Something I get asked all the time is how can I be so productive when I’m running my business round my 2 young daughters – that means working term time only to fit in with my 8 year old and then 2 full days a week when my 2 year old is at pre-school.

This is where you have to be focused and make sure that you get the most out of each day.

As busy mums, we have so much going on in our ‘mum role’ that it can be a full time on its own, so when you’re running a business as well, you need to be focused so that you don’t waste any time – after all, time is a luxury!

Here are the 3 specific strategies I use to help me become the productivity superstar and get loads done:

Have a Business Development Day

This is where you schedule a whole day out of your business to spend on the strategy for your business, or the specific tasks that will take you closer to achieving your long term goals.  This is something that you need to be doing every 6 – 8 weeks if you really want to build a successful business.

You need to remove yourself from the distractions of the day to day running of your business as well as social media, emails and phone calls.  Even try going to a different location so that you are actually taking the time to work on growing your business.

Have a MAD Day

A MAD Day stands for Massive Action Day and is a great tool to use when you need to play catch up.  Even with the best plans and intentions in the world, there are going to be times when you’ve missed deadlines, things have cropped up or you’ve just run out of time.

This is where a MAD Day can come in very useful!

Every 6 – 8 weeks, I schedule a MAD Day so that I can take massive action and blast my way through my to do list and projects that I haven’t had chance to work on.

Treating it the same as a Business Development Day, I remove all distractions of social media and emails.  I make a list of everything that is urgent that have just not happened for one reason or another and I just work my way through the list of things I need to get done.

It’s always a fantastic feeling to actually mark off so many activities.  The name does suggest what happens.  It is a massive action day.  You get through so much.  I do recommend it because it helps to avoid any guilt or overwhelm that you’re feeling, because you’re like, ‘Oh my god, I’ve got so much to do.  I haven’t got time to do it all.’  Have a MAD Day.  Get through it.  Sort that out.

I’ve found that my business has thrived and been more successful as a result of just implementing the Business Development Days and MAD Days.  It hasn’t just stayed the same, it has gone up as a direct result.

Batching Your Time

Batching is a fancy way of saying to group similar tasks together and do them at the same time.

For example, if you have to make some telephone calls, schedule the time to do all the calls in one batch instead of spacing them out throughout the day – this is a fantastic tool for anyone who works with clients over the phone.  Your aim is to get all your calls completed in one go so that it leaves you the rest of the day to work on other things, instead of only having a little bit of time between calls.

Another example is to catch together posting out of parcels to 2 – 3 times per week instead of going every day.  You could also do other errands whilst you’re out at the post office to really make the best use of your time.

These are the 3 strategies I use which have really helped increase my productivity and allow me to get so much done in the limited time I have available.

Your action plan
Now it’s your turn:

  • Schedule your first Business Development Day and MAD Day and create a list of what you want to be working on for each day
  • What activities can you batch together?

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