The Business Bulletin
I never have enough time to get things done! Does it feel as though there aren’t enough hours in the day to get everything done? It doesn’t matter whether you’re a business owner, senior manager or office junior, we can all experience times when we feel as though we’re drowning in work.
Does it feel as though there aren’t
attention and focus. Don’t put off
enough hours in the day to get
doing these as you’ll free yourself up
everything done? It doesn’t matter
to focus on the Important and Not
whether you’re a business owner,
Urgent items which is where your
senior manager or office junior, we
focus really needs to be, before they
can all experience times when we feel
become urgent and put pressure
as though we’re drowning in work.
on you. The Not Important and
The starting point to try and get on top of the situation is to look through your to do list and categorise the items on it. I find using the grid below can really help, start by dividing your page into four, with urgency on the x-axis and importance on the y-axis. Now go through your list and divide the things on it into four categories ■ Important and Urgent – to be done first thing ■ Important and Not Urgent – schedule in calendar ■ Not Important and Urgent – delegate ■ Not Important and Not Urgent – don’t do – in the bin Items that are Important and Urgent need your immediate
Urgent should be delegated and Not
Kathy Bassett
Important and Not Urgent items
ActionCoach
are things that can and should be
Kathy’s passion is working with owners
assessed and either delegated or
of successful small to medium sized
binned. I’m not saying that these
companies. She can help you to bridge
things don’t need to be done, rather they don’t need to be done by YOU. Now that you have taken control and can start to feel a little less pressured your attention needs to turn to the Important and Not
the gap between where you are now and where you really want to be, whether it be to grow your business long term, or to implement an exit strategy. 07952 112432 kathybassett@actioncoach.com actioncoach.co.uk/coaches/kathy-bassett
Urgent tasks on your list. This is where you will find it useful to set up a default diary. Using a system allows you to block out times during your week to focus on particular tasks. They might be recurring activities, so doing your admin every Monday morning for example, reviewing the marketing activity for the business on a Friday afternoon, the weekly Wednesday
6 | Issue 8 – Strategy and Personal Development
team meeting, setting aside one hour each day to focus on the new project that has been stalling because you’ve been busy dealing with other things. Don’t forget to include some time out during your day even if it’s only making sure that you take a
