I want to follow up with last week’s blog and not only continue to talk about my unpopular opinion, the entrepreneur hustle mentality but talk about ways you can get more done and become more productive.
This was a trap I fell into early on in my journey as an entrepreneur as well. I thought that you had to put in a ton of hours to be successful but in doing so, I burnt out, twice.
I knew there had to be a better way. Back before I was an entrepreneur and although I wasn’t a fan of the leadership I had when I worked at the Beer Store I knew I could do better.
When I really started to think about it, I realized that if I had the proper tools back then I wouldn’t have had to put in 70+ hours when I worked there.
I also realized that as an entrepreneur if I found the right tools I wouldn’t have to put in those kinds of hours doing what I love to do and I could have a much better work life balance from the start.
So the journey to becoming more productive and working a “normal†week began. I started to watch videos, listen to podcasts and talk with successful entrepreneurs that have already started and since I’ve started to study this, I have been working with a great balance in my life.
Doing all of this, I found a system that worked for me and that’s what I want to talk about now. I want to show you exactly what I do and hope that helps you become more productive in less time so you can have a much better work life balance.
Routines
Having routines is absolutely key when you want to stay productive. Now you don’t have to use an app like ToDoist for this but it’s something that has helped me get started and is a huge help for me daily.
Before I started with ToDoist and before having any sort of routine I was all over the place. I would often find myself forgetting things and then having to rush and get even the smallest tasks done at the last minute.
Setting things up in ToDoist with a recurring task in the beginning helped make those routines a habit and now it’s like second nature. It’s all about structure.
Planning
It doesn’t matter what you use to plan with, what matters is that you actually have a plan in place.
From my Rocketbook Planners to my Momentum Planner from Alex Charfen I make sure to plan each and every week out so I know what I have coming up and it’s fresh in my mind.
From there, I plan my day out as part of my morning routine so I have my most important tasks and meetings laid out and fresh in my mind.
Doing this and actually writing it down will do two things for you. It’ll keep you on track and write it down either in a planner like the Rocketbook where you can upload it to the cloud or in a notebook, it gives you something to review and then improve on down the line.
Time Blocking
With everything I do to stay organized and keep productive, I think Time Blocking is one of the most important things I do.
This is something I use Google Calendar for and it not only makes my life easier but helps make sure I’m not double booked for anything.
To start, I sat down and looked at everything I need to get done for the week and from there I plan out a generic week and plot in the time slots needed to get things done.
As time goes on you will notice that you can get things done a lot faster and adjust those blocks accordingly while making sure you take breaks throughout the day to stretch and get away from the screen.
With these 3 things, you will be able to get a lot more done in a lot less time but I would love to hear how you do it. Are there things you do that help you become more productive?
First I would love to have that conversation on our Facebook page and secondly I would love to help you with a few great tools.
Below you will find our Time Study as well as our free tools resource that includes ToDoist Pro that I’m giving you for free for the next two months!
Can’t wait to hear how these have helped you or what you do to be more predictive!
