It’s easy to become overwhelmed with all of the challenges you face as an entrepreneur: in between growing your business, managing your employees, managing client relationships and the more mundane administrative aspects of a business, sometimes you can lose focus. A loss of focus can and will cause a marked drop in productivity, so it is important that you understand exactly what your brain is capable of handling at any given time and schedule your work time around that.
So what can you, as a hard-working business owner, do to minimize the “noise” of your day-to-day work environment? There are a lot of tried and true methods that people across the world use, and implementing some of them can drastically improve your focus. Here are some of my favorites:
Number one: always think of the big picture and create a daily to-do list with that in mind. It is easy to forget about the big picture, the goals that can and will define success in your business. Creating a daily or weekly list should consist of everything you need to get done on a given day but also balanced against the larger issues that must be constantly in your mind. Only then can you keep your priorities straight. Try to keep the list near your work space, but not on your phone nor your personal computer as these devices can tempt you into checking other tabs or windows that will distract you from the work at hand. A whiteboard, sticky notes, or even a piece of loose-leaf will do just fine. Prioritize all of the things you want to accomplish, taking into account the following tips: 1) you are at your most productive during the first hour of work, 2) don’t overlook small, seemingly unimportant tasks, for they may come back to bite you at the end of the day, 3) make sure you tackle all of the things that you don’t enjoy doing so that they’re not waiting for you later and (perhaps most importantly), 4) the big picture goals must always be foremost in your mind.
Step number two: use this to-do list to schedule your work day. Get the work day going by doing your creative work first, as this requires the most concentration, then move on to easier tasks later on. Remember, the earlier you start, the better off your performance will be. Starting early will allow you to get a sizable chunk of tasks completed before the daily phone calls and emails start rolling in and forcing you to pause. It’s easy for your alertness to drop when you’re working constantly, so make sure that you’re taking the occasional break every hour or hour and a half. Use these breaks to unwind, grab a snack or a cup of coffee, or listen to a couple of your favorite songs. Make sure that you’re actually coming back to work from these breaks; it’s easy to get lost talking to a coworker, catching up with friends, or surfing the Internet.
Last but not least, train yourself to be distraction-free. Your mind can be trained just like any muscle via repetition. Practice by turning off all distractions and committing your full attention to the task at hand. If you start by just doing this five minutes a day and gradually working up to larger chunks of time, soon it will be come to be a habit and you won’t even have to think about it anymore. Take some time to turn off the outside world by turning off your phone and email and finding a quiet place to work. Recognize that not every call coming in is an emergency and not every email needs an immediate response, so it’s perfectly acceptable to go “invisible” for an hour or two every day. Stay off of social networking sites like Facebook or Twitter and discipline yourself to only log in when you have to (or when you have a couple of free minutes).
If you can incorporate these three tips into your everyday work environment, you should start seeing an increase in your focus and productivity. You will also see a huge increase in your personal confidence about your approach and your ability to multi-task. All it takes is a little bit of motivation and effort on your part, and the rewards will soon become apparent.
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