Time Management for Small Business

By Jay Hindrik

Time. We all want more of it, but sadly, there’s just not enough hours in a day to go around. And there’s nothing that a small business needs more than time: more time to build your business, more time to look for clients, and more time to pass deliverables.

Smaller businesses are always the first ones to feel the pinch of the ticking clock. They’re under-staffed, under-budget, and even under-managed. That’s because during the first few years, the boss spends most of his time doing some of the dredge work, taking away precious minutes that he could have spent growing the business.

But while we can’t add more hours to a day, we can learn better ways to make use of them.

 So here a few ways that managers of smaller business can better manage their time:

 Do a work-audit.

What do you really do every day? We all have a general idea of our goals, and what we need to do in order to achieve them. But rarely do we ever evaluate the different tasks required to do our jobs. The result, is that we sometimes repeat the same tasks; do something we could have easily delegated, or never find out a better way to do a particular task.

By breaking down our tasks and doing a work audit, we can come up with not only more efficient ways to do our business, but it also gives us a better idea on how we all spend company time.

Learn to delegate.

Most bosses hate delegating, more so in smaller businesses, where the boss tends to be the business owner. They feel more in control if they do the important stuff, which in their eyes is everything.

Delegating smaller task not only allows you to focus on the core business, but it also builds a feeling of trust among co-workers.

Play to your strengths.

It is amazing how people never capitalize on their strengths. Likewise, how people seem to be stuck on their weaknesses. Do yourself a favor; step back and analyze the things at which you excel. List them down, then move on to examining the things with which you feel you need help. (Do not include those which you hate doing.)

Playing to your strengths means concentrating your efforts where you excel; and delegating the things with which you need help. Not only do we do the things we’re good at faster, but it makes no sense to spend half-a-day drafting a sales copy, when you know writing is one of your weaknesses. Instead, hire someone who can do a better and faster job, then focus your efforts where you excel.