The next few weeks will see more Bank Holidays and long weekends than any other time of the year, starting with Easter, a Royal Wedding and the two May Bank Holidays.

Not only does this create a challenge for businesses but also for families planning childcare around their busy working lives. So, how do you cope and how can you make the most of both work and holiday time.

Firstly - don't even attempt to cram a normal working week into the forthcoming four and three day weeks.

Secondly - stay focused and be selective. Not only will clients, customers and providers be off over this time but you want to be able to take time off as well.

Plan WHAT needs to be done over the next few weeks and WHEN you're doing to do it. Just because there are fewer working hours/days available, doesn't mean your productivity and the results you can achieve needs to drop.

Prioritise - make sure you select the 'most important' things you need to be working on in order to take your business forward. What's the minimum you need to do to keep things moving? You'd be surprised at the results you can get when you focus on the right things.

Put things aside that don't absolutely need to get done in the limited time available. Put off until later anything that can wait and isn't time critical.

With children around over the school holidays, if you need time to work on your business, share childcare with friends and family and return the favour when they need it. 

If you work from home, a few focused hours is a far more effective use of your time than a whole day being distracted or trying to juggle work around family commitments and ending up feeling guilty and overwhelmed.

If you think you can start early and work late in order to fit in a working day around spending time with the family during the day, think again. While that might work for a couple of days, you're more likely to end up tired and stressed.

Having identified the key tasks and actions you need to do in the next few weeks, fit the work into the time available.

Set time limits on tasks, so you'll get things done quicker and be less distracted if you only have a limited amount of time available.

TIP: Use a kitchen timer if you want to be REALLY focused.

Make use of the time when others are off or things are likely to be quieter to plan your business.

Take a step back, look at your systems and processes and think about areas where you could improve. When was the last time you looked at your business stats? Now might be a good time to rethink your marketing plan and business approach.


Get more tips, ideas and information to maximise your work time when you book a free Strategy Session.  Give me a call or email me - www.clareevans.co.uk.

Until next month.