Business Juice
Business Juice
Unlocking Productivity for Entrepreneurs
As we navigate the often-overwhelming digital landscape, I reveal my beloved analog secret—a leather-bound traveler's notebook—that keeps my creativity grounded and my thoughts organized. But it doesn't stop there; digital tools like Evernote and Asana emerge as the companion to my hand-written notebook, streamlining workflows and fostering outstanding team coordination. Don't miss the teaser for an upcoming episode where I'll walk you through my daily planning rituals, and remember, your productivity hacks are always welcome for a chance to shine in future discussions. Tune in and transform the way you perceive productivity—this isn't just a listening experience; it is meant to encourage you and move your business journey forward!
If you have any productivity tips and would like these to feature in one of our future episodes, write to hello@devenishmasters.com. For questions on how we can support your business journey through personalizes coaching, reach out at that email as well. We love seeing entrepreneurs thrive. Your success is our joy!
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Hi there, hey, welcome to this week's episode of Business Juice. So this week I want to talk to you about productivity. It's one of the hottest topics on many social media platforms. It is one of the topics that I've discussed a number of times, and people have downloaded some of the podcast episodes we've done in the past on productivity and really enjoyed them, and I think part of that is because people want to know how can I be more productive, how can I make my business work for me rather than me just working for my business? So many of our listeners are either people who want to set up a business or who already have a business and are just looking for better ways to manage their business. So what I want to do is to provide you in every episode, with some great tools and some great insights on how you can do that and things that you can use right away. So today, talking about productivity, what I'm going to do is I'm going to give you some insights that I have gathered over the years as a multiple business owner on what productivity actually is, and then give you three tools that we use in our businesses which I think you'll find really helpful and you might want to adapt for your business as well.
Speaker 1:Okay, well, let's have a look at what is productivity for your business as well. Okay, well, let's have a look at what is productivity. So, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, productivity is a measure of economic performance that compares the amount of goods and services produced so the output with the amount of inputs used to produce those goods and services. Okay, so that makes sense. You know, how much are we putting into the business and what are we getting out of the business? In that sense, how do I define productivity? In terms of running your own business, productivity is the positive output you or your business creates in order to move your business forward. So you might think that equates to sales. Well, it sort of does, but it sort of doesn't. If we think that sales and revenue are something that comes straight out of a linear process, we need to think again. So there's no linear 10-step manual for sales. There just isn't. It doesn't occur in a linear fashion.
Speaker 1:You want to think of productivity as different strands moving forward in the same direction. You might want to say it's comparable to creating a harvest. You don't simply plant a seed and right away see a harvest. It takes different factors. So we need good seed. Faulty seed will not produce a healthy harvest. There are external factors, such as you know, we need sunlight, wind, great biodiversity, water and the regularity of nourishing the seed towards growth and the regularity of nourishing the seed towards growth. And, of course, the ground. You know good, solid ground and we know this.
Speaker 1:As you know, many of you are Christians as well, so this will resonate with you. You know we need a good foundation, we need some good ground, and the ground really, in terms of business is is where are you trying to be productive? Are you in a marketplace that will allow you to be productive, or are you trying to sell something that you know it's just not going to work in that area that you are costing your business? So people themselves have to be the right type of people for the business they're in. So if you run a business, it should be something that aligns with your passion and your skill, so sure. So if I look at myself, yes, of course I could try and start up a, an accountancy business, but at this point in time I can tell you that would not line up with my passion and also it would not line up with my skills or any of the training that I've had, so that would not be a good idea. Equally, people need to be well and well-rounded. It's difficult to be productive you know, at the level you would like to when you're not feeling well or your mind is all over the place, or if you're just low on energy. So at this point, though, let me say and I hope you're listening not being well or not as energetic as you would hope to be does not stop you from being productive. Not at all. The only difference is that you need to reassess how productive you want to be and by what time.
Speaker 1:The biggest mistakes business owners make is to overestimate how much time they have or can give, or how much brain power they can give to their entrepreneurial endeavors. Successful business owners know that, and they know that setting a goal is key, but setting the right goal is even more crucial to success, more than that setting the right goal and achieving it. What does that do? Well, it propels you to greater productivity because, in the long run, as you're seeing success along the way, because in the long run, as you're seeing success along the way, you're motivated, you're excited and productivity then picks up over time. So on the other side though, on the flip side if you set a goal too high and you don't achieve it, clearly you're going to get frustrated. And you don't achieve it, clearly you're going to get frustrated and a sense of failure kind of sets in no-transcript people who started a business because they felt failure right away. They set their goals too high, they couldn't meet the goals. Well, they don't continue.
Speaker 1:So my biggest advice is, if you're starting a business, set your goals slightly lower within your ability to meet those goals in terms of productivity, achieve those and then move forward with greater goals, bigger goals, and you know, don't rush. You don't have to rush necessarily. So, coming back to people, if you hire people, be it as employees or freelancers or service providers, you'll also want to know that they can meet the productivity goals you have set. Even that might mean that you're asking them not to contribute too much. That has happened as well. So sometimes people who come in as freelancers, they have wonderful ideas, but you've got your goals and you actually don't want to be overwhelmed, particularly in the beginning. So you know, be okay with saying to them you know what? I love your ideas, let's capture those, but right now. That's not something we're going to pursue Externally.
Speaker 1:Business productivity of course, depends on your supply chain. So how easy is for you to get any materials you need? We know from COVID-19, you know that era well, supply chains were really heavily impacted by lockdowns and businesses actually closing. Have you considered where your materials are coming from? Do you have a backup plan in case your supplier closes down or suddenly raises prices? You know even our freelancers. You know they might suddenly choose to raise their price. Do you have a backup plan? Do you know who else you can contact? So let me give you an example. Let's say you're running a coffee house and a bakery. All is going really well, you're on form, your staff is tip-top and then milk prices shoot up. You know, because of information that you have, that this is only temporary, due to a shortage in the market.
Speaker 1:But are you resilient enough, flexible enough to make a change to your business model so that you can still be productive or so you can prepare for greater productivity in just a little while? So you might remember this case of KFC. You know they had an issue with their supply chain and turn that into PR opportunity with some great posters and social media posts as well. Productivity might go down for a short while, but could spike as you gain more customers after a while and more people are following your brand. So if you see something happening and your business has to slow down in terms of productivity, keep going with the same goal in mind, but arrange things so that you can pick up again at a slightly later pace. But take that period of time as an opportunity for other things. It could be an opportunity for PR, an opportunity to reorganize, for instance. So that would mean you're still being productive, but maybe in a slightly different way.
Speaker 1:So, apart from being clear on your goal, not over committing and being flexible, the type of tools you choose will make a difference. So if we come back, you know, to that example with the harvest, well, of course it will matter what type of watering equipment. You know to that example with the harvest well, of course it will matter what type of watering equipment you have the harvesters, you have tractors, animals, but it doesn't mean you need to have the most expensive or the most high tech, but you need to choose the tools which help you for your setting and your context, and you know the tools are going to help you achieve your goals. So if someone comes and says to you hey, you should really be using this social media management tool for $300 a month, well, you might not need that. Don't spend money on productivity tools. You don't need Assess what your goal is, how are you going to get there and choose the right approach as well as the right tools for that?
Speaker 1:So I said in the beginning like I'm going to share some tools with you. So what I want to do here is to share three productivity tools that we've used. There are many more and we use more than that, and I will share some of those in another podcast, but I thought these could be quite useful to you. We use them for our two businesses Zeitgeist Communication in the UK and also Devinition Masters here in the US. A very new business just started up.
Speaker 1:Okay, so the first two tools I'm going to share with you are notebooks. Now, that sounds potentially a little bit boring, but bear with me. The very first tool, and, in my mind, the most important one, is a physical notebook. Now, I don't use just any notebook. What I use is a traveler's notebook. I'm just going to explain what I do with that and why I think it's really helpful.
Speaker 1:So I've learned over the years that creativity flows when you use your hands. You doodle, you make notes, maybe you draw something. Your thoughts can flow much more freely when you do that than when you use a computer, because a computer of course has limits and while you might use a pen on an iPad, there's still some limitations and a notebook and some paper. There's just something special about it and it's really particularly helpful in terms of your brainstorming phase. So it's definitely my number one and I have several of those, one I created myself and then the other one I have compiled by getting different notebooks and putting them into a leather binder. What does that look like? So the different notebooks essentially have different topics.
Speaker 1:I have one notebook in this binder, in the traveler's notebook, which I just capture ideas. So I can highly recommend, if you run a business or you're about to have a small notebook in your bag or, you know, in the car or wherever, and if you have an idea, write it down. Someone else is telling you something about a great idea they've heard or something they've seen and you really like it. Write it down, use it as a repository for interesting, stimulating, great ideas and then use those later on when it comes to your next planning stage. You'll be surprised how it really sparks your thinking and your team's thinking. I then have other sort of segments or other smaller notebooks in this traveler's notebook. One of them is a calendar, and then I have another one for long editorial type pieces that I like to write, and then I have another one for long editorial type pieces that I like to write, and then I have one with scripture comments. So scriptures as well as scripture commentary, things I've heard in a sermon, things I've read in the Bible, and all of that is captured in this one notebook. And why do I do that? Well, this notebook shows quite a lot of who I am and what I do and really is a reflection of the person I am and I want to show up in my business, the person you know as the person I am and not as a different persona. So that's why I really like this notebook and it kind of just, you know, it just resembles part of, or most of who I am. So I highly recommend doing that.
Speaker 1:And now the second tool is also a notebook, but this is a digital notebook. It's a bit of an older tool Many of you probably have it or have seen it. It's called Evernote, and Evernote allows you to create several digital notebooks with whatever topics you want to have and in their different notes, and I really love this tool because it allows me to capture, you know, web links, documents, ideas and to categorize them in a certain way. I can find them through tags, for instance, I can put them in different individual notebooks, like I said before, and also you can view documents just as they are. So if you, if you put in a PowerPoint presentation, it isn't just an attachment, but actually you see the PowerPoint presentation in this notebook. The beauty of this for me as a consultant is that I can go to a client with a digital notebook and have all the links in there for everything I want to show them, as well as some additional information, maybe about the client or maybe some points that I want to make a bit later on in the conversation. So a really good one. So that's Evernote, and just to say I do not earn any affiliate. You know anything on these as an affiliate. I'm just sharing tools with you that we like to use.
Speaker 1:Okay, so the third tool is really a wonderful project management tool and I love it and the team that has worked with me. They were fully integrated and we use it whatever client we work with, and the beauty is you can pull your client into this project management tool as well. You can share information with them. The tool is called Asana, so it's a project management tool. You can use it as an individual, but mainly the benefit is to use it as a team.
Speaker 1:This project management tool allows you to create tasks. These show up in your calendar. You can link it to your own calendar. You can have a timeline, you know, like a Gantt chart. You can also show it as a Kanban. You can get people to send in information through a form which then populates your tasks. I mean, it is so versatile.
Speaker 1:I love this tool and I love how easy it is to assign tasks to other people and to communicate with them on, you know, things that have been done. So my team members can communicate and say, hey, I wasn't quite sure what you meant by this task, is this what you wanted? And you know I can communicate with them really easily and things just get done. And that, of course, is what we want when we talk about productivity. We need things to get done, course, is what we want when we talk about productivity. We need things to get done and we want to turn the idea of us doing things for you know, for the business, slightly on its head. We also want the business and the tools we use to do things for us. I don't want to spend hours trying to manage and project manage. I want a good tool that's going to serve me, and I think Asana really does that. So, as I said before, there are many digital tools we use and I will share some more on some of the other episodes.
Speaker 1:I really want to say to you just one more time when it comes to productivity, you set the goal, you choose the tools and you make all these work for you. Do not become a slave of productivity. Too many people do that and they get, you know, burnt out and just so tired of it all that that beautiful business idea they had just shrinks and fades away. So be clear on what you're trying to achieve. Set your goals only as high as you know that you can deliver on and use some great tools. You know some great digital tools and paper tools that are just going to help you manage things better.
Speaker 1:Okay, so we also, of course, use a planning system, and I'm not going to talk about that today, but I wanted to let you know that in one of the episodes, I will talk you through how I plan my day. How do I plan a workday, where do I begin, how do I set priorities, how do I manage to keep my mind focused but also continue to have joy throughout the day, and I'll explain that in one of the next episodes. In the meantime, however, if you have any productivity tools or tips that you'd like to share, send me an email. Send it to hello at devinishmasterscom. That's, hello at devinishmasterscom, and we'd love to feature those, or some of those, in one of our upcoming episodes. I'll put all that in the show notes, as well as the tools that I've shared today. So, really, I just wanted to wish you a really good rest of your week and a blessed Easter, and I look forward to our next episode next week.
