It took Van Gough just 2 days to paint his ‘Starry Night masterpiece’.
The Rolling Stones wrote their mega-hit ‘I can’t get no satisfaction’ in just 2 hours.
Lady GaGa and RedOne worked together to create her breakout hit and catchy dance tune ‘Just Dance’ in just 10 minutes.
Some of the greatest pieces of art, music, design and sculpture have been conceived and created in a ridiculously short period of time.
Now, compare that to your average business owner, who spends:
• 4 hours a day reading emails
• 16 days a year filling in forms (writing your name, address and date of birth 2,800 times in the process)
• 120 days a year on admin
If you multiply that by every business owner in the UK, that’s 400 million days spent on basic business admin. That’s crazy!!! Just think about what else you could do with all that time, if you weren’t doing admin tasks. Well, you don’t have to think, because we’ve got some suggestions for you. So, in case you hadn’t gathered already, this blog is all about why business owners doing their own admin is a waste of their time, and why they need someone else to do it instead.
Admin Is A Skill
I wanted to put this one first, because it’s something I come across a lot. Many people think admin is one of those ‘lowest common denominator’ jobs that everyone can do, no matter what their qualification. And to some extent that’s true – it doesn’t take a university degree to be able to delete spam from an inbox, make dinner reservations or book a hotel. But it does take a hell of a lot of skill to manage someone’s travel experience from end to end, making sure they get to airports on time, have the right paperwork, connecting flights all match up and hotel rooms ready when they arrive. It’s not easy to organise someone’s diary to make sure they don’t double book for meetings, get all their work done and still have time to take a break and actually eat some lunch during the day. And it takes a genius to understand the mountain of paperwork HMRC can throw at business owners and work out what needs to be filled in when, sent where and by what date. Being good at admin is a serious skill, and not something everyone can do well. And if your skill as a business owner is in providing a service, the odds are you suck at admin. That’s part of the reason it takes you so long! You don’t like doing it and you’re not good at doing it, so you put it off, and then you spend much longer doing it than you need to.
That’s why so many successful businesses have specialist admins PA’s or virtual assistants on board – they keep the wheels turning behind the scenes so that the business owner can work their magic.
Just think, if you didn’t have to spend time doing admin (that you don’t really want to do anyway), you could:
• Discover new ways to grow your business. Spend that time researching and brainstorming new ways of reaching your customers, exploring other avenues of marketing or just pondering new services or products you could provide, all of which would grow your business.
• Level up as a business owner. Learning is the single best thing a business owner can do to help themselves improve and run a more successful business. Invest that admin time back into your business in a more productive way by learning how to be better at timekeeping, learn how to outsource, go on some training courses, or try some new events.
• Learn a new skill. It’s not all work you know. Some of that free time could be used to find a new hobby or discover a new interest that you love, bringing a bit more enrichment to your life.
• Work on your work-life blend. As we’ve stated before, work-life balance is bullshit. But with the admin strain removed, you could redress some of the blend between your work and your personal lives, helping you become happier. Spend more time with the family, do something for you, or treat your friends to a day out.
• Get Healthier. There is no such thing as never having time for exercise – it’s just that you prioritise other things above it. Admin is usually one of those things, because it is a necessary evil in life and in business. But without it, you could spend some time exercising and generally making yourself healthier (and happier).
So, what I’m trying to say in a very round-about way, is this. If you need magic to happen in your life or in your business, then leave the admin to someone else. Like us! At Your Admin Hub, we love admin. It’s what we’re good at, it’s what we love to do, and frankly nothing gets us going more than a big chaotic admin mess that needs sorting out. So if you want to free up some time in your life, all you have to do is talk to Your Admin Hub.
