Time is money, but unfortunately, not every business owner takes this saying seriously. Every hour you and your staff spend on your business must add value to your business. Thus, it makes a lot of sense to optimise how your company spends that time fully.
Time management, however, is easier said than done. For instance, only 20% of an average workday is spent on essential things, while 80% of it is spent on – you guessed it, time wasters. To solve this, it is best to identify the time wasters in your workday and find a solution to reduce them to get more things done.
It is also essential to know that there are ‘time wasters’ that are only applied to you. As the business owner, you play the most valuable role, so your time and skills must be spent wisely. This means your time is better off doing something most important, while you can allocate other repetitive or administrative tasks to a professional and highly skilled virtual assistant.
For example, suppose you are in the Australian mortgage and finance industry and working as a mortgage broker . In that case, it may be wise that you delegate and offload the time-consuming tasks to a highly skilled virtual assistant who has specific knowledge in helping you do your day-to-day tasks, such as data entry to broker’s CRM (Connective, Mercury, ApplyOnline, Podium, Symmetry, AdviserLogic, COIN, etc.), as well as knows how to communicate with clients, patiently wait in the long queue for the BDMs to answer the calls, conduct lender research, prepare servicing calculator, etc.
Here is a step-by-step guide on how to reduce or stop your business’s time wasters to get more things done:
Distinguish the common time wasters in your business
Off the top of your head, you probably know what these are. These are obvious time wasters in your business, such as daily meetings, internal emails and micromanaging your staff. According to research, about 40% of staff time is wasted on reading internal emails – that’s a lot. Do you really need to update your internal staff this way?
Another time waster, if you have staff to manage, is micromanaging employees. This is when you try to control every tiny detail of your business. You might be the person who asks for frequent updates or prefers to be cc’d on every email. Or maybe you focus too much on unimportant details. Micromanaging does more damage to your business as it discourages independent decision making by employees and leaves no room for creativity and initiative.
Point out the less-popular time wasters
These things make you less productive, but you often don’t notice. This could be sending emails back and forth, which can be solved by just picking up the phone and talking to that person. This could also be the ambiance of an office. Is your office too open that you hear every little thing that happens in it that you can’t focus on your work?
Another example is taking breaks, which is beneficial as it avoids the feeling of burnout and fatigue. However, it can also derail you from work. Another overlooked time waster is decision fatigue. This refers to exhaustion from making unimportant decisions that could affect making impactful decisions. This is the reason why Mark Zuckerberg wears the same shirt colour every day – this leads to fewer decisions he has to make in a day.
Gather data from your time wasters
This is the time to track the time you and your staff spent in the office. Although it might be impossible to track everything, there are software or apps that can help you, such as RescueTime, time-tracking software, and Toggl, project management software. Another way to get more information is to conduct an anonymous employee survey to determine which time waster is more impactful on their tasks.
Use Alternative Solutions to Stop Wasting Time
Once you’ve compiled the list of top time wasters, it’s time to examine them. You may want to ask yourself the following questions:
Is it possible to avoid or even stop this time waster?
Social media are a distraction at work and can be avoided or even be stopped with a website blocker. You may also encourage your staff to use the Pomodoro Technique, in which one works non-stop for 25 minutes, followed by a 10-minute break.
Is it possible to reschedule?
An example is a weekly meeting. Could it be turned into a once-a-month meeting?
Is it better to delegate this specific task?
There are essential tasks that are beneficial to the business which can be time consuming and frustrating but must be done. These are repetitive admin tasks and/or part of the entire process that can be delegated to a highly competent virtual assistant.
Conducting the above steps might take some time, but imagine the time you can save and be productive instead.
Only a Highly Skilled Virtual Assistant for Your Repetitive Tasks and Time Wasters
Whether you are an employee working for a large organisation, a business owner managing a medium/small company or a self-employed working from home, you can reduce time wasters and get more things done by leveraging and maximising the use of highly specialised and professional virtual assistants.
Like any other businesses or if you are in the Australian financial planning industry and working as a financial planner, you’ll need a highly experienced and tailored-fit virtual assistant who is knowledgeable in navigating software, such as XPlan, Zoho, WealthSolver and XTools (CALMS). These highly specialised virtual assistants also know how to manage SOAs, coordinate and speak with other insurer brokers, monitor review dates for insurance and even organise meetings and appointments, if needed.
Your ‘time wasters’ are better off done by a virtual assistant you can trust and rely on, a person who’s fit to your highly special and specific needs. And that’s where Virtual Office Angels comes in.
Why Work with Virtual Office Angels
Established in 2010, Virtual Office Angels P/L is a boutique Sydney-based VA outsourcing company that specialises solely in the recruitment and management of only highly skilled virtual assistants (VAs) from the Philippines. With our combined 45-year work experience in the Australian human resources and recruitment management industry, we can help you work less, earn more and grow your business faster in the most cost-effective manner. As one of our clients said, ‘Same quality, fraction of the costs.’ More importantly, we specialise in the search and matching of highly professional virtual assistants for your special needs who can minimise, if not eliminate, time wasters for you and your business.