It has been my observation that most people get ahead during the time that others waste time.
- Henry Ford
Whether you are Bill Gates or a one-person operation, an hour is still 60 minutes long. But where the wealthy differ from others is in the ability to make the best use of time. Business owners who invest their time more astutely will always achieve better results. Bill Gates quarantines 2 weeks a quarter, away from his office and cellphone, to work on product design – not the actual software, but how the programme will add value to the customer. He does nothing with his time but think.
But many of us don’t think about time like that. When we started in business, we traded time to make money. We could, and did, do everything in the business, because we thought that our time had no cost.
The fact is, our time does have a big cost. Every minute we spend on a ‘low dollar productive’ activity is a minute we can’t spend on a ‘high dollar productive’ activity. Time spent on administration is time that can’t be invested into marketing. Time spent “on the tools” is time that can’t be spent growing the business.
How can you make the most of the time you’ve got? There are lots of techniques and structures, but here’s the most powerful: record how you spend your time, and then identify those areas that make you a lot of money and that you are absolutely passionate about. Delegate the rest. All of it.
Most people struggle with this. They say “but these are the things that made us what we are today”. True enough. Unfortunately they’re also the very things that are keeping us where we are today.
Dr Mike Ashby is Director of BizTime in Auckland. Log onto the BizTime web site and ask for a FREE CD full of techniques for growing your business and balancing your life http://www.biztime.co.nz/