Regardless of what many would have you believe, most people aren’t very good at multitasking. Many people claim to be able to multitask, but in truth they’re fooling themselves. When you take on too many tasks they either don’t get done, or corners get cut in an attempt to get everything done.
Buddhists believe you should concentrate all your efforts on one task and become great at it. You will do it better than everyone else. It doesn’t matter what the task is or how small. Just do your best to get it done using all of your efforts.
So how can you utilise this Buddhist philosophy in your business? You must start by identifying the things that you are good at and doing them is the best use of your time.
A good place to start is to implement the Pareto Principle. Wilfredo pareto talks about the ‘vital few’ and the ‘trivial many’. Known as the 80/20 rule, it states that 20% of your tasks or the vital few, will generate 80% of your results. The 20% being the tasks that you should be concentrating on. But what happens to the other 80% of tasks, or the trivial many, they still have to be done.
The answer is to outsource some of your 80%. Outsourcing has exploded onto the scene in the past decade and is a great way to leverage your time. You can get multiple tasks completed in a fraction of the time and depending on the quality of the outsourcers, it will be done correctly.
The good news is you can be selective on who you choose for your outsourcing. If one doesn’t work out, you simply ask them to correct their mistakes, or you don’t use them again. When you find a great team of outsourcers, you become an unstoppable force.
More companies are adopting the approach of outsourcing. Many companies are outsourcing entire departments where this makes sense. Why fund a credit department when there is a company that can do it for you? The same is true for payroll, IT, marketing and a host of other company functions. You don’t worry about salaries or benefits when you do this. You simply pay a fee for services based on your agreement with them. Depending on the size of your company and the services that you are outsourcing, you can save a significant amount of money when you do this.
Some companies are even allowing their employees to outsource portions of their duties, where it makes sense to do this. For instance, web programmers are not typically known to be good designers. The company either doesn’t have a graphic design department or the group is booked solid with work for other groups. Outsourcing the design can solve this dilemma and give the project the right look and feel.
Of course, you will need to manage the outsourcers, and that often includes getting the specifications right for what you want to be accomplished. But, this is a skill like any other and is something you will get better with over time.
If you’d like to save time and money you can outsource your marketing to an experienced Aardvark Marketing Director or Aardvark Marketing Manager. Contact us for a confidential chat on 01905 885 285 or email us here.
Our guest blogger, Mike Gardner, aka The Time Doctor was a writer, speaker, and business coach on all aspects of Time Management and Productivity. Sadly he recently passed away but we are keeping this blog in his memory and supporting the British Heart Foundation, the charity he was such a super ambassador for. He helped many small business owners, entrepreneurs and independent professionals to be incredibly productive, whilst balancing their business and family commitments in a way that enables them to feel fulfilled and guilt-free. On a personal level he was always supportive and great company and we’ll miss him.