Stop to Succeed

To make your business more successful, what should you STOP doing?

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Time to stop time being the enemy of you and your business…

Should you be better at managing the time in your business?

Have you ever stopped doing things that don’t matter to free up time in your business?

Stop doing the things in your business that waste time and make time to focus on the business-critical tasks.

Do you and your team lack focus when it comes to managing the time in your business?

How focused are you and your team on managing the time in your business?

How well do you and your team use the finite amount of time you have to work on business-critical tasks?

Let go of the things that don’t matter in your business and climb the ladder of success…

Don’t allow important tasks to put your business at risk…

Time to focus on the things that matter in your business and stop doing everything else…

When you focus on the business-critical tasks in your business you will climb the ladder of success…

Do you have a ‘stop doing’ list in your business, if not why?

Time to make the right changes in your business and focus on the things that matter…

Plan to abandon the things in your business that are holding you back…

Beat the competition by using your business time to focus on critical priorities…

Should you be choosing what NOT to do in your business for success?

What happens to your business when you stop doing unimportant tasks?

Your business is at risk if you do not take the time to write a ‘stop-doing’ list…

How to work out the things to stop doing in your business and be more successful…

Drive the success of your business up by not doing certain things…

Should you be doing ALL the things you do in your business?

What happens when you focus on the mission-critical tasks in your business and ignore the rest?

Stop accepting the status quo in your business and focus on the priorities that bring success…

How can a 19th-century philosopher better help you manage the time in your business?

Why risk the future of your business by not investing in the 80/20 principle?

Free up the right time in the right way in your business with a bit of 80/20 help…

Allocate your time to things that matter by learning from Vilfredo Pareto.

Apply the 80/20 law to your business for time and priority wins…

Give you and your team the gift of time by applying the 80/20 principle to key tasks…

Prioritise right in your business with lessons from an Italian philosopher…

What happens when you give the time in your business the 80/20 treatment?

Delegation not abdication is the key to unlocking time in your business…

Should you be delegating the non-business critical tasks in your business…

Your business is at risk if you do not learn how to use the initiative ladder in your business…

Time to use the initiative ladder in your business…

Climb the ladder of success in your business by getting better at delegating…

Manage the time in your business better with a little initiative…

What happens to the work you do when delegate unimportant tasks?

What happens to the way you manage your time and your team when you master the art of delegation?

Because you want to spend your time focusing on business priorities you need to climb the delegation ladder…

Holidays and deadlines – the answer to how to better manage the time spent in your business?

How do you ensure your team is using the time they have well?

What happens when you create deadlines for the work that needs to be done in your business?

Are holidays the key to getting the best out of your team?

Mission critical work and holidays will mean the time in your business is well spent…

Eliminate time as an issue in your business…

Make time work for you as a business, not against you…

Time – when used right, it’s your greatest business tool…

Should you be using the time you have in your business to deliver the greatest results?

What happens when you apply the right time and the right focus to the priorities of your business?

Don’t allow time to derail the mission-critical task in your business.

Stop blaming time when it comes to the delivery of your business priorities.

Start using time as your greatest business advantage…

LinkedIn Updates

1. Time is the enemy of every manager and business owner – there is just never enough of it. And with the time you have, how do you decide what to do, or more importantly what not to do. Click here to discover that deciding what not to do matters more than anything else…

2. How often do you hear these words in your business:

‘I don’t have enough time’

‘I will do that when I have more time’

Or even ‘I wish I had the time to do that’

Well, here is the thing – you are in control of your time, you and you alone, so how you decide to spend it, is your decision. Click here to discover more.

3. Think of the steps to success in your business as rungs of a ladder, only when you let go of the rung below you can you climb higher. If you stay on that rung then you and your business don’t move forwards. Click here to discover how to climb the ladder of success in your business, by making use of the finite amount of time you have.

4. How do you ensure that your business can adapt, change and be more successful when time always seems to be against you and seems to hold you back from achieving the things you want? Click here to discover how to make time work for you by you choosing what to do and more importantly what not to do…

5. Time is not earned, it just IS, it shows up every day, because of this you, me, everyone takes it for granted in both our personal and business lives. Very rarely do any of us take time seriously or use it wisely but it is your more precious business asset, click here to discover why.

6. Time is not like money – once you have spent it, you can never get it back – so don’t you think it’s worth using wisely? Therefore, it is important to ask this question: How effectively are you using your 480 minutes (8 hours) of every working day? Click here for more…

7. How much time in your business is invested on the little things? Probably more time than you should. And when you look at the completion of these little things, how important are they to your business success? Click here to discover how to focus on the things that matter in your business, by listening to a story about peas.

8. The 80/20 principle can help you shift the focus of your business to focus on the 20% of things that bring in 80% of your desired outcomes and results and to not spend time on the little things that have no effect on the future of your business. Click here to discover more about the Pareto principle and how to use it to great effect in your business.

9. How good are you at delegating work? I know it’s easier to think that if you just get a job done then it’s easier than trying to explain to someone else how to do it, but if you don’t free up time in your business how will you move forwards?

Click here to discover a tried, tested and proven method to successfully free up your time by generating initiative within your team.

10. Delegation – Something that I suspect you know you should do more of, but in reality, probably don’t. But with time against you constantly in your business, how do you free up time to focus on business-critical tasks? The answer is simple, you delegate. Click here to discover that delegation is not abdication and if you want your team to swim not sink you should invest the time in delegating well.

11. When you look around your team and your business, I am sure that everyone looks busy. But are they just busy, being busy or are they focused on the business-critical tasks that will move your business forwards? Click here to discover how to make better use of the time in your business with the right priorities and deadlines.

12. Parkinson’s Law can work against you in your business if your team lacks the knowledge of the business-critical tasks and the focus to achieve them. Click here to discover what Parkinson’s Law is and how to use it in your business to ensure that the time your team spends at work is focused on what really matters.

13. Remember your team gets up and comes to work in the morning to do a good job, but there is little doubt that in your business time will be wasted, so it pays to have a serious, conscientious look at how you and your team use the time available. When you shift the focus to being about what to do to deliver the greatest results and crucially what not to do it helps everyone win just a little, and maybe a lot. Click here for more.

14. Click here for 4 helping hands to enable you and your team to gain control of the time in your business and how it is spent. Don’t allow time to derail the mission-critical tasks that will generate the biggest success.

Facebook Posts

2. How often do you hear these words in your business:

‘I don’t have enough time’

‘I will do that when I have more time’

Or even ‘I wish I had the time to do that’

Well, here is the thing – you are in control of your time, you and you alone, so how you decide to spend it, is your decision. Click here to discover more.

Click here to discover a tried, tested and proven method to successfully free up your time by generating initiative within your team.

Blog Posts

Blog 1 – Your business is at risk if you do not learn to manage the time you have available…

For a business owner or manager, time is often their greatest adversary.

There is never enough of it, and you are always chasing it, wanting more. I am sure you often feel like you could achieve so much more if you only had more time…

Sound familiar?

How many times in your business life, or in your personal life for that matter, have you said something similar to this:

‘Let’s look at this when we have more time.’

‘Can we go through this tomorrow? I should have more time then.’

‘I could do this if I had more time.’

or even, quite simply, ‘I wish I had more time.’

And how often do you get to the end of a working week frustrated that you’ve not been able to achieve what you want for your business, simply because you’ve run out of time?

But here is the thing – time is a finite resource, one which, once it’s spent, you can never get back. It pays to use it wisely.

How you choose to spend the time you have available is totally down to you. You are in control of your time and what you do with it. It might not always feel that way, but how you manage your time is, to a large degree, about your own choices.

So, it’s time to take back control of your time, your team’s time and the time you spend on the things that happen in your business.

There are 8 hours in a typical working day – 480 minutes.

How effectively are you using this time?

Click here to discover the importance of focusing on the business-critical tasks in your business with the finite amount of time you have.

Blog 2 – Your business wins when you stop doing the things that don’t matter…

Think of the different steps to success in your business as a ladder.

Only when you let go of one rung can you climb to the next. If you never let go of the rung you’re on, you are stuck, and your business is not moving forwards. When you let go of the rungs one by one you begin to move up the ladder of success.

This sounds so easy, doesn’t it?

What it means in simple terms is that you have to adapt, change and use the time you have wisely in order to enable your business to grow.

Most of us like the status quo – things stay the same, it’s our safe place, we know where we are and what we are doing – and staying with the status quo ensures that we keep doing those same things over and over again.

This is bad news for your business, as sticking to the status quo can lead to irrelevance and ruin for your business. When your competition adapts and changes and spends time on the right things, they will climb their own ladder to success much faster than you.

Most business owners will blame time for the status quo situation, saying things like ‘Well, we would like to make that change or implement that new technology or hire that new person or take on that new business, but we don’t have the time.’

But you will have time – when you are EFFECTIVE with your time and when you STOP doing the things that are unimportant to your business.

Peter Drucker, author and influential business leader, is also very knowledgeable about the importance of time management to business success.

‘Working on the right things is what makes knowledge work effective. This is not capable of being measured by any of the yardsticks for manual work.’ – Peter Drucker, The Essential Drucker

Drucker talks about optimising your time and the importance of effectiveness, of choosing the right things, the important, goal-focused things, in which to invest your time.

In your business, choosing WHAT you do matters more than HOW you do it and, according to Drucker, choosing what NOT to do matters even more.

Drucker calls this ‘planned abandonment’, or ‘abandoning the behaviours and activities that derail you and lead to activities that are a waste of time and effort and which are not good for your business.’

It sounds like common sense, but it is not common practice.

Do you have a ‘stop doing’ list?

Have you ever written a list of the things that you need to stop doing to achieve the strategic goals and aims of your business?

Click here to learn how to abandon the status quo and climb your ladder of success by writing a ‘STOP doing’ list and a ‘WHAT to focus on’ list in your business.

Blog 3 – Time to stop doing unimportant tasks in your business…

Time is not earned, it just IS, so it is easy for us to take it for granted. This happens in both our personal and business lives.

Very rarely is time taken seriously or used wisely enough, but it is your most precious commodity. When it’s misused, should you be surprised that you don’t get the results you want?

Time is not like money – once you have spent it, you can never get it back – so don’t you think it’s worth using wisely?

Here is an important question: How effectively are you using your 480 minutes (8 hours) of every working day?

Your answers are demonstrated by the quality of life you lead, the success of your business, the sense of pride you feel about the work you and your team do in your business and, on a deeper level, the relationships you have with your family and friends. And let’s not forget health, happiness and wealth – they matter too…

So, think about time again… how effectively do you use it?

If you want more or want better, the first thing you have to do is less.

Tim Ferriss, author of The 4-Hour Work Week, says ‘believe it or not, it is not only possible to accomplish more by doing less, it is mandatory.’

Ferriss says that doing less is mandatory if you want to achieve more.

Using your time effectively means doing the things that get you closer to your goals and stopping the things that take you away from or contribute little or nothing to what you want to achieve.

By identifying the tasks and projects within your business that are no longer yielding significant benefits or aligning with your priorities, you can reallocate your time, energy and resources to more important, business-critical and impactful endeavours.

Choosing what NOT to do matters. The act of intentionally letting go of tasks that are no longer relevant, viable or valuable to your business will help free up time and allow you and the team to focus on the one or two business-critical priorities that truly matter.

Click here to discover how to streamline the focus of your team and optimise the resources and time you have by deliberately abandoning the things that bring no benefit to your business.

Blog 4 – Should you be using the 80/20 principle to better manage the time in your business?

The business world itself, the way you run your own business and the way you plan and manage your time are all unbalanced – not with intent or deliberately, but they are.

How often in your business do you and your team spend time, far too much time, on the little things?

And when you really look at these little things, how important are they to your business’s success?

Let me ask a more direct question:

If you stopped doing those little things, how would that impact your business?

Remember, choosing what NOT to do matters when it comes to freeing up time and improving your business.

The Pareto principle, also known as the 80/20 rule, states that roughly 80% of effects come from 20% of causes. In other words, a small percentage of causes have an outsized effect.

The principle is named after Vilfredo Pareto, an Italian economist who, back in 1895, noticed that 80% of his garden peas came from 20% of the peapods he planted.

This concept is especially important when it comes to analysing how time is spent in your business because it is likely that:

80% of your profits come from 20% of your products, services and customers

80% of your results come from 20% of your time and effort

This basically means that you are wasting 80% of your time on just 20% of your customers, profits and results.

When you identify this in your business, the importance of focusing on the things that deliver maximum returns seems obvious.

When working out what not to do in your business, it’s important to analyse and determine the tasks that will contribute most significantly to the success of your business.

Using the 80/20 principle, identify 20% of tasks that generate 80% of the desired outcomes and results and work out how to do more of them.

Click here to read more about the 80/20 principle and how to use this to manage the time in your business to enable you and your team to focus efforts on the more valuable priorities.

Blog 5 – Delegation is the future of the management of time in your business…

What is the one thing that holds you back from achieving everything you want for your business? You might say it would be the day-to-day work, money, recruitment, outside forces, team, clients, suppliers…

In truth, it is a little of each of these – but they are all the result of one thing: how you manage, or don’t manage, your time.

If you had more time, you could make more money, recruit another person, implement new technology and spend more time with your team, clients and suppliers...

The truth is, you do have the time, you just need to use what you have available more effectively.

You have one key decision to make every day, every week, every month, every year: how to best reduce your use of time.

Peter Drucker, author of The Essential Drucker, points to a big win when it comes to reducing your use of time:

‘Identify which activities on your time log could (should) be done by somebody else, just as well, if not better, than you’.

In other words, delegate jobs which you are currently doing to other members of your team.

But a word of caution – delegation is not just a case of handing over all the work you don’t want to do and running for the hills. Delegation is about training, developing and transferring the work following a tried and tested process.

If you just throw the work over the desk to someone else, this will lead to errors, costing time, money and team dissatisfaction. In the long run, this will be a drain on your business, not a benefit.

Delegation, when done right, is actually more about mentoring, generating time for you and empowering and growing the responsibility of your team.

Click here to read more about how to generate more time in your business to focus on the tasks that really matter by climbing the delegation ladder.

Blog 6 – Parkinson’s Law – the answer on how to manage the time in your business?

How is the time in your business spent?

On the face of it, your team looks busy all the time, but are they just busy being busy or are they focused on completing the mission-critical tasks that will drive greater profits and capital value for your business?

How about asking your team this question:

When are you most productive?

The answer is likely to be:

‘In the days before I go on holiday’ or ‘just before a critical deadline’.

Why is this?

This is because human beings have a tendency to avoid, ignore or disregard anything that is not urgent.

Think about yourself – if you know you have a longer amount of time to complete a certain task, you're going to be much more likely to procrastinate. You'll drag it out, put it off or fiddle around to fill the time instead of buckling down to get the work done.

And if you are over-generous with the time you’ve set aside to complete a particular task, you will rarely, if ever, complete it in a shorter amount of time.

This is known as Parkinson’s Law.

Tim Ferriss, in his book The 4-Hour Work Week, states ‘Parkinson’s Law dictates that a task will swell in perceived importance and complexity in relation to the time allocated for its completion.’

Put simply, your team (or you) expands the work to fill the time. Most people do this subconsciously. However, some do it consciously and, if you have team members who do it, you know who they are.

Parkinson’s Law has implications for your business when it comes to productivity, effectiveness and how you all use your time.

Here are a few short ideas on how to address Parkinson’s Law in your business:

Time allocation: Set shorter, more realistic deadlines for the mission-critical tasks in your business.

Establish business-critical priorities: Ensure your team are working to deadlines on the most important priorities of your business so that you are confident that time is not wasted on unimportant tasks.

Track the deadlines: If a business project has multiple deadlines, track the achievement/completion of these mini-deadlines with the team, ensuring buy-in and focus.

Don’t over-commit: Agree with the team on the right timeline for the work being done, be mindful of the amount of work and ensure the deadlines are achievable. If your team is under increased pressure and stress due to unrealistic deadlines, they will not produce their best work and their long-term health and motivation will be affected.

Parkinson’s Law, when used correctly, can be very helpful in setting strategic goals for your business and can foster togetherness and camaraderie within your team. It can also ensure that time is better managed, productivity increases, tasks are completed on time and you have a happier, more motivated, team.

Click here to discover more about Parkinson’s Law and how to use it in your business to ensure time is spent focused on the right tasks.

Blog 7 – Make better use of the finite amount of time you have in your business.

In your business, time is your most precious resource.

How you and your team spend it and what you do with it is down to you.

There are 480 minutes in an 8-hour working day. Do you make the most of these 480 minutes?

Remember, you have a hardworking team who are striving for success. No one gets up in the morning wanting to fail. Most people want each and every day to be a success and most people work hard at trying to make that happen.

However, it is a hard fact that in most businesses, no matter how small or large, time is not spent effectively. In some cases, a great deal of time is wasted on things that aren’t actually business-critical.

A serious, conscientious look at how you and your team use the time available helps everyone win just a little, and maybe a lot.

Here are 4 helping hands to help you make better use of the precious and finite amount of time you have:

1. Acknowledge that you (your team, all of us, really) are wasting time that could be put to better use. Peter Drucker suggests that as much as 25% of your time is currently spent doing things that don’t need to be done.

2. Identify the 20% of things that waste 80% of your time and energy. Root out the things that either don’t benefit you at all or which only have a marginal benefit to your business – you will then start to see the ways and means to free up chunks of time.

3. Work out how to stop spending time on these marginal tasks. Once you identify the tasks that are of little or no business benefit, you and your team will be able to plan a process that stops these things happening.

4. Use your newly freed-up chunks of time for the things that bring the most benefit to your business. Look at the 20% of jobs that deliver 80% of your returns and work out how to do more of them. Be mindful of Parkinson’s Law and attach processes, tracking and deadlines to one or two (no more) business-critical priorities.

Addressing the time challenges in your business is not easy. It requires discipline from you and the team, clarity on the strategies and priorities, planning, uninterrupted time and focus and a commitment to the deadlines. But what is clear is that time can either sink your business or it can allow your business to fly. Which one is it going to be?

Click here to discover the importance of having a deep, close, serious and brutal look at your use of time across your business and how using it wisely will bring substantial wins.

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