My name is Matthew Bredel and as of March, 2007, I am a full-time, work-at-home internet marketer.
For close to 10 years, I worked for a defense company which was an OK job, but I was so uninspired in life and frankly, I needed some more money. That is when I first discovered internet marketing! Now I admit that I didn't start making thousands in my first couple of months (in fact, I lost my shirt!), but I finally saw the "internet light"...
No matter what you are doing online, there always seems to be a mountain of tasks to manage and perform. We usually fall in the trap of either pondering the enormity of final goal at hand (and not do anything) or we start focusing our time on the wrong things. A simple notepad and a cup of coffee from your favorite cafe may be the solutions to your problems.
Believe it or not, but I am personally not the biggest fan of Starbucks coffee…I’d prefer a 50 cent cup of coffee from the local donut shop, but still, for some reason I am drawn to Starbucks for the atmosphere. This is where it begins for me.
Over the years, I have seen my online businesses grow, almost out of control. Most of this is due to the large number “tasks” involved to grow, or even maintain them. And over time, I have found myself staring at a monitor asking myself:
“WHERE SHOULD I START” or “WHAT’S NEXT?”
This usually resulted in a trip over to Tweetdeck, Facebook profile picture change, possibly a exploration of my Gmail Junk Mail for possible “real messages”.
Not a very good use of time.
So why is my productive time dwindled?
OVERWHELMED? Possibly.
DISTRACTED? Always!
MIS-MANAGED - Absolutely!!!
I know, everyone always says this, too. There are tons of tools online that are meant to solve these problems, too. There are the goal managing software suites, or maybe your MicroSoft Outlook…even Google has their own task tools built into the Gmail system. But do they work?
For some, maybe…for me, it is just another DISTRACTION that I try to avoid rather then embrace. I have enough things pestering me on my computer screen to really take notice.
I mean really, if Outlook wants to inform me of an overdue task, I am more than likely to dismiss it and ultimately erase it because it gets in my way.
But there is also the problem of creating the tasks, too. If I am sitting at my computer (which I sit in front of 8 hours per day) and try to figure out tasks, more than likely the superficial stuff comes out and the true tasks to grow and maintain my business are lost.
I’m not saying that computer-based task or goal management software is bad. It is just not for me!
I’m going ol’ school! And this is what I used to do when I worked 9-5 and had only 1-2 hours per night to really create my online business.
A simple pad of paper in a different environment. I think both need to be present to make this work, too. I know if I get a pad of paper and sit at my office desk trying to write out tasks, I get distracted and loose focus (that pesky RSS feed reader keeps popping up new articles!).
I go to Starbucks now; Once per week. I do it after I drop off my youngest daughter from Kindergarden (and since Starbucks is always so conveniently located at the corner of every street in America, it seemed like a good place to go).
I sometimes meet my wife there. Sometimes I do it alone. Either way, I take my pad of paper, and assign a different page to each company or venture I am working on and then start outlining what I need to do to maintain it, and what I need to do to grow it.
The ideas usually POUR out, too. And after about 30 minutes and 5 pages of notes, I go back and prioritize the tasks by numbers and names.
Which tasks need immediate attention.
Who is going to do these tasks? (me? my wife? outsource it?)
At the end, (and a well deserved trip to the restroom after the Venti Latte) I have a complete task list for the upcoming week.
This works MIRACLES for me, too. My productivity skyrockets. My stress actually goes DOWN since I am focuses on tasks rather than the “big picture”.
Plus, any excuse to get out of the house is always a good and healthy one!
Really try this and tell me how it works for ya.
cheers…matt
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Hey brother,
I am a friend of Ryan M. and Brian O. I met them at Austin and I noticed you are on the same facebook page as Ryan. Anyways, just introducing myself. Moving forward..
One time management strategy that I have stumbled across that has been working wonders for me is this. After you have a list of your todos, make a decision on how many tasks you expect to complete each month (project based - “real progress projects”.
Then what ever that number is subtract 1 from it because you and I both know that as entrepreneurs we seem to “think” that the time frame will take ‘half’ the time it generally does. Heck you might even want to subtract 2. For me, my number was three major project chunks a month, so my safe number is 2. This gives me 24 (2×12) major project chunks of progress each year. Now here’s the next trick.
Don’t give exact due dates on your progress projects. Give yourself “some” flexibility. The way that I do this is I set on my “todo list” 2 major project chunks due by 10/31, 2 by 11/30, 2 by 12/31, and so on. Generally if you really try you can get about a year planned out of tasks doing this. Prioritize them of course. Then with all the other tasks that you know you eventually want to get too but you know you can’t place an exact day or month to it, file it by year. Then when that year comes around, take all of those and break down the list 2 per month again (for that year).
Example
2009
10/31 - Set up auto responder for blank campaign
10/31 - Hire 2 new ghost writers and train
11/30 - example project chunk 3
(I say chunk because sometimes projects need to be broken
down as you well know)
11/30 - project chunk example 4
2010
12/31 - project chunk pending file order
12/31 - project chunk pending file order
12/31 - project chunk pending file order
12/31 - project chunk pending file order
12/31 - project chunk pending file order
12/31 - project chunk pending file order
12/31 - project chunk pending file order
12/31 - project chunk pending file order
2011
12/31 - project chunk pending file order
12/31 - project chunk pending file order
12/31 - project chunk pending file order
12/31 - project chunk pending file order
12/31 - project chunk pending file order
12/31 - project chunk pending file order
12/31 - project chunk pending file order
12/31 - project chunk pending file order
I like this strategy because most of us can generally get an idea in what year we think we can get to the task and we can generally gauge on how many chunks we need to break a bigger project into to where it can fit in our time management strategy of 2 chunks per month.
Now I use 2 chunks per month in addition to my normal daily maintenance tasks (which is why I call them progress chunks not maintenance chunks). Anyways, I figured I would share.
It may seem over simplified but in my opinion, that’s what makes it so effective. I personally use the Windows Live Shared Calendar to work this strategy because it will allow me to do this for my shared calendars as well. And I can move my tasks to other people’s calendars fairly quickly if I decide it would be better performed not by me.
Mike
October 14th, 2009 at 12:35 pm
Hey Mike!
Good to meet ya! A friend of Ryan’s and Brian’s is always a friend of mine.
I do like the comments you made, if fact that may be think of my old project management days. I remember my first Microsoft Project exercise for a new radio we were designing, and my boss came in and looked over my shoulder and said “The plan looks great, now double the deadlines of everything…(for the software engineers, go 4 times!)”.
It is true that we do seem to over-estimate what we can and can’t get done. It is not that the time is wrong, it is that the distractions and “fires” always will slow you down.
I think your points are excellent (though, it did make me think of my old days as an engineer…and that always scares me!)
Don’t be a stranger, Mike!…cheers…matt
October 15th, 2009 at 6:21 am
Matt,
Love your Chargers shirt and your Starbucks approach to time management. As a person who also spends most of 8 hours in front of my computer, I tend to get too distracted by emails, Google surfin and searchin and just “stuff”. A symptom of my AAADD (Aging Associated Attention Deficit Disorder), I’m sure.
I like to go to a Starbucks inside a Barnes & Noble. Then after the thinking time spent with the note pad; I like to spend time with the magazines. I am always looking for new magazines that would be of interest to my niche demographic and what products are being sold.
The articles might also provide fodder for blog posts or articles of my own.
And then after having had my soy latte and time away with notepad and magazines; I can go home and hopefully “take action”. That’s the next issue you need to address for us. Great video by the way.
CashNana
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