The best way to get through your to-do list and be successful.
Your to-do list should be your best friend. I like to use the analogy of that old saying “check it twice.”
Your daily to-do list should be your friend. You should be making a list and checking it twice.
If you are someone who makes a list and another list and another list and /or adding and adding to your list my guess is that you never seem to get much done from it.
Am I correct?
If that’s you, you aren’t being very efficient and that’s not good for business. True, no one is watching you to see if you are being naughty or nice, but it’s one of those self-defeating or self-sabotaging activities that inhibit your business success.
Here is the game changer. Make your list and THEN check it twice. The reason for that is to be sure that the only things you have on your daily to do list are the tasks that you absolutely can and have to do today.
It’s the one way to be sure that you will get what you need/want to done!
Trying to do too much is probably a struggle you have. It’s one a lot of business owners have. I talk about it a lot with my clients and I and have struggled with in the past too. It’s part of wanting to be successful in business.
I was famous for smooshing 60 minutes of work into 15 minutes, sure I could do that! No problem. I used to say “this will only take me 10 minutes” a lot. When it really would take me 10 hours!
That mindset is a problem. A BIG one. It’s not at all helpful and it causes you a lot of backlog, frustration and overwhelm.
If you do something similar, you’ll never get things completed. Time management is so elusive we think we can manage it but we can only manage a task.
Two thing you need to know:
- How much time do I have today and
- How long will the task(s) I need/want to do take to complete.
Until we make changes to how we manage our tasks, it’s mission impossible and often epic failure that follows.
To ensure that you set yourself up for success, I’m going to teach you something that works, and you won’t like it. In fact, you may even ignore me. That’s ok, I’ll have put the idea into your head and you may choose to come back to it.
Look at your list and pick one thing you want to accomplish today. Determine how much time you think something will take. And then TRIPLE the time you think it will. This works because you have ample time to get the task done and key is, it gets DONE.
AND you may have time left over! That’s a beautiful thing.
Before you think “ya but, it could be too much time.” Yes, it could be. So then chunk it down into 25-30 minute timeframes and set a timer.
My experience and that from my clients have been that when using a timer, we stay more focused and get things done quicker. Best of all we stay on task!
Give it a go. Something I use to stay on target is the Pomodoro technique. Here is a little explanation of what it is and the actual one that I use to keep myself on task.
If you like the idea but not the resource, there are more out there you can use. I suggest you DO NOT use your mobile phone because, well, do I really need to tell you?! I think not.
But I can’t help myself, it’s because you will get distracted! It’s best to not be distracted when you are working to get something completed.
This week give it a go and see what happens. Triple the time you think something will take and then go ahead and use a timer. Let me know how it goes.
It can be a little like a game. I bet you’ll get more done than you imagined and even have some fun doing it!
As you get better and better at this best way to get through your to do list and be successful you’ll find you achieve more and more faster and faster!
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Combining a day job with an online business and a lot to do as my business grows,doing too much is a struggle I sure have.(reached a point I needed a break, that took me 3 months to “recover” and get my act back together) I make a weekly planning, with a daily to do list. My time is limited when working on my online business, have only the evening hours, I am glad to read,that timeframes of 30 minutes I use are ok for each task, taking breaks in between. I also learned to be happy if something not has been done, making a planning is also a learning process and just adjust it in the planning. Thanks for this article, Kim.
Luc, you are so right! I’m glad you recovered because you also share valuable information. I have had days where I’ve exhausted myself too and that means that the next day I’m not productive at all. I believe the secret sauce is in taking those small breaks! Yes, 30 minutes can be the perfect amount of time to do small tasks or start a portion of one. It is enough yet not so much that we run into procrastination tendencies. We can learn to plan and it is a process. Thank you for sharing your thoughts.
Wise advice, Kim! I have running to do lists on my calendar and move them from day to day if they don’t get crossed off. I can see there’s a better way by breaking the big giant to-dos in to bite size chunks. I’m going to try that next week!
Thank you Denise. I was thinking about this yesterday during our GIDD while you were talking about all you were doing to get a product launched. We often have so many moving pieces and lump them all together in kind of a mish-mash way. You will have to let me know how it goes on our next GIDD!