As business owners, we are told to work ON our business, not IN it.

It's just really hard to do this without a system in place to do it.

When you work IN your business, you are doing all the daily tasks - such as answering phones, dealing with mail or emails from customers, dealing with complaints and sales, as well as the admin part of your business - invoicing, paying bills, banking, making decisions, or even just being out "on the tools".

So many things to do and never enough time to do it.  The days are short and the "to do" list is ever growing, right?

When you work ON your business, you look to figure out how to delegate some of these tasks, so you are not the only one working on the business.  You might get rid of some of the easier tasks that can be handed over.  But how do you trust someone else to do the same job as you?  Training and procedures (boring!).  Trust me - there's been a lot of resistance to procedures in my business over the years.  But now that most of what was in my head is out, I am able to see that the staff can do a job as good as me.

A written procedure can be boring... but what about a screen recording of what you are doing?  Will that be easier?  There are plenty of tools you can use to record yourself as you go through your daily tasks.  Yes, there will still be questions, but once your replacement knows what to do, questions will reduce significantly.  Save these videos and have a reference library to where they are all saved, and leave the boring tasks for someone else.

Then what?  Once you have freed up your time, you can spend more time learning how to improve your business and invest that time by making your business run easier.

Things like setting a budget (!), reviewing your finances including pricing, working to develop partnerships or new ways to sell your products...  there's lots to do.  Or - just have a break and work less hours.  When you come into work next, you are less overwhelmed and its easier to make decisions.

What steps can you take to free up some time to work on your business?