How to Reclaim Your Time and Start Focusing on Your Business's Big Picture

Everyone has time, yet it's 1 of the world's scarcest resources. Money comes and goes arsenic accelerated arsenic the blink of an eye, but clip is the principle of life. You tin activity much gross aliases get different deal; however, the number of hours successful a time remains constant. Quite a number of business group extremity up wasting their precious time connected activities that do not adhd worth to their business alternatively of building a billion-dollar company.

I knowledgeable this firsthand. When starting my business, I agreed to respond to emails, execute administrative activity and measure non-beneficial options that did not lend to development. The realization of clip arsenic a captious assets led maine to attraction connected establishing systems and procedures that would thief maine reclaim my clip and build a successful business.

Related: Managing Every Single Task connected Your Own Is a Trap for Business Owners — Here's How I Moved From Doing It All to Doing What Matters

1. Reclaiming your clip starts pinch building the correct team

The astir precious plus you person is time, and you tin ne'er get this backmost erstwhile it is lost. If you are investing it successful areas that are not halfway to the business, successful things that do not require the unsocial accomplishment group of the owner, entrepreneur aliases CEO, past you are dissipating the very point that needs to beryllium focused connected to create leverage. This is wherever the correct team comes into play.

The cardinal here, of course, is to place individuals who tin not only usability arsenic beardown counterparts to your ain accomplishment group but are besides consenting and tin of taking afloat work for definite aspects of your business. You do not person to power each variable. Once you person a squad that is afloat successful sync, past the attraction is not truthful overmuch connected being in the business but connected moving on the business.

For example, if you are spending astir of your clip attending to customers' complaints, past you should fto personification pinch bully connection skills be to customers. Have personification other relieve you of the bookkeeping, societal media and regular tasks. When you person the correct group connected board, you are nary longer the "bottleneck" successful the business. You are the skipper of the ship, not the repairman who is engaged mending the holes successful the ship.

Actionable insight: List down 3 activities that devour your clip but are not productive successful achieving your company's objectives. Either delegate those to a much tin squad personnel aliases outsource to personification who tin negociate those. Get those hours backmost and dedicate them to strategy, imagination aliases moreover slumber because a tired mind is simply a anemic mind.

2. Systems and processes are the backbone of scaling

While the squad is simply a beardown foundation, this is wherever processes and systems travel in, truthful that the squad tin activity efficiently. A business without processes is an aimless vessel that is sailing successful the oversea without a compass and will ne'er get to the shore. Consider this: If you are stuck answering the aforesaid questions, fixing the aforesaid problems aliases dousing fires, your business lacks the processes to usability without you. The much you standardize, the much you tin turn without complicating your life and the life of your business.

Automation tin beryllium of awesome thief successful this case. Chores that rob your clip whitethorn beryllium repetitive and whitethorn easy beryllium handled by technology. Regardless of whether it is simply a customer onboarding process, managing leads aliases addressing customers' inquiries, having specified systems saves you much clip for much important tasks.

Actionable insight: First of all, representation retired each of the processes wrong your business and constitute them down. Where could you use automation, aliases wherever could you trim the number of repetitions? Some examples of these are task guidance applications, autoresponders for emails and customer narration guidance (CRM) programs.

Related: How to Use Automation (and Avoid the Pitfalls) arsenic an Entrepreneur

3. The $10 task versus the billion-dollar vision

Unfortunately, the worst point that tin hap to an entrepreneur is getting mislaid successful the details. You decide, "I tin do this faster myself," and though that mightiness beryllium the lawsuit successful the short term, it is simply a detrimental cognition to have. Sitting successful beforehand of the machine for an hr correcting a website glitch, typing successful information aliases arranging files seems productive, but it does not lend to the business's billion-dollar goal.

What is the costs of performing these tasks yourself? It's not only the clip facet but alternatively the worth of the clip mislaid successful different worthwhile processes. Each hr that you walk connected $10 tasks is an hr you are not planning, haggling complete a woody aliases exploring caller markets.

To efficaciously double, triple, quadruple aliases moreover much your impact, you person to ore connected the activities that bring the astir important returns. This is wherever clip and money meet. But by doing so, you free up your clip for the large picture, and that is wherever the exponential effect takes place.

Actionable insight: You should determine connected what tasks are due for you arsenic the leader of the business and what tasks should beryllium reserved for others. If it is simply a $10 job, past it should beryllium delegated. If it is simply a $10,000 type of task — say, building caller strategical partnerships aliases diversifying your merchandise statement — past that's wherever your attraction has to be.

4. Implement the norm of 10-80-10

One thought I person travel crossed and which has been of awesome thief is the 10-80-10 rule. Here's really it works: As a business owner, you request to do only 10% of a project, namely, defining the direction, imagination and objectives. Then, walk connected the remaining 80% of the activity to your squad — the implementation stage. Last but not least, you spell successful for the last 10% to edit and make comments. Following this norm intends you are portion of the decision-making process and controlling the imaginative imagination but not micromanaging the process. It intends that your squad does astir of the activity while you are the 1 to make awesome decisions.

Actionable insight: Use the 10-80-10 norm for the adjacent task you are moving on. It is wise to group the goals and fto your squad get to the specifications of really it will beryllium achieved, past critique.

Related: The Best Way for Your Business to Thrive Is for It to Not Need You

5. Systems create freedom, not restrictions

A batch of business owners debar processes and systems because they deliberation it stifles creativity. But the reality is that having systems successful place leads to freedom. When your business does not require you to power each facet of it, you get the opportunity to innovate, walk clip pinch your squad and strategize for the adjacent large measurement forward.

Actionable insight: Create structures pinch the objectives of liberty successful mind. Automate the repetitive. Document the essential. Delegate the rest. This way, you will get the hours and moreover days backmost to activity connected what is important, which is the early of your business.

You tin ever gain much money, but you cannot summation clip backmost erstwhile it has gone. The key, then, is the correct people, bully processes and the attraction connected the activity that really matters. Steal backmost your hours from the discarded work, and put them into building your dream. You person clip — usage it properly.