Being a business owner or an independent contractor comes with a boatload of responsibilities, and every single one of your results as a company or a salesman ultimately depends fully on your ability to manage your time, discipline yourself to take care of tasks, and really to “show up” every day to produce and create sales and leads. There are dozens of plates to spin, and all of the responsibility falls almost entirely on your shoulders.
Whether you’re a company owner trying to run your business, manage your staff, motivate your salesmen, take care of payroll, and stay up to speed on your books, or you’re a salesman trying to get your lead generation in, sign enough deals every week to stay on pace for your annual goal, write estimates, get properties measured, send invoices and draft supplements, there’s always a LOT going on. It’s easy to start to feel the pressure, feel impossibly overwhelmed, and find yourself wanting to just hide in a dark room and disappear from the world sometimes.
So how do you deal with it? What’s the key to eliminating overwhelm so you can continue moving forward and stay on top of your stuff?
1) Re-focus.
Go back to the break down of your annual goal. What needs to be accomplished weekly or daily to stay on pace with your yearly target? If you’re a salesman, perhaps you broke down the numbers to sell $750,000 in 45 weeks, and you know that you need to knock 48 doors each week, or 8 doors six days a week in order to get there. Remembering that that’s all you have to do each week and the results will follow will make your feelings of overwhelm evaporate into thin air. Every week when you put those 48 doors in, you can relax and trust the process.By focusing on activities instead of results, you will prevent feelings of doubt, stress, and pressure creep into your mind. You can’t control 100% of your results, but you can control 100% of your actions. The good news is that 100% of your results are dependent on 100% of your actions. Therefore, do what is necessary, and the results will come!Get back to basics. Break down your goal to determine the necessary actions they will require daily and weekly, then tackle that sh!t.
2) Write everything down.
Imagine your brain like your computer desktop. Incomplete tasks or to-do’s are like random files, pictures, and folders scattered all over your desktop, taking up space, cluttering your brain, and preventing you from focusing; in other words, overwhelming you. How do you clear your brain and eliminate the feeling of overwhelm? Write out a list of what needs to be accomplished. Everything from big things to small things. List out calls that need to be made, estimates that need to be written, faxes that need to be sent, customers who need to be called, bills that need to be paid, properties that need to be inspected.If you aren’t physically putting pen to paper and listing out what needs to be accomplished every day/week, you’re going to constantly feel like you’re working harder than you really are, and that you have way more to do than you actually do. When to-do’s float around in your head, they take up a lot of space. You may only have 3 or 4 tasks that need attention, but without seeing them on paper and being able to look at them, prioritize them, and cross them off the list, you’ll put them off and procrastinate, and the next thing you know, now you have 6 or 7 things that need attention, and the snowball effect makes you feel like slamming a fifth and going into hibernation to avoid it all.
The moment you pull that task out of your brain and slap it onto your to-do list, it will remove a weight from your shoulders. When you are then able to physically cross that item off the list later that day, you’ll feel even better. Nothing clears your mind or instills a sense of relief quite like completely crossing off an entire list of responsibilities. Not only will you eliminate that feeling of being swamped, but completing an entire to-do list also creates motivation. You’ll feel good. And when you feel good, you want to continue to do things that make you feel good.
List writing is a habit that will make you more organized, more productive, less stressed, and more successful. Don’t cloud your mind with the tasks that are hanging over your head. Write them down, prioritize them, and immediately take action toward tackling that list.
3) Take care of little things while they’re still little.
Inch by inch, life’s a cinch. Mile by mile, you’ll need whiskey and a miracle.
Don’t let things pile up. It’s much more difficult to tackle a mountain than a molehill. Think of your responsibilities like maintaining a clean room. You know when you let your bedroom get way out of control and it becomes an absolute pigsty? Clothes are everywhere, empty cups litter the nightstand, dusty books and magazines pile up next to the bed, the laundry pile would intimidate even the conquerors of Mt. Everest, you can barely see the floor and you find yourself at the corner of “Go sock-less” and “Do I have time to stop at Target for new socks before work?”
Your messy room becomes this big black cloud weighing on your mind. It’s something you HAVE to do, but because you’ve let it get so bad, you continue to avoid it. And because you continue to avoid it, it gets worse and worse. When you finally say enough is enough and make the decision to take care of it, it takes industrial strength cleaners and an entire Saturday afternoon to get it back into ship shape.
If you hate starting over, stop giving up! It is MUCH easier to maintain your room one little thing at a time instead of letting it all build up to monumental proportions and then having to face an overwhelming chore. When you take your socks off, put them directly into the laundry basket. When you finish a glass of water, bring the glass to the dishwasher. When the laundry basket is full, bring it to the washing machine.
When a customer leaves you a voicemail, call them back that day. When you get done with an inspection, do the estimate within 24 hours. When your job is complete, send the invoice that day. Taking care of things as they pop up versus letting a ton of little tasks accumulate and then having to put a large amount of energy into completing them is the key to staying on top of your responsibilities and not causing yourself to feel completely overwhelmed.
There you have it. Three simple steps to eliminating overwhelm and stress. All it takes is a defined end goal, a detailed plan of action, pen and paper, and consistently applied effort. You’re in control. Go tackle your year.
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