How to Stay Consistent with your Biz, Goals & Habits
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Running a business and having a successful career can be overwhelming, especially when you're trying to balance it with personal goals and habits. It's easy to get off track and lose sight of what you're working towards. However, consistency is key to achieving success. In this blog post, we'll discuss some strategies for staying consistent in your business, goals, and habits.
The tips…
01. Planning Things Out Ahead of Time
Planning ahead is a crucial aspect of staying consistent and when I say planning ahead, I mean planning as much ahead of time as you can. Plan your launches ahead of time, plan your goals ahead of time, and plan your content ahead of time, just to name a few things. When you plan things out ahead of time, you can avoid the stress and chaos that comes with last-minute deadlines and unexpected tasks. Of course, taking some time at the beginning of each week to plan out your schedule and tasks for the week ahead is a great start. This can include setting aside time for specific tasks, scheduling meetings, and blocking out time for breaks and self-care. However, if it were me, I would take it a step further.
At the start of the quarter, I plan out my launches and the majority of my social media content. I start each quarter knowing when I’m going to do my launch tasks, what newsletter prompt I’m going to write about each week, and what content I’m going to put out each week. Then, as other tasks come into my business and in my life, I can plan accordingly.
In a nutshell, planning ahead helps you stay on track and avoid falling behind.
02. only commit to what’s sustainable
I was going to have tip 2 be all about having a master to-do list and/or a master calendar, but honestly? I don’t think that helps you stay consistent in your business, but what does? Making a plan that you can actually commit to.
We’re told a lot of things that we should do in business. We’re told how often we should post on social media and we’re told how often we should launch in our businesses, but you know what? Who gives a shit what we should do, am I right? Should is playing by someone else's rules, building your business on someone else’s timeline, and following someone else’s schedule. I don’t give a crap about should. I don’t give a crap what some marketing guru online tells you about how you should build your business because, frankly, they’re not living your life. They don’t have your responsibilities and they don’t know what things you have on your plate that you’re trying to balance your business with. Besides, all these things that they’re telling you should do? They’re often created by people who either have no kids or husband or desire to have a life outside of their businesses. Their businesses are their life. If that’s not you, then the should doesn’t matter.
Only commit to what’s sustainable for you. If that means you only release new content every 2 weeks or every month, that’s what you do. If that means, you only launch every 6 months, that’s what you do. If you can only take on 5 clients at a time, that’s what you take on. Only commit to what you can commit to.
03. Prioritization
Prioritization is critical when it comes to staying consistent. It's essential to focus on the most important tasks first and to avoid getting sidetracked by less critical tasks. I find that sometimes we aren’t consistent in our businesses because we’re putting too much on our plates and the reason why we’re putting too much on our plates is not that we have too much to do but because we’re not prioritizing what we have on our plate. There are things that we often put on our plates as business owners that aren’t that important and that aren’t the highest priority activities. If you want to be consistent in your business and have your business actually keep you going, you need to make sure that the actions you’re pouring your energy and your effort into are the highest priority activities that are going to pour back into your business and you.
One way to prioritize your tasks is to use the Eisenhower Matrix, which helps you categorize tasks based on their urgency and importance. But, the drawback of an Eisenhower priority matrix is that it’s manual. You have to input your tasks by hand. So, as much as I like that strategy, I need it to happen automatically. That’s why I have automatic prioritization built into my Notion systems. All I have to do is decide on the priority and it auto-sorts the tasks that I need to do by the priority they need to be in.
Sustain yourself by making sure you’re pouring your energy and effort into the right things.
04. Quick Tasks
Additionally, it's helpful to have a list of quick tasks that you can complete when you have a few spare minutes. These quick tasks can help you stay on track and avoid wasting time, but—more so than anything—they keep you moving the needle and getting things done. Quick tasks are momentum builders and sometimes, when we’re in the thick of procrastination and a lack of motivation, momentum is what we need to create the motivation and get ourselves going.
I start my day every day with quick tasks because it gets me motivated. The sooner I can check off a couple easy, quick tasks, the sooner I can dive into the big projects of the day.
If you are struggling with motivation, give yourself the gift of quick wins. Some examples? Creating graphics on Canva. Do a quick brainstorm. Send a follow-up email. Send a quick text to schedule dinner with a friend. These are all quick wins that give you momentum to start your day.
05. Being Willing to Change the Plan If It's Not Working
Finally, it's essential to be willing to change the plan if it's not working. Sometimes, despite our best efforts, things don't go according to plan. You might have a fire that happens with a client that you need to put out and you might need to deprioritize putting out a new podcast for a day. You may have technical issues. You may get stuck in traffic and just not have enough time to do what you’ve set out to do. When this happens, it's crucial to be flexible and willing to adjust your plans accordingly. This may mean shifting deadlines, reorganizing tasks, or delegating tasks to others.
Perhaps the most important part of the notion of “being willing to change the plan if it’s not working” is this: becoming okay with having undone tasks on your calendar. When a plan changes, you’re going to have things you can’t get to. You’re going to have tasks that you can’t make the time for because life happened. And we have to learn to be okay with that. If the undone tasks and the plans that had to change derail you or make you think less of yourself as a business owner, that’s going to become a problem. So, become okay with it. Accept it! It’s a part of the process…
In conclusion…
Staying consistent in your business can be a challenge, but it's essential for building a successful business. By planning things out ahead of time, having a master calendar and master task list, prioritizing your tasks, and being willing to change the plan if it's not working, you can stay on track and achieve your goals. Remember, consistency is key to success, so make it a priority in your business.
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