Amazing Time Saving Tips To Try Right Now!
It can be difficult to manage you time as an Early Childhood business owner/manager while balancing the demands of running your school, play cafe, enrichment program or other EC business, while spending time with your family, and taking care of yourself.
If you're able to successfully manage your daily tasks, you can focus on what really counts — your team, the families you serve, and creating a time+freedom lifestyle for yourself. On the other hand, if you're constantly struggling with time management and don't have the support necessary to make the most of your day, you may end up feeling overwhelmed and not able to operate a successful EC business.
Today I hope to provide solutions with practical tips and strategies for saving time and streamlining processes, as well as tools to help you operate your Early Childhood business more efficiently. We discuss these 3 Amazing Time Saving Strategies:
Planning out your ideal week based on your quarterly goals.
Creating a start up and shut down plan that you can stick to.
The best ways to ask for help when needed.
My Big A-HA Moment
It was on my oldest, Kennedy was in elementary school. I had recently left Kindercare and was operating my first 2 EC businesses, Peake Academy boutique preschools and Play Boutique an indoor family play cafe. I was completely overwhelmed trying to do all the things. But at the time there was no way we could afford a nanny or extra help with my kids. And even if we could I wouldn’t allow it. That was the whole reason I left the corporate world. Because I never had time for my girls. The whole reason for starting my own business was so I could have more time for them. But I only recreated that overwhelm of no time and I also added the stress of having to now be financially responsible for everything. That was one stress I didn’t have working for someone else.
My goal was to be done by 3:30 so I could meet her at home when she got off the bus at 4pm. When she was in first grade she wasn’t old enough to be home alone. Every day was a constent struggle to leave my preschool or playcafe in order to be home on time. Looking back now I can feel that stress, it was piercing.
I was lucky enough to have the most amazing neighbors who were usually always there and waited the extra 10 minutes for me to roll in late. But it wasn’t until Kennedy mentioned something really simple about those moms being there for her. Now, she probably doesn’t remember this today and looking back on it now, it probably wasn’t as powerful as I thought it to be in that moment, but it hit me hard.
In that moment, I was doing everything in my power to make sure other peoples children were well cared for and put first at the expense of my own daughter. It was then that I realized I had to clean up my act! I had to get organized and figure out a better time management process that would allow me to make sure my daughter felt and knew that I was there for her.
Planning out your ideal week based on your quarterly goals.
I want to make sure you understand one thing. Ideal weeks are just that. They are Ideal. These Ideal weeks will not happen every single week. Your Ideal week is a template to follow as closely as possible while understanding things do come up, you'll never be able to execute it perfectly every week, and that's okay. I don't even know if I've ever had a perfect week with my ideal week; however, without it I would be a mess. It is a guide I use to navigate through those small daily fires. I can see what needs to be done and what might need to be moved to next week if one of those fires have to become a priority.
A weekly planning routine will ensure you no longer wake up in a fog but instead feel a sense of purpose and momentum in your life and your business. When you adhere to a weekly planning routine like this, you’ll experience more clarity and productivity. With this as a part of your morning ritual, you’ll begin every day focussed on the important things and on task so you don’t get distracted with work that doesn’t move your goals forward. This weekly planning tool will help you establish a daily routine that will pull together all the elements we have worked through so far.
I go into far more detail with you about the weekly and daily planning process I use in our Time+Freedom Planner. We begin with what we call the Weekly Strategy Sheets. You how all to plan your best year yet with our Work+Life Bundle.
Creating a start up and shut down plan that you can stick to.
This may seem super simple and unimportant. However, do you have very specific things you do before you start work and very specific things you do when you wrap up work?
When I find a system that really works and I stick with it, that's when I know I'm in the zone because I too struggle with consistency just like everybody else. But this has been something that has worked for me. They allow me to start my day off, right. They allow me to end my day in a way that feels good to me and I feel like I have more clarity, I can knock certain tasks out and ultimately increase productivity in my EC businesses.
So what you want to do is block off 10-20. It may feel a little difficult at first to find even 10 extra minutes a day. I get it! I started small in the beginning. I just forced myself to do something just to get into the routine. Now I do 30 minutes. For me, 20-30 minutes is the zone that works for me. I enjoy them now and look forward to these rituals. They are part of my self care. You will figure out what works best for you.
There are many different things that could start or end the work portion of your day. You could do something like visualizing your day. Take five minutes, set an alarm, and visualize the kind of day you want have. You can review your mantras, you can answer emails and text messages, you can check Trello, you can check Slack, you can review your calendar, review your big three in your ideal week plan, set appointments and alarms. These are all the different things you could do.
The best ways to ask for help when needed.
Asking for help can be one of the most difficult things we as proud EC business owners and managers can do. It can seem overwhelming just figuring out where to start. So lets start with a few simple ways you can get the extra support you probably need to eliminate some of that overwhelm and free up more time.
Look at outsourcing. Outsourcing specific tasks can be an effective way to free up time and focus on more important responsibilities. Outsourcing refers to hiring an external company or individual to handle certain tasks or functions that are typically done in-house.
Examples of tasks that can easily be outsourced include:
Bookkeeping and accounting tasks, such as maintaining financial records and preparing financial reports, can be outsourced to a professional bookkeeping service or an accountant.
Marketing and advertising tasks, such as creating and managing social media campaigns and designing marketing materials, can be outsourced to a marketing agency or a freelance marketer.
IT tasks, such as setting up and maintaining computer systems and networks, can be outsourced to an IT service provider.
Administrative tasks, such as scheduling appointments, tours, handling phone calls, and payroll processes, can be outsourced to a virtual assistant.
Cleaning and maintenance tasks, such as cleaning and upkeep of the facilities can be outsourced to a cleaning company.
Another great way to add more support and save time is finding quality interns or volunteers to help with day-to-day operations. Interns and volunteers are a great resource for easing the workload and freeing up valuable time. These individuals can take on a variety of tasks, such as classroom management, lesson planning, cafe management, and administrative duties, which can help to alleviate the workload for you.
By implementing some of these time-saving tips you can free up more time for yourself, your most important tasks and goals, and your personal well-being. There are many things happening throughout our days that create chaos and add to our overwhelm. But having systems in place to manage and clear the chaos is the key to clarity and success. When a system is set in place and followed will help you create more time freedom. Remember, small changes can make a big difference, so start by taking one step at a time.
Resources
Be sure to check out and download our FREE resource to help guide you in Planning Your Ideal Week.
Work + Life Planning Bundle
This Work+Life Planning Strategy Bundle helps you Reduce Chaos, Break Free From Overwhelm & Take Back Hours Of Your Time every single week!