How I Stick to a Daily Routine as a Small Business Owner
For the longest time, I had so much trouble planning out my daily routine as a small business owner. I dreaded starting my workday because there was so much to do with little to no time to do it. I constantly stressed about what was on my plate and overplanned day after day, so it never truly felt like I got anything done.
But after taking time to plan out the bigger picture — like my quarterly goals — I found that setting a routine in motion for each day became so much easier!
Over the last few weeks, I’ve been taking you inside my process for planning out everything from each quarter, to each month, to each week, and now today, I’m giving you a behind-the-scenes look at how I plan out my day!
Tools for daily planning
The reason why daily planning is so simple for me is because I have a bigger picture, which ties into the monthly and weekly goals at hand. And I keep them stored in three different areas — my Full Focus Planner, Google Calendar, and Asana!
I’ve been using them for years, and it helps me stay focused, on track, and communicate with priorities to my team. I’ve even been able to manage my work/life balance better because I have a clearer view of what needs to be done and when, including things like dentist appointments (because those things do affect how much we can realistically get done in a day).
Morning routines
I’ll start this point off by saying, I don’t think you NEED a morning routine to have a productive day. You’ve got lots of stuff going on, kids to take care of, and a team to manage. Sometimes, all you can do is make sure you’re online at a decent hour, and that’s okay!
If you’re struggling to make a morning routine work for you, no sweat. Just do what you can.
But what I like to do is get up at 6 am (my kids are older now, 6 and 8, so it does afford me a little more flexibility with what I can do in the morning). I jump on the treadmill or go for a walk for 30 minutes. Then I get the kids ready and send them off to school for the day!
Starting the work day off right
I like to start off my day with a startup routine, which usually consists of:
Journaling
Checking emails
Checking Slack notifications
Eating breakfast
On Mondays, content audits for 10K on Replay members
This usually takes me about an hour to do, but it’s so worth it! Starting the day with a plan that eases me into a consistent level of focus helps me get (pretty much) everything else done. And what helps me stay at it is blocking it inside my calendar like it’s an appointment. No calls, no notifications. You have to take those daily goals seriously!
Working ON my business
I start to ease into my *official* workday flow around 9:30 am. This is the time when I’m fully focused, working on tasks that require the most thought. And they’re usually tasks that contribute directly to my biggest goals each week.
It can be anything from scripting, filming, outlining courses, writing emails, writing social content, digging into metrics, and coming up with product ideas.
Time for calls
From 12 pm to 3 pm is when I take calls of any kind! This could be coaching calls with my members inside of 10K on Replay, calls with potential clients and current clients, or calls with my team.
And calls may not be something that seem like they take up a lot of time, they have a funny way of lasting longer than scheduled, which is why I always like to block out more time than actually needed.
The workday wind down
Between 3 and 3:30 pm, I like to start winding down my day so I can make it to the bus stop on time to get my kids. I go through my inbox again, check all my slack messages from my team, check Asana, and re-review my Full Focus Planner to see what I did get done and mark that off (there’s something so satisfying about crossing something off a list, right?!).
And if I didn’t get something done, I see where I can adjust the rest of my week so that it does.
And finally, I write out my big three (my top three goals) for the next day, log off, and start my evening routine with my family — which usually consists of eating dinner and watching an episode or two of lego masters.
How do I make planning my days so easy?
Planning out my daily routine may seem easy, but that’s only because I take a lot of extra time to plan out my week, month, and even quarter ahead of time. If I know what I’m working towards for the long run, it makes deciding what’s truly important and what’s not during the day-to-day much easier.
If you want to see where this all starts, then check out the video below! I’m taking you through my monthly planning routine so you can see how all of my other planning routines stem from that!
