Danielle Guerin

Archive for the ‘Your attitude is showing’ Category

If the basics of reading and writing are learning your ABCs, the basics of work-at-home success is setting your priorities. If you don’t have a set of priorities by which to guide your business, your day, and your week, you are at the mercy of circumstance. Happenstance is for people who play the lottery; not for entrepreneurs.

You sit down at the computer to begin work on your to-do list, and the emails start coming in. Instead of having a way to rate the importance and urgency of each request and item on your list, you just respond to whatever is front and center – which is usually whatever email or phone call has come in most recently. Then the end of the day comes, and you still have as many items on your to-do list as you started with. The stress starts to mount as your business goals recede farther and farther into the distance.

So what’s the solution? Setting priorities. When you have a list of goals and priorities, you have a map for your future.

My advice is to set one or two business objectives for each quarter of the year. You may choose to launch a new product the first quarter of the year, revamp your website during the second quarter, create marketing materials for the third quarter, and develop an outsourcing strategy for the fourth quarter.

The following is my favorite process for breaking down a large objective into daily, weekly, and monthly priorities:

• Start with your quarterly objective.
• Ask yourself, what would have to happen this month to achieve this objective?
• What would have to happen this week?
• What would have to happen today?

Once you have defined what needs to happen each day, week, month, and quarter, put those items on your calendar and to-do list with a big star next to them. Now you know what has to be completed every day before you start answering phone calls or emails. No matter what the rest of the day brings, you know you have completed the things that will most move your business forward.

This small routine will help reduce your stress because you’ll no longer lie in bed, wondering what the heck you accomplished that day. Instead, you will have taken concrete steps towards achieving your most important goals. (P.S. This works great with personal goals, too!).

Now that you have your priorities set for each day, week, month, and quarter, how will you know if all that work will fit into your schedule? In our next post, we’ll take a look at how you can manage those fleeting 24 hours we all have to work within.

When you work from home, stress is everywhere. It’s in your success as you become more in demand, it’s in your lack of success as you try to figure out how to make a go of your venture. When you’re stressed out, you become less effective as your energy is sapped away from your goals and diverted to fighting fires. If you could minimize these stressors, you’d be better able to focus on your long-term business goals.

In my experience, there are nine main stress points that home-based entrepreneurs face:

1.You’re stressed because you don’t set priorities.

2.You’re stressed because you don’t manage your time efficiently.

3.You’re stressed because a lot of what you do is outside your control.

4.You’re stressed because you can’t say no.

5.You’re stressed because you don’t set boundaries for your family.

6.You’re stressed because you get sucked into the TV/e-mail/blog-reading trap.

7.You’re stressed because you don’t delegate.

8.You’re stressed because you don’t take care of yourself or your health.

9.You’re stressed because you don’t have a support system.

If you were to rate yourself on each point, you’d likely score higher on some than others. You may be a great delegator, but you’re not so good at setting boundaries. Each of us has our own strengths and weaknesses, based on our experience and personality. Even if you answer “yes” to only one of these stress points, you may suffer from more anxiety than someone who has answered “yes” to numerous stressors. Each of us responds differently to outside pressures and stress.

In upcoming posts, we’ll take a look at how you can make adjustments and get on the road to increased productivity and a more enjoyable work life. The first stop? Taking a look at your priorities.

I’ve been a virtual assistant for almost 8 years now and on a day like today, I am grateful for being a member of a community where many members believe in collaboration instead of competition.

To me, and I think I tweeted about it a while back, when you are being authentic and work with integrity, there is no competition.

I saw a great free information product on an English speaking VA’s site yesterday. It is EXACTLY what I wanted to create. How cool is that? The idea was in my mind but not on paper yet. I could have just taken the document and translate it in French for my clients without telling anyone. It would not have been right and I would have known that it wasn’t mine entirely. And I wouldn’t have gotten the idea for this post.

I took 5 minutes of my time yesterday to write the VA to ask permission for translating the document and I will keep it as intact as possible with the original author’s information. She accepted and I feel this will be the beginning of a great collaboration.

I did not lose anything by asking. In fact, I think I may have won a trusting colleague.

Next time you see something great on another person’s site, instead of just taking it, just ask! The worst that could happen is receiving a NO answer and that would just leave you with the power to create something entirely of your own.