11 Tips For Running
A Productive Business
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As a full-time work-at-home mom with two children under 18 and a husband, I’m often asked, “How in the world do you get it all done? Do you have a magic formula? A secret you can share?”

My answer varies based upon who asks the question, but it all boils down to this: I don’t always get it all done. Sometimes, I have to say, “No” or “Not right now”. Sometimes, I have to make the kids help out more and ask my husband to do more on his days off. Sometimes, I have to give up a fun hobby to make sure my customers and clients are happy. And I no longer give my home the “white glove” treatment—there’s just no way to run a profitable home business if I spend half my day cleaning!

While everyone is different, here are 11 tips that work for me:

1. Clean House
   The first step in getting things done, for me, is to get my house in order. Sometimes, I feel overwhelmed when my house is a mess or disorganized and that takes my concentration away from my work. It bogs me down. So when I begin feeling squeezed for time, I make a point to gather the kids and husband and have a SPRING CLEAN DAY. I give each person a task; then we blare the radio, open up all the windows, and set a time for when the tasks must be complete. Two hours later, my home feels clean, I feel de-stressed, and the clean house helps refresh my brain cells.
   
   
2. Keep A To Do List
   I have four “to do lists” going at all times. Three of them are in Word® documents on my computer. There’s one for projects I want to get done this week, one for projects I want to get done in a month’s time, and one for projects I want to get done in the distant future. Then there’s my “daily to do list”. It’s usually a small Post-it® note stuck to the current day on my desk calendar.
   
   I organize my “to do lists” this way because if I had one long list, I’d never get a thing done—I’d be too overwhelmed, which would stop me dead in my tracks. By having my larger “to do lists” on my computer I can alter them when needed and don’t have them visually reminding me of everything I’ve yet to accomplish. My Post-it® notes are rewritten every night before going to bed—undone tasks are moved to the new Post-it® and new tasks that pop up during the week are added.
   
   
3. Set Your Priorities
   Your priorities are a result of your business goals, your client (or customer) needs, the needs of your family, and your own personal needs. Each day, you must decide what’s most important and organize your “to do list” to meet those priorities. The best way to do this is to take everything you have to get done in a day, a week, a month, or a year and list them according to time restraints. In other words,
   
   
   • What must get done today?
   • What must be done within the hour?
   • What must be done by the afternoon?
   • What must be done before I go to bed?
   • What can wait until tomorrow?
   • What must get done this week?
   • What must get done in a month from now?
   
   So if you need to make an appointment at 2 p.m. and it takes an hour to get there, your presentation must be ready by noon. Or if your child has a school concert at 4 p.m. and your new client wants his project on his desk by 4 p.m. that same day, you’ll need to complete the project the day before. Waiting until the last minute could mean complications that prevent you from attending your child’s concert and that’s simply not acceptable on your list of priorities.
   
   
4. Watch Your Browsing Time
   I love to read websites, blogs, emails, and message boards. In the past, I devoured every morsel of information I could glean from such places, but as my business grew so did my lack of time.
   
   I have learned to only stick with email groups or message boards if they offer something in return for my time—lessons learned and networking. If all they do is take my energy and time and give nothing in return, I leave—without ever looking back.
   
   Email can be a huge problem. Every minute used to check if “new mail” has arrived is a minute wasted. I have learned to set times for checking and replying to email: when I wake up in the morning, when I’ve completed a project and need a break, and right before I am ready to stop working for the day. (The same goes for blog reading.)
   
   
5. Designate Chores
   When I was little, I felt like Cinderella before the ball so I had a hard time giving chores to my children. But now that they are older, I’ve realized that if they don’t learn household and cooking skills now, they won’t know how to take care of themselves when they move out on their own. Who knew enlisting the help of our children could free up so much time!
   
   
6. Get A Hobby
   When I first started my business, I gave up all hobbies. In fact, I gave up any “me time”. I had to if I wanted to succeed and still have quality time with my kids and husband. But after awhile, I began to feel really burnt out. My business was beginning to stand on its own but I’d developed a bad habit of “working, working, working” and I completely forgot what it meant to actually enjoy life. On the advice of both my doctor and my chiropractor, I began to rediscover the value of taking a time out—just for me.
   
   What I discovered was amazing! A hobby that required nothing more than my time and ability to be creative allowed me to release the pressure I felt from running my business, things that once made me freak out no longer bothered me, and my business didn’t suffer. In fact, giving myself an hour a day (or three hours a week) has actually allowed me to become a more productive writer and better business person.
   
   
7. Make Time For Family
   “All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy” or so the saying goes. And you know what? All work and no family time can really wreck havoc in both your personal life and your work life. When your family is happy, you’re happy. And when you’re happy, you’re business runs smoother and difficult times don’t feel quite as desperate which allows you to think outside the box for solutions you never dreamed possible. Besides, unhappy families take up far more energy and time than necessary and make working difficult.
   
   
8. Ask For Help
   Sometimes, we simply can’t do it all. Sometimes we must pay or barter for help. By freeing the half hour it takes to wash and vacuum your car, you’ve just given yourself a half hour to work. By asking a neighbor to take your children to school in the morning in exchange for picking up her kids in the afternoon, you’ve saved yourself anywhere from 20 to 50 minutes every morning! By swapping babysitter duties once a week, you’ve just given yourself a toddler free day to make uninterrupted phone calls, run errands, and complete tasks that would have taken you twice as long had a toddler been underfoot.
   
   
9. Give Up Nonessentials
   In order to get things done, it sometimes means we have to give up something that essentially wastes time and doesn’t enhance our quality of life or our business. Nonessentials, like watching television, prevent you from accomplishing your tasks. If you have a favorite soap opera, you don’t have to give it up. Just record it and watch it in the evening, when you need to unwind from a busy and hectic day. Don’t watch it during the day when your kids are napping and the free time could be used for business.
   
   Are there other areas in your day where you “waste” time—time that is not essential to providing a healthy, happy you?
   
   
10. Just Do It
    Sometimes we just don’t wan to work. We’d rather play hookie and as home business owners there’s no one to reprimand us or dock our pay if we decide to take the day off. But taking the day off too frequently can and will put an end to your business. When times like these creep up, determine the cause for wanting to play hookie and then work to resolve those feelings. Are you burnt out? Would one hour of relaxation help instead of taking the entire day off? If the only reason you want the day off is because you don’t want to tackle the task at hand—you need to just do it! In other words, you need to talk yourself out of procrastinating and talk yourself into working—even if it means offering yourself a small reward at the end of the day, like your favorite ice cream or a trip to the local coffee shop.
    
    
11. Set A Timer
    Some people get so engrossed in what they’re doing that before they know it hours have passed; if that happens while taking a break to play Solitaire or read blogs, that can lead to an entire day wasted. Setting a timer can help.
    
    I discovered a free reminder service that has been a God-send. With a few adjustments, I can remind myself to stop browsing the Internet, to stop reading email, to take a break and stretch, to stop working and eat, to get to work on an assignment, and when a deadline is nearing its final days. Check it out at: Free download.