Effectively Managing Time & Prioritizing Tasks
When there is so much to do in business!
Something that I tend to struggle with is timing and prioritizing.
In fact, in my mind, everything usually holds the same priority making it very difficult to get started on the right thing, let alone create any semblence of routine with routine tasks!
So, I thought I’d take some time to share the sorts of things that might make managing those priorities more bearable.
One thing I suggest to makers most often is to batch your work. Assembly line style, as it were. But I don’t mean the creating part. Honestly, for some creations, let alone some people, assembly line style just doesn’t work well and can actually take more time than just creating the one product at once.
Instead, I’m thinking the admin stuff. The stuff that none of us actually want to do: Inventory. (blech)
Keeping up with inventory can be a full-time job on its own because of how disjointed it can get going from purchasing components - to making product - to substracting out used/wasted components, etc. But, when you are creating things on your own, it can be easier if you don’t try to track as-you-go.
Instead, create a day each week, or even up to each month, to log everything. Before you start your usual making process, you can jot down notes on what components you plan to use. You can jot down notes as you go with what you have used. Nothing pristine, just quick notes. Keep those notes in a single location so that when it is time to log every thing in its appropriate place, you have those notes at the ready.
One of my members had a notebook that she’d quickly note information on and since her mom helped make things too, her mom could write down the things she used and made. If I remember correctly, she sometimes had small scraps of what they had used in there, too. Then, when my member’s kiddo had extracurricular practice, she’d take that notebook and a laptop or tablet and enter in the information during the time that she’d otherwise be sitting doing nothing. I thought that was brilliant!
And I would do this for various aspects of your business.
Purchases from the week/month entered into your component inventory system
Finished products made and components used from the week/month entered into your finished product inventory system
Finances in general (revenue & expenses like on these Paper & Spark spreadsheets) — this is an affiliate link, I may receive some compensation for purchases made after clicking this link at no extra cost to you
Email marketing content for the week, month, or quarter (or more if you have it - go you!!)
Social media content (maybe even split this up between content creation, adding images, and posting/scheduling).
Shipping (particularly if you are in a rural area or an area with less consistant pick up - just make sure to note your shipping days on your listings!)
General admin like creating new Children’s Product Certificates, updating any contracts, contacting suppliers, etc.
Many of these things do have *a* priority, just not *the* priority all the time, so you can save these things for their own time instead of trying to do it all at once. Whether you do them once a week or once a month really will depend on how much activity you do in each area. If you are purchasing less often, once a month may work, but you may need to track once a week if you are making lots and lots of product each week. I would not go more than one month, though as it can cause you to forget entirely and we definitely don’t want that.
And, if you are like me and you need reminders and processes, my top two tips, aside from everything above, is to set calendar events (with reminders turned on) and use Standard Operating Proceedures (SOPs). A SOP is, put simply, a task list that you can use, or give to anyone else, to keep you on the right path to getting something done. I use them when creating these Substack posts:
Choose a topic
Write about topic
Find image
Grab share link
Save images as TMRS_[Title]_post and TMRS_[Title]_story
Open FB Business Manager and create new post
Share to FB & IG
Create Story & share to FB & IG
Save story to Highlights
See, just something “simple” (IYKYK about breaking down tasks into steps…) is considered an SOP, and it helps!
Give it a think today. What kinds of things do you do that can be turned into a single day (hour-ish) task each week or month? Choose one and go for it! Let’s see you gain a bit more of your time and energy back.