1 Try and limit the amount of times you check emails to only 3 times per day at set times. Start of day, lunchtime and End of day.

2 Limit Web browsing to just 30 minutes per day includes visiting forums etc. Keep a record of things you want to look up and then treat that as a task. Go to the web and only look for the items on your list.

3 Make a to do list for the following day made at the end of the previous day this will allow you to start the day with a clear head and clear direction of what needs to be done.

4 Spend at least 30 minutes per day away from work taking some exercise. I often find that when I walk away from work and leave my mind clear to wander that is when ideas and solutions to problems pop into my head. If you can perhaps you could bring a digital recorder with you to brain dump ideas too (see point 6 below).

5 Employ a call answering service to take your calls and then forward details to you by email. This will have two benefits it will effectively screen your calls, avoiding you wasting time talking to non important cold callers; also it will reduce interruptions which can kill your train of thought.

6 When you have reports and articles to write try and learn how to use a digital recorder to allow you to quickly brain dump ideas before you forget them. Then you can send the recordings to a transcription service and have them type them up for you. We all think and talk much faster than we can type and with the advent of freelance websites such as www.elance.com it is possible to get 1 audio hour worth of transcription typed up for less than €20.

7 Prioritise the tasks that will make you the most money. If you need to make more sales to bring in more clients for your business then focus your time around that. If needs be spend the whole day out visiting prospects from the start of the day. Leave lower value tasks like tidying your desk way down the list. If you focus your attention on the high value tasks these should yield you increased income that will give you the money to pay someone to do the more menial non key tasks.

8 Get to the office 30 minutes earlier. By starting work just 30 minutes earlier for a 5 day week over the course of year you will have given yourself the equivalent of 15 extra days.

9 Look for ways that you can leverage your time by working once and having it profit you multiple times. For example an author leverages their time by writing a book once and then selling it multiple times when they are off doing something else. Even by writing this article I am leveraging my time. This article will be a post on my blog, an article with links back to my website that I submit to article directories. I will then modify it slightly and turn it into a press release. All of these things will directly benefit my business by increasing the amount of traffic to my website. In addition all content that I create I store away for future use and one day I might end up using it for content in an information product, newsletter or perhaps as content in a seminar I give.

10 Document the tasks within your business. As you develop and grow your business one of the best tips I can give you is to take the time to record key tasks that you perform in your business. In common with most start-ups it is the owner that does everything. However if you plan to grow your business into a proper business rather than just a job disguised as a business you need to plan for other people to one day do the tasks you do. So even if you are not in a position to take on staff quite yet you can still do some of the ground work. Keep a folder with all the different tasks that you do in your business. Everything from how to check your bank balance on the online banking to the sales script you use when calling prospects. Take a few minutes each time you do a task to note down the steps you take in plain English. Over time this folder will grow and become the ‘operations manual’ for your business. Then when the time comes to take on additional help you will have tasks well documented for them to be able to follow. This will save you a huge amount of training time and make new employees far more efficient in a shorter time frame.