Build Your Profits By Getting Your To-do’s Done

Of course you have a lot to do.  And the more you do in your business, the better your business will be and the more valuable your services are. Right?  Well, not completely.

The actions you take certainly add to your value but not necessarily in the way you think. First, it’s about doing the right things and second, it’s about being confident that the things that you add to your to-do list get done.

Unless you put the right things on your to-do list, AND actually do them, you create a drain on your energy that erodes your confidence and the value you place in yourself and your services.  I know that when I look at the same thing at the top of my to-do list day after day, I start to doubt that I can even do it.  The cycle continues as the doubt creeps in and I find it harder to do other things like pick up the phone and have sales conversations and harder to do the very thing on my to-do list that I promised myself I’d do in the first place.

As you get better at deciding what you really want to do to grow your business and actually doing it, you increase your personal value and the value you have for your clients.

So how do you do it?

To help you decide what to put on your to-do list in the first place I ask myself (and my clients) a series of questions.

• Why do you want to do this?
• Is doing this in line with your vision of where you want your business to go and what you want to be doing?
• Is doing this what’s best for you and your business or is it a distraction?
• Is there something else that would be a better use of your time, energy and money?

Putting things on your to-do list is easy.  Now you have to actually do it.  

Here are three things to do when you find it hard to get yourself going.

• Change your surroundings.  If you normally work in your office go to another room, go to a coffee shop, go to a library.
• Pick one thing to get started on and ask yourself the question “If I only had 15 minutes to do something on this project what could I do?” Set a timer for fifteen minutes and do it.
• Do a brain dump.  Get all of the ideas and steps out of your head and onto a piece of paper.  It will give you clarity and allow you to simplify what you have to do.