Ivy Exec* discusses what it takes to “have it all” and how to manage it.
There are only so many hours in the day and it can already be a challenge to find any semblance of a successful work-life balance, particularly for busy executives and senior-level professionals.
While it is commonly perceived that individuals with high-performing positions in senior levels have even less spare time than everyone else, it is still possible to pursue entrepreneurial passions outside of the normal workday.
Believe it or not, it’s even possible to have a personal business project, a day job, and a work-life balance that promotes happiness and success in your life.
This article will walk through a few key pieces of advice to help high-performing professionals pursue passion projects and maintain a healthy work-life balance.
Time management is critical
Time management becomes more and more critical to success with the more tasks, projects, and deadlines that you need to juggle.
Add in a concerted effort on taking time to enjoy life with your significant others on a regular basis and a schedule can look very cramped, very quickly.
The key to performing well in your day job, chasing down success on your passion project, and having a life is honing in your time management skills.
This means taking time at regular intervals to project short-term tasks and long-term goals into a carefully calculated schedule.
While it might seem counterintuitive to spend time planning instead of executing, proper time management helps ensure that you focus your efforts and energy on the most important steps towards achieving your goals.
Here are a few tips that you can use:
- Break down large goals into small steps that you can consistently work against
- Prioritise your work in order of time-sensitivity
- Ensure that you schedule personal time as seriously as you schedule work-related tasks
Be realistic about your capacity
The most common problem that senior professionals face when they add a passion project into their daily workload is overestimating their ability to do “everything.”
A natural characteristic of high-performing individuals is to be highly productive by aggressively putting as much of their energy against their goals as possible.
However, when you have multiple competing priorities, it’s not possible to dedicate this same kind of effort to everything.
It’s important to understand that if you are already obligated to a certain amount of hours each week to maintain success at your day job, then it will be very difficult to spend that same amount of time on a side business, and still have time left to spend with your family or friends.
Independent entrepreneurial projects are likely to move much slower and it’s important for high-performing individuals to find patience and resist the urge to divert all of their attention to the new project.
Otherwise, there is a significant risk of hurting your performance at your day job and neglecting other important areas of your life.
Maximise your productivity
If you can be realistic about your capacity and if you are diligent about managing your time properly, then it’s important to seek methods for maximising your productivity whenever possible in order to fully secure success in all areas of your life.
Every minute counts, and this means that you need to stay focused and remove distractions from your daily life.
When you sit down to complete a task, turn off your notifications, put your head down, and get the work done quickly and efficiently.
Here are a few tips that you can use to help maximise your productivity on a daily basis:
- Recognise that tasks always take the amount of time that is allotted to them.
Don’t give yourself an hour to do something that could be completed in fifteen minutes.
- Multi-tasking is not equivalent to productivity.
You can’t do more than one thing at a time with equal success. Focus on a task, complete it, then move on to the next one.
- Understand your goals with intimate detail.
It’s one step to set a goal, it’s another to define that goal with every necessary action required to achieve it and why you are pursuing it.
You can take more consequential action against goals that you completely comprehend.
Don’t stress the small things
People with many competing priorities and multiple projects on the go can easily become stressed and frustrated with their progress.
It’s important to practice patience and be realistic about what any one person can achieve.
Failures will happen. New challenges will arise. Plans will not come to fruition.
However, remaining optimistic and adapting as you continue to push forward will help ensure that you are eventually able to reach your goals, find success in your passion projects, and enjoy your life along the way!
*Ivy Exec is a resource for professionals seeking career advancement.
This article first appeared at ivyexec.com.
