As an entrepreneur, it's easy to get overwhelmed. You have the responsibilities of entire teams on your shoulders, and if you don't accomplish everything on your task list on a daily basis, the consequences could be lost business or pushed deadlines. But if you don't find a way to clear your head, you'll spend more time stressing about all the tasks you have than you'll spend actually completing them.
Consolidation is one of the best strategies you have as an entrepreneur in these situations. Consolidation allows you to reduce and organize those millions of thoughts and tasks you have into smaller, digestible chunks. Take a look at these four example task consolidation strategies and consider how you can implement them in your business:
1.Prioritize everything. It's a simple first step, but it's an important one. Whenever a new task comes into play, prioritize it immediately -- is it something that needs to be done today? This week? This month? Don't waste time trying to make everything high priority.
2.Divide your time into communicative and non-communicative. Emails and phone calls distract all of us, but they are necessary to keep the business momentum going. To handle these necessary distractions, divide your time into "communicative" (when you'll respond to emails and return phone calls) and "non-communicative" (when you'll shut off your phone and focus on work).
3.Create a task list for items of concern. Making a task list exclusively of items that concern or worry you establishes a mentality that everything that isn't on that list is not worth worrying about. Then, you'll be able to focus on handling the most concerning items without getting bogged down with peripheral tasks.
4.Focus on a different segment of your business each day. If you consolidate your tasks into segment-specific days, you'll be able to stream fluidly from one task to another. For example, Monday could be a day for development-related tasks, while Wednesday could be focused on new sales.
These strategies won't magically make your task list disappear, but they will help you stay focused and organized as you work your way through the rigors of entrepreneurship.
Jose Vasquez is a serial entrepreneur and tech enthusiast dedicated to helping startup technology companies get the direction and momentum they need to succeed. As the founder of Build. Brand. Blast., Jose has established a collective resource for tech entrepreneurs to consult when brainstorming, creating, launching, or expanding a new business. Jose is also the founder and CEO of Quez Media Marketing, a marketing firm that combines technology and creativity to help new and growing companies get the results they need.
Jose graduated from Goldman Sachs' 10,000 Small Businesses program. Goldman Sachs is a partner of the What Is Working: Small Businesses section.
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