Running a small business at the same time as looking after a family can place huge demands on your time. Add in a couple of hours a week (if you’re lucky!) for yourself and there really isn’t a great deal of time to deal with anything unexpected or urgent. If something like that occurs, something is going to get bumped and you’re going to be in trouble in one or more areas of your life. Productivity, therefore, is always on an entrepreneur’s mind.

But are you thinking about productivity in the right way? Is productivity just a to-do list of activities to get done before 9 o’clock? Or is it something much deeper? On this solo episode of Excellence Expected, I’m going to take you through what I believe productivity to be and how I strive to be more productive every day in my own life.

Actually, I don’t really like using the word ‘productivity’ as I feel that it gives people the idea that productivity is an end point, a destination. If you want to be able to run 10 miles, you have a defined goal in mind and once it’s been achieved you can move on to your next target. Job done! Productivity isn’t like that though. As you, your business and your life change, what it means to be productive will change too. Even if you’re doing the same things every day, there will always be ways in which you can improve your impact. There will always be new ways you can experiment with your working processes and time management. In my mind, productivity is a continuous process of development and, for me, ‘productivity optimization’ is a better way to think of it. It’s a deeper mind-set that you adopt not a series of quick and easy hacks!

Seeing productivity as a process of optimization allows you to constantly break new ground in how you use your time effectively. It allows you to experiment, test out new ideas of how best to use your time, and win back some precious time for yourself.

Giving yourself the time and space to test out new ways of doing things can be difficult, especially if you are working with other people who are frequently looking to you for guidance or support. On the journey of productivity optimization, you need to be a little ruthless with your time. Perhaps people come to you for help because they know that you will drop everything to help them out. Of course, we all want to help people, but you need to ask if their request can wait half an hour, an hour, or until this afternoon? More often than not, it can wait and by putting people off temporarily you will have created a buffer around yourself that will allow you to focus on your most important and urgent tasks. There are going to be times when you need to drop everything, but the vast majority of requests can be handled a little later.

Productivity is a journey, not a destination and productivity optimization requires testing, tweaks and refinements every day to get the most from your time.

Issue Challenged in this Small Business Podcast:

How can I manage to stay productive when there are so many demands on my time?

Actionable Tips:

* Treat productivity as a journey, not a destination. People often treat productivity as something akin to a fitness goal, something that has defined parameters. Productivity is not a promised land that we reach, it is a process that continues every day. We should all be striving for continually productivity optimization. Measure and test new tweaks to find out what works and what doesn’t. Each day can be a step towards further optimization.
* Don’t treat your different projects and work outlets as siloes. Put all of your work from your different projects into one pot and prioritize each of the tasks that you need to do based on their urgency and importance. By keeping everything together and not trying to split your time into different segments. This can not only make you more effective,