Today is the most important day for your business. Why? What you achieve today impacts what you can accomplish tomorrow, next month, five years from now. In our fast-paced business world, it’s easy for our days to blur together. Too often we cultivate bad daily habits without even realizing it. But these little bad habits add up to impactful shifts in our success down the road.
Many of us are guilty of the following daily mistakes of small business owners. Taking the time to identify, and then correct, these mistakes helps empower you to achieve your full potential. And what business owner doesn’t want that?
- Not Prioritizing Your Own Health
Notice I didn’t say “value your own health” or “take care of your own health.” You need to prioritize your health because it is the best way to prioritize your business!
Your body is remarkably like a machine. Optimal performance requires quality fuel, proper maintenance, and adequate rest. Skimp out on one of these areas and the performance suffers.
Many of us buy into this workaholic American mentality. You slaved away at the office for 60 hours this week? Gold star for you! You worked through lunch? Gold star for you! You stayed up all night working on a presentation and gulped down four coffees to make it through the day? Gold star for you!
Stop it with these gold stars. The best entrepreneurs know your health should be a bigger priority than your business. Taking care of your health leads to being more effective and efficient as you work, maintaining better work-life balance, and being all around happier. Think of it as the ultimate productivity hack. Hit the gym, bring healthy lunches to work, and turn off the screens an hour before bed. A few weeks of healthy habits and you’ll be amazed at your increased work output.
- Not Posting to Social Media Daily
Social media for businesses is not a spectator sport. Either you are all in. Or you don’t enter the game at all.
Granted, all in does not need to mean several hours a day online or a disproportionate chunk of your marketing budget. But posting to Facebook once a week and never keeping up with the always changing marketing trends is not going to cut it.
Take some time to choose the best one to three platforms for your business (more if you are a large business with more marketing resources). Dedicate the necessary time to get these platforms thriving. While most businesses opt for the traditional Facebook and Twitter platforms, consider alternatives like Google+ and Facebook and LinkedIn Groups. These offer unique marketing benefits most marketers fail to take advantage of.
- Failing to Organize
Is your desktop scattered with documents and folders? Is your desk overrun with papers and packets? Does it take you more than 15 seconds to locate any given document?
It’s time for improved organization. To many entrepreneurs, organization can seem like a luxury. Who has time to look for (and then implement) the best organizational system? But the longer you go without one, the more time you waste searching for that one filed buried under desktop folder after desktop folder.
Take some time to actually implement a thorough organizational system. Then be sure to stick to it every day. Always put digital or physical files in their correct location with the correct labeling. Deal with any papers dropped on your desk right away. Don’t save to your desk drive or let stacks pile up on your desk. Every day be sure to keep things organized.
- Starting the Day With an Email Check
This can be one of THE hardest bad habits to break. We are all guilty of logging onto our computer and going right for the email.
But nearly every business productivity expert gives the same advice: don’t!
When we start with an email check, it puts our brain in reactive mode rather than a proactive or creative mode. When we arrive to work, we are often at a peak mental state (assuming we didn’t suffer from a horrid commute and got our cup of Joe). This precious optimal mental state should be used tackling the hardest projects of the day, not scanning through emails.
It’s best to get a project or two done before checking your email. As a business owner, you often are bombarded with questions and comments from clients and employees. Set aside dedicated time to check your email, say at 11am, 2pm, and 4pm to deal with these emails. This allows you to really focus on your work and use email as a slight brain break during your natural energy dips.
- Not Taking Breaks
This is another difficult mistake to stop engaging in. It’s all too easy to sit down at your desk in the morning…and never get up again. We falsely believe the best way to maximize our work is to maximize our hours working. In reality, our brains are much more efficient when we take breaks. Even just a few minutes every hour getting up and stretching can help your brain feel refreshed and ready to tackle whatever problem awaits you.
Try this Navy SEAL trick. Every hour, set an alarm on your phone for a SLLS break: stop, look around your surroundings, listen and try to name as many sounds as you can, and smell and try to name as many smells as you can. Soldiers use this when they are trudging through the worst environment possible for days on end. You can use it when you need a break from the hours staring at a computer.
- Failing to Look Long Term
In the daily hustle and bustle of work, it’s easy to get a narrow focus. There are so many tasks needing to be done now. But each day, you need to be preparing for the future. Spend time working on moving your business forward a few months from now. Send your current clients a little gift to strengthen that relationship. Attend a networking event or conference to build up your prospective client list. Take an online class to hone your skills. Try out new tools. Do something daily to prepare for the future. When the future comes, you’ll be ahead of your competition.
- Not Delegating or Outsourcing
This is a mantra all small business owners need to hear. Just because you can does not mean you should.
All too often we take on tasks that can and should be handled by someone else. We do this for many reasons. Maybe our team is so small we feel guilty passing along the task. Maybe we struggle with relinquishing control over our passion project. Maybe we worry it’ll take more time managing the employee than just doing it ourselves.
The reality is delegating is a powerful tool to maximize your business. Every small business owner should be delegating in some regard. You can delegate to your own employee or rely on the strength of a virtual assistant. Whatever approach you take, you can free up your valuable time to projects more pressing for your attention. It’s painful letting go, but you will be so glad you did!