What’s a Squirrel got to do with focus and productivity?
Have you ever watched a squirrel?
They barely stay still for more than a few minutes. They dart off here and there searching for food. They constantly scan their environment for anything that might have changed. Any sign of movement and they scamper off. They very willingly explore anything new.
Can you see where I’m going with this? 🙂
Business Owners can be very Squirrel like
When you run your own business it’s very easy to behave like a squirrel and dart around looking for the next bit of revenue, lose hours “researching” on the internet, get lured in to new ventures, and be constantly busy just not productive (by productive I mean generating revenue or strategically growing your business).
Squirrels aren’t known for their business acumen
Let’s face it; do you know any squirrels that head up successful organisations?
A successful business doesn’t happen by chance.
It takes a well-executed plan and a ton of focus.
Far too many great business ideas have been lost to squirrel behaviour. That lack of focus and productivity has killed the business. Usually because the money just didn’t flow quickly enough.
How to beat the squirrel
You need to create your business shot-gun aka the Anti-Squirrel Planner.
You need to know what you want to achieve for the next 12 months and then build the plan to achieve it (take a look at Time To Do It Differently).
The key part of this, the real anti-squirrel ingredient, is to break the steps right down. It’s very easy to get distracted and not make progress when you feel like you need to find “a couple of hours of quiet time” to get things down because that quiet time just doesn’t exist.
Break the tasks down to simple elements that may only take 5-30 mins to get done. An hour at the max. Then plan them into your diary.
It really is that simple. Then keep your eye on the prize. You need to know exactly why it’s important to get the tasks done.
Imagine our squirrel friend. We’ve all seen those hilarious videos of them trying to release food from bird feeders and going to extreme measures to do it. They do that because they keep their eye on the prize. What’s your prize?
Do you have what it takes to use the Anti-Squirrel Planner?
If you want to achieve your business targets you need to use the Anti-Squirrel Planner approach.
Take your annual target and write down all the component tasks that you need to complete to achieve it.
Next you need to break them down so they’ll take ~30 min (1 hour max) and schedule them into your diary.
Then Implement!!! There’s no way round it, you will have to put the effort in. When this is well executed you will find it easy to ignore that inner squirrel and make huge strides forward with your business.
Please note: no squirrels were harmed during the reading or implementation of this advice 🙂
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