By Michael K Adonteng
Nov 18th, 2024
Time is one of the most precious resources in sales, yet so often, we find ourselves struggling to make the most of it. For sales professionals aiming to excel in fast-paced markets like Africa, efficient time management is essential—not only for achieving targets but also for maintaining a sustainable work-life balance. Imagine if you could gain back 30% of your time. What could that mean for your productivity, sales pipeline, and personal growth?
At Africa Sales Academy, we believe in empowering sales leaders with tools and techniques that help them optimise their time. Here’s how you can use a structured time audit, like the one illustrated in the template, to reclaim 30% of your time and reinvest it strategically for career growth and personal satisfaction.
Step 1: Conduct a Time Audit to Understand Where Your Week Goes
The first step to gaining time is understanding exactly where it currently goes. Begin with a comprehensive time audit to account for every hour of your week. The template breaks down time usage into categories such as:
- Work Hours: Time spent on core work activities.
- Sleep: Essential rest to recharge for optimal productivity.
- Commute: Time spent getting to and from work.
- Meals: Eating and meal prep, a daily necessity that consumes a surprising amount of time.
By listing each category and recording hours spent, you gain a clearer picture of how much time is truly available for work and personal commitments. For instance, if you work 52 hours a week, sleep for 56 hours, commute for 5 hours, and spend around 8 hours on meals, that’s 121 hours gone from your week’s total of 168 hours. This leaves you with 47 hours, but it’s likely that some of those hours are also lost to unplanned or inefficient activities.
Step 2: Calculate Your Annual Time Availability
A detailed time audit doesn’t stop at weekly activities—it also considers annual factors like holidays, training days, sick days, and conference attendance. Subtracting these from your total available days gives a realistic view of your productive days in the year.
For instance, after accounting for weekends, holidays, training, and other commitments, you may find you have around 220 working days left in the year. This realistic overview of your actual time availability is crucial for effective planning and for understanding how much time is at your disposal to achieve your goals.
Step 3: Identify Time Drains and Eliminate Low-Value Activities
With a clear view of your time allocation, the next step is to identify areas where time is wasted. These often include:
- Travelling: Commutes and travel for meetings can add up quickly. Consider whether any travel time can be reduced through virtual meetings or by optimising your travel schedule.
- Waiting for Meetings: If you find yourself frequently waiting for others to join or start meetings, use this time productively by reviewing notes, checking emails, or preparing for upcoming tasks.
- Administration and Emails: Routine tasks like responding to emails and filling out reports can consume hours without much return. Streamlining these activities by setting specific times for emails or using automation tools can help reduce this drain.
- Other Low-Value Activities: These could include unnecessary meetings, browsing non-work-related content, or multitasking inefficiently.
If these time drains take up, say, 10 hours per week, addressing them could instantly give you back significant time. Even reducing these activities by half could lead to a noticeable improvement in your available hours.
Email us at info@africasalesacademy.com with “Where Does the Week Go” as the subject for a FREE copy of the template.
Step 4: Reclaim and Reinvest Time in High-Impact Activities
Once you identify areas to cut back, it’s time to reinvest those hours into high-impact activities that directly contribute to your success. Here are some suggestions on where to focus:
- Sales Prospecting and Client Follow-Up: Time gained can be reinvested into proactive prospecting and nurturing relationships with potential clients. In markets like Africa, where relationships are a key component of sales success, dedicating more time to understanding client needs and staying in touch can greatly impact your pipeline.
- Skill Development and Training: Reinvent your career by dedicating time to upskilling. Use some of your reclaimed hours to stay current on sales techniques, industry knowledge, or even digital skills. This investment not only improves your confidence but also enhances your value to clients.
- Strategic Planning: Sales professionals often get bogged down in day-to-day tasks, leaving little time for strategic planning. Dedicate part of your reclaimed time to planning and reviewing your goals, understanding client segments, or aligning with broader company objectives. This habit helps you approach sales with a big-picture view, positioning you as a strategic partner to your clients.
- Personal Well-being and Work-Life Balance: Winning in sales requires sustained energy and motivation, which can only come from a healthy work-life balance. Use some of your reclaimed time for activities that recharge you, such as exercise, spending time with family, or hobbies. A balanced life leads to better performance at work, making this a valuable investment in itself.
Practical Example: Implementing the 30% Time Gain
Let’s say, through your audit, you identify 12 hours per week that are being underutilised. That’s roughly 30% of your working hours. By reclaiming those 12 hours, you could reinvest:
- 4 hours for additional prospecting and follow-ups
- 2 hours for skill-building and training
- 3 hours for strategic planning and review
- 3 hours for personal well-being
This reallocation not only enhances your productivity but also positions you for long-term success by focusing on high-impact activities.
Step 5: Monitor and Adjust Regularly
Time management is an ongoing process. To ensure that you continue to benefit from your reclaimed time, set a monthly or quarterly review to assess whether your time is being reinvested effectively. Adjust as necessary to maintain alignment with your evolving goals and responsibilities.
Regular monitoring helps you stay agile, allowing you to adapt your time management strategy based on changing demands and priorities. For example, if you notice that a particular client segment is yielding high returns, you might decide to allocate more time to client engagement and less to administrative tasks, further optimising your time investment.
Take Control of Your Time for Greater Success
Gaining back 30% of your time isn’t about squeezing more hours out of the day—it’s about making better choices with the hours you have. By conducting a thorough time audit, identifying time drains, and reinvesting reclaimed hours into high-impact activities, sales professionals can significantly enhance their productivity and work-life balance.
Michael K. Adonteng
Founder, ASA
