Do you wonder where your day went?

Time Management for the Home Business Owner

If you have your own home business, you know the value of being able to manage time effectively on a daily basis. In order for your new business to succeed, it must be treated like any other full-time job. In fact, if you also happen to be blessed with a family and a home to care for, they are probably the major incentive you had to even start your home business – and the subject of all of your hopes and dreams each day.

Let’s analyze our time. We all think of it in different terms: long, short, boring, stressful, valuable, the best time in my life, horrible, the good old times. This is because time is a very personal thing. And because it is so personal, the only person who can really control how it is spent, or saved, is the individual. Although it may seem to be something you do not have a lot of say in, ultimately you can choose to either waste it, or make the best use of it.

So does time really have a variable speed? When you have tons of things you would like to accomplish in a certain period of time, does it really tend to move faster? And when you seem to be waiting endlessly for news or something you have been anticipating, does time then slow down? Being the boss of your own time is not something you are going to achieve overnight – it is an ongoing process.

My personal experience is that there is a direct correlation between the amount of available time and how badly you really need to "get things done." Because of this, a true overachiever will never feel a real sense of satisfaction, or “time well spent” unless at the same time they experience the symptoms of total exhaustion!

Will power is another important ingredient to maintain focus on the tasks at hand. Why? Because distractions are everywhere: the telephone rings, the neighbor comes for a cup of coffee, the children come home from school, laundry needs to be done, dinner needs to be started, you trip across an interesting website on the internet – well you get the idea.

Here are a few tips how to get started controlling your time:

First of all, analyze your present situation. How are things going in your life and business right now? Make a list of everything that works fine and another one of items or habits that should be improved.

Next, visualize the best of all time schedule you can come up with. When doing this, do ńot worry how to accomplish it. Just picture it in your mind and feel it as if it has already happened and is a reality. Compare the two – if you dońt like what you feel, it is time to change the picture.

If you go deep into the feeling part, it will provide you with the right motivation to change your present unsatisfying situation. You can always go back into that visualization of your ideal to get the support and power for your actions.

Now you must prioritize. Make a list of your daily tasks and evaluate their importance. Maybe also make a list of daily, weekly and monthly tasks. This will only help to lessen your burden for a short while, because tasks without priorities are always going to reside in the back of your mind. When you have sorted out a few and written them down, give them a number according to their importance. You will soon notice that the number of tasks that are really urgent is a relatively small number. You may also see that quite a bit of your day is probably spent on things that could wait.

So at this point you have separated the urgent from the less important. Your next assignment is to figure out at which working speed you are most comfortable. As an example, for me it is totally unacceptable to do things in a hurry. I live by the rule that a job worth doing is worth doing right – the first time. In an office setting, it is said that you should handle each piece of paper in your inbox once to avoid inefficiency.

I want to be satisfied with my work, so I tackle each task completely before moving on to the next. Once you are comfortable with certain elements of your job, then you can estimate how long a certain task will take you to get it done. In my line of work we can use writing an article like this for guidance. Since I have written quite a few articles, unless I have to do extensive research during the process, I have a pretty good idea of how long to allot for an article to be proofed, edited and ready for distribution. So before I even sit down to begin writing, I ensure that I have at least that much time, barring unforeseen circumstances, to complete it without interruptions.

And finally, it is your business and yours alone, so you must be decisive. Decision making is one of the most important tasks in a home business. Sure, you can go to forums or other business owners and ask for input, but “the buck stops here.” This means that the both the consequences and the rewards of each decision are yours, so my suggestion is that you try to be so aware of each important decision that you write them down in your business diary or daybook. This will keep you on track and give you the means to look back, follow your personal development and the progress of your venture, and also be able to justify any recommendations you may give when mentoring other new business owners. Please do not decide in advance that you will never offer guidance to others – we all have a moral and ethical obligation to give back or “pay it forward,” as our way of showing gratitude for our successes.

We are given only 24 hours in each day, and it depends totally on the set of values we carry in our hearts and minds how we experience time, indeed how we spend our lifetime. Sometimes we tend to get lost in greed or certain material goals which do not guarantee a life of happiness and fulfillment. Maybe once in a while it would be a good idea to evaluate what value we place on our lifetime. It is totally up to us to change anything that does not satisfy us.

I must give credit where credit is due -- a special thank you to Success University for providing a sound foundation for the successes I've enjoyed with my own home business.

Your comments are welcome and encouraged.....

Melissa