When looking to make improvements in our business, we often turn to books, articles, podcasts, and the like to learn what things we should be doing. Quite often, though, we really need to stop doing things to see positive changes in our business, which is entirely counter to our culture. Stopping activities is overlooked as a way to amplify our success in a world that’s constantly bombarding us with messages to do more, spend more, eat more, and be more, yet it works! Nike tells us to Just Do It but sometimes, you’ll be more productive and get a lot…
Another tax season came and went but boy, did it send entrepreneurs everywhere scrambling! Like many, you probably blocked out hours upon hours to get caught up on 12 months of bookkeeping. It took you tons of hours to tax prep because you had to piece things together, find missing receipts and invoices, and strain to remember why you bought certain items so you could expense them correctly.
Bookkeeping may be your most important task because it drives decision making for everything you do. It gives you data and intel to know if marketing and visibility…
No entrepreneurial journey is free of missteps. Even those who make it to the top swiftly can tell you tales of bad decisions, costly errors, and embarrassing moments in their business. I prefer to call these growing pains bloopers and I’ve had my fair share of them. Now, I haven’t had any Three Stooges-type bloopers where I tripped up the stairs in front of a large audience or slipped on a banana peel walking to the podium, but I’ve done a number of silly things along my entrepreneurial journey. And when I was living out some of those bloopers, it…
Have you ever been on a long road trip? It can be fun, right? Or you at least try to make the most of it. You pack yummy snacks and drinks. Maybe some books and magazines. Great music. You play license plate games, point at all the funky looking buildings and signs you drive by, and sing silly songs. With the right and willing company, road trips can be an enjoyable bonding experience.
And with every long road trip comes the inevitable pitstops. You must stop for gas. Clean the windshield. Stretch your legs. When Mother Nature calls, which can…
A new year can be a great thing for your motivation and determination because it feels like you’ve won a clean slate or a start-over, complete with new goals (perhaps even amnesty goals not achieved last year), a new planner, and 365 days of opportunity. But the question is, how will you sustain beyond the optimistic and hopeful feelings you’re having right now simply because you feel you’re getting a fresh start? How will you stay the course, run the marathon, and get back up when the struggles of running a business knock you down? How will you make this…
My guess is you use webpage bookmarks to some degree. After all, they’re shortcuts to your favorite and most utilized webpages. And who doesn’t love shortcuts? Bookmarks are easy to use and their benefits are great. They save you time, remember what you fail to, keep you organized, and they’re ultimately safer than typing in websites.
Benefits Of Bookmarks
Save You Time
Bookmarks mean quick access to the sites you’re always in and out of. You don’t have to waste time trying to remember the name of a website, how to spell it, whether it is .com or .net, or…
Everyone loves a great comeback story. The greatest one in NFL history was the AFC wild card game of 1993 between the Buffalo Bills and Houston Oilers. The Bills overcame a 32-point deficit to win the game 41–38 in overtime. It was a fourth quarter to behold! Well, comeback stories aren’t only in sports. They exist in business, too, and you can live out your own comeback story in the fourth quarter of this year!
Think back to the beginning of the year. You probably started the year out super strong, with a bang of business…
Having deadlines is necessary for your business and critical to your success. Deadlines are basically goals with due dates that keep your business moving forward. They should be held sacred and viewed as unchangeable. The magic of deadlines is they require you to focus because they leave no other option.
The problem is, as entrepreneurs, we are our own bosses and generally have no one to answer to when we don’t meet our deadlines. As such, it becomes a tendency to miss our deadlines or continually push them back when we get “busy” or “sick” or “overwhelmed” or “just don’t feel…
Are you overwhelmed by the wealth of opportunities all around you? Perhaps you allow yourself to be pulled in many directions for fear of missing out on THE opportunity that could change the trajectory of your business? Are you tempted to say yes to everything because you think you should?
The giant underlying problem with saying yes to every opportunity is the opportunity cost. When you choose one alternative, you lose the potential gain from other alternatives . That’s because you cannot do it all! That is a fact. When you say yes to one thing, you’re essentially saying no…
If you’re going to construct a building, you don’t just start placing bricks on the ground, piling them up high, and slapping some mortar in between each one without a plan. You’d be sure to fail. Benjamin Franklin said, “If you fail to plan, you are planning to fail,” and he’s absolutely correct. No matter what you set out to achieve, you must take the necessary step of creating a plan, often one with many if not hundreds of steps and components. Constructing a building is important work. You don’t want it to fall down because it’s poorly designed or…
Amber De La Garza
The Productivity Specialist is a sought-after coach, trainer, speaker, writer, and host of the Productivity Straight Talk podcast.
