Do you ever feel like your to-do list only gets longer? There is a lot to-do as a business owner! Sometimes our list seems never ending.
How do we keep from treading water and barely keeping our head up, to actually making substantial progress towards our goals and dreams?
Making big strides in our business, or reaching a new level of success doesn’t mean you have to make a ginormous change, turn everything upside down, or do things a whole new way. And it doesn’t mean stop everything, put it all on hold so you can tackle it like a big new project.
What if you could just do a couple little things everyday that would make a big difference over time? Do you know what those little things would be?
1. Revenue generating activity. When you look at your list, the number one thing to take care of is that revenue generating activity. If you don’t have business you don’t have a business. If you’re in real estate and you have a client wanting to write an offer, write the offer. If you have sales calls to make, make the sales calls. If you have a speaking engagement to confirm, confirm that speaking engagement. What is the number one thing on your list that will bring in revenue the fastest and most directly? That is your number one priority.
- I highly recommend Gary Keller’s book, The One Thing. What’s the one thing I can do such that by doing it everything else will be easier or unnecessary?
2. Taking care of you. I find that when I take care of myself then I can function better in the rest of my life. For me, it’s getting enough sleep on a regular basis and exercising often. When these two things are happening, I’m a much better business owner, friend, and human being. While I suggest everyone gets enough sleep and exercise, these two are critical for me. Do what you need to best take care of yourself.
3. Take a step at a time. What’s a big goal, project, or habit you’d like to achieve? What are the steps that you can take on a daily or weekly basis that will get you there? For example, I have a goal that includes becoming a better speaker and getting more speaking engagements. Every week I make sure I take action on both parts of my speaking goal, I:
- Either follow up on referred speaking engagements, or identify new speaking engagements I want.
- Work on my upcoming presentations and delivery.
Every week I’m making progress towards my big goal.
I have come to accept that not only will I not get my to-do list done in its entirety, I don’t want to or need to get it all done. I keep my lists going so as my revenue increases I can delegate more and more of the items on that list that don’t require ME to-do them. These things will help me grow my business and make progress towards my larger vision, just not until I can pay someone else to-do them. I don’t ever have to get it all done, I just have to get the most important things done.
Big progress in business, and life, comes by taking many small steps on a regular basis that accumulate over time to big things!
– Maile Collmer