5 Time Saving Tips For a Small Business Owner

Show:

June 29, 2022 Business

It is a great mistake to believe that a small business requires less effort and time. As a rule, in large companies most of the processes are automated, but what should the owners of small firms do? Installing CRM systems can be quite expensive, and frankly speaking, it will not always bring a sufficiently effective result if we talk about a staff of several people.

Saving time is just as important for a businessman as high profit margins. But optimizing your time is not so easy. The life of an entrepreneur even if you own a small business is constant negotiations, viewing reports, meetings, planning for the future. Naturally, when the schedule is so loaded that there is no time even for a full sleep, it is worth thinking about the correct optimization of time. Time optimization has taken a stable place in our everyday life. We regularly order food or even clothes delivery instead of going to the market and would rather choose this online service than visiting a photo studio.

In this article, we will talk about five ways to save time for a small business owner. But first, it’s strongly recommended to remember Pareto principle while being overloaded with tasks. Only 20% of efforts will bring you 80% of the result. You have to prioritize your business issues

Create effective daily schedule

The best way to save time is to start monitoring it. To do this, you can start a diary and record all past and upcoming events. Based on this information, you will be able to understand what is really important to you and what is wasting time, and give up some habits. So, for example, you can trace that instead of, as you think, 30 minutes for lunch, you spend 50 simply because you scroll through the social nets feed and get distracted. Or for example, you use irrational solutions that should be replaced with more modern ones. For example, personal control of employees instead of using CRM systems that allow you to remotely monitor the activities of each employee, evaluate its effectiveness and set tasks. The daily routine will bring discipline into your life, which will have a good effect on the respect for you from partners and competitors. Punctuality will be positively appreciated by any partner and will know that you are fulfilling your promises on time. You can also schedule your next day in the evening, so in the morning you will be more aware of your workload and your tasks will be distributed without the usual morning rush.

Various apps can help you with this, for example Any.do. The difference of this application is the most simple interface, due to which it can be called one of the best time management apps. In the program, you can plan the day literally by the minute: create tasks, set reminders for them, deadlines and priorities. The data is synchronized in real time with the device’s calendar, Facebook events and any other calendar applications. And to keep things always in front of your eyes, you can use the widget for the home screen.

You may also consider investing in a time-tracking app. This will allow you to keep track of your day and identify any problems that may be causing delays. Using a GPS time clock in app, you can easily track working hours for payroll purposes and make sure that employees are clocking in and out on time. These apps also provide detailed insights and reports about the time spent on different activities which can help you adjust and manage your daily routine better.

Delegate authority

Yes, you can be a jack-of-all-trades, at the same time a professional in the field of design and an excellent engineer, plus a competent physicist, but some duties are better performed by hired workers. To save your time and at the same time increase the efficiency of management, you can delegate part of your authority. A simple option is to hire an assistant who will do routine work, for example: call up with partners, organize meetings, arrange papers and small things that take a couple of minutes individually, and an hour together, if not more.

A more complicated option is the distribution of their powers to the staff. In this case, they will do your main job, while you will be an official representative. Simply put, you will meet with partners, attend events, while people with experience and education will take over the entire routine of organizing the workflow.

Learn

Knowledge is your main weapon in the competition. The more you know about your business, about technologies and employees, the better you understand everything related to your company, the faster you will do your job. As an example, you might not be able to use professional software, or you used a small part of its functionality and spent an hour on one task. Having studied the capabilities of the software, you can reduce this time by half, or even three times. Also, don’t forget about progress. For example, engineers used to draw projects on whatmans, which took a lot of time. Now they use special systems where the same work can be done not only for minutes, even hours faster. Do not hesitate to study someone else’s experience. If, of course, you do not mine ore on asteroids, then be sure: somebody has already been engaged in a similar business, which means that there are developments that will allow you to optimize the workflow and build it so that it works quickly and efficiently.

The easiest ways will be to use apps such as DuoLingo for example, which will help you to learn foreign languages in the funny and memorable way, TED app to learn about new innovative ideas or edX to take best universities’ courses online.

Give up the insignificant

By insignificant we mean some people, habits, as well as transactions. Learn to say “no” to those who do not deserve the time spent. Stop taking orders that do not bring you income and are fulfilled because of some ridiculous obligations, for example, because you have known the customer for a long time. Of course, if you’ve just started a business, you’ll have to take on any job, no matter how cheap it is, but over time it’s better to get rid of the customers who stop you.

Stop being an idealist

Striving for the ideal takes a lot of time, and there is practically no benefit. As an example, you make very high-quality furniture, but it takes a month to produce each thing. If you stop chasing the ideal and doing just fine, then the time will be halved. It takes most of the time to finalize minor details. And for the end user, there will be no difference between high-quality and ideal (in your opinion) furniture, but you will save time and, which is also important, increase profits. But there should be a limit to everything, and it’s not worth lowering the quality significantly below the current one, otherwise you risk losing customers. Remember, good quality is better than ideal both for you (reducing the cost of time and money) and for the consumer (almost as good as ideal products at a lower price).

You can use one of the variety of mobile apps helping to manage your time or read business literature on this topic. Of course at first it will take some time – to build a completely new working scheme but be sure that in the nearest future it will bring you numerous benefits and will make your business more effective and resultative.