DON'T WISH FOR IT. WORK FOR IT.

Every entrepreneur wants to be more productive and get more things done in less time. Being more productive means having a bigger reach, making an impact on a wider reach of people and making more money. 

Here are some hacks to increase productivity as an entrepreneur. 

Daily Planner- Using a daily planner to map out your day and week can help to increase productivity. When seeing your tasks write down in measurable goals and tasks is helpful to get more stuff done in less time. 

Eating for Energy - When you eat to keep your blood sugar stable throughout the day and keep up your energy you are able to be more productive. Eat high protein meals balanced with complex carbs & fiber and healthy dietary fat. You can download my FREE cookbook on with quick healthy meals designed for you to Eat to Energize. 

Habit Bundling- This is different than multi-tasking, which you want to avoid because it makes you less productive. Habit bundling is doing things like returning emails while leisure walking on your treadmill or cooking while listening to a podcast. Things you need or want to get accomplished that don’t need complete focus. 

Doing most important things in the morning. The morning is the best time to get the most important things done in your day. Your brain is fresh in the morning and not drained from a day full of thinking. 

Content Planner. As an entrepreneur who manages your own social media or other people’s and also creates content for your business, it is important to have a plan. Making a monthly/weekly/daily schedule ahead of time to plan out what content you want to create and put out is important for productivity. When you sit down to create your content at a certain time then you are able to just write and create without having to think of new ideas or what you are going write about. It has already been planned out ahead of time and you can use this time to be productive. 

Stay Hydrated. A study from University of East London revealed that drinking 8 glasses of water a day made participants up to 14% more productive

Time Cube. Is a great tool to help keep you on a scheduled task. If you are looking to schedule a time to focus on one task for a specific time period then this is great for you.  The four sides of the cube simply state the minutes that you would like to start timing. Turn it on the side needed and it will immediately start timing. When the time is up, a loud, unmistakable alarm will ring. Simply turn it back to its upright position to silence it. 

Physical Activity will get your blood flowing to your brain and body. Increasing blood flow to your body helps to increase energy and bringing blood to the brain will help to increase creativity and productivity. 

Brendan Burchard Productivity Planner breaks down your goals into 3 major projects and the top 5 big things you must do to move the product forward. People you need to reach out to and the people you are waiting on and your top priority.  You can download it here 

The Pomodoro Technique is a time management method developed by Francesco Cirillo in the late 1980s. The technique uses a timer to break down work into intervals, traditionally 25 minutes in length, separated by short breaks.

Time Blocking is organizing your daily schedule into certain productive times of the day. For example; 8am-9am writing blogs, 9:30-11am coaching calls, etc. When you block your time throughout your day you are able to get more done because you are not switching back from task to task. 

Scheduling Your Week to block days so on certain days you do specific tasks. For example, Monday is content creation, writing and returning emails. Tuesday and Wednesday are dedicated to coaching calls, Thursday is for making videos and in-person meetings, Friday is for networking. These are just examples and it will look different for your business, the idea is that if you know that you have certain days for certain tasks and you can stay in that zone and be the most productive. 

Don’t Multi-Task. While one may think multi-tasking can increase productivity it is actually the opposite. Switching back and forth between tasks decreases productivity since it takes time for your brain to continuously re-focus. Focus on doing one task at a time and you will be able to get more done in less time because your attention will be on one thing at a time. 

Stay in Zone of Genius. In the Gay Hendricks’ book The Big Leap, he talks about staying in your Zone of Genius to stay the most productive. Your zone of genius is your unique power. Operating in your zone of genius in service of your WHY is a surefire way to produce the best results and attain the highest degree of sustained satisfaction in your life. These are some of the questions that he proposes to ask to find out what is in your Zone of Genius. 

1. What do I most love to do?  (I love so much I can do it for long stretches of time without getting tired or bored.);

2. What work do I do that doesn’t seem like work?  (I can do it all day long without ever feeling tired or bored.);

3. In my work, what produces the highest ratio of abundance and satisfaction to the amount of time spent?  (Even if I do only ten seconds or a few minutes of it, an idea or a deeper connection may spring forth that leads to huge value.  Whatever it is, find it and I want you to put the highest priority on doing some of it every day.);

4. What is my unique ability?  (There is a special skill I’m gifted with.  This unique ability, fully realized and put to work can provide enormous benefits to me and any organization I serve.);

Outsourcing. Anything that is not in your Zone of Genius can be outsourced. Think about it, what in your business do you hate to do because you are just not good at it? Can you outsource your social media or your bookkeeping? Perhaps there is someone more qualified to take over building your website. These are all things that you can look into your business and see if there are ways that you can outsource to help you stay in your Zone of Genius keeping you more productive and making more money. When you waste time with tasks that you could easily outsource you are losing money because you could be using that time to work on things that make you money. 

Being in Alignment. When you are in alignment with your goals and what you want to accomplish you are automatically more productive. If you are working on a project or towards a goal that you don’t really believe in or that you don’t want to be doing then your productivity will drop and you will find yourself procrastinating and pushing off these projects. 

Use a Calendar Managment Tool like Evernote, Wunderlist, Fantastical 2, OmniFocus, Trello, Asana are all great calendar management tools.

 

90 Day Goals. I learned this technique from Todd Herman when working on your goals break them down into 90-day chunks. Instead of seeing your goals and being overwhelmed and paralyzed and not taking action, when you break it down into smaller, more manageable goals that you can actually focus on then you are able to be more productive. 

Energy Management. Did you know also the average person’s optimal working timeframe is 52minutes. So when you spend hours trying to work on a project and you start to feel unproductive then take a break and walk away from the project. 

Take Downtime. In the book The Power of Full Engagement, the author speaks about being fully engaged in a specific task and then taking downtime to increase productivity. As important it is to schedule in block time for work it, it is equally important to schedule in downtime for rest and relaxation. 

Beware of shiny object syndrome. Avoid being pulled under by "shiny object syndrome" in your business. Shiny objects will pop up from time-to-time and they will do everything to distract you from what you're trying to achieve now. New opportunities are good, but be sure they don't become bad. Be sure to stay focused on your goals and stick to one task at a time. 

Avoid Social Media. Ahh, Social Media can be one of the best things for our business but also a huge time suck for us. When you want to be productive shut off your SM on your phone or your computer and focus on your task at hand. If you are using social media for fun or business set a time limit and restrict the time you end up going down the rabbit hole of darkness! lol, You can also take SM apps off your phone or shut off wifi on your computer when you are trying to get work done and you find yourself scrolling through SM instead. 

Schedule when to check emails and SM messages. Answering emails and SM messages can be time-consuming and throw you off your agenda and put you on someone else’s. Scheduling specific times during your day to check messages and respond to them will increase productivity. 

Turn off push notifications. Push notifications equal distractions. Turn them off and celebrate your new found freedom. Only check those notifications in designated time periods. 

Meditation helps to increase your focus on one thing and helps your brain to absorb more information and improve productivity. 

Have a Morning Routine. If you have studied any successful business owner or CEO they will mostly tell you that they have a morning routine. You are naturally more productive in the morning since nothing has gotten in your way yet. 

You are focused on your own agenda and what your goals are for the day. 

If you have ever heard of the book “The Miracle Morning” by Hal Elrod he speaks about this extensively in his book. Everyone’s morning routine/ritual may look a little different but all have the same goals in mind to set up your day in a way that brings positivity and productivity.

Hire a Coach. As entrepreneurs we are always thinking of new ideas, have a million different projects we are working on and sometimes our thoughts are all over the place. Working with a business coach will help to increase productivity because they will help to organize your thoughts and projects and hold you accountable for reaching your goals.