By Lisa Kanarek
With only 24 hours in each day, 168 hours in each week, it's important to make each minute count. Determine which (or if all) of the following activities are wasting your time and keeping you from being productive.
The wrong software. With an increasing number of computer programs available for accounting, project management, contact management and more, you can afford to be picky. Before you invest in a computer program, talk with others to find out the program's ease of use, usefulness and backup support reliability (whether timely technical support is available). One program may be ideal for one person and worthless or too confusing to another. Also, a program may offer more features than you need, costing you time and money when a simplified version of the same program will do.
Interruptions. Close your office door and let your voice mail take messages while you work on important tasks. Start by ignoring your phone for thirty minutes, then work up to an hour and longer.
Postponed decisions. When you're faced with several solutions to a problem, it may be difficult to decide which direction to take. Rather than wasting time contemplating each choice, to the point that you continually miss deadlines, make a decision and develop a backup plan in case your first choice fails. An indecisive person appears unstable, unreliable and unprofessional. Avoid all three by making a conscious decision to decide.
Long-winded callers. When you call someone who is notorious for keeping you on the phone too long, state up front that you have only a few minutes to talk. Then ask the caller for the information you need or respond to their request, then finish the call. If the caller starts to ramble, remind him that you need to go and if necessary, will call him back later.
Searching for lost items. If you waste one hour a day, five days a week, at the end of the year (with two weeks off for vacation), you'll have wasted more than 32 eight-hour days. If you take time to set up files, organize reference materials and store extra supplies, when information or products reach your office, you'll know where they belong.
You can't add hours to your day, but you can increase the number of tasks you accomplish each day by recognizing the time-wasters in your life and more importantly, reducing or eliminating them.
Home office expert Lisa Kanarek is the founder of HomeOfficeLife.com and the author of Organizing Your Home Office For Success (Blakely Press) and 101 Home Office Success Secrets (Career Press). |
