Three Success Tips That Have Increased My Energy & Productivity

Update: 10 Hour Work Week Still Working for Me

Since a few people have asked me…yes, I’m still doing the 10 hour work week and loving it. Besides Blogworld in Vegas for a day, I’ve been pretty good about sticking to my goal. I appreciate (so does my family) the daily challenge of increasing my productivity and maximizing my time.

Yes, I was on vacation last week and so the temptation to work was lower, but that normally would not have stopped me from working…I would have usually still put in a couple hours a day before/after Disneyland (and yes, I WAS tempted, however, I was good, I checked email fast and got off). I have to admit that it was a very nice 5 days. But there was a consequence because I didn’t know about the trip until the last minute and didn’t have pre-scheduled posts ready, our site wasn’t thriving here, I’m afraid and RSS traffic decreased slightly. However, what DID work well was the Startup Princess team back here in Utah. Leslie Smoot, our new VP of Business Development was in charge of the Startup Princess event and Laurie Ann Thomas our admin support at the UVSC SBDC ran the show while I was gone and I literally got back at 2 am and showed up to the event at 10 am…it was a beautiful thing!! Having a team is essential!!
I spent my 10 hours last week at Startup Princess Networking Tea Party 2 hours, Editing our conference DVD for 4 hours (nearly done!), daily emails, updating finances, planning and strategizing for Startup Princess 2008.

Today’s Magic Wand: When you go on vacation, really GO on vacation…don’t check your email more than 1x a day and I challenge you to take Thanksgiving completely off!

Opportunity: 10 Hour Work Week

Last week I was absolutely skeptical about my “challenge” to work 10 hours. I was used to working uh, um…40-50? (leading up to the conference was a LOT). Well, I’m very happy to report that I did it just over 10 hours (business planning meeting went a bit long, I realized I was way MORE addicted to email than I originally thought and checking it just once a day was very very hard, some days were better than others, but every minute was logged. I also realized that work is like dessert, if you know you’re only going to “work” for 2 hours then you plan a lot more for what you are going to do…like if you know you’re only going to have 1 dessert a week, you think about what to have and make the best choice (Haagen Daz vs. Blue Bunny ice cream, you know?)

Here’s a brief overview of what I did and what I DIDN’T do as well.

DID:

• Planned a lot more, before I ever sat down at the computer I knew how long I could be there and what I needed to accomplish
• Blogged quicker, because I had more of a plan when I’d sit down…(set up the systems) less editing (good and bad, someone emailed me with a grammar error and I caught a few mistakes I normally would not have made)
• Delegated a lot more than I have before
• emails were shorter, still tried to keep them friendly, but quicker. I tried to follow after Seth Godin’s style of email (when he’s emailed me he’s always been quick, to the point, and left me feeling good about myself in a simple way like, “you’re great”)
• Looked at business models and systems (particularly for the Startup Princess profile pages) which are very time consuming to organize/manage–looking at software that will do it for us affordably
• Took time to have a great planning meeting on the phone and cleared distractions beforehand
• Mostly spent time on emails, writing, planning events/future strategy of Startup Princess, cleaned my office!
• Checked email after 4pm each day, a couple times after 10pm
• Spent most of my daytime with my kids, Halloween activities, did some service for neighbors, kept up on dishes better and laundry was DONE and put away all in the same week (miracle)!
• Early Dinner each night Put my kids to bed EARLY when they were ready at 6:30pm (18 mo and 3 yr old)-7:30pm(7 yr old) * except Halloween!
• Spent more time with my husband in the evenings than I usually have done which was good for us!
• Honest with myself and with you–telling you that it’s hard to be balanced struck a chord with many of you and multiple emails and comments demonstrated that we all need more harmony with our responsibilities
• “I’m doing the best I can and trust that it is enough” was my motto
• Relied on/Delegated to Leslie Smoot, my new partner here at Startup Princess and VP of Business Development and Laurie Ann Thomas, Admin Assistant/Sponsor of our Utah County Chapter to move forward with their projects and trusted they would fulfill their tasks (and they have)
• Eliminated a few projects
• Drank green smoothies everyday; My Magic Potion recipe: 1 c rice milk, 2 c spinach, 1 frozen banana, 1 c berries (YUM) Instant energy!
• Got up early several days and got showered/ready before carpool so that I could come home and be ready to face the day (instead of driving to school in pj’s and showering whenever), the early method is the plan!!
• Listened to my iPod more in the car, listened to an audio written about my great-great-great grandfather, Parley P Pratt and felt more joy in my heritage (instead of listening to a business book, which I often do)

DIDN’T:

• Didn’t read blogs, I only read eMoms at Home 1 day to catch up and learned about the Google Page Rank issues (which I would not have known otherwise)
• Didn’t miss working so much (besides wanting to check email) I feel more inner-peace and genuinely happier
• Didn’t get as stressed out or upset with myself or my children
• Didn’t feel worried that Startup Princess was going to dissolve, actually comments increased and the interest for membership was at an all time high last week; letting go actually, pushed Startup Princess forward! Tim Ferriss said that when he got “out of his business” it thrived, it’s that concept of micro-management, it doesn’t work.
• Didn’t exercise, thought about it, but I didn’t! (unless walking around trick or treating with my kids counts!) Ha!
• Didn’t go to bed before 11pm like I had planned, found myself reading magazines, catalogs, taking baths, etc…somewhat nice to “veg” because it had been soooooo long, but I could have been sleeping earlier, need to establish night time routines better, however, I feel much more rested than I have in a long time
• Didn’t go see Guy Kawasaki (bummed) my kids were sick, but that would have pushed me over 10 hours up to 15 getting up there and back, it would have been worth it!
• Didn’t hire a babysitter the whole week except for a date night/networking dinner with a few other couples

All in all, it was an awesome week…I’m up for week 2! Anyone else want to join me?

Today’s Magic Wand: Set a timer when you get on the computer (in your mind or a real one, decide what you’re going to do, get on, get it done, get off). If you only read this site 1x a week, that’s ok by me! Just tell 5 friends about our site and then our site will still grow without you here so often, haha!