Episode 233: The Number 1 Secret to Finding More Time in Your Week as a Work at Home Mom

Full Episode Transcription:

[00:00:00] If you’re anything like me, you probably struggle to get everything on your plate completed each week. I know y’all listening. You’re busy moms, busy wives, friends, daughters, and you just wanna be able to do it all. So in this episode, we’re focusing on helping you, mamas listening, find more time in your week so you can streamline everything and actually have the time to work on growing your virtual assistant business. So grab your notebook and pen and let’s dive in. Tip number one to help you find more time in your week is to do what’s called task mapping.

[00:00:37] To effectively manage your time, you need to start out by mapping out all of the tasks that you do on a recurring basis. So the first thing you have to do to do this is to brain dump all of the tasks that you do throughout the week. I would recommend doing this exercise for all of your life tasks, and then you can do it again separately for your business tasks. So you wanna divide your tasks into three different columns, tasks that you do every day, tasks that you do every week, maybe once or twice a week, and then tasks that you do on a monthly basis. This is gonna help you gain a really clear overview of your responsibilities. Automate them so you don’t have to try to remember them all, and then prioritize them accordingly. If you’re having a hard time thinking of what the tasks are that you usually do, try to just look back at the past week and just write out all the things you’ve done. That’ll kind of help you start to realize what you’re doing on a consistent recurring basis.

[00:01:36] Okay, so once you’ve got that done, your second tip to help you save more time, find more time in your week is to batch batching similar tasks together can significantly boost your productivity. You wanna group tasks that share commonalities, and they can be completed in one day or one chunk of time. By focusing on similar tasks together, you’ll stay in that flow and then you’re gonna minimize the time that you lose when you’re trying to switch between a lot of different activities. I. Okay, so you wanna batch those similar things together. So for example, if we’re talking about marketing your virtual assistant business, those tasks that fall into marketing, such as creating your graphics, writing your captions, you might wanna put those together in one day rather than spreading them out.

[00:02:27] That way, once you’re in that creative mode, you can just sit down and bust it all out at once, rather than having to try to get in that creative mode multiple days in a row. Okay. The next tip is time blocking. You need to calculate the time needed for each task that you’ve mapped out and write down the total number of hours required for each group of tasks. Okay, so write out that time estimate for all the tasks you wrote down, and then you also need to perform a time audit and see how many hours you have available in your week, and compare that to the total hours you need to complete those tasks. Then you wanna assess and see if there’s enough time to complete everything. And if not, you need to identify tasks that can be deleted or delegated to others.

[00:03:19] Okay. Then you want to make sure that you have a planner where you have written out specific time blocks in your week where you’re gonna be able to get each task done. This gives some structure to your weekly schedule, and I think a lot of people, they see a planner as kind of like a budget, like it’s. They think it’s going to make them have to stick exactly to that, and it’s going to be so structured and there’s gonna be no wiggle room. And to me, that’s not what a planner is. A planner is a guideline for me, but I don’t have to follow it a hundred percent. And it really allows me to see when I’m going to have free time, because if I’ve just got something stored in my brain. I don’t see where the pockets of time I’m gonna have in my day to just breathe are. But if I map it out in a planner, I can see, oh, Wednesday I have three free hours, I’m probably gonna have where, you know, I can catch up if I need to, or I can just have that time to myself. I. Okay, so I really highly recommend a planner. My favorite one is from Horacio Printing. That’s H O R A C I O printing. So you can just Google that. They are amazing and they’re faith-based. They’re awesome. I love them. I. So the next tip for saving you time throughout your week is to set up your workflow. So you wanna streamline your weekly planning process, and you can use tools like Trello to do that.

[00:04:43] So I do have a free weekly planner, Trello template. Which you can find at ariannavernier.com/free-weekly-planner or go to the link in the show notes and that’s gonna help you organize your tasks and assign due dates. So I mentioned the planner and the planners when we put out all our time blocks of when we’re gonna be able to work and like what specific category we’re gonna be working on during that time. But then in Trello, I put the exact tasks that are in that category and I assign a due date to them because for me, I like checking things off. And if they turn red because they’re overdue, I know I gotta get them done. That just works for me. So do whatever works best for you. But that’s what’s really helped me in a lot of the students in the Virtual Assistant Mama Academy. Okay. So when you get that free weekly planner from me, then you can go in and organize your tasks, assign the due dates, and all you really have to do is just plug in your task groups, add in the specific tasks, and then allocate them to the day that you’re going to be getting it done.

[00:05:47] So this is totally gonna save you time and effort in the long run. The fifth step is to check for alignment. So you wanna regularly review your tasks and make sure that they align with your long-term goals. So if your objective is to grow your virtual assistant business and leave your nine to five, you need to be evaluating how each task is helping you work towards that goal. You wanna make sure to remove tasks that don’t serve your purpose or consider delegating them to others. So if it’s not important for you to be doing, you can see if maybe your spouse could help you with it for a minute, or if you could exchange some services with somebody else, for them to do it for you. But if it’s really not that important, just delete it. Focus on the tasks that are actually going to help you get where you wanna go.

[00:06:35] Okay. So by implementing these effective time blocking strategies, you can totally make the most of your available time, and you can take big, big steps towards growing your virtual assistant business. You just have to be intentional. I. So I hope these time blocking tips will help you find more time in your week and propel your virtual assistant business forward. Don’t forget, you can always come into our free Facebook community at facebook.com/groups/virtualassistantmama. Share how these strategies are working for you. Ask any questions. If you need any help figuring out how to get it to work for you, all the things. I wanna help you celebrate your achievements and support you along the way, so make sure you get connected in that group. Again, that’s facebook.com/groups/virtualassistantmama. Alright, and if you are ready to really, really focus on your virtual assistant business and figure out exactly what you need to do, I wanna invite you to the free workshop I have coming up on Thursday, September 28th at 6:00 PM.

[00:07:40] In that workshop, we’re gonna be covering the five Ps you need to know to become a successful virtual assistant so you can fully replace your income, be home with your babies, and never have to go to your nine to five again. If you want to. If you just wanna do it as a side hustle, that’s totally fine too. This is still for you, but I encourage you to come and register for that at ariannavernier.com/free-workshop. That’s A R I A N N A V E R N I E r.com/free-workshop. Or you can find the link in the show notes. I can’t wait to see y’all there, and as always, we will see you in the next episode.