Small Business: Rocking Horse Syndrome

Are you constantly feeling busy but not making any progress? Do you know someone that looks busy or appears to work harder than anyone else but never gets a project completed? Work life integration looking like a light at the end of the tunnel? You or they might be experiencing Rocking Horse Syndrome, you know, always in motion but never making progress. As a small business owner, Rocking Horse Syndrome can cost you revenue. Good news, this can be fixed.

Motion Doesn’t Equate Progress

Just because you or someone else is ‘so busy’ doesn’t mean progress is being made. Motion doesn’t equate progress. We often fall into doing pointless or non-value tasks for no reason other than getting distracted. Reading a business book, logo design or some other tasks that aren’t generating revenue are examples of non-value tasks. Simply put, all tasks take time, time equals money.

Prioritizing

Prioritizing tasks takes discipline, identification, and decisions what hierarchy tasks should be ranked based importance. Prioritization can reduce stress and burnout in the workplace. Include both work and personal tasks. This will help you plan your day and find ways for workflow to be more efficient to reach the desired goal. To get off the rocking horse consider the following tips.

Ranking Tasks

Write down and review your list daily. Not all tasks are equal, distinguish between important and urgent task. Ask yourself what the impact is, what is the reward, what happens if the task isn’t completed. Add breaks and exercise time too. Stay away from tasks that bring little to no value to your day. An example of a value-added task is completing a proposal for a client while a non-value task is commuting or working on a logo. Ranking tasks will allow you to pay more attention to those that are value added.

Visualize Your Day

You have identified and ranked. Start adding the tasks to a calendar by setting specific times and durations. You can visually see how your plan is developing, it will be easier to identify any constraints or conflicts. Also, you may find yourself focusing better having a visual cue of each task needing to be completed. You need to visualize your day.

Boundaries

Set boundaries. Setting boundaries early will let people know where they stand and lessen frustration. Learn to say, ‘No.’ Every time you say ‘yes’ you are saying ‘no’ to something else. Don’t be fearful of being mean, ruining relationships or angering people. Boundaries are healthy. Set aside two times a day to respond to non-urgent e-mails and phone calls. Set up an e-mail away message letting people know when you respond to e-mails and calls. This will allow you to work without interruptions and get value added tasks complete. Each interruption can contribute to 15-20 minutes of lost time. Try to be consistent with your boundaries so the lines remain clear. Communication of boundaries is critical if someone is constantly crossing then address it immediately.

Optimize

As business grows you will need to optimize by hire employees and introduce technology. Work doesn’t happen in vacuum so communication with the team and delegating tasks should be a daily routine. Delegating distributes responsibility, syncs goals, and lets team members hone their skills.

Technology can be your friend to streamline the task prioritization process. Apps or software will reduce waste and non-value tasks. Productivity tools have adapted to remote working to make sure you have what you need at your fingertips. Be sure to choose a tool that is key to solve your business’s problems.

Conclusion

To stay off the rocking horse you need to be able to create a daily agenda. This means identify value added tasks, prioritize tasks by importance and urgency, avoiding schedule conflicts, and being realistic. Don’t feel guilty about setting boundaries, they are essential and healthy for you. Optimize your day by using tools, they can help eliminate distractions, track time, and resolve schedule constraints. Remember, spend time working on tasks that make a difference and move you in the right direction.

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