Discipline is an important part of an entrepreneur’s life. Without proper discipline, most people wouldn’t succeed in business anyways. You’ll find several articles and posts online about the healthy, strict, and rigid habits of successful business owners. These posts intend to be the secret formulas that would allow you to get as much success as these high-flying billionaires.
While changing your habits won’t be enough to turn you into a billionaire, it would allow you to function better and be more productive. There are some bad habits that you need to remove from your life if you want to be more productive. They’re listed below.
All You Do is Multitask
People who can tackle all sorts of tasks at the same time are often lauded for being productive and efficient. However, successful business owners know that multitasking is just mask and an ineffective one at that. When you’re tackling two or three different tasks at the same time, you can’t effectively focus on one. Your attention is divided and that can compromise the quality of your work. Multitasking doesn’t make you more efficient and productive. You’ll be better served if you go through your work one task at a time.
No Time For Breaks
Human beings are the only living beings that don’t value breaks and rests as much as they should. Even lions tend to spend the better part of their time lounging in the shade. You need to recognize that your body and mind can’t work at 100% efficiency at all times. In fact, you’ll be more productive if you give your mind a break every 2 hours.
That’s one of the reasons why companies like NASA and Google have introduced a napping policy. The intention is to give your mind some much needed break. You might think it’s a waste of your time, but it actually reduces your levels of stress and increases your performance. The reason behind this is that your brain will eventually start to miss details when you work continuously and you’ll start to notice a distinct lack of focus. This can be avoided with frequent breaks.
No Flexibility
If you don’t have flexibility in your schedule, it can hamper your productivity. A small business very rarely follows a routine. In fact, more often than not, it’ll spring surprises at you and test your ability to think on your feet. You can either cope or fail spectacularly. If you follow a very rigid routine that has no breathing room, unexpected changes and problems would catch you unprepared.
This is where being flexible in your schedule matters. Give yourself breathing room for unexpected problems. A small business owner needs to be able to adjust according to a given situation.
Checking Emails Immediately
Unless you’re a sale representative, replying to an email immediately will only hamper your productivity. You might get hundreds of emails during the course of a day, would you spend all your time simply answering them instead of working? It’s a good idea to keep a designated time of day to answer emails. As your clients and business associates to mark urgent emails as urgent to avoid any major problems.
