5 Ways to Erase Daily Procrastination in Your Business

According to Real Simple magazine’s survey of 10,000 readers, the average daily to-do list has 5 to 9 tasks on it. Only 5% of the readers are productive for 3 hours during a 9-to-5 workday as a result of web-related distractions. According to the Procrastination Research Group, based on some figures, it is estimated that as much as 95% of the people are prone to procrastination. Amongst them, 20% of them are chronic procrastinators.

Procrastination is generally defined as avoided tasks or activities that need to be accomplished. Poor time management and procrastination can be a direct result of having unreachable goals, having to meet others’ standards, disorganization or the inability to handle the task. Below are ways to erase daily procrastination in your business.

1. Use the first hour or two of your day to work on things that require your attention or have deadlines. Accomplishing necessary tasks will invigorate you to do more.
2. Inspire yourself with insightful reading. Read at least one business article daily and take action. Try implementing a new idea. Don’t just read about it, but do.
3. Afternoon organization can make the next day easier. Take 15 minutes at the end of each day to think about tomorrow’s priorities. Knowing what needs to be done at the beginning of each day gives you focus and direction.
4. Break large projects or tasks into smaller activities and schedule them on your calendar as appointments. Do them in 30-minutes, 1-hour or 3-hour time blocks. You wouldn’t interrupt a scheduled appointment, so don’t allow unnecessary interruptions when working on your projects.
5. Don’t make lofty goals. Be reasonable in your expectations of yourself, your time and your commitments. Overextending yourself can cause you shut down. Be practical and realistic.

It’s always helpful to identify the source of your procrastination. Take some time to think about why you are putting things off and then try one of the above techniques. Procrastination can really be a struggle and challenge for small business owners, especially when they are simply overwhelmed and unsure of their next move. Take it one step at a time and be conscious of your actions AND inaction.

A.Michelle Blakeley is the Founder and CEO of Simplicity, Inc.; a progressive small business development firm. She manages her clients’ business expectations and prevents information overload via Micro Business Therapy™ and Micro Business Action Plans. She is featured in Forbes.com and the Financial Post as one of 30 Women Entrepreneurs to Follow on Twitter and the host of Simple Truths for Women Entrepreneurs on BlogTalkRadio.com.

Using Microsoft OneNote to Get Organised

I have discovered Microsoft OneNote. It usually only appeared when my printer wasn’t installed properly and a Word document would say Print to OneNote, which I dutifully then changed to my assigned printer. But then one day, I thought: Why not have a look what this programme actually does – apart from taking printing instructions from Word and Excel.

Wow, was I amazed. I suddenly had a really good organising tool at my fingertips. If you’re already using OneNote you’ll know exactly what I mean. If you don’t, let me show you what you can do with it.

In OneNote you create virtual notebooks. Just like a real notebook you can divide it into sections which contain pages. And that’s where the similarities with a real paper-based notebook ends. Because it’s virtual you are not limited to an existing number of sections and you can re-arrange them at your leisure. If you end up with a lot of section you can group sections together (into Section Groups) to form a higher level and you can have sub-pages to create lower levels of more detail if pages aren’t sufficient. And everything can be renamed and rearranged any way you need it.

You can easily copy/paste from any other programme including from web pages, import pictures, videos, sound clips, links, etc. You can take screen clippings which will be referenced where you got them from. You can add hyperlinks to webpages or other files or to somewhere else in the notebook.

You can mark any bit of text with tags like ‘To Do’,  ‘Contact’, ‘Remember for blog’ or whatever else you need, since the tags are also customisable. And you can also link to Outlook and schedule tasks.

That’s the how, now for the why and what for. If you ever needed something really versatile to catch all your ideas, references and random scribblings – OneNote will do the job. And here are just some ideas what you can use this programme for:

• create a wedding planner notebook
• use it for studying multiple topics/subjects
• a hold all for your goal setting
• a project planner
• a notebook to catch your ideas for a book
• a research project
• a moving house log
• the possibilities are endless …

There is a free trial version on the Microsoft website so you can have a play and see if it’s for you. The trial also comes pre-installed on lots of new computers. OneNote is also part of the Office Home & Student package and the Office Ultimate package.

Have some fun and try it out!

A Fun Time Management Technique The Pomodoro

First of all a very Happy New Year to everyone. How did the first couple of weeks of the new decade go for you? Did you do any resolutions and set some good goals? And are you still on track? If not, don’t worry. Simply start over today. You don’t have to wait until the 1st Jan, 2011. You don’t even have to wait until the 1st February this year, not even until next Monday. Simply start over today, now. Put that cigarette down now, start using your diary now, cut down on alcohol and fatty foods from your next meal or do some exercise as soon as you finish work today. Whatever your goal is, keep working towards it. A little bit every single day.

If your goal is time management I found a great little tool on the web recently. It’s called the Pomodoro Technique. The basics are that you use a kitchen timer (the Pomodoro is exactly that, a tomato shaped kitchen timer) and set it for 25 minutes at a time and work on your to do lists.

Here is a little excerpt from their website:

The basic unit of work in the Pomodoro Technique™ can be split in five simple steps:

1. Choose a task to be accomplished
2. Set the Pomodoro to 25 minutes (the Pomodoro is the timer)
3. Work on the task until the Pomodoro rings, then put a check on your sheet of paper
4. Take a short break (5 minutes is OK)
5. Every 4 Pomodoros take a longer break

On the website you can download the workbook as a pdf for free and there are groups to join and Twitters to follow. You can even attend a workshop in Milan – combine a nice break in a beautiful city with some time management training!