Being a salon owner is hard work at the best of times, your days will be filled with stress and you may feel exhausted and swamped by a sea of work that doesn’t end when you get home.
Table of Contents
If this sounds all too familiar then continue reading to see how these 5 simple time management ideas can help to create some free time in your work and social life.
We are in the day and age now where being glued to your mobile, Ipad and computer is just the norm. If you aren’t writing Facebook statuses, your snapchatting your dinner or tweeting about what is on the telly. But our brains are not wired to be on the go all the time on these electronic devices, we need downtime to replenish our energy and come up with new ideas. We as a society graze on our mobile devices all day long whether we are being productive or not and we can waste a lot of time reading through celeb tweets or catching up on the latest gossip.
By the time you come to do some proper work to help your salon advance, you are exhausted with strained eyes and a tired brain.
To help out with our electronics based obsession we must learn to shut them off and use them for productivity at appropriate times of the day rather than 24 hour grazing.
Pick times of the day where you can only work on Salon ideas such as new Facebook posts for your company’s page or answering emails. Set yourself targets to achieve and a time limit and do not get distracted, once you feel tired take an appropriate break to refresh.
Also limit your time on them in the evening when you are trying to enjoy your down time.
No matter who you are you will always try to multi task when you shouldn’t, for example eating lunch whilst trying to answer emails. Something will go wrong such as your lunch down your clothes or sending non-coherent emails whilst swapping between typing and cutting up your food.
I can guarantee that no matter who you are, you can always stop what you’re doing for 10 minutes whilst you carry out another task such as eating lunch or grabbing a coffee. These important breaks will keep you going and are a necessity in your day.
Changing from one task to another is a big no-no. By trying to carry out multiple tasks at once by hop scotching back and forth can increase the time it would take you to carry out all the tasks by 40%.
Instead of helping us get ahead in our work, multi-tasking actually slows us down. Start with a To-Do list, prioritise your list and crack on from the first till you finish. At most you will feel less irritated and lost than when you skip back and forth between tasks and you won’t have to remember where you left off thus reducing some of your daily stress.
We are all guilty of cracking on at the job in hand and losing all sense of time in your day, before you know it the suns setting and your still only half way through the task you set yourself that day. You think back to all the times you got interrupted and lead away from your task but ultimately wonder where on earth your day has disappeared too.
Being more aware of time can increase your productivity and focus as you are determined to get your task done by a certain time. I bet the day before your holiday from work was spent in front of a computer being the most focused and productive you have been all year…because you have a time limit. You want to get everything done before you head off so it is essential to keep track of your time to make sure you complete your tasks.
Research shows that if we are aware of time then we are considerably more productive. I find by setting myself a task and putting a time limit on said task and marking it with an alarm on my phone then I commit to completing my task in the time limit almost as if it is a challenge. It will also make sure that you keep an eye on time so that you remember to eat and take breaks and most importantly, leave work on time!
It is easy to try and be the helpful boss who is determined to make your staff happy. I’m sure more than once you have agreed to let your staff have time off when it really isn’t possible and you stay behind for hours re-arranging appointment books and calling clients. Not to mention the time spent covering the hours they are missing by using your own free time to help them out.
I’ll let you in on a secret…It is okay to say no. You don’t need to be unfair or unkind when doing so, just explain the situation using the reasons behind your decision. Using the word ‘because’ in your point is seen as more rational and acceptable, for example, explain to your staff that they can’t have next week off because….
Do you have difficulty starting a project that has been filling you with dread whether it is the difficulty or the size of the task?
If you have no time line then try setting aside 20 minutes a day to tackle the task as it will seem less daunting if you only give yourself 20 minute slots. If you do have a time limit then start the task early, if your task doesn’t start until the following week or month then give yourself a head start. Put aside small amounts of time in the day to get started on the task so when the real work begins you will feel less stressed as you have already started it and hopefully put a small dent into your work load.
Small changes to your day will make a big difference in the long run.
