Schedule a 30-60 minutes block each night, or every other night to return phone calls.
These are great tips from Greg and I follow them religiously.
They have effectively increased my producivity at least 10 fold.
Here is one more tip from Greg that I would like to share…. when you get your mail out of the mailbox each day, don’t open it. Scan through it, open only extremely emergent letters (which should be extremely rare), and put them on a shelf somewhere.
Open all of your mail once a week. Pay any bills necessary or perform any followup at this time.
Another great time saver.
Thanks, Greg for these great insights. And thanks to my loyal readers for all your great ideas.
If you have any other great time-saving tips, please comment so you can share them with everyone.
To your productivity!
Bob
December 13, 2008; Cresskill, NJLIVE COMMENTS
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