Sometimes in small business, no matter how hard you work and how many hours you put in, you just can’t seem to keep up.

Often you end up spending a lot of time on work that isn’t all that productive and you don’t feel like you are achieving anything. Here are a few tips on making the most of each and every day and increasing workday productivity.

Eat breakfast

To have a productive day you have to start at the beginning! This seems quite obvious, but many people do not eat a proper breakfast – in fact a lot of people don’t eat breakfast at all. If you don’t have time to eat it at home, you could at least take it with you. This may involve some planning or getting up a bit earlier, but it will be extremely beneficial in enabling your mind and body to operate to their full potential when you are working in your business.

Plan ahead

According to professional development expert Brian Tracy, every minute that you spend planning saves you 10 minutes when it comes to executing your task. In order to become productive you must know exactly what you should be working on and when. It’s a good idea to schedule all appointments and tasks a week in advance. Then, at the end of each day, check your calendar for the following day and plan how you are going to get it all done. If you find that you regularly can’t achieve all your goals for the day it may be because you are overscheduling.

When you are planning your day it is important to…

Schedule everything

A good approach to increasing productivity is to schedule absolutely everything into the calendar. For example if you need to visit a client, you would schedule the time to and from the client, the client meeting itself, and also time to follow up any action points coming from the meeting.

Check your email at specific times only

Checking your email regularly can become a huge distraction in your work day. You should only check your email at specific times of the day unless you are waiting for something important. Twice a day should be enough.

Work to deadlines

A lot of people say they are the most productive when they have a deadline such as a holiday coming up. All their work is completed before they leave so they don’t have to worry about the mess they left behind. You should consider setting yourself deadlines every week, even if they are artificial, so that you have a goal to work towards.

Hopefully you can take a couple of these tips on board and start making the most of each and every day you go to work.