Schedule Time With Yourself to Think

As a business owner, what's your greatest resource that costs you nothing to use? Your brain. When properly utilized and focused, your brain can transform your business and life for the better...like nothing else can. But how often do you fully engage and leverage this powerful resource? How often do you slow down and make the time to think deeply about your business? To think, write and plan in a quiet setting with minimal interruptions or distractions? Probably not too often. Odds are, you feel that you are too busy, too frazzled, too involved or too worried to take the time. But that's the point! As a business coach, I can tell you with the utmost certainty that most troubles and problems faced by small business owners are not only self inflicted but come about because owners do not schedule enough time to THINK.

Since your brain is your idea factory, it should be operating at optimal capacity and producing a tremendous output
of good ideas. However, because of busyness, distractions, interruptions, and constant fire drills, owners do not spend enough quality time thinking and their production level of good ideas is suppressed. When was the last time you scheduled time by yourself in a quiet setting to think without distractions and interruptions (e-mails popping up, employees asking questions, phones ringing, a Blackberry buzzing, etc.)? Don't you think it's about time to do some concentrated thinking?