Tami Dubose discusses getting things done using a physics concept:

Did you take physics in school? If so, do you remember this law, even vaguely? If not, no worries, I’m about to explain.

In classical physics the first set of concepts we study are about the laws of motion. These concepts are governed by Sir Isaac Newton’s 3 laws of motion.

Newton’s first law is an object in motion tends to stay in motion unless it is acted upon by an external force. Conversely, an object at rest tends to stay at rest unless acted upon by an external force. This law is also known as Galileo’s law of inertia.

In a home-based business, inertia can be hard to overcome since your time is very flexible. But there are several things you can do to make sure you’re getting a respectable amount of important work done each day, work that adds to your bottom line or accomplishes personal things that are really important to you, like taking your kids to the park as soon as they get home from school.

• Plan your important work at the time of day you are most productive. For some people, that’s in the morning. For others, like me, it’s in the late afternoon all the way to about 5 a.m. the next morning. When you can, don’t fight your own body clock and feel guilty about not being up at the crack of dawn to tackle your day.
• Do the most important tasks first. Take your coffee in your office. Don’t get bogged down in your email, read the newspaper or hang out on facebook. If you need to write an important email to send to your list about your business, that isn’t getting bogged down. Responding to client and vendor email is also important. Make important phone calls. Schedule business appointments and attend meetings during this time. If it impacts your bottom line in any way, it needs to be done first.
• I do condone exercise at some point during the day and I believe it’s just as important as any task you do, but you must remain disciplined about it. Much of my exercise is mowing the yard and tending the bushes. It’s a great way to save money and sweat at the same time.
• After your most important task or tasks are done, or you’ve been at it for quite awhile and need a break, take a break. Get up, go somewhere else in the house and do something that needs doing like taking wet laundry out of the washer and putting it into the dryer. Fold a load of clothes while you listen to a training audio, watch a training video, or watch a podcast of a program that is important to you. Start dinner or clean something. By making time for household tasks in your work day you are taking advantage of the best of both worlds. Set a time to stop so you can get back to work.
• Get back on your important tasks. If they’re finished, get through the bulk of your email, postal mail, and organize your desk if it needs it. Run errands or maybe plan your next day, week or month. Some people work best from a set schedule, some work better by task priority and everything else is flexible. Do what works best for you.
• I do my best writing late at night. Whether I’m working on a report, an ebook or a blog post, I do my best writing after 10 p.m. The second best time for me to write is after 3 p.m. Once I start writing I will keep writing until I’m finished, exhausted, starving or my son is insisting upon being fed. I used to have trouble getting started, but now I have trouble stopping. Once you get used to staying in motion, you need an external force to act upon you to get you to stop.
• Have a set time for your work hours. Whether they’re from 1 p.m. to 5 p.m. or 9 p.m. to 1 a.m. or 7:30 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. or a 2 hour day, make sure you have hours during your day that you are working and hours when you are off. Also be sure to schedule your days off. Most people take the weekends off, but in my current businesses, I take Fridays and Saturdays off. If I have the time, I take an extra day off, or work less on some work days.

If you work for yourself, take advantage of your time flexibility and do all the things other people wish they could do, like spend an hour taking a quiet walk with your significant other or going for a family walk or bike ride. Cook healthy meals at home instead of eating out. Do your grocery shopping at 7 a.m. when the shelves are full, the isles are empty and the checkout lines are short.

But whatever you do, make sure you get busy and get your important work done so your business becomes and stays successful. Overcome that beginning-of-the-day inertia. Once you’re moving and accomplishing, you’ll keep it up.

If you aren’t doing because you don’t like what you do, do something else worth getting out of bed to do.

Technorati Tags: home office organization, Newton's first law of motion, overcoming inertia to be productive, physics applied to business, Productivity, Tami Dubose

A new article was published today on Computerworld in the Knowledge Base area of the website. Check it out.

Title: Study: Facebook use cuts productivity at work

Survey finds 77% of Facebookers use the social networking site while on the job

By: Sharon Gaudin

Summary:

The productivity loss overall in a company where employees use Facebook on the job for no business reason is 1.5%. This may not seem like much, but if your margin is 2%, this could mean the difference between closing and staying in business.

A previous study showed students who use Facebook at college get lower grades than students who don’t use it.

Why is this important to home businesses?

If you are cruising around on Facebook for non-business purposes during your work hours at home and thinking you are accomplishing anything, you may not be. When it is just you or you and an employee or two, you’ve got to make the most of your work so you can make the most of your profits.

The most important things you can do while working in your home office or at your home-based business are tasks specific to increasing your bottom line. If what you are doing is not directly putting more cash on your bottom line, you must start doing those tasks first and foremost every day.

Checking email, reading articles in your RSS feed reader, cruising social networking sites for pleasure (not doing research), and performing any task that doesn’t either make money or lead to making money must wait until after the important tasks are done.

You may need to scan your email for important work messages. You may need to scan your RSS reader for articles specific to your business. You may need to reply to a comment on Facebook from a business colleague. But those tasks need to be strictly limited to business and a tight leash needs to be on so they don’t sap your time. If you don’t focus on performing work tasks that make money, you might as well go to the park or play with your kids. The quality of your time would be much better spent.

Every day, do what makes money first, then you will be free to peruse email and articles, and socialize on social networking sites with friends.

If you don’t know how much time you’re spending on each task you perform, get out the kitchen timer and set it for one hour. In that one hour spend your time doing only money-making work, whatever that is for your business. You will be surprised to find at first you are distracted frequently and it will take at least a few days to be able to focus for just one hour.

Another thing you can do is keep a diary for a few weeks on every activity you perform in your business, notes on what you accomplish, how you will profit from it, and what time you started and stopped each task. If you are busy all the time but don’t seem to be accomplishing anything that is adding money to your bottom line, this technique will help you analyze where your precious time is going and what you need to change to improve.

If you spend a lot of time on the phone and need to block out time away from those interruptions, either turn off your phone ringer and let your voicemail catch messages, or send calls to an answering service. Then schedule time each day when you will return calls. You may need to tell people you will return their call within 24 hours, or leave a specific message that you are in a meeting from x-y and will return to your office at z. You don’t have to leave your office to have a meeting with yourself, but those calling don’t need to know that.

Get a handle on your business. Don’t just work in it, work on it. A helpful book to read to improve your business and increase your productivity is The E-Myth Revisited by Michael E. Gerber:

Don’t have time to read? Here is the book on CD that you can listen to in your car or load to your mp3 player and take with you:

Sherri Joubert
Getting more productive

Technorati Tags: home office organization, home-based business, make home office profitable, Productivity, social networking, time management, time-wasters