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If you’re working from home as an entrepreneur, time management is an absolutely vital skill that you can’t afford to overlook.
One of the issues that afflict many entrepreneurs when they first begin working from home, is precisely the fact that they lose the structure that had previously helped to define and set boundaries around their working lives. They then enter into a situation where they are completely responsible for managing things on their own.
For all but the most organized, this means that procrastination and a lack of structure can become serious issues in a hurry.
Here are a few things to know so that you don’t waste your time at work.
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Even if you’re running a solo business from home, you don’t have to do everything yourself
There’s a misconception that solopreneurs have to deal with absolutely everything concerning their businesses, alone. After all, it’s in the name, isn’t it?
Although you may be running your business alone, there are all sorts of ways of outsourcing various tasks without having to hire a team of staff and put them up in your living room. For example, there is a range of companies that offer managed services for things like IT. Click here for more info on that.
There are also personal assistants, subscription-based services that help you to handle your annual reports, and a suite of tools that you can use to largely automate various processes that would otherwise risk-taking up all your time.
In other words, instead of running yourself into the ground trying to do everything at all times, consider the ways you can offload some of that stuff.
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You shouldn’t try to do an unlimited number of things – say “no” to most chores and tasks
Supposedly, Warren Buffett once commented that the difference between really successful people and everyone else is that “really successful people say no to almost everything.”
While it may seem like you have to do everything you could conceivably do to help boost up your business, the reality is that if you try to do too much you will inevitably spread yourself too thin, and the hours you put into your work will not be anywhere near as productive as you would want them to be.
Instead of trying to do an unlimited number of things, say “no” to most chores and tasks. Focus on the stuff that you actually have to do, and that really matters. A lot of the rest can be more or less safely ignored.
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You need to focus your business and professional ethos in order to make headway
Every new entrepreneur needs to focus on a particular niche if they want to be successful, and they also need to develop a particular professional ethos to guide their actions.
If you’re too unfocused and “general” with regards to your business – especially at the beginning – then it will be essentially impossible to act in an efficient way or to capitalize on your time.
Your marketing will be confused, you will struggle to identify how to set yourself apart from the competition with your services, and everything will just be scrambled.
As a rule, the more you can focus on things, the less chaotic your situation will become.
