How To Prioritize Conflicting Time Demands

I'm frequently asked how to get more done in the available time. It's easier than most think, but it does require some planning and work.

Let's look at time wasters. Where ever you go in the next day or two, see if you don't agree with me that most individuals waste approximately 15 minutes out of every hour. That's 2.5 hours at the end of a day and 1.2 days at the end of a week.

How would you like to have UPS or FedEx deliver to your door 2 months of productive days? These would be your days to use for whatever you wished. Stop the waste and those days belong to you!

What causes the waste? Worrying about what to do, a lack of proper equipment, inadequate training, and unclear directions are some of the main culprits.

But my favorite time waster is analysis paralysis, which is often caused by competing demands. For example, let's say you face the decision as to whether to prepare your taxes or generate cash. Both are extremely important to your business and considered high-priority and high-payoff items.

Should you do the taxes or make the sales? You could flip a coin to decide which should be done first, but that means you'll not win on one or the other. I suggest removing the "or" and replace it with "and" so you're focused on finding a solution that accomplishes both.

For example, cash generation for most businesses must take place during core times of the day. In this illustration if you personally prepare your taxes, you could sell during the day and complete tax forms in the evening. Now, I purposefully kept this simple so you can readily see my point. I acknowledge, however, that life can be a bit more complex—but only if you let it.

The next time you face the dilemma of competing demands, weigh the consequences (positive and negative) and if similar in importance, then search for ways to do both. After whittling down the time wasters, you might be surprised that you have more than enough hours to accomplish what matters most.