Check in with yourself
If there if one thing I definitely don't miss about working for someone else, it's the endless parade of meetings each week. One meeting I particularly loathed, no matter where I worked, was the weekly "this is what I'm up to/this is where things stand" group status meeting. The only way I could manage to stay awake at times was to fantasize which would hurt worse - scratching my eyes out with the pen I was allegedly making notes with, or sitting in that damn meeting for one more minute.
When you work for yourself, that kind of status check takes on a whole new meaning. It can be very easy to blow off checking in and strategizing when you are your own boss. Of course you know what's going on, right?
If you're like me (and I hope for everyone's sake you're not), it's all too tempting to focus on paying client work than to take some time to plan and reflect. Unfortunately, that can lead to chaos, which can land you on the express bus to Crazy Town. And that chaos can make it seem even more difficult to step back and take time to plan.
But it's really not that hard, Dave Navarro at Freelance Folder tells us in 3 Questions That Can Instantly Boost Your Bottom Line:
A good strategy session doesn’t have to take long - it could literally be a lunchtime appointment you set with yourself once a week to just stop, breathe, and think about how you want to tweak your way of working for the next seven days. Here are three food-for-thought questions you could ask yourself during your weekly strategy session:
What events/obstacles stole valuable, billable time away from me this week?
Things happen during the week that suck time away from you doing the things you got into business to do. Don’t let these things “just happen.” Isolate what they are (whether it’s a failed hard drive or a meeting that spiraled out too long) and plan ways to avoid this moving forward.
What’s non-billable, “routine” tasks am I spending a lot of time on?
You have a certain billable rate that you can get from clients. If you’re spending time on other activities required to run your business, and you can get someone else to do them for less money than you could make if you billed those hours out, than you need to consider making that happen. Sounds like a no-brainer, but it’s an easy mistake to make when you’re in the heat of the moment with a busy business.
What strategic tasks have I been procrastinating on?
Chances are there a few things you already know would make a strategic difference for your business … but you just haven’t gotten around to doing them because you’ve just been “too busy.” Well, what if you decided that you weren’t going to accept that as an excuse? Push yourself to start putting those smart ideas you’ve already come up with into practice; grab a calendar and a pen and carve that time out so it gets done.
The brief amount of time spent checking in with yourself each week will end up being an investment in your business, leaving you with better ideas to work more effectively.
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