Welcome to the eighth week of the Tony Elumelu Entrepreneurship Programme!
This week, you will be considering how to manage your time and employees. Maintaining productivity is an important part of running a business, but entrepreneurs must also be careful to avoid burnout. You’ll have the opportunity to learn about some techniques that can help in this process. Then, you will be learning about effectively managing employees to maintain their productivity, and to hold effective meetings.
As you go through these lessons, please think through techniques you’ve personally discovered in the past that help you improve efficiency, reduce stress, and more effectively communicate with others. Discuss your learning and your own ideas with your mentor, and please feel free to bring these thoughts to other Programme participants through the Activity tab.
Read the Glossary this week to understand terminologies!
Project To Dos
Complete Daily Work Hack Worksheet
Increasing Productivity
Speak with other business owners in your area and learn what they do to increase their productivity. Try to speak with at least three business owners, with at least one of these coming from a different industry than you. Share with them your own thoughts on increasing productivity, and discuss how to apply this knowledge in your daily business operations.
If you discover any particularly meaningful ideas through your discussion with fellow business owners in your local area, share them in a Forum discussion with your fellow programme participants.
Brainstorm each of the major tasks that must be accomplished to keep your business running. Consider how frequently each task must be accomplished.
Focus on the individual tasks that must be accomplished every single day. Draft a Daily Checklist tracking these items.
Review your "Daily Checklist" with your friends and Mentor.
Share any of the best activities on one of the Forum discussions
Set calendar reminders for all important TEEP events
Complete the Meeting Survey
Complete the Pre-Meeting Checklist
Schedule at least three different meetings with potential customers, using the "Pre-Meeting Checklist" as a guide
Discuss any lessons that you learned on the Forum
Set a regular one-hour meeting with your Mentor every other week that begins after the 12-week programme.
Glossary of Terms
Shareholders
Shareholders are people or organizations who hold shares in a company. More generally, they are people who consider ways to support - and profit from - a company’s activities.
Agenda
A list of items to be discussed during a meeting.
Meeting
A meeting is a pre-arranged assembly of people, especially members of a company, for discussion.
Checklist
A checklist is a list of items that need to be accomplished. Upon completion, each item is “checked off” so the owner of the list knows it has been completed.
Hack
A hack is a creative solution to a problem or situation that often saves time, energy, or money.
Daily Work Hacks
There is too much to do, and not enough time to do it. Everyone, especially entrepreneurs, need to find ways to do more valuable things in shorter periods of time. That is the essence of productivity.
Work hacks are things that you do at work that let you be more productive. The word “hack” was borrowed from computer software, where it means a clever solution to a tricky problem that saves you time, energy, money, or some combination of all three. Work hacks help you accomplish important tasks.
Notice that this is not just about being efficient. Efficiency is not the same thing as productivity. You can be very efficient at activities that do not produce value for you, or for anyone else. What if you first started hopping on one foot, and could hop 30 times in one minute. You could practice and eventually improve to the point where you could hop 60 times in one minute. You are becoming more efficient but hopping on one foot doesn’t make you any more productive.
Work hacks, on the other hand, emphasize productivity. They are designed for you to create as much value as possible as quickly as possible. They will also inspire your employees to adopt some of these practices, too.
Hacks for you
● Keep a checklist of the most important things to do each day
● Start the day focusing on the most difficult task
● Answer emails and other social activities in the afternoons
● Bring a notebook and pen (or your mobile phone) everywhere
● Take a break every hour to refocus and refresh your mind
● Do not multi-task, or try to do more than one thing at a time
● Delegate any non-essential task to others, giving them clear instructions
What activities take up most of your time? Why?
Do you find yourself overwhelmed with phone calls? Text messages? Emails?
How quickly do you get frustrated at work every day?
Hacks for your employees
● Only allow meetings that have a clear agenda
● Allow everyone to listen to music on headphones, when appropriate
● Have everyone (except sales staff) put their phones on silent to avoid distractions
● Recognize performance by publicly telling stories about employee successes
Do your employees work as hard as you would like?
How do you congratulate the top performers in your company?
Do your employees ever complain about meetings?
Hacks for your company
● Do not take on customers who distract from your main business
● Promote stories related to particularly satisfied customers, crediting employees
● Invite potential clients and partners to a social event once a month
Do a few of your customers cause almost all the problems? If you are not yet selling a product or service, where do you expect to have problems from customers?
Do a few of your customers account for almost all of the revenue? If you are not yet selling a product or service, where you expect to sell the largest number of products or services?
Daily Checklist
As an entrepreneur, you have many demands on your time. There will be different options for you every day, and often it will not be clear which ones are the critical tasks that must be accomplished to move your business in the right direction. It is impossible to predict what you must do ahead of time, but many people use a daily checklist as a tool to help them stay focused.
A daily checklist is important. It reinforces the goal-oriented nature of your work. You and your team must be focused on your mission, clearly connecting to a customer’s problem. There will always be distractions, but you must be able to put them to the side while you focus on your most important tasks.
You should prepare a daily checklist at the end of the previous day. This helps you organize your thoughts, and also write down any important things that you may forget while you sleep. Many entrepreneurs also find the checklist very helpful when they are trying to sleep, when there seem to be many ideas inside your head. Writing them down can make you feel more comfortable that they will be accomplished.
A common method for daily checklists is the 1 - 3 - 5 rule. This is the simplest way to organize, and it also more manageable than longer lists that usually do not get finished. 1 - 3 - 5 lists work like this: identify one big important thing that you must do the next day; then identify three relatively important but manageable tasks that you must do the next day; and finally identify five smaller items to complete the next day.
That’s all you have to do, and it is surprisingly difficult. At first, many people do not think it will be hard. Then they try to do it for a week and find out that they could only complete the entire checklist once or twice. The reason is simple: we are surrounded by distractions all the time, especially because of our connection to people and information through the internet.
Try following the 1 - 3 - 5 checklist for the remaining weeks of the programme. You will be surprised how much you can accomplish, and how it will benefit your company. Beyond accomplishing your goals, your employees can also be motivated to do better.
What is the single most important thing you need to do tomorrow?
What are three other things you should do tomorrow?
What are five minor tasks that also need to be completed tomorrow?
How could you fit the 1 - 3 - 5 checklist into your evening every single day?
Pre-Meeting Checklist
There are a few simple steps you can take to make sure that every meeting you hold will be productive. Many of us are used to doing things in a more simple way, where we invite a broad group of people so we can be sure to have a packed room.
Instead, you should treat each meeting as an opportunity to inspire your team, to refocus on the company’s mission, and to ensure that everyone understands how much you value their time. The first meeting of any new project or group of people should be used to help everyone understand the overall goal, and then the role each person plays.
After the first few meetings you should be able to transition to a different style. Eventually it is the people who attend the meeting that provide the information. They all attend to update each other, asking for feedback and support as necessary. This is the goal of a good leader and manager. In a few months the meetings should feel like they would be able to take place without you in the room.
This type of meeting does not happen overnight. You will need to invest time and energy into your employees. You will also have to set the example by holding productive meetings that use everyone’s time efficiently. Use this checklist to assess your current style, and see where you can improve.
In one sentence, what is this meeting about? Have you clearly explained that to everyone?
Who needs to be at this meeting? Who does not need to be there?
Do you have a clear agenda? Have you distributed it to everyone who will be at the meeting at least one day ahead of time?
Do you have a clear stopping time for the meeting? Make sure you stick to it.
Do you know who will be responsible for implementing the actions that result from the meeting? Have you talked to them ahead of time to see how much spare time they have?
Do you have one person who will take notes so that everyone else can just pay attention?
Do you really need to be there? Could someone else run this meeting and let you focus on more important tasks?
Meeting Survey
Meetings are a fact of life as a professional, whatever your industry or experience level. You may not enjoy meetings but they will be important for you as an entrepreneur. Your employees require information, and they also need opportunities to build relationships among the group. Meetings do not have to be a waste of time. The lessons you should apply for personal productivity can also help you manage others, and to help others manage themselves. You may think that you know how to run meetings because you have been in them many times, but that is not true. Most meetings are poorly run, so any lessons you have learned are probably counter-productive. Please complete the following survey to help get a sense of your experience with meetings.
Which option best describes the meetings you have attended?
a. Long and boring.
b. Long and boring, but necessary.
c. Interesting and worthwhile.
d. I fall asleep almost every time.
Answer: c. Interesting and worthwhile.
How long should an average meeting last?
a. No more than 30 minutes.
b. Between 30 minutes and an hour.
c. More than an hour.
d. However long it takes to get through the agenda.
Answer: a. No more than 30 minutes.
How much experience do you have running meetings?
a. I’ve run at least 50 meetings.
b. I’ve run a few meetings.
c. I haven’t run any meetings, but I’ve attended a lot.
Answer: b. I’ve run a few meetings.
Have you ever been trained to formally build an agenda or manage a group?
a. Yes
b. Not really
c. No
Answer: a. Yes
How important is planning and practice to meetings?
a. Very - the leader needs to work hard to do it right
b. Sort of - you need to have an agenda
c. Not really - they take care of themselves
Answer: a. Very - the leader needs to work hard to do it right
What is the main purpose for a meeting?
a. Share information
b. Make decisions
c. Assign responsibilities
d. It depends
Answer: d. It depends
How many people should be in a meeting?
a. up to 5
b. 5 to 15
c. 15 or more
Answer: a. up to 5
