File this under one of those really important things that they don’t teach you in business school: As an entrepreneur, how you look at time can make the difference of whether your company is worth $1 million, $10 million or $100 million.
I first met legendary entrepreneur Norm Brodsky when I started The New York Enterprise Report and called him to get some feedback and advice on my new business. When discussing the options for building the readership base, Norm deduced that it was critical to build a quality subscriber list as fast as possible. Because I could charge advertisers more when I had more subscribers, the quicker I built the subscribers, I could generate more revenue, sooner. Also, as larger advertisers won’t bother with small publications, I could draw more of them when I got to a meaningful number. In starting my first venture, I was quite patient — maybe too patient, and Norm sensed that.
Since then, I have paid a lot of notice to how I look at time. Here are five areas in which time plays a major role in the degree of success for business owners:
1. Decisions
Many decisions that we make have huge implications for our businesses. On one hand, we are dealing with so much change in the marketplace that it can be very difficult to make decisions. On the other hand, our decisions, combined with the effort that follows them, are a key factor that determines the level of our success.
I have learned that it is better to make a decision with 70% of the information and data needed than waiting until you get closer to 90%. Why? The benefit of the additional information that you get almost never outweighs the benefit of making a decision and getting started. The results that come from making decisions, like the additional revenue from starting a new marketing initiative, are always better sooner than later. If you are wrong, it’s better to know sooner than later. When something isn’t working, try not to let too much time go by before deciding to take corrective action.
2. Momentum
How many times have you started an important project that gets put on the back burner while an “urgent” issue comes up? Weeks go by, and you come back to the important project only to have lost your enthusiasm for it. When you allocate the time to get the important projects done in a brief period of time, you have momentum. And the excitement from you and your team typically manifests into strong results from the project.
Similarly, the little interruptions during your day are huge impediments to your ability to get important things done. Research shows that it takes, on average, 23 minutes and 15 seconds to get back on track after an interruption. When this happens several times a day, your productivity is zapped to mediocre levels that can have a huge impact on your ability to make significant progress in your business. I try to do everything I can to avoid these interruptions, including turning notifications off and closing my email apps.
3. Spending Money (Sometimes Called Investing)
Once you have decided to deploy capital because you see an opportunity to generate a return, such as for a marketing campaign or an important new hire, you should make the investment sooner than later so that it generates returns sooner than later. I learned this when raising money for a venture several years ago, and would have been better off hiring salespeople sooner in order to increase our revenue sooner.
4. Your Time
There are three things I try to do with my time:
• Set aside time to work on the important things, like working on strategy and thinking about how changes in the market are affecting clients. I find that when I do not do this, I spend my time on urgent tasks that don’t move the needle for me.
• Similar to the above, don’t spend time on things that don’t create significant, enterprise-level value. That is why I have a virtual assistant who handles my calendar, travel, administrative matters as well as building our prospect list. My assistant has made such an impact on my business and personal life that I co-founded a virtual assistant business so that other business owners could reap the benefits of having an assistant.
• I ensure that I have time for personal things like spending time with my family, guitar playing, hanging out with friends as well as personal and professional development.
5. Your Team’s Time
Ensuring that your team spends their time effectively is at least as important than how an entrepreneur spends their time. Why? Because they are doing most of the work. When it comes to my team’s time, I try to do two things:
• Give them as much clarity as possible as to what the outcome of what they are doing should be. By being clear about what my expectations are and what the end result should be, they don’t have to spend the time guessing or doing something that is not up to expectations.
• Respond to their questions as soon as possible so they are not waiting around. I also empower them to make decisions themselves.
Now that you have spent seven minutes reading this post, how are you going to spend your time?