Tools and Equipment

In the twenty-first century, digital conquers the life of peoples that gives rise to the virtual assistant work. Especially to the millennial who give more emphasize in checking their phones for the update in their social media status, watching YouTube videos, reading eBooks, playing computer games and many more. Social media in today’s generation is the most influential tool that a company can use. In introducing their products and services through blogging and posting in their social media accounts because we can deny the fact that most of us do have a social media accounts, we have Facebook,Twitter and many more. The most common social media platform is the Facebook that’s why advertising a particular product and services are more easy and effective. Therefore, through the internet people and company can make deals and businesses. All we need to do is to involve in the internet and work to earn money.

In today’s generation, the richest person in the world is the person who is the owner of some website on the internet, to be mention we have Mark Zuckerberg, the owner of Facebook who provide service through the internet. Every time we use our internet, many activities will happen behind the internet. Some of us work through the use of digital like the Customer Service Representative especially we Filipino is excellent in speaking the English language. So we are expecting that a foreign company of outsourcing will hire a Filipino virtual assistant. Filipino workers are more affordable than any other foreign workers. Filipino workers are competent enough regarding providing excellent outsourcing. Services. Another is, Filipino workers are hardworking and loyal to their job and their employer. That’s why Filipino virtual assistant is more demand regarding working in an outsourcing company because they are the full package. They can work hand in hand with less supervision that’s the reason why you should hire a Filipino virtual assistant. Another is they can provide excellent services as a website designer, editor, market researcher, writer, personal assistant and many more.

5 Reason Why You Should Hire a Filipino Virtual Assistant

1. Filipinos are hardworking
Filipinos are no doubt hardworking when it comes to their work. They can work and provide services above and beyond what is being ask of them from their company.

2. Filipinos are loyal
One of the best character of Filipinos are loyal. They can stay in the company for 15 years or more especially if their employers treat them very well. Filipino exercise “debt of gratitude” to someone who showed them nice, even if it’s just one time.

3. Filipino never say “NO”
Filipino never say “NO” to their employers. You will always heard a Filipino worker say “yes ma’am/sir” they tend to perform a task without asking further questions. They will follow the instructions. The employer will give them the full details of the task together with the expectations and the employer will get that expectations. Filipinos are positive thinker

4. Filipino always look for the brighter side of life.
They did not easily giving up but they always find another options to solve the problem. Even harsh calamities can’t stop them from smiling.

5. Filipinos are proficient in English
They can speak English language fluently. They use English as second language and a medium of instruction in education.

Mobile marketing can also be commonly known as wireless marketing although wireless is not necessarily mobile, which can cause confusion in the use of the term. This article can help you better understand what mobile marketing is and is not and to help you see if this can be a type of marketing that you can benefit from.

Make your messages relevant. This is the most important aspect of mobile marketing. A text message can be very personal and it interrupts someone no matter what they are in the middle of doing. Avoid re-purposing an e-mail. Your text message should be short and very relevant to the audience whom you are sending them out to.

Keep your mobile marketing simple. It is important to keep the number of required clicks to a minimum to raise the response of your efforts. Since using a mobile keypad is frustrating if it require excessive typing, do not require too much information to be given. Only ask questions that are absolutely needed and make your directions very clear.

You need to be certain that you’re describing a benefit well to people in mobile marketing. It’s not enough just to be short and to the point. You also need to be very poignant as to what you’re speaking about. This means directness is required in telling a customer exactly how they will benefit by following your link.

To stay on track with your mobile marketing efforts, decide what you want to accomplish, and write a mission statement that you can stick to. Always ask if a move makes sense for your business.

If you have people working for you, make sure you explain to them how and how not to approach social media. Your mobile presence is very important here, and the last thing you need is someone representing your company poorly by deciding to spam social sites or to present your company in a bad light.

Wait for results of one campaign before beginning a new one. It is important to figure out your campaign’s potential for longevity in addition to its impact on sales numbers. Apply the same formula to design a better campaign.

Take your time to make your mobile marketing fun for other people if you really want it to be effective. As someone is out there waiting for their bus to come or waiting for that traffic jam to relent, they could be watching a funny advertisement created and released by your company.

When you are setting up your marketing adds for cell phones, they must be cross-platform compatible. Every one has a different phone, and you don’t want to end up cutting off some people from seeing your advertisement just because of the phone that they have. Your customers will not switch phones, though they may switch from your product to one that they see all the time on their phone.

As explained above, mobile marketing is also called wireless marketing but wireless marketing isn’t always necessarily mobile. Therefore, the term can be confusing or misleading and mobile marketing also has many methods. By reading this article, it has helped you to comprehend what wireless marketing truly is and what it is not.

We all can relate to a website that simply stalls before loading content, or in another typical scenario, experience content that loads painfully slow. Most of us agree that either experience is annoying. But beyond annoying web visitors, let’s find out what the real consequences are for a sluggish website.

Show Me the Money

Once you assign a dollar value to speed, it becomes crystal clear in terms of real costs why the enduring visitor perception and experience with page speed relates directly to customer service and brand value.

For example, KISSmetrics presented statistics from Akamai who studied the dollar cost of speed as it relates to page conversions. They found a 1-second delay in page response time results on average in a 7% increase in page abandonment. The kicker here is that page abandonment exponentially grows as seconds add up, so a 4-second delay results in about 28% page desertion, which means your sluggish website is hemorrhaging visitors and potential income at an alarming rate!

Maybe this doesn’t seem like a big deal if you measure things like downloads and other call-to-actions where speed is not considered a critical metric, but it is an important metric when applied to an e-commerce site making $100,000 per day.

Think about it; a 1-second page delay could potentially cost you $2.5 million in lost sales per year. Additionally, page speed is an important online metric for both perceived customer service and brand quality.

Check Your Website’s Speed

What does speed mean to website managers in 2018 and beyond? Don’t ignore it! Do everything in your power to increase the page speed of your website for both desktop and mobile sites. If your website is responsive, make sure it works well on every device imaginable. If you test your website and it’s found to be less than optimum, contact a competent web developer who knows how to optimize your website’s speed. It’s more affordable than most other SEO endeavors, and you have nothing to lose but customers-right?

Use Google’s PageSpeed Insights tool to see your score and take notice of any advice they may give you in the results. Secondly, take a look at the size of your page, as many sites are bloated nowadays. Try to shave off as much as you can by optimizing images, compressing code and loading fewer external scripts and ads.

Maybe it’s time to drop the most egregious designer “cuties” that bloat your website and go with a more minimalist approach. What customers love most about your site is the content and how quickly they can see it!

Google Loves Speed, Too

Speed is most critical when web visitors are using mobile devices, but desktop websites are not off the hook. Google takes note of your website’s optimization for all devices, and poor results reduce search ranking automatically by its Page Rank algorithms. If your website speed is annoying enough to catch Google’s attention, then it’s a sure bet your user experience is in the toilet, too.

Of course, there are over 200 factors that make up Google page ranking; however, not all elements are weighted evenly or even come close to the importance of speed. Yes, your website should be responsive so it can work well on all types of devices. Yes, you should have a security certificate whether you are doing e-commerce or not. And yes, you need to optimize your website for speed. Once these things are in order, you can continue to add to the list, but these items are the most important after great content, which will always be number one.

The rise in the number of smartphone users has made mobile the new normal. Realising this, Google rolled out its mobile-first index, giving mobile versions of websites an upper hand when it comes to ranking. So, marketers must focus on mobile more than ever. If you need help optimising your website for search engines in the mobile era, keep reading.

Create a Responsive Website Design

In order to rank well, responsive website design is the most critical change that you need to make. Responsive websites offer the value of two for one – they rank well on both desktop and mobile. Moreover, the design seamlessly fits the size of any screen across devices.

Optimise Content for Mobile

Mobile visitors look for the same content experience as desktop visitors. So, your content must be properly optimised for the mobile so that users can quickly find what they are looking for. You need to create content using short paragraphs, along with the addition of media, such as screenshots or infographics to make reading enjoyable.

Make Use of Infographics

The attention span of mobile users is lower than desktop users. In order to arrest and retain their attention, you can use interesting and engaging infographics. It has been proven that attractive-looking content gets shared more than three times across digital platforms compared to text-only content. The more your content is shared, the more chances your website gets to become visible on search engines and obtain a higher ranking position.

Improve Navigation

As aforementioned, mobile users lack patience; therefore, you need to remove any kind of hindrance or obstacles that visitors might have to face whilst navigating your website. You can avail affordable SEO services in order to get a professional audit report, as well as, solutions.

Link Building Strategy

For your SEO success, you must continue to build links to your desktop pages. Even though the world is moving into the mobile-first index, the importance of link building is not declining. Besides that, you must also consult with a professional SEO expert and come up with a link building a mobile strategy to make sure that your website ranks above your competitors.

Optimise On-site SEO

Once you have designed and built a responsive website, it is time to manage on-site SEO for your mobile website. From optimising title tags to H1 headers, you need to pay attention to every little detail and make sure that they are SEO-friendly. Tags in mobile, for instance, varies from tags in the desktop. Whilst desktop has about seventy-one characters, mobile gets seventy-eight characters.

Speed Up Page Load Time

Building a website for mobile with a focus on fast page speed might seem like a daunting task. However, it is important to remember that the page speed on mobile can directly impact your SEO rankings. As per reports, slow load times result in approximately ten percent increase in bounce rate and four percent decrease in conversions.

Optimise for Local Search

Unlike desktop users, mobile users are generally searching for products, services or information that are available locally. Reports also suggest that the intent of mobile users is usually to take an action. This clearly shows that you need to optimise your mobile website for the local search so that you are present at the right time and in the right place where your potential customers are looking for products or services relevant to you.

So, do you think you are prepared for mobile-first index? Follow the aforementioned tips to get started and do not let the mobile-first experience stop you from ranking well on search engines. However, to create a more in-depth SEO strategy, you must engage the services of experienced SEO professionals. Since these professionals are dedicated to continuously update themselves as per the changes in the digital world, they will be able to help you find the perfect solution.

Our businesses also differ in terms of interface with clients. If you do “business to business” transactions, the number of people you interact with on a daily basis may differ from someone whose business relies on interacting with consumers. Appointments may be more practical in some instances than others. You have to tailor-make how you manage access to your particular situation if you are to eliminate distractions. Having said that it is important to note that some people do not mind spending the whole day at the office entertaining friends, visitors, and casual acquaintances dropping into the office whenever they feel like it. Do not be that kind of person. It sets the wrong kind of example to junior staff and can harm one’s productivity because these people take up time that you do not have and besides you want to cultivate a professional environment.

The demands of the day are enough to fill the eight working hours available unless if you tend to stay back and play catch up. How do you stay competitive in the market if there is no separation between work and play? Anybody serious about success and achieving effective results will put boundaries that are clear so that there is no confusion. Entrepreneurs are more susceptible to this especially when the workplace is easily accessible. The fact that you are your own boss even puts more responsibility on you to maintain self-discipline and self – management. I have written a whole book called, “Achieve More through Self – Leadership. In it I walk you through the practicalities of how you can get better results through managing self.

Appointments are an important way of not only managing time but managing life. They help you become more structured and productive. Some people seem not to be able to honour their appointments. I once attended a job interview that was supposed to start at 10:30am. By 11:30am there had been no communication about what was happening or when the supposed job interview was going to take place. I decided at the point that this company was probably not good enough for me to join because if you don’t respect people’s time you probably do not respect them.

You may be saying appointments are just not for me yet you never rock up at the doctor, dentist, lawyer or hairstylist without an appointment. Why is that the case? Because you simply won’t see the dentist without an appointment. They have given you conditions acceptable to them. We tell the world around us how to treat us by what we allow.

Some people are always available when you want to see them. If you are always free to see people at short notice, you are probably not that organized. The one who owns a diary will manage the one who doesn’t own one. Why? Because the one without the diary is always available, even though he is very likely to forget important meetings, dates and engagements because of a lack of organization. I used to have a boss who kept a diary and whatever you promised to do in the line of work, he would write down, including the day and time you said he would have it by. You would of-course forget because you didn’t record it like he did and when the time to deliver comes, guess who would be found wanting. It was then that I decided that I do not commit to an action that I am not willing to write down because, what’s written gets done!

You may be saying, “what if my business feeds off the “walk-ins? The fact that your business relies on walk – in customers should not be an excuse for disorder. Sometimes those who drop in unannounced may indeed be potential customers, suppliers, cold-calling salespeople, and even worthwhile business contacts. There is nothing wrong if the call is beneficial to you and your business but I believe there must be a structure and way of doing things that follows certain pre-set principles. I remember seeing a poster in an office that said “if you don’t have anything to do please don’t do it here”. It’s humorous yes, but true. Appointments help to structure your day and helps you allocate time to what’s important. This means you can focus on your most important asset: the paying customer. There is nothing as bad as walking into a place wanting to do business and staff are inattentive because there is just a demand on their time. I am more understanding if the personnel are not busy entertaining social visits at work.

In conclusion, you know your business situation better than any of us. All we can do is make recommendations that will enable efficiency that leads to growth. Some of you may actually need a personal assistant who will put order in your office and focus on the things you are not willing to do that will enable to focus on the highly value things you ought to do such as running a business.

Do you think successful people are just plain lucky?

Successful people did not become successful because they were lucky.

They did not achieve success by accident. Being at the right place at the right time, meeting relevant people, reading the appropriate book, did not come about accidentally or by luck.

Luck is brought about by Labour Under Correct Knowledge.

Successful people prepared themselves. Instead of giving up on anything they started and wanted to achieve they got stronger by learning more.

Success is a methodical, orderly and deliberate process of deciding what you want to do with your life, what are the steps that you need to undertake to get you there, and lastly what you will do once you get there.

One of the most important aspects, if not the most important aspect to success, is the ability to visualise your successful outcome and stay focused on it until you achieve it.

“Imagination is more important than knowledge, knowledge is limited.” – Albert Einstein

Successful people understood the potential power behind knowledge, yet they also understood that, for them to close the gap between where they are and where they wanted to be, they would have to piece together the enigma that is most often referred to as “life”.

They had to build a picture, a vision, of success in their mind, and then go about taking action on creating that envisioned life.

In much the same way, you have to be serious about your present and future, you need to have the knowledge that is required so you, too, may close the gap: you need to be and remain determined to devote yourself to taking massive action to build your business of succeeding in life.

You, too, will need to see the end, your dream and destiny that you desire in your mind’s eye. It is up to you to take the necessary and relevant action to make it all happen. It’s just like going to the doctor with a particular health problem.

The doctor may prescribe a medication for you to take four times a day, yet he cannot be there with you to ensure that you are taking the medication.

It comes back to deciding to be responsible for your life.

Have you noticed how it all stems from that one attitude? Being responsible for your own life.

Your success, your being responsible 100% for you to live your dream life starts here.

When you accept 100% responsibility for yourself and your current life situation, you will have the power to move towards those things you truly desire in life: which is success in all areas of your life.

This life-changing article is about possibilities and opportunities, knowledge and tools. It will help expose your unique course in life.

It will inspire, support and motivate you to excel, to do what successful people do, to have all that successful people have, and to become a shining example of a successful person.

Here, you’re not being told what you couldn’t do, instead you are being told to shoot for the stars. And above all, you are being shown how to shoot for those stars.

“A person is what he thinks about all day long.” – Emerson

Interesting thought, wouldn’t you think? So much so, it’s worth repeating: “A person is what he thinks about all day long.”

Success and happiness cannot happen if you possess the same old thoughts and beliefs.

If you do not change your mind, if you do not get rid of the unsupportive thoughts and beliefs, you will inevitably remain stuck in your old ways. Not much, if anything, will change.

Let’s give you a quick overview on how change comes about:

Your BEHAVIOUR, how you act (or perhaps do not act), controls your success or failure. Your ability to attain high levels of success is dependent upon your actions and behaviours. Your results are the outcome of your behaviour. Now let’s consider where your behaviours come from and what controls them?

Your FEELINGS command your behaviour. Every action that you take is first filtered through your feelings that reside in your subconscious mind. How you feel about something determines what you do and how well you do it. So where do your feelings come from?

Your ATTITUDES create and influence your feelings. Your attitude is your perspective from which you view life. Whatever attitude you have about anything will affect how you feel, which, in turn, affects how you act. Where do your attitudes come from?

Your BELIEFS create, control and influence your attitudes. What you believe about anything will determine your attitude about it, which will create your feelings, and then which will direct your behaviour and action. Belief patterns are so powerful that two people who are in the same situation could perceive things completely differently. It only requires us to believe what we see and how we see it. We all have thousands of beliefs – big and small. And where do your beliefs come from?

Your THOUGHTS create, control and influence your beliefs. Your thoughts are real and are immensely powerful. Everything you accept from the outside world and everything you feed yourself from within is a product of your thoughts. Everything starts as a thought.

So, it goes without saying you need to learn to control your thoughts. And when you do, you will automatically control your beliefs, your attitudes, your feelings and, consequently, your behaviour and actions.

The big secret to success:

Learn to control your thoughts and you will influence your behaviours and actions. It’s all a mind-set. That’s what we’ve been saying all along.

Success is predictable and is not achieved by accident.

Have the mind-set of the successful people and you will achieve success. Believe and it is yours!

“There is a great future in front of you, you can leave your past behind.” – Joel Osteen

Science of success experts have concluded that the brain is a goal-setting organism.

That is fantastic news for us: for whatever goal we give to our subconscious mind, it will work for us day and night, 24/7, to achieve it for us; to make it a reality.

The principal breakthrough that scientists made was that we do not need to waste our precious time and effort trying to change old thoughts and behaviours: we just simply create new ones.

And the other discovery they made was that we can continue to create new thoughts, new memories, new behaviours, new skills, and learn new things for as long as we are alive on this earth.

Now, with the new discoveries in recent years, it has been scientifically proven that our capacity to achieve and succeed literally has no limits.

Our brain has the capacity to continually learn during our entire lifetime.

Our brain can form new thoughts, can have new memories, and can learn new things by the millions, no matter what your age is. By the millions.

That’s how many new things we can learn, that’s how many new skills we can learn, that’s how many new thoughts we can have, that’s how many new behaviours we can adopt.

This is encouraging because there is no limit on your capacity to achieve new things.

No limits whatsoever for the human brain to learn, memorise, develop, achieve and perform at higher levels than ever imagined. It makes no difference what your age is: you are capable of learning anything new that you want to learn.

That adds to what we spoke of earlier: no more excuses.

“The future belongs to those who prepare for it today.” – Malcolm X

Your brain has the capacity to achieve way beyond what was ever thought possible. So now is the time to break out of your limited thinking and start dreaming big and imagining unlimited possibilities.

Becoming successful is not impossible.

It is a choice you make through a decision. Every day, step-by-step, you may climb the mountain of success if you’ve decided to do so, if you’re committed to accomplish what the others think impossible.

Design your future now.

Prepare to receive what you desire.

Thanks to the phenomenal advances made in cognitive science and the development of NLP (Neuro-Linguistic Programming), personal change, personal transformation, has come a very long way.

In fact, personal growth is no longer a mystery.

NLP has brought to light that change, transformation and growth can be fast, reliable, and even fun. It has shown us that we do not need to spend thousands of hours slaving away to increase our creative-thinking abilities.

By practicing a few simple exercises and applications, you can start your creative juices flowing, and you may even amaze yourself at the quality and quantity of good ideas that you can come up with to expedite your success.

It can allow you to achieve something you seek within days and months as opposed to years and decades. That’s the power of the progress science has made on how the brain works, and also how you can have your mind to be your best ally in achieving anything you want.

Learn to live as you like by no longer living as you dislike.

Are you ready to get on the road to success and fulfilment?

Bear in mind, much like everything else in life, success requires practice and massive, consistent action.

“Success doesn’t mean the absence of failures; it means the attainment of ultimate objectives. It means winning the war, not every battle.” – Edwin C Bliss

Do you feel as if you’ve outgrown your circle of friends? Perhaps you do not feel safe or understood any longer. There may be fewer and fewer things you can share with people in your habitual circle, and it leaves you feeling lonely or isolated. If so, you are not alone. Welcome to one of the core dynamics of continuous growth!

As we continue to evolve, many of us struggle with a sense of not quite fitting in with our traditional community or tribe: we may have expanded or changed beyond the borders of tribal norms, and no longer find the same sense of belonging there. Other members may have tightened the tribal rules to foster a sense of security. As a result, we may feel a sense of disconnection or alienation.

In truth, each one of us belongs to many tribes simultaneously: there is your original tribe – the family you were born into – and then there are all the communities of choice you have joined: your work tribe, your social circles, your faith-based community, your neighborhood, and more. These communities are not static; they are in continuous flux because they consist of individuals who are in continuous states of change. When there is a lot of change happening in either the individual or the community, a sense of dissonance results.

How are we to deal with this? First, it is important to recognize that tribal allegiances were historically forged for survival. They were adapted over the course of centuries to ensure the safety and survival of the group. Survival required that individuation be sacrificed for the trade-off of security.

In modern society, the tables are flipped. Whether we enjoy it or not, change is essential for survival at every level of being. The pace of change is driven by technological advances and happens with increasing rapidity: sociologists estimate that more change has taken place in society over the course of the past 100 years, than in the totality of the previous 6,000 years. Individual adaptation now is a requirement for survival, and the pace of individual change does not always match the pace at which our various tribal communities evolve. The resulting dissonance can cause intense friction and pain.

Dissonance also results from confusion between the concepts of ‘connection’ and ‘community.’ We tend to equate one with the other, when they really relate to different qualities. Connection relates to connectivity: the objective physical technology or media that enables us to build community, but which does not represent the quality of that community. Connectivity simply offers the opportunity to connect with others through internet, texting, phone calls, or any other social networking options.

Community is the result of building relationship through meaningful interaction over time. There is no shortcut; it is a process that develops when bonds of trust and intimacy are nurtured and honored.

And here lies a caveat: When we confuse connectivity with community, we depersonalize the sacred nature of true community and start relating to people as objects. Instead of developing intimacy over time, we collect friends on social network sites or try to buy people’s allegiance. Yet friending is simply an act of connecting; it does not create intimacy.

In fact, social experiments indicate that technologically dominated connectivity results in alienation and social collapse over time. In a groundbreaking social experiment conducted by Josh Harris, one of the founders of social networking on the internet, he found that the more people’s private lives were exposed by 24/7 technology, the more their sense of intimacy and relationship deteriorated until the community collapsed in violence and self-destructive behavior.

It is time to revisit our concepts of community so we can create tribes that offer a true sense of intimacy and belonging.

In his 1987 book, The Different Drum: Community Making and Peace, psychologist M. Scott Peck described several core characteristics of true community. Beyond the obvious components of inclusivity, commitment and participatory consensus, Peck pointed out the quality of embracing diversity through realism. When each member contributes their unique viewpoint from a place of humility and goodwill, the community benefits from a broader perspective in which to better grasp the full context of a situation. In other words, mutual tolerance helps members to embrace one another’s different viewpoints as an integral part of the whole, instead of imposing a forced compliance to groupthink or cohesion.

In an environment like this, members experience and express compassion and respect for one another. They allow others to share their vulnerability, to learn and grow, and to express who they truly are. When conflict arises, they learn to resolve it with wisdom and grace. Members listen to and respect each others’ gifts, accept each others’ limitations, celebrate their differences, and commit to find solutions together rather than to fight against each other. Indeed, the true spirit of community is the spirit of peace, love, wisdom and power. The source of this spirit may be seen as an outgrowth of the collective self or as the manifestation of a Higher Will.

Does this description of community sound spiritual to you? It is indeed, because Spirit is the common denominator among all of us, regardless of how separate we feel from others.

As human beings, we often experience a socio-economic sense of separation from others because of different opinions, beliefs, expectations, language, culture, or interests, since each one of us expresses these in a way uniquely different from anyone else. And still, we continue to differentiate! In this ongoing process, we continue to evolve or devolve in response to life. A community that felt like a good fit last year may no longer work today; the places where we felt embraced, now may suffocate us. Over the course of a lifetime, we can expect to outgrow and change allegiances to many of the tribal communities we once belonged to.

And yet, when we transcend the layers of physical appearance, mental beliefs and socio-economic conditioning, we find in the presence of Spirit a common denominator in everyone around us. Perhaps it is time to expand our tribal definitions to embrace a spiritual community that includes all of mankind as children of God.

Mother Teresa admonished her nuns to see Jesus in every leper they encountered, to find His presence as they looked into the eyes of the homeless. When we can look past the issues that divide us to find omnipresent Divinity in each other, we will uncover the foundations of true community.

Spiritual community transcends all socio-economic borders, beliefs and backgrounds. It is inclusive because it operates on voluntary self-responsibility and mutual compassion, and its doors are open to everyone.

Building this type of community takes time: time to listen, to hear, to respond and to participate. Take a few moments to read the description of spiritual community again. Then, make time in your life to foster that type of connection with people who matter to you. You are one of the architects of community in your life, and you can participate in building a tribe where you belong.

What would happen to you if your home life was more organized than it is right now? Can work-life balance be achieved? What are the tools at our disposal? Could scheduling appointments and keeping them at home help us save time and prioritize?

What is the challenge we face? I sometimes find that time spent at home can be the busiest time, especially in the times we live in. Imagine someone working from home, home-schooling children, and sometimes even doing a side hustle. Imagine also the full-time home-based entrepreneur. How do they manage to do all they need to do in a day?. We are living in a time when many entrepreneurs and even company employees have adopted work- at – home culture. This comes with its challenges as the lines become blurred between home and work. These blurred lines and constraints on the limited resource called time result in over-worked, under-rested, burnt-out individuals. Whilst good time management has been encouraged and indeed, embraced in the workplace, I believe more needs to be done in changing the mindset for the elusive work-life balance to be achieved.

What are the tools at our disposal? To manage time effectively at home, there are many interventions one can employ including setting goals for the day, prioritizing wisely, setting a time limit for every task, organizing oneself, and instituting the discipline of appointments. Yes, an appointment at home! We can spend time pontificating on the pros and cons of each intervention, however, I believe we need to focus on appointments and see how this can powerfully change the course of one’s day regardless of whether it’s a workday or weekend. Life is busy as it is without any intrusions. The question is how do you handle the one who announces that they are at the gate. These can be friends, neighbors, a salesman of some product you do not even need. I am not promoting regimentation here but rather a culture of filling your day with what’s important. Everything that we succeed at is because we carefully plan and execute it. I am a firm believer that you cannot manage time if you do not manage yourself thus I implore you to incorporate planning and appointments into your repertoire. I am not talking about something I do not do. I have to achieve many things in a day therefore I set appointments with my work, others, and myself.

Could scheduling appointments and keeping them on the home front help us save time and prioritize? Whereas we have established that it is a normal business practice to set appointments and keep them, we need to abandon the liberal open-door policy of allowing all and sundry to have access to us as and when they please on the home front. Please understand where I am coming from. We each have greatness within us but for us to achieve it we need to culture great habits. Employing the use of appointments at home and seeing only those people you had agreed to see removes non-essential encounters especially during the most productive hours. I know this will vary with culture, geographical region, or even level of affluence, whether you live in a low density or high-density residential area, but doesn’t negate the need to be organized and effective. Controlling access determines how organized you are and how well you will work and rest when the time for scheduled rest comes.

What do we need to do differently? We need to be disciplined and diligent, learn to say no, now is not a good time, let’s make an appointment for next week. What are the benefits of this approach? You are not always fire-fighting to meet deadlines, You are not always tired because you have not taken time out to rest. You have set aside enough time to spend with your loved ones or a loved one. If you are a busy person, I am sure you appreciate what I am saying. Whether it’s time to work uninterrupted, family time, or “me-time”, it takes some kind of order to enjoy it.

I am not saying that those that come unannounced are bad people. No, not at all, they probably are people you enjoy spending time with. Nevertheless, there must be prior communication so that you can attend to your visitor(s) when it is convenient for both you and them. It can be quite disrupting and a whole day can just pass by without achieving anything that you had planned to do.

As we grow older we begin to appreciate that rest and recovery need to be scheduled. The fact that I am relaxing doesn’t mean that I don’t have anything to do. One therefore cannot assume that just because you are at home you are available. Maybe you have scheduled that time to rest. That is important. You need to make an appointment with yourself, spouses need to also set aside time for each other. Parents need to schedule a time to spend with their children. When you have some sort of order in your life you determine who sees you and who you see. It also means that your relationships will be healthy and that makes you a happier person.

In conclusion, I believe that the work-life balance can be achieved. There are many tools at our disposal just like it is in the workplace.I believe we could do more and be happier if we are disciplined enough to make only the commitments we can keep.I am certain that setting appointments and keeping them at home help us save time and prioritize.