Learn how to say “no”

No one likes to say “no”.   However, it is an essential skill that one must learn to properly manage their time.   By saying ”yes” to everything, you risk falling into several traps: 1) Not living up to all your promises, 2) Not doing anything well because you are trying to get everything done, 3) Getting burned out by trying to please everyone.

So, how does someone who hates to say no learn how to say it?  First of all you need to change your mindset.  Saying “no” doesn’t make you a bad person.  There is a great article on RealSimple.com that gives several scenarios and how to say no gracefully (http://www.realsimple.com/realsimple/content/0,21770,1149806-1,00.html).  The more you learn to say “no” to the things you need to say no to, the more you can say “yes” to the things that matter most to you.

Motivation is half the battle

For some, time management is less about the need to get more done in a day then is is about doing what matters most.  You can have great systems put in place, but unless you are focused on a goal they will get you no where.  This is where motivation becomes a factor.  If you’ve read my previous posts, you know I love systems and I’ve learned to love my “to-do” lists.  But all the systems in the world will not help if you do not have the proper motivation and frame of mind. 

My most recent session with my business coach, Spencer Combs (www.spencercombs.com), was eye opening.  We looked back at an exercise we did about 6 months ago and I realized I met most of the goals I set for myself back then! It was now time to do the same exercise again in order to move my business forward to the next level.  You would think that would be motivation enough to light a fire under me and renew my push for building a successful virtual assistant business.  I was surprised that instead of being productive last week, I was totally un-productive and just went through the motions.  I think I finally realize what coach Spencer means when he explains that everyone has different motivators (what “moves” you).

My motivation this week came from a conversation about vacations I had with my husband this week-end and what we can afford to do next year.  We talked about how much we need to save each month to get us where we want to go and I realized THIS is my motivation.  That’s why it’s Monday morning and I’ve already written my blog for the week, heck I might even write TWO this week!

In summary, time management is very important and the more you work on implementing things that will leverage your time and energies the better, however the other part of the equation is you have to find what motivates YOU to put it all together and MAKE IT HAPPEN!  Systems alone will not make your business grow.  You must have focus and a goal that motivates you to keep moving forward.  That motivator is different for everyone (there is no right or wrong motivator).  It’s taken me a year of coaching to figure out mine, so don’t give up if you haven’t found yours yet!  It may even change over time.  Just believe in yourself and don’t be afraid of what you learn.

Use a showing feedback tool to save time

I am always getting requests to evaluate different software programs that tout the “latest and greatest” guarranteed to help agents sell more houses for the low, low price of $— ……

More often than not, my evaluation comes back with a firm “It’s not worth your money, stick with what you have”.  There is one program I was told about by a realtor friend that I think is worth telling you all about.  It will help you organize your showing feedback requests, save you time, and best of all… It’s Free!

The website is www.showingfeedback.com.  You set up your listing (with a picture to help agents remember what home you want feedback on) and when you have a showing you simply enter the showing information (agent’s name, company, e-mail address) and send the request.  This will send an e-mail request to the agent with a brief quesionnaire about their clients response to the home.  You can even customize what questions are asked.  Their response is automatically uploaded into the program and you can even give your clients access to the feedback.  Do you have difficulty getting ahold of agents, or do they not always respond to your e-mail request for feedback?  This program will automatically re-send the request up to 3 times so you don’t have to remember to re-send the e-mail.

All-in-all a big timesaver.  Everything is kept in one place, you don’t have to continuously give your clients feedback (they can see what others are saying for themselves), and you don’t have to keep sending multiple requests to agents to try to get them to respond.

Try it sometime, if you need help getting it set up just let me know!  I’d be glad to help.

How to Manage Interruptions

We’ve all experienced this scenario: You have carefully planned out your day, knowing exactly what you need to get done and how long it should take you, then BAM! You get a phone call.  The deal you are closing next week is falling through!  You spend the next hour on the phone putting the deal back together.  Crisis averted.  Then you stay up an hour later that night to finish the things you had scheduled on your to-do list…

Why not schedule “miscellaneous” time into your day to cover these situations?  That way if you get that “emergency” phone call that has to take priority you can go with the flow, handle the situation, and be stress free!  The worst thing that could happen is that you don’t have an emergency come up.  If that happens, you can use the opportunity to work on some of the lower priority items on your list that you wouldn’t have normally been able to get to.