Work It Wednesday ~ Today is the day of the week we put our head down and focus on getting a lot done. It is also the day where you can find yourself hitting the slow down in your motivation and your focus can be distracted easily. Power through it! Keep focused on crossing a lot off with your Finish It Friday and your personal reward in sight at all times!
Staying Focused Can Be A Challenge…
As business owners, Small Business – Home Based Business – Network Marketers, staying focused can be a challenge. When we go into business for ourselves we still have life going on around us. When you become your own boss, you are thought to have a more flexible schedule than those with a traditional job/career in your circles (family and friends). As much as that is true it is false at the same time. Though you do not have a boss, office manager or corporate America telling what to do and when to do it, you actually have MORE responsibility. The weight of success vs failure solely rests on your shoulders along with all of your other responsibilities in life – they are all distractions you can easily get absorbed into and loose focus on YOUR BUSINESS.
Distractions you might get lost in are… family, “having a fun day”, phone calls, cleaning, paying bills, running errands, television, visitors/guests, kid’s school, and more!
We all went into business for our own reasons. These reasons are important to us and to our families. We have to remember without focus and discipline in getting “work” things done, our success will hang in the balance. Focus and discipline is easy when we work for someone else because we are held accountable on our tasks and responsibilities on a daily manner – but working for ourselves with no one looking over our shoulder it is harder to be accountable to what HAS to get done.
Staying Focused…
Stay Focused!
- You have your WHY – the reason you wanted to be your own boss. What is that? Is it worth you being focused everyday? Be sure to have a visual of that WHY where you can see it. Create a collage of images, maybe it is family, traveling, free time, no boss and so on – what every it is have a visual reminder where you can see it in your workspace. I also suggest keeping a visual copy on the front of your time management tool – like your Tickler File.
- You have to set “work hours”. You need time you can count of being “focused”. This needs to be shared with your family, friends, down line, team and if you are like me in a service providing career with your clients/customers. If you have small children you are responsible for working from home this is a bit more flexible with them but everyone else should be able to respect those as they would any other place of business.
- Don’t kid yourself, having your own business and being your own boss – you have a JOB – you are just running the show and make up the rules! Staying focused is even more important now than ever. You and your family along with your business rely on you. This is where discipline and focus is so important. In the beginning while you are still building your business foundation, you might have to make personal sacrifices and miss out on things so that you are setting up for success. Determination!
- Time management/Structure – having a clear layout of time allotted for certain tasks is a MUST like Social Media – set aside like 30 mins a day, emails – set aside 30 mins in the morning and 30 mins at the close of the day to check and follow up on emails, call returns – pick a time of the day you can sit down and just focus on calls you need to make. Having time specifically ear-marked for tasks that can be time sucks allows you to be focused and get them done! Get them Crossed Off your daily todos! When you get things done you are motivated to do MORE! Keep milestones for daily activities – monthly achievements – annual goals
- If you find that you are spending too much time on doing non-productive tasks – delegate them. Find a VA service like VA-a-GoGo or a team member that can take over doing those tasks and stay focused on the tasks only YOU can do in building your business. Things like training a new recruit, following up on new downline, keeping your database up to date, formatting and sending your newsletter, setting up your appointments and so on…. there are several tasks you can get help with that take too much of your focus off of building your business foundation. This is true for ANY business!
- Be sure to reward yourself as you focus and reach your milestones, achievements, goals. Even the smallest job well done IS A JOB WELL DONE! Celebrate it. Reward yourself and remember to set rewards that the family can enjoy with you at times – they are in in it too!
Finding and Keeping a Balance While Staying Focused!
It is hard to always be focused on your business. When you make the rules it is hard to hold yourself accountable. Keeping a balance between work and the freedom you wanted and became your own boss for is tough. It is so easy to say “I’ll do it later” and then take off to play – on the flip side it is so easy to stay so buried in your business that you never take off to play… How do you keep focused on your business and still have a balance between life and work?
Be sure to focus on the right stuff! Is it the money that is your focus? Is it your family that is your focus? Is it the prestige that is your focus? Is it the I Can Do It How I Want To Do It you are focused on? Is it the freedom you are focused on? To be honest is should not be any ONE of these – your focus should be the combination of ALL of these. With a well rounded why and focus, you can build a structure that can support achieving all of these in your life. The key to keeping balance while staying focused is a clean structure to how you do things. Be organized. Take it serious. Take pride in what you do. Your focus will be where it needs to be following a structure.