Do you ever feel like there just aren’t enough hours in a day to accomplish everything? For many people, planning is the key to breaking through that barrier and making the most of their time. If you’re struggling to optimize your schedule, you may be wrestling with one of these three common challenges.
1. Not Knowing What You’re Doing Next
If you don’t know what you’re doing next, there’s no way you’ll stay on track—in fact, there’s not even a track to begin with! Don’t waste time by not knowing what you’re doing next. Schedule daily, weekly, and monthly tasks and goals as precisely as possible. For example, instead of writing “cold calling,” be specific and list the people you want to contact.
2. Diverting Your Focus Across Too Many Activities
The ability to multitask well can have its advantages, but diverting your focus across too many activities can severely impact your ability to finish tasks and do those tasks well. When you sit down to work on something, try to focus only on that task until you’re finished. If you often find yourself multitasking, you may need to be more specific with how you schedule your time.
3. Becoming Fatigued and Burned Out
Without a carefully planned schedule, you may stay busy each day but not necessarily be productive. Chasing deadlines, juggling multiple tasks, and playing catch up will lead to fatigue and burnout. This is a problem that only gets worse the longer it lasts. Instead of leaving work at work, you’ll take it home. Stress will seep into all your activities, and you’ll have a harder time doing all the things you’ve said you were going to do.
Reclaim Your Time by Investing in the Right Activities
You should spend at least 70 percent of your time on activities that fall into one of these three categories:
- Anything that drives revenue (things we can control)
- Anything that creates or maintains a current relationship
- Anything that saves you drastic amounts of time
Developing a good schedule is essential to maximizing your time, so make sure you’re committing a specific part of your week to that task. Start by setting aside an hour from your calendar to start planning. You’ll need less time as you become familiar with your routine and what you need to accomplish. This process will ultimately leave you with more time to build yourself and get better at what you do.
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