Category: Work From Home

What Batching Work Tasks Actually Does

I used to try and cram any marketing into spare afternoons when I felt like it. I have discovered that my brain works best in the mornings. So any activities that don’t require creative thinking I do after lunch. Trying to come up with captivating social media posts when you’re not mentally on is not a recipe for success. 

Now you may have read from me that I recommend themed work days. By that I don’t mean dressing up 😀. Instead batching work tasks to particular days to give you the time and space in your schedule to do specific jobs. 

My recommendation of themed work days came from discovering the concept of Marketing Monday. This was absolute gold for me. 

I am increasingly getting more introverted as I age, so I absolutely love starting my week with a no-client day. As I don’t love doing social media posts, having a day in which to just concentrate on doing those posts without anything else competing for my brain is a life saver. I would do a week’s worth of posts in that one day. 

Then I had the realisation that I really needed to put more time into planning and doing more entrepreneurial work on my landscape business, not just working in it. 

The Three Roles You Need to Wear

There are differing ‘hats’ or roles that we need to wear as business owners, especially as sole traders. 

There is the role when we are the ones actually creating the product or service. This is often the inspiration for going into business in the first place. We may know how to build wonderful furniture or are great at party planning so we decide to go into business due having this knowledge and skill. 

Operating solely in this role limits us to working IN our business. Working IN it is doing all the jobs necessary to bring in money. This is the design, measuring sites etc, the actual doing of the job.

The next hat or role necessary is that of Administrator. This role enables the wonderful furniture to be sold, invoiced, packaged and transported. It means the party planning business is advertised, quoted and invoiced. Without this role, money doesn’t flow in. 

But for a business to flourish and grow, there is one other hat. That of the Entrepreneur. In his book The E-Myth, Michael Gerber refers to this person as the Visionary also. 

This is working ON the business, not just IN it. 

This role involves thinking of the big picture. Like where do I want this business to go, what are my goals, dreams and aspirations for this business. If you don’t spend any time and energy here, your business can continue to bring in money but there may not be growth, or even responding to events when necessary (think 2020).

How My Marketing Monday Evolved

Realising this, that while I need to work IN my business, I also need to work ON my business is when Marketing Monday morphed into something bigger. 

Not only would I do the week’s social posts, but now I set aside some time to think about where I wanted this business to go. My husband would join me and we would spend 10 mins or so giving God the leadership in our business. We called it Marketing, Prayer and Planning.

We would meet for coffee at the beginning of our working day after seeing the kids off to school. Before any discussion re our schedules, we would pray and ask for guidance about this business’s possibilities. Then we would look over our diaries for the week and see what existing jobs we already had booked in. We’d discuss if we could fill any new landscaping jobs, check the weather etc. and contact clients to see if those days suited them. Once we sorted our weekly schedules, we would then talk about marketing, specifically what worked and what we needed to change. We also would chat about opportunities we could look into and ways we could advertise our business that we hadn’t done before. 

Why Task-Switching Drains Your Energy

The research on task-switching is clear. Interruptions destroy focus and drain mental energy in a big way. And as mothers and busy women we are constantly getting interrupted and pulled in different directions. This damages our output. This is why themed work days work so well. They give you the ability to keep your focus on one thing until it is done. That’s the benefit of batching tasks. When you batch similar tasks, eg marketing and planning, or accounts and stock levels you give yourself the opportunity to stay in flow. 

This isn’t a nice-to-have. It’s essential if you want to actually run your business with time to spare instead of just keeping it alive. Not only will your work be of a better quality, you will be so much more efficient with and in your time. 

We often don’t have that much time to spare. So to do what we need to do at a more efficient rate is highly important and has huge impacts on our stress levels and our capacity to operate our own business. 

How to Design Your Own Themed Workday

Have a look at your week. See if there is a day that is better suited for different tasks. As mentioned, I personally love starting my week with a no client day. Not only do I get on top of my marketing which can cause low level anxiety at the back of my brain if it doesn’t get done, but with the planning and prayer brought in, I get a great grip on my week and that bodes well for the rest of it. 

As I get older I am learning more about myself and what works best for me. My creative brain is wonderful in the morning but after lunch, not so much. So I decided to only see clients after lunch as answering questions and going through landscape plans didn’t require creative thinking. I was just responding to questions. This was massive for me. Any design I did, I did in the mornings. Setting this rule – batching my creative work to the mornings and seeing clients in the afternoons has also made a massive impact on how I feel about working on my business.

Discover What Works For You

You’ll find that specific days lend well to being at home and concentrating on your admin etc. Once you factor in everything else, you will discover the right days (even just a morning or afternoon) for specific business tasks.

This frees up times to concentrate on other tasks and your brain will thank you. 

Themed work days are just one piece. In my blog How to Structure Your Day when Running a Business from Home I cover 4 other productivity suggestions that work alongside batching your days. 

Systems like themed workdays are how you actually make things happen. But they only work if you’re focused on the right things first. My free class shows you why most women approach starting backwards – and what to do instead. You’ll finish knowing exactly where to focus your energy and your concrete next step.

Sign up here.  

How do you know when to push through or delegate?

The Moment It All Went Wrong

My very first quote chat as a landscape designer was an absolute disaster. I had met the couple at netball and was heading to their new build in the country and we would be having a walk around their property. I was planning on impressing them with some innovative ideas, then emailing them a quote, getting a yes and landing my first paying client. 

It did not go like this. 

It was an overcast day, so no sun out and I wasn’t clear which way was north (in the southern hemisphere, north facing is gold). 

They lived on a farm and said that any fences could be moved out or new fences put in. So there were no boundaries to work with. 

I was floundering badly. 

I did not get the job. 

That day is seared in my memory.

But instead of quitting, I now google map for north before each new client visit. Before going in, I get an idea of the place as much as possible before going in. 

I have learnt to ask questions when I am unsure of what to suggest and to just admit when I don’t know a plant instead of pretending.  

This discomfort was a signal I needed to stretch and grow, not run and hide. This pushing through is how Once Upon A Garden was built. 

Discomfort Is a Signal, Not a Verdict

My disaster of a day felt like the end of Once Upon A Garden. It wasn’t. It was a signal – clear, bright and loud – pointing at the two options ahead of me.

Road One: The Growth Edge

Firstly, I could use it as an amazing indication of the areas I needed to improve or grow into. How to prepare for a quote chat. That designing without boundaries is genuinely hard. To start with questions about how they want to live in the space, because this dictates the size and layout. 

The day left me drained and discouraged but that was due to my inexperience and not knowing what I didn’t know. Now I knew more about what I didn’t know. 

That day was uncomfortable because I had never done it before. I had thought about it and planned for it but never actually walked someone’s property with them while trying to come up with design ideas on the spot, in a muddy paddock with no fences and no sun. 

And the next quote chat wasn’t nearly as bad. I didn’t make the same mistakes that’s for sure. 

Sometimes we convince ourselves that avoidance is necessary or strategic – someone else can do this better than us etc., but this is just our brains trying to keep us safe and in the familiar. 

Here’s a way to tell the difference between being on the edge of growth or being genuinely drained:

Ask yourself this: if money and time were no object, would I still want this off my plate? Or do I just not want to feel the fear?

Road Two: The Genuine Drain

In this instance, the drain came from my lack of preparedness, not the activity itself. That’s the tell: if something drains you because you haven’t learned it yet, that’s a growth edge, not a task to pass on.

But some activities in business you don’t need to grow into. The side ones – admin, social media posting, FB ads, accounts etc. These can take your time but they don’t actually need you.

Cleaning my bathrooms was one of these. The truth was, I wasn’t getting to them as often as I would have liked and this was stressing me. From an idea I first pinched from Lorraine Murphy’s Remarkability, I decided I would rather spend my time earning more money, so for 3 years I hired my daughters to clean the bathrooms. It was wonderful. They got some spare money and I got the job done very regularly and removed that back of the mind stress. 

The gut-check is this: is this draining me when I do it, or because I don’t? A task you keep avoiding can sit there generating guilt just as surely as one that flattens you when you finish it. Either way, if it’s not where only you add value, and it’s not essential to your business growing, it’s a candidate for getting off your plate. (If the whole business drains you like that, it’s a different problem – you might be in the wrong business, and I’ve written about finding the right one for you here.) 

Four Ways to Get It Off Your Plate

There are 4 moves you can make here. You may be able to eliminate it (do you need to be part of that networking team?), automate it (set up email templates or a standing online order), delegate it or add it to your wish list for your dream team.

Maybe you’re not in a financial position to have a FB ads team (alas I am not as yet) but keeping that list is pretty cool – it subconsciously keeps you on the lookout for someone who may be able to help down the line. 

Knowing When to Push Through or Delegate

The skill isn’t avoiding discomfort. It’s knowing when to push through or delegate. 

Starting your own business will definitely bring feelings of discomfort. But I find the challenge and learning here exciting and inspiring. I love the growth that has come along with starting my various businesses. I am choosing to learn on purpose. 

If you are willing to look at your discomfort, and choose to grow within it, start with my free class. It’s a low commitment start, only 30 mins.  Save your spot in the free class.

The Life I Knew I Didn’t Want

If you’re thinking about running a business from home, one of the first things you’ll need to figure out is how to actually structure your day.

But first, let me tell you about my very first job…

When I was 14 I got a job for the school holidays working full time sorting files for my parents’ friends’ business. I’d catch the bus into the city, walk 20 minutes through downtown Auckland to their small electrical business, and sort files all day. There had been a fire and everything needed cleaning and refiling.

I started dreading going to bed at night because it meant waking up and doing it all again. A sad state for a 14 year old.

That was when I decided full time work was not for me. (Ironically, I also declared I would never work for myself either – but that’s a story for another blog.)

I’ve had a few full time jobs since then. Some I loved. Some bored me to tears. And some had my whole being internally screaming “I do not want to live like this” while my brain worked overtime trying to figure a way out.

It’s Your Life. You Get a Say

I read somewhere that couples spend enormous amounts of time and energy preparing for the wedding but very little preparing for their life after it. That idea stuck with me and it’s the premise behind Your Handpicked Life. It’s your life. You get to have a say in how it turns out.

Running my own business from home has given me that say. We decided early on, one of us would stay home with the kids. Starting my own business afforded me the opportunity to still contribute to the family finances, and as our kids grew, enabled me to stay at home during all their teen years.

5 Tips for Running a Business From Home

If you’re ready to start building that kind of flexibility into your own life, here are five tips for structuring your days when you’re running a business from home. 

Avoid task switching

This one has a massive mental impact and I don’t think we talk about it enough.

For years I watched my husband start a task and just… keep going until it was finished. Meanwhile I’d been interrupted by kids and life so many times that jumping around felt normal. I’ll be honest – I resented his focus a little.

But here’s the thing: just because you’re at home doesn’t mean housework needs to be slotted in between everything. Finish your work task first. Then hang the washing, make a coffee, take a break. Then come back to work.

The mental cost of switching back and forth is real. Every time you stop and restart, it takes effort to get back into flow – and that adds up across a day. Protect your focus like it’s your most valuable resource, because when you’re building a business from home, it genuinely is.

Stick to set hours

Honestly? This one I still struggle with.

I tried starting at 9am after the school drop, but once I added morning exercise and a prayer call with a friend, my husband is home for morning tea at 10.30 and I feel like I’ve barely started. Not great for motivation.

So my real advice here is to experiment and find what actually works for your life. Maybe that’s getting up early and doing an hour before the kids wake up. Maybe it’s during nap time, or after bedtime if you still have energy. There’s no right or wrong – just more or less efficient for you personally.

What I have figured out is where my energy goes. I’m sharper in the mornings so I protect that time for thinking work – writing, planning, creating. Client interviews happen after lunch when I don’t need to be at my creative best. I’ve also learned that too much time with people drains me, so I cap myself at one client interview per day. Two in a day and I’m horizontal on the couch all evening.

Know your energy, protect it, and build your hours around that.

Create themed workdays

Taking the previous tip one step further – once you know your energy patterns, you can start theming whole days around them.

For me, knowing that people can drain my energy meant Mondays became a no-client day. Marketing Monday was born – content, posting, admin, planning the week ahead. Starting my week at home, on my own terms, sets me up well for everything else.

If you’re naturally social and love people, your version might look completely different – maybe Monday is your client day and Friday is your admin day. The specifics don’t matter. What matters is that each day has a purpose, so you’re not making a hundred small decisions about what to work on next.

Batch similar tasks together

This one is gold when you actually do it. Sitting down and knocking out 10 Pinterest pins in one session, then not having to touch it for a week? That’s the kind of efficiency that makes a real difference. 

I used to log every expense and payment as it came in. It only took five minutes each time, but it meant constantly opening and closing spreadsheets, filing receipts, checking my bank account. Now I have a drawer for things to be actioned and a set time in the week to deal with all of it at once. I open the accounts once, sort everything, close it off. Done.

Go through all the tasks in your business and group the similar ones together. Then slot them into your week based on your energy levels. Paying bills and logging income doesn’t require much brain power, so that happens late afternoon. It saves both time and mental energy.

Use a time tracker

This one is less about productivity in general and more about getting through the tasks you’d rather avoid.

Set a timer, put your head down, and just do the thing. Knowing there’s a cup of tea waiting at the end makes the grind more bearable than you’d think.

It’s a simple tactic but an effective one. And if you find yourself dreading the same task week after week, that’s useful information – it might be time to offload it. Hire an accountant, outsource your bookkeeping, find a VA for admin. Your time and energy are better spent on the parts of your business only you can do.

These tips are useful whether you’re already running your business or still in the planning stage. Either way, knowing how you’ll structure your days before you start running a business from home is half the battle.

If you’re still in the thinking stage, come to my free class first. It’s the clearest starting point I know.