How do you prioritise your time?

Time. For most of us it’s one of the greatest assets we have. It’s finite and we all have the same amount. Leveraging your time effectively can be a real differentiator in your practice. That’s common sense, right? If so, the question is, how intentional are you with your time? How do you protect it?

If you want to maximise your time, start by understanding where you spend it now. It’s analogous to an advisor having a conversation with a client about their cash flow. What comes in, where does it go and how do you track it?

Your ideal week

Assuming you know what your business goals are and have a magic wand, how would you create your perfect week. What would it look like? How would you spend your mornings versus your afternoons?  What would you start doing more of and stop doing? To begin, create a list of the key areas you would begin to spend your time on.

Consider if there’s a time of day you might focus on these activities. Don’t forget to include your personal time as well (family time, health, etc.). Then, create another list of responsibilities you would stop doing. In creating these lists, think about which activities are best served by you and what brings you the greatest pleasure.

Your current week

For one week, track your time. Account for every 30 minutes from the time you wake until the end of the day. Categorize these 30-minute blocks into several different areas of responsibilities. A few to consider might be portfolio management, marketing/business development/admin/ client interaction/operations and technology.

By the end of the week, you should be able to review your activities and categories and understand where you’re spending your time. Now compare that to your ideal week. What are the results telling you? Are you focused on the activities that will help you accomplish your goals? Or the activities that make you happy? If they are, congratulations! This exercise confirms you’re on the right path, and you may want to consider doubling down on some of those activities.

Something needs to change

If you’ve realised that you’re not allocating your time the way you’d like, today is a great time to reconsider your approach. In our experience, many advisors would say they’d like to spend their time with clients and prospects and say it’s the reason they got into the business.

Unfortunately, many are pulled in so many different directions and can’t make this happen.  Many find themselves spending too much time on activities they really don’t enjoy and some activities they really aren’t skilled at, such as back-office responsibilities. This can impact the probability of attaining their goals and can begin to weigh on an advisor’s overall job satisfaction.

The good news is that today you have the option to outsource areas of responsibility that you do not wish to focus on day to day. In addition to outsourcing the back-office, there are outsourced platforms that can provide you additional resources to give you valuable time back, enhance the client experience and differentiate your practice.

As advisors, we spend our day helping our clients plan their lives—that’s our job. However, many of us are also business owners, and we need to make sure we are allocating enough time to focus on our business: goal setting, re-evaluating the business model and anticipating what clients will ask for. It all starts with becoming more efficient with your time.

Find out  how you can spend more time growing your business and less time running here >>

Disclosures:

The views expressed herein are for commentary purposes only and do nottake into account any individual personal, financial, or tax considerations. Mariner Platform Solutions, LLC (“MPS”) is an SEC registered investment adviser. Registration of an investment adviser does not imply a certain level of skill or training. MPS is in compliance with the current notice filing requirements imposed upon SEC registered investment advisers by those states in which MPS maintains clients. MPS may only transact business in those states in which it is notice filed or qualifies for an exemption or exclusion from notice filing requirements. Any subsequent, direct communication by MPS with a prospective client shall be conducted by a representative that is either registered or qualifies for an exemption or exclusion from registration in the state where the prospective client resides. For additional information about MPS, including fees and services, please contact MPS or refer to the Investment Adviser Public Disclosure website (www.adviserinfo.sec.gov). Please read the disclosure statement carefully before you invest or send money.