One of the most significant components to personal growth is asking the question “Why?” Constantly questioning your thoughts and actions causes you to consider what motivates you, and understanding what motivates you makes you a better decision-maker, and ultimately a more effective, successful person in life.
Believe it or not, this concept is even applicable in social media. Do you ever ask yourself why you post the text or images that you do?
Once you’ve chosen the CMS (contact management system) that you’re going to use in your business, it’s important that you organize your contacts for ease of use.
Here are a few things you can do to organize the contacts in your CMS:
In the last week, I’ve spent a minimal amount of time on Instagram and Facebook on my iPhone, and the result has been a clearer, more focused mind, and more productive days.
We’ve covered the idea of scheduling communication in the past, and I generally group Facebook with email communication, but I developed a bad habit of still religiously checking Facebook and Instagram on my phone. Facebook and Instagram are just for fun, so it’s ok to check those regularly, right?
I see two problems with the practice:
After only beginning my training in December of 2011, I completed my first triathlon, an olympic distance, on May 6. The Olympic distance is a .93 mile swim, a 24.8 mile bike, and a 6.2 mile run.
Many months ago, I shared my plans for involvement in triathlon, the races I was going to be in, and some of what I was learning as I trained.
You can make plans, but you can rarely make guarantees, and such has been the case this year. As I’ve dealt with various personal struggles, my efforts in triathlon have been inconsistent, and I missed two of the races I had planned on competing in. But when all was said and done, I competed in my first triathlon in May, and completed my first Half Ironman in September! I overcame my fear of swimming enough to race at these distances, and I’ve learned that I can still reach so much deeper than I have to push myself further outside my comfort zone.
I’m excited to share about my two races and ongoing training in upcoming posts, and ultimately encourage you to find a passion outside of your business to which you can escape and better yourself!
We could spend an extensive amount of time reviewing all the major CMS (customer management systems) out there, and go into a detailed comparison about their features, but I’m going to save you a bunch of time!
Part of running an efficient business is minimizing moving parts. This is true in your daily and weekly workflow, your work space, and even in your computer.
I mentioned CleanApp before as a solution for removing unnecessary applications and their related files from your computer, but applications aren’t the only thing taking up space on your computer. Many times you may be taking up more space on your hard drive than necessary with files from old personal and business projects, and this can actually slow your computer down.
WhatSize is a great little application for Mac that will give you a good picture of what’s eating up all that space on your hard drive, allowing you to quickly remove the unneeded files. If you’re on a Windows computer, check out TreeSize.
As business owners, one of our most important assets is our address book. In the end, it’s largely who you know, and ideally, who you have a relationship with, that matters when it comes to growing your business. If you don’t have a good system in place to manage your contacts and their information, you’re not as effective a business person as you could be.
What should you be looking for in a contact management system?
Life is simply more beautiful when you learn to appreciate it a day at a time.
Having a grasp on the direction that you want to go with your life - on a business and personal level - is important. But once you have a plan, learn to soak in each day. Learn to appreciate the moments. Feel, touch, listen.
Don’t just get a life - enjoy it, too. You’ll be better for it.
As business owners, we tend to sit….a lot. Whether it’s our home office or the local Starbucks, we’re on our butts way too much, and it’s detrimental to our health. Check out this infographic from Businesss Insider for more information about what excessive sitting is doing to your health.
Pictured above is a portable standup desk that I purchased on Amazon recently. It’s does the trick in my apartment, but is easy enough to take to Starbucks with me as well!
