Are You Too Busy to Get Organized?

At least once a week, I will hear a business owner say, “I’m too busy to get organized. I can’t take time out of my day to get organized!”

Are you running around telling people there aren’t enough hours in the day? Are you disorganized? If the answer is yes, then you have to re-evaluate how you function on a day-to-day basis. If you want to work on your time management skills and become more efficient and productive, you have to declutter, get organized, and streamline processes. Your time management skills will improve once you do this.

If you think getting organized is a waste of time, you are wasting time by not being organized. If you continue to say you are too busy to get organized, you will continue to be overwhelmed, stressed out, frazzled, and paralyzed due to your disorganization. If your business hasn’t been affected by this yet, wait a little longer and it will hit you like a brick.

How long have you been operating this way? Has it been weeks, months, or years? It’s time to carve out some time in your day and make a plan to get organized.

The people that state they are too busy to get organized are usually the same people who are doing the following:

Wasting time and energy searching for files. If you filed it when you initially received it or finished working on it, you will have no problem grabbing it when you need it. It will take you seconds to put your finger on it. How much time have you wasted searching for a file in a stack of papers?

Not billing clients in a timely manner. Do you have a process for billing your clients? Are you consistent with following through with that process? Are you losing money? Your clients will take notice, especially if they are organized and your business will begin to feel the effects.

Paying bills late. Are the bills you need to pay underneath a mound of paper on your desk? Do you forget to pay them? If you pay these bills late, you are going to be paying late fees, your interest rates will increase, your credit score will drop, and collection agencies will be hounding you.  Also, the company that you owe money to may drop you as a customer. I have seen the latter happen many times.

Don’t return calls in a timely manner and/or show up late to appointments. Do you always sound frazzled and distracted when speaking to customers?  If you are distracted, clients are going to question if you will handle their business in an efficient and productive manner.

Clutter in the office.  If you have a client visiting your office, they will be distracted by the disorganization in your office and it will be difficult for them to focus on what you are saying.

Bottom line, you are losing time, money, and clients due to your disorganization.  The majority don’t have working systems in place. There aren’t any processes and procedures in place. If you are disorganized, stop saying you don’t have time to get organized. Carve out a few hours in your day and make that change. Does your business have a slow time of year when you could tackle this project? Can you take one Saturday or evening to tackle this?

Are you giving the excuse that you don’t have enough time? Do you think the real reason you don’t want to tackle this is because it’s going to be too overwhelming? Maybe your organizational skill set hasn’t been developed and you don’t know where to begin or how to go about getting organized.  Break this project down into small tasks. After you finish reading this, make a plan and tackle this or reach out and call a professional to help you. You won’t believe the amount of free time you will have once you get organized.

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