Three Ways You Can Be More Productive As A Business Leader

Posted on September 04, 2020 by Nick Leighton, One of Thousands of Executive Coaches on Noomii.

Do you consider yourself a great leader?

Whether you’re a leader, a business owner or a professional working your way up, this is an essential question you should ask daily. It’s important to examine yourself to look for areas of improvement, as well as to celebrate areas of great achievement, or what I like to call champagne moments.

So, how do you know if you’re a great leader or not?

For most people, being a great leader is subjective in nature. There’s not a specific calculation that you can add up to see where you stand each day. But there is a way to measure it.

As I discuss in my book, Exactly Where You Want to Be: A Business Owner’s Guide to Passion, Profit, and Happiness, no matter how big or small your business, successful leaders should embrace the following four traits: productivity, motivation, ability to sell and awareness.

Over the next few articles, I’ll be diving deeper into each of these four traits. I’ll also give you practical tips on how to increase your skills in each of these areas. I plan to cover tips for mastering your workweek in a future article, but first, let’s discuss productivity as a whole. Here are there big ways you can be more productive as a leader.

1. Embrace the impossible.

While it may feel like you can never catch up, it is possible. It just takes proper time management skills. You need to make time for what’s most important — including continuing to learn and hone your leadership skills. Becoming great at time management takes a lot of practice. Here are some practical things you can implement to save time:

• Avoid multitasking. This is actually a time-waster.

• Play to your strengths. Stop wearing all the hats in your organization. Just wear the one that looks the best on you. Do what you are good at and only what you are good at.

• Get organized. Being scattered is a definite time-waster. This needs to be at both a physical and technological level. You don’t have time to find lost files, data or information.

• Schedule to reschedule. Sit down once a week and plan the next seven days. Ensure when you do this that you leave enough time to do what needs to get done. And as the leader of a business, you have a responsibility to be spending time learning new skills and working on innovation with your organization, so schedule that time too. If things don’t work this week, give them more time next week.

2. Delegate more often.

I can’t encourage this enough. Your time is valuable. You must start looking at it in terms of dollar signs. If you’re still doing mundane tasks and holding daily processes on your plate because you’re worried they won’t be done as well as you can do them, get over it!

Trust your team, and find some contractors you can trust as well. Spend your time being productive as a leader and helping your business to grow.

For example, imagine you have two things that need to be done now — one can be delegated, and one you have to do in person. First, delegate the job that can be delegated. That frees up your concentration and allows them to work on it, while you deal with the in-person task.

3. Say no.

Sorry. There are no hidden strategies for this one. The best way to say no is to actually say no to things that distract and do not serve your larger objectives.

Stay tuned for a discussion of the other three leadership traits, as well as more productivity hacks and advice on how to master the workweek.

For business owners who want more passion, profit & happiness – contact Nick Leighton on nick@leightonlive.com. This article originally appeared on Forbes.com