8 simple things I did to win back 20 hours a week.

The busier I’ve become over the 8 years growing this business, the more I’ve had to find tiny tricks to win back my time. 

Everyone always goes on about delegating as the solution to gaining time back, and I absolutely agree. 

But when you’re a small business, delegating can sometimes feel like more work initially. 

It can also be expensive or time-consuming to find the right person. 

And even though I’ve delegated lots of things to grow the business to 140 people, I still think there are some really powerful levers you can pull on before handballing things to others.

When I look back at how I’ve used each of them, they’ve probably saved me close to 20 hours per week.

Let’s have a look at each one…

But first, the key to all of this is removing things. 

I know that sounds obvious, but most people think they’re not doing enough.

So let's delete some shit from your life and get you those precious hours back. 

The next step is:

1. Time blocking

When you have a massive amount to do each week, don’t try to squeeze in more while sitting in front of the TV or with your kids climbing all over you or by trying to work while on another Zoom call with the camera off. 

It’s all massively distracting. 

Instead, lock yourself in a room for 3+ hours a day and smash out your tasks starting with the most important.

When I first did this I struggled to focus, but after a few weeks it became the most powerful thing I’ve tried so far.

Ideally, it’s best to do it first thing in the morning, but sometimes you don’t have that luxury.

Either way, find blocks of time to do focused work on your ONE main priority that will get your towards your goal.

When you do it right, it easily saves you 1-2 hours across a longer inefficient day.

2. Delete regular breaks

My day used to look like: work, toilet, work, coffee, work, snack, work, tea break, work, chat in the corridor, work, phone call…

Nothing got done for any length of time. 

Instead, eat 3 meals, get on with your main task, prepare your lunch, make a thermos of tea for the day, and don’t snack.

Do whatever it takes to just FOCUS!

When I added up all the stopping and starting, focus shifting and pointless daydreaming it came to almost 5 hours a week!

3. Delete your open-door policy

I used to tell myself that I must always be available to my team. 

But when you’re accessible, it's a wonderful opportunity for other people to waste minutes of your time. 

Get yourself out of shared office spaces, hot-desking and open-plan offices.

They’re brutal, disruptive, time vacuums.

If you can't, at least do it when you're trying out your time blocking sessions.

It saved me 3 hours of pointless chatter and follow up each week. 

4. Avoid small talk

People love to chit chat…

Maybe you do too?

And a little bit of it is important for maintaining relationships.

But limit it to lunch breaks.

Cut to the chase in every conversation during business hours.

 It’s a bit weird at first, I found myself apologising for being more direct, but people actually learned to like it.

So stick with it.

5. Balance

When you start a business or lead a team, some people make you feel like you should be always on. 

First in, last to leave and then available all hours of the day.

People who feel that you should be working yourself to death as the owner aren't people you need on your team.

The truth is, you’re no good to anyone if your dead so find some freaken balance Dian.

And most importantly… Be at peace with it.

This is easier said than done and took me many years to convince myself it was okay to have balance. 

The sooner you start, the better your life (and business) will be.

6. Unnecessary meetings

I’ve never been big on meetings.

And thankfully everyone in my company feels the same and values efficient meetings. 

But I hear stories from my friends and family about their workplaces that make my ears bleed about how badly other people waste time in meetings.

Like a 3-hour weekly executive meeting with no agenda, no outcomes, no assigned responsibilities - Just a chat… That would kill me!

If you’re in this, do everything you can to wriggle out of it. 

Say you’re working on a super important project that will catapult the business forward and ask to be sent a brief of the discussion/outcomes.

If you’re in control, set excellent agendas with limited points and half the time as an experiment. 

There's easy 5-10 hours a week saved there.

And lastly…

7. Unnecessary Fitness 

I can only speak for myself here but, I think about exercise differently…

It’s like brushing my teeth. I have to do it.

It’s not fun, I don’t look forward to it, but it improves lots of other things in my life. 

Back when I had time, I used to like going on 3 hour mountain bike rides for fitness. 

These days I don’t have the time so I’ve switched to the gym. 

It sucks, but it’s flexible, requires no prep, can be done in all weather, and gets me the outcome I need.

It’s the same thought for organised sport that takes hours of your week including training.

If this is you, there's a handful of hours each week for you. 

At the end of the day, there are hours you could be saving all though your week. 

But not so you can just sit around doing nothing.

It’s so you can use those minutes to do high-value work (or learning) that gets you to the next level. 

Think of finding and using them like an investment in your future

Use the time wisely.

I hope this helps.