I own my own business and found the work-life balance impossible to get right, I am a bit of an all or nothing person which is a character trait of most entrepreneurs.
I spent a lot of money looking for the perfect system for me and I spent a lot of money on experts who knew nothing and books that weren't worth the paper they are written on.so I thought I should share a very cheap system that work sfor me. It takes a bit of setting up, but like everything you only get out what you put in.
I started using a system called Get Things Done or GTD. by a chap called Dave Allen, y the idea is simple enough and after installing a little device on to my Outlook (https://gtdsupport.netcentrics.com/buy/indexd.php) and then reading the book and disciplining myself I found I could get through twice as much work and find quality time for myself.
How does it work? Well you can read the book and implement what appeals to you or follow my guidelines and make it simple.
Firstly The In Box is the starter. Use it for things that have to be done today and can not wait. This will take a while until you become realistic about what you can really achieve in a day and the second part will defiantly help with the Inbox.
Anything that arrives in your Inbox that you can deal with straight away do so. Anything that needs input from other people or more planning make into a Task.
Task should have reminders and dates put in to them and again make them realistic dates.
In tasks open up folders for Today, long Term and Short Term. Put anything from your inbox into these folders or when applicable snooze the email.snoozing an e mail is could for those e mail were people are out of the office or you won't be able to reply until you have finished a task.
The next thing is your calendar. I am so easily directed that I have split my day up into section like below 8-10 go through e mails, check Manchester professionals and Linked.
10-12 make sales calls
12-12.30 do admin for the sales calls
12.30-1.30 lunch and a walk,or I as often do sit in the car 1.30-4pm sales calls 4pm-5pm admin and check MP and Linked.
5pm home.
I do this for a Monday, Wednesday and Friday. I make appointments for Tiesdays and Wednesdays but keep the diary up by making sure I do things like writing new web pages or customer newsletters on the train.
My weekend are now free, my evening are great and my health a whole lot better.
I have been to all the groups that ate supposed to help and employed people to do the admin I now find time for.
If you want to know more please feel free to call me. I can fit calls in 8-10(only kidding)
