How do you feel at the end of most workdays? Do you find yourself stressed and exhausted, feeling as if you have worked hard all day, yet you don’t feel as if you have been very productive? Emails and texts never stop, purchasing challenges are constant and you feel as if your creative excitement has disappeared. How realistic is it for entrepreneurs to demand that their work and life are always balanced 50/50? What if that work-life “balance” is just not possible and you are setting yourself up for failure and frustration? In this article, we won’t try to create a work-life balance that can’t be achieved—instead, we’ll work on a shift that makes your time more valuable, and your identity more intertwined with your purpose than your raw output.
Identify where your time is going
Many people feel as if they’ve been running all day, yet they aren’t sure where the time has gone. As in so many areas of life, you can’t fix what you don’t measure. Set a goal to track every 30 minutes for one week. Put all activities into one of the following categories:
- High-Value: Design concept, client closing, vision planning, mentoring team.
- Low-Value/Admin: Email, bookkeeping, sourcing without specific intent, making phone calls to chase late invoices.
- Personal: Family, sleep, exercise, creative hobbies.
Then apply the 80/20 time principle. Identify the 80% of the Low-Value/Admin tasks that consume 80% of your energy. The solution then becomes that you must either Eliminate, Automate, or Delegate every task that falls into the Low-Value/Admin category. This process is the only way to free up time for rest and high-value work.
Sacred Non-Negotiables
This process is about setting firm, client-facing boundaries that protect your well-being. And this is often hard for many designers to address and then take action on. Yet if you do this, you will not only be more likely to rediscover your enjoyment of the business, but you will also have clients who respect you and the professionalism of your firm.
End-of-Day-Ritual
Clearly define a consistent time to stop working by using a physical ritual, such as closing your laptop, putting away/silencing your phone, or changing into a more comfortable outfit, to indicate the transition.
The Client Communication Contract
Establish firm boundaries on when you reply, and how quickly, and share them verbally and in writing.
To reinforce this boundary, use auto-responders that clearly state your operating hours and set the expectation that you will respond during business hours only. It is then up to you to stick to these boundaries if you expect your clients to do so. If you want your nights and weekends to yourself, you’ll need to stick to your guns.
Batching
Dedicate two specific blocks per day solely to responding to emails. This way, your clients and industry partners know when they can expect a reply, and you are not living in your inbox or worrying about how quickly you’re responding.
Time Blocking
In “batching” above, you identified specific blocks of the day to respond to emails and set boundaries as to when business opens and closes. It is also important to incorporate family and personal blocks of time as you set your calendar. As Stephen Covey states, “The key is not to prioritize what’s on your schedule, but to schedule your priorities.” If you let the day control you, then you are much more likely to be controlled by OPP – “other people’s priorities”. That is what usually leads to a feeling of frustration and lack of accomplishment at the end of the day. So, take control of your calendar and schedule your priorities to be more productive in your business and your personal life, and encourage your team to do the same.
Physical Space Boundaries
If you work from home, then design a physical “commute” or dedicated zone. Your “office” should be physically separated (if at all possible) from the “home” space to allow your mind to disconnect. Even if that is a corner of a room, treat it as if it were outside your home and use it strictly as your office, and only use it during office hours. Use the transition approach above to signal the end of your working day by closing your laptop, cleaning off your desk, closing/silencing your phone, etc. You might even have a decorative screen you use that closes off that area during work or closing hours.
Buying Back Your Time – The Delegation Dividend
One of the common causes of burnout is trying to do every task yourself. Be willing to let go of total control and trust the team that you’ve hired. Remember that if you identify tasks that you can delegate, it allows you to focus on the parts of the business that you love and are good at.
- Identify the First Delegate: Review the Time Audit and identify which of your Low-Value/Admin tasks can be immediately delegated.
- The “Two-Minute Rule”: If a task will take two minutes or less, then do it now. If it takes longer, then you need to schedule it. Or if it is repetitive, document it into an SOP (standard operating procedure) and delegate it.
- The Value of Investment: Rather than costs, view salaries or independent contractor fees as investments in your time and health. By delegating a $20 or $30 per hour task, you are free to concentrate on earning $200+/hour – thus creating a huge return on your investment to delegate.
Taking Time to Recharge
To quote motivational speaker Sam Glenn, “Sometimes the best solution is to rest, relax and recharge. It’s hard to be your best on empty.” Just as it is important to invest in delegation, it is also important to invest in time to recharge—both for you and your team. However, a common problem for many business leaders is putting this advice into practice and turning it into a habit.
Recharging can involve taking care of your physical, mental, emotional, and/or spiritual health. With this in mind, block out time for a daily “recharge”—a walk in nature, a meditation break, a bike ride, or anything that gives you a reset—but take a break during the day that distances you from work and gives your mind and body a chance to reinvigorate. Growing evidence suggests that taking regular breaks from mental tasks actually improves creativity and productivity. Incorporate the idea of a daily recharge into the culture of your firm and watch productivity and energy soar!
Designing an Extraordinary Life
- Key action steps: Audit your time, set non-negotiable boundaries, strategic delegation, and take time to recharge. Rather than simply creating balance, you are creating a design for a sustainable, joy-filled and profitable career.
- Long-Term: Don’t forget that high-level success is not a sprint but rather a marathon. Burnout is the biggest threat to that goal.
Remember that you are the primary client for your firm. So, apply the same creativity you provide to your clients toward designing your own extraordinary life.