How Scheduling Systems Can Help Grow Your Business

One major benefit of entrepreneurship is the fact that we no longer have to follow a company schedule. We’re flexible and time is fluid and no more getting up at 6am! But as we take our schedules from one extreme to the other, we may find that having a schedule (even a loose one) helps our businesses grow faster than before.

My own scheduling is pretty low key – I start my work day at a specific time, have a few set calls and appointments and block off time for clients, marketing and administration.

It’s not hard to set up once you have a system going – the real trick is caring about why to do it in the first place. The difference between a schedule and a calendar is that your schedule says on Wednesday mornings you do marketing, your calendar may show a call with a promotional partner, setting up some social media posts for the week and writing a blog post. The schedule comes first and is less detailed but provides the foundation for your calendar.

So here are my top 4 reasons that having (and following) a system can grow your business.

1. Clarity on what’s next – so many times we feel like the whole day or week was a mixed bag of “and what do I do *now*?” There’s not curriculum and well, you’re the boss! Without that clarity we can end up washing dishes at noon, browsing for a new keyboard on Amazon or finding out what everyone else is inspired by on Facebook. A calendar and loose schedule tells me in black and white what’s coming up.

Sometimes I’m behind and need to go back and complete that thing I didn’t get done this morning. Other times I can work ahead to make the end of my day come faster. But I’ll always know what’s next which saves me a lot of “what now” time.

2. Helps Achieve Balance – Most people like to color code, or at least be able to highlight important things on their calendar. Instead of doing this on paper, I add appointments with different colors in my calendar. Trainings are in orange, client calls in green, networking in red, admin in yellow. At a glance I can see if I’m doing enough networking. Or if one week is overloaded with client calls and I won’t have a chance to do many trainings.

The schedule doesn’t just help me plan for a half day of admin work or networking events a few evenings a month, it also reminds me to be seeing the whole picture and not neglecting an important aspect of my business.

3. Demonstrates responsibility and follow through – I can’t tell you how easy it is to make a good first impression. It starts by being where you are supposed to be when you’ve promised to be there. So many of my colleagues, clients and leads comment on this, “wow, you’re… right on time!” which tells me that many other entrepreneurs are not.

If you’ve waited and waited and waited for a call that didn’t come or an email you were expecting then you know the frustration. By having a schedule that accounts for your responsibilities and sends reminders so you can show up on time and prepared you’ll prove that you’re responsible and good with follow through from step 1.

4. Finally, scheduling reduces stress – It happens to everyone, a miscommunication or another event goes too long, maybe you get sick and can’t make an appointment. In that event it is incredibly easy to identify and reach out to the people whom you can no longer meet and move around the tasks that you know need to be accomplished.

The day to day stress is reduced too if your schedule and calendar are set up properly. Knowing that you’re prepared for a call, meeting or event is calming. Seeing that you’ve done your marketing, made time for business admin like billing and setting up client files, and networked to grow your business leave you feeling confident and less stressed.

No matter what level you’re at in business, a schedule that correctly identifies your essential tasks is a critical element. I love setting these up for clients, and scheduling is a part of each of my coaching programs. If you’re feeling stressed around your schedule then let’s make time to talk soon.

I’ll leave you with this quote from Andy Warhol:
“They always say time changes things, but you actually have to change them yourself.”