Source: Betsssssy

Someone who works in a cubicle or a corporate office can leave his or her mess at work. Yet when your business and personal life are under the same roof, it’s more difficult to keep home office chaos to a minimum. By following a few do’s and avoiding the don’ts, you can keep your home office under control.

Do

Set a schedule

When you work for yourself, it’s important to make every minute count.  Each day set a schedule, but make it flexible. If you wait for the right time to work on something, you may never get started.  Your schedule may change based on the appointments you’ve scheduled or the tasks you need to complete, so focus on the top five tasks you need to accomplish each day. Otherwise it’s easy to get sidetracked.

To read the rest of my guest post on Startup Nation, click here.

As her business grew, she quit using her planner and switched to sticky notes that she plastered all over her monitor. Her system broke down when she started covering older notes with newer ones. She tried to improve her sticky note system by using different colored notes, but that didn’t help.

Now, instead of using her new smartphone to record tasks, she writes her top to-do’s on her hand. She admits that her “organic” way of tracking tasks is a little unreliable, especially by the middle of the day when she’s washed her hands a few times, but she’s out of ideas.

Whether you’re like my friend and you’ve exhausted all of your options, or you’ve used the same planning system for years, take a close look at how you’re planning your days. There are a few ways you can make your system more effective.

Be willing to change what isn’t working

Decide whether or not your planning system is still working. If not, decide whether you want to use a paper-based list within a daily planner, a program on your computer or an app on your smartphone. Whatever system you pick, make sure it’s easy to use and that it fits your needs. A program that has more features than you need or more than you’ll ever use, will help you waste time, not save it. In this case, less is more.

Keep your list readily available

Your to-do list will be easier to use if you’re able to find it when you need it. You shouldn’t have to dig through layers of paper to find your list or search through your computer to find a planning program you use often. As with anything in your home office, including equipment you may have had for years, if you can see it, there’s more of a chance that you’ll use it.

Break your list down into “calls” and “tasks”

A long list of tasks and calls can be overwhelming. If you want to combine your personal and business to-do lists, use the headings “personal calls,” “personal to-do’s,” “business calls” and “business to-do’s.” You could also label each task according to the type of task. When you break a long list down into smaller lists, it’s easier to manage.

Move it forward

At the end of the day, look at your list and either move uncompleted tasks forward or delete them. This will give you a head start on the next day’s tasks. Realize that you can’t do everything, and at the end of the day if you’ve accomplished even five or six items on your list, give yourself a pat on the back.

A final tip is to keep your list manageable. Most of the time, quality matters more than quantity.

What type of planning system do you use, and why? Share your comments below.

Lately, though, I’ve talked with some home-based business owners who think that if they’re not working 9-5, the way they did in their corporate job, they’re probably not as productive as they should be. They say that they’re working late at night, as early at 5 a.m. or whenever they can “get into the flow.”

Last week I asked a few business owners about their work schedules. They told me that their traditional and not-so-traditional work hours work for them for a few reasons.

“I work from home and try to keep hours that balance my own peak productivity with the needs of my clients. I tend to be most productive late morning and then around 5-6pm.”
—Maris Callahan, Freelance publicist and writer 

“If the house is quiet I whiz through email and office admin tasks before 9:00 a.m. My daytime hours are more about creativity, or socializing. In the very late evening I’m most productive with problem solving.”
—Loralee Hutton, Entrepreneur, travel writer and QuickBooks coach

“I am a late night owl (plus insomniac!) and definitely not a morning person. I created my work hours for 11am-7pm, so this definitely fits my lifestyle. I appreciate the freedom of staying up late, “sleeping in” and creating the flexibility of generating hours that I will be the most productive.”
—Sarah Woodruff, True North Ventures VA

“For me, the most productive hours are very early in the morning – 5am until about 9am. During this time, my mind is very fresh and I can typically work uninterrupted. Often, I can look back at the day and realize that over 70% of my tangible output for the day came from those early morning hours.”
—Lori Sullivan, Fingerprints Marketing

“I base my hours around my baby’s sleeping hours and it has in turn resulted in me being extra productive during those work hours (limited amount of time available, pressure to get things done).”
—Peep Laja, Traindom

“Being a night person and preferring sunsets to sunrises, I am most productive after 11 a.m. I often begin work early afternoon and write well into the night. However, the best thing about working from home is that I have the option of adjusting my work hours to accommodate family and friends.”
—Linda M. Farley, Farley Training

Is one schedule better than another? Not necessarily. But working from home on your own schedule will always be a better option than going to a corporate job every day.

When you work for yourself, it’s easy to feel that you’re always playing catch-up or running in place. We all have days like that…some more often than others.

One of my clients described it as feeling like a hamster on a wheel. She was on the go constantly, but never accomplished anything.

There are a few ways to get off the hamster wheel.

• Determine what your time is worth. Are you spending time entering e-mail addresses into your contact management program, updating your Web site, or handling tasks that someone else could take care of? If so, hire someone to help you. You could hire a virtual assistant or a freelancer to take care of routine tasks that are taking you away from handling moneymaking tasks.

• Figure out whether you are overscheduled. Some schools make children limit their after-school activities to one or two at the most. The same could apply to you. Between running your own business, handling personal tasks and chauffeuring, how much time do you have for yourself? Before you say yes to one more project, figure out what other project you’re going to have to postpone or drop in favor of the new project.

• Use errand-running services, the Internet and retailers that deliver. Another option is to hire a teenager to run errands for you. He or she could use the money and think of what you could do with that extra time.

• Stop. Unplug. Enjoy your life. E-mails, calls to return and projects to finish will always be there. It’s a never-ending cycle. When you take the time to disconnect, recharge and rethink how you’re spending each day, you’ll have more energy, time and motivation to focus on what’s really important to you.

Dealing with clients, handling activities and managing personal and business requests are all parts of everyday life. It’s how you handle them that will determine whether you’re going to keep moving forward or keep spinning your wheels.

When my alarm went off this morning I got out of bed, took a few steps and then fell back into bed.

I feel crappy.

When you own your own business you can’t call in sick (who would you call anyway?), but in-between naps you can still handle a few tasks from your comfy bed or sofa.

That’s what I’m doing today, but first I’m going to have another cup of tea from the new mug Carrie Wilkerson, The Barefoot Executive, just sent me. (Thanks, Carrie!)

• Focus on one area of your life that’s organized. Think hard. There has to be something in your life that’s organized. Maybe you’re an impeccable dresser, or you keep your favorite supplies in one place. Consider everything you’re doing now to get organized, no matter how small it may be, and pat yourself on the back. Who cares if no one notices the changes you’re making? It’s your life, not theirs.

• Consider your priorities. If something is important to you, you’ll change it.  If not, you won’t— and in some cases you shouldn’t. If you make only a few changes in the way you work, you could be more productive and maintain your creativity

• Ask yourself why you’re having trouble getting organized. Instead of beating yourself up over missed appointments or postponed decisions about paper, face it: you may be someone who thrives in a disorganized environment.  Work around your need for a bit of disorganization and designate one place to put your keys every time you come home or figure out one place to keep track of appointments and enter them as you make them

Before you throw in the organizing towel, realize that being right-brained doesn’t doom you to a life of chaos. If you change the way you think, you’ll reduce your stress level and leave yourself open to accomplish more.

In the episode I watched, the chefs on opposing teams were equally talented.  The difference was that one chef was a perfectionist.  The other had his eye on the end result: to serve good food in a timely manner.  The perfectionist spent more time on the presentation of the food — her customers wouldn’t have noticed if the lettuce wasn’t centered on the plate — and less time watching the clock.  The perfectionist lost the competition.

When you focus on making sure the slightest tasks turns out perfectly, you risk missing deadlines, annoying your clients and getting in your own way of success.  Your business can’t move forward when your need for perfection turns into an anchor that drags your business down.

The next time you can’t let something go because it’s not perfect, take the pressure off yourself and keep your eye on the big picture.