Chapter 7 Money Comes and Goes—Time Just Goes

Too many people in Western societies practice rugged individualism, typified by John Wayne’s movie roles. Not so curiously, 17 years after his death John Wayne was voted America’s favorite actor. He took care of everything himself. Unfortunately, life is not a movie.

In the workaday world, you frequently see middle managers who attempt to leapfrog several positions in the company by taking on more projects, even though they’re already working beyond optimal capacity. Among entrepreneurs, you may encounter someone trying to crack a new market—even while juggling several other balls, short-changing his or her health to keep that circus going.

It’s Gotta Be Me

What are some danger signs indicating that you believe you have to do it all yourself? Consider these symptoms: You think you’ll be able to overcome obstacles by working longer; you tell yourself (or worse, your boss) that you “appreciate the challenge.” If the people around you think it can’t be accomplished, all the better; you’ll wow ’em by doing the impossible, right? You might become a little overbearing, but hey, you’re in pursuit of an important goal, and that’s what counts. Besides, you’re the “only one who can do the job.”

Certainly, working hard in itself is not a problem unless you maintain preposterous ambitions or let force of habit push you beyond the point of diminishing returns. If you’re willing to stay late, work on weekends, and minimize your vacation time, you well may be your organization’s star performer—hey, what a great deal for them!—but too many career-achievers fall into an endless cycle. These people feel their accomplishments are too small or too few; they experience disappointment, frustration, and health-threatening stress. To relieve these feelings, they work even harder in the hope they’ll accomplish more and a golden rainbow will appear.

Attempting to “Do It All” Will Cost You

The notion that you and you alone must take care of everything is, in a word, erroneous. If working too hard is you way to gain the respect of others—or self-respect—it’s time to rethink your whole approach.

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 Chronos Says Admit to yourself that you can’t do everything; acknowledge that trying harder in some instances may not be worth it. Contemplate the possibility of using help for selected segments of your life.

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Some do-it-all people may have the ill-advised notion that the only way to exhibit competence is by constantly proving it to everyone else. Worse, if they never quite prove it to themselves, they live in dread of being found out as imperfect.

• Rather than focus on your weaknesses, accentuate the positive! Develop your strengths. Also give yourself realistic time frames for ambitious goals.
• Divide and conquer. Take smaller steps when setting larger goals so that you don’t burst a spleen along the way. When progress is slow, try an alternative route, a new door, or a different mindset—anything but plod along the same as you’ve always done.

Misers Are Often Penny-Wise, Pound-Foolish

Especially when it comes to domestic tasks, do you get stuck in a miserly mode? Do you think that if you spend a few minutes here and there taking care of this and that you can handle all you seek to keep up with—and avoid shelling out the money to have others do it? Many people do.

Each time you avoid getting a service professional, helper, or part-timer—when such parties could aid you considerably—you’re ensuring that you won’t win back your time. If you don’t enjoy mowing the lawn, for example, every time you do that chore you add to the cumulative total of undesirable tasks in your life (as discussed in Chapter 2, “Time Flies Whether You’re Having Fun or Not”). Besides, you’re incurring all that unnecessary tissue-and-decongestant expense during hay fever season.

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 Time Out! Watch out if you start believing that you alone are the only one who can handle things. Many organizations tend to seek out people with such urges and expect them to over-perform forever. Only superheroes need apply.

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You Can’t Make More Time: You Can Make More Money

When I make presentations to groups around the country and explain the value of shelling out a few dollars to preserve your time, invariably someone asks, “What do I do if money is tight?” I don’t presume for a second that you have loads of cash stashed away in a trunk somewhere. (Remember, most people spend more than they have.) And the thought of parting with some of your money to hire people to do what you’ve traditionally done yourself may seem like heresy at first.

But let’s look at hiring others from the vantage point of your life’s big picture. You have things to accomplish that can perhaps make you much more money than the $15 you pay somebody to mow the lawn or trim the hedges.

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 A Stitch In Time It makes perfect sense to pay a high-school kid $15 to mow the lawn if you can’t stand mowing the lawn. In the long run, you won’t miss the money and you’ll be glad you’re no longer stuck with a task you dislike.

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If you’re an entrepreneur or self-employed, it pays to rely on outside services so you can focus on what you do best and make the overall business prosper. If you work for an organization, there are still countless opportunities for relief; you can rely on others (at work and away from work) to alleviate the piddling tasks you don’t enjoy doing. Thus you can be at your best, get noticed by superiors, and stand a better chance of getting those raises and promotions.

Overcoming the Urge to Do It All: Making a Little Money Go a Long Way

It’s surprising how common the do-it-all urge is. Nanci Hellmich, a reporter for USA Today, uncovered some of it when she interviewed me for two articles. The first was a brief, two-column article; in it Nanci invited readers to write to USA Today and discuss their time-pressure problems. Several lucky readers would benefit from my counsel (aw, shucks). The second article would include the results of my counseling.

Over several weeks, Nanci received hundreds of letters; she selected respondents for me to call. I lived in Falls Church, Virginia, at the time, so I made the calls from the USA Today offices in Arlington, Virginia. I had lengthy talks with a female attorney and a graduate student, among others.

The attorney was perpetually racing the clock, getting her daughters to school in the morning, seeing her husband off on his (frequently long) business trips, plying her trade as a partner in a successful law firm, picking up the children, driving them to various after-school activities, making dinner for them, reading to them, and putting them to bed.

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 Chronos Says You need to be rested and alert when you head into work. Having others take care of domestic tasks helps you in your professional career.

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After listening to her story, I asked her why she didn’t give herself the liberty of ordering dinner a couple of times a week rather than making it all the time. She said she’d never thought about it—and, on first hearing, it seemed a little extravagant. I asked her how much she earned. It was considerable. I asked her how much her husband earned. It was more than considerable.

“Okay,” I replied, “between the two of you, you’re clearing nearly a quarter million per year. Suppose you had Chinese food or pizza or chicken delivered to your home now and then—and you didn’t cook at all on those nights. How much would it cost you, once a week, to have dinner delivered?” She thought about it and said, “Maybe an average of $16 a week, so that’s $800 a year.”

I said, “Would it be worth $800 a year if, once a week—particularly during hectic work weeks—you had dinner delivered instead of making it yourself? Would that free up some of your time? Would you enjoy it? Are you worth it?” She agreed on all counts. It’s food for thought.

Booking It

The graduate student I spoke with also had a hectic schedule. Besides taking several courses, she worked in the afternoons and was a volunteer for a service organization two nights a week. Frequently she found herself arising in the morning barely in time to catch the bus. This kind of pressure was no way to start her day, yet it had become routine.

I listened carefully to her story and asked, “How much is the bus ride to school?” She said it was $1.75. I said, “How much would a taxi ride cost?” She was aghast. “I couldn’t take a taxi!” I said, “Wait a second. How much would a taxi ride be?” She didn’t know, so we paused our conversation. She called the closest taxi company and asked about the charges from her apartment to her class in the morning. The cost was approximately $4.50.

When she called me back, I asked her the million-dollar question: “How upsetting would it be to your budget if, occasionally, when you were running late, you permitted yourself to hail a taxi and pay $4.50 instead of paying $1.75 for the bus?” She thought about it and said, “Well, I suppose occasionally it wouldn’t hurt.”

I said, “You’re right. You could hail a taxi as often as once a week, and in the course of a 15-week semester, you’re only paying an extra $67.50 for the luxury of not being enslaved to the bus schedule. You could easily blow $67.50 on stuff all the time. Why not be gentle with yourself? Acknowledge that you’re handling a lot in life right now, and occasionally you deserve to take a taxi ride to school.” She relented.

Make Mine Manhattan

If you’re a big-city career-type, the same principle applies. If you’re up on East 78th Street in Manhattan and have to get down to 43rd in a hurry, once every week or so, it won’t put a significant dent in your pocketbook to take a taxi rather than the subway or bus. Suppose it costs you $8 more per week. In the course of a year you’re only paying $400. How many times have you blown $400 in ways that were far less beneficial to your overall health and well-being?

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 Time Out! Don’t get caught in the trap of false economies. How many times do you get stuck in a miserly mode, pinching pennies here and there, while blowing triple or quadruple digits on items of marginal value? If you don’t watch out, you’ll find you’re sacrificing your time and wasting money.

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A Flying Leap

What time/money trade-offs might make good sense in your situation? Consider a few:

• Grocery delivery: Many supermarkets and grocery stores will deliver for free or for a nominal fee of $5–$7. Some offer catalogs from which you can order by phone, by fax, by e-mail, or by Internet. For items you buy frequently, you can establish a standing order: Every week the market delivers eggs, milk, whatever. You can still shop for new or specialty food items now and then, lugging all those bags home so you remember what it’s like. It will reinforce your inclination to use grocery delivery services.
• Office supplies by phone and fax: Those giant superstores splashed across the terrain—such as OfficeMax, Staples, and Office Depot—have delivery services and publish large supply catalogs (with 800- numbers so you can reach semi-knowledgeable attendants). The catalogs also contain 800-fax numbers; you can fax your order without even talking to anybody. Ordering via e-mail or the Internet is becoming a standard option. Most vendors deliver at no extra charge if your order is above $50. The orders usually are delivered the next day, right to your door. It’s fast, accurate, and relatively painless.
• Gift wrap it, please: If you’re buying presents and the store offers a wrapping service, pay the extra dollar and have them wrap it. Do you particularly want to fiddle with wrapping paper, tape, scissors, string, bows, and all that stuff? If you do, fine, that’s your option. For another dollar (or whatever it takes), however, isn’t it worth it to have that chore completed?
• Online services: Rather than doing it yourself, consider the online service vendors who maintain bibliographies, citations, dossiers, and indices for a fee. Sure, software can help you navigate the Net. Extracting what you need, however, takes time—your time—your valuable time.
• Pick-up and delivery services: Use vendors and suppliers who come right to your door. I use one firm that recharges my laser printer’s cartridge for about half the price of buying a new cartridge every time. Virtually all the major express package delivery services will both pick up and deliver for home as well as office locations. You can start your own account even if it’s from your home and you send only a few packages monthly.

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   A Stitch In Time Every time you successfully use one of your many helpers, you’re winning back your time!

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• Shopping services: There are people who can go shopping for you to buy gifts for others, new shoes, or nearly anything. If you dislike shopping (or aren’t too good at it) and someone you trust is good at it, this could make sense. The professional shopper can actually save you money. He or she knows where to get the best buys. Often the overall cost of the item-plus-the-hourly-fee is less than you would have paid (especially if you often hunt for items in five or six stores and end up paying full retail price).

Clean and Green

In my book Marketing for the Home-Based Business (Adams Media), one recommendation I make to entrepreneurs is to look for local service providers. The Maid Brigade, for example, was the service I used when I wanted to have my house cleaned quickly. Rather than hiring a service that sent over a cleaning person or two and required three or four hours to get the job done, the Maid Brigade would send six or eight people at once and finish the job within 45 minutes.

Here are other types of services that probably exist in your community (they’ll be called something else in your city, of course).

• The Butler Did It (a catering service)
• Everything But Windows (housecleaning)
• Rent a Dad (house repair when there’s nobody around who can drive a nail straight)
• The Tree Doctor (tree and hedge trimming)
• Jumpin’ Jack Flash (pick-up and delivery)
• Walkin’ the Dog (takes care of Pooch when you’re gone—or when you’re not)
• Gutters-R-Us (clears your gutters, saves you from roof duty)
• Shake a Leg (airport shuttle service)

There are plenty of part-time workers as well; some may be more suitable to your needs than others. These include part-time regular employees, retirees, temporaries, and students (high school, college, intern, foreign-exchange, grad school, and so on).

You probably can find a bright, motivated student to help you. Schools are full of intelligent, perceptive young men and women—many of whom are seeking an opportunity to gain some real-world experience or extra money. Their part-time status doesn’t mean they’re less intelligent or effective. Many can take a divisible unit of work and do a bang-up job on it.

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 Chronos Says Most communities have high-school juniors and seniors who’d be thrilled to work for $.50 an hour above minimum wage while gaining more experience than flipping hamburgers. This might not seem like a lot of money to you, but it may to them.

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What could helpers do for you? Fair question. Take a look:

• Route/sort the mail
• Answer requests for information
• Send out mailings of any sort
• Serve routine customer needs
• Make deliveries and pick-ups
• Survey customers and their needs
• Keep track of necessary data and news sources
• Type mailing lists
• Type anything, for that matter
• Keep things tidy, clean, and in good repair
• Study competitors, their literature, and their products
• Make first-round or lead calls to prospective customers
• Hunt for a product or service you need
• Catalog new information or products
• Proofread or double-check anything written
• Track inventory or arrange displays
• Do anything that a less-essential part-time employee could do without excessive guidance

Identify all those non-essential-but-bothersome tasks you’ve been putting off and that a part-timer can handle.

Seed work functions best when it’s a distinct unit of work that’s easily assigned to someone else. For example, suppose you want information on the eight other local companies in your field. A high-school student can easily open the phone book or a local trade publication, visit the sites, write for the brochures (using his/her home address), and summarize the information gathered. A more experienced employee could spot trends or innovations from this data, all with a minimum of your time spent on instruction.

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 Watch WordsSeed work is the sort of task you can easily assign to another because the downside risk if he or she botches the task is negligible.

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Putting Your Service System in Place: Ten Steps

Whether you live in a community of 35,000 or 1,035,000, many service providers can help you with domestic as well as business tasks to free you for whatever makes the most money for you.

By now, you’re probably mildly enthusiastic to downright excited about the prospects of bringing such providers into your life. Good. If you start using such helpers in a systematic way, you’ll be far along the road to winning back your time.

Here are 10 suggestions for putting your service system in place:

1. Identify all the tasks you don’t like to do. Make this list as long as possible. Be honest with yourself. Separate the list into domestic and career-related tasks.
2. On two separate pages (one for domestic and one for career-related tasks) create a matrix listing these tasks down the left side of each page. (There’s an example Task Matrix lurking nearby in this chapter.) Across the top of each page, leave room for four columns; label them Option 1 through Option 4.

   Task Matrix

   
3. If you list seven tasks down the left side of the page for your domestic sheet, with four option boxes across the top of the page, potentially you have 28 cells to fill. Fill even half of them, and you’ll be in great shape.
4. Within the blank cells, write down every alternative you can imagine for not doing tasks you don’t enjoy doing. You may find yourself writing down such options as delegating the tasks to your kids, your neighbors’ kids, or someone you found in a shopper’s guide or the Yellow Pages.

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    A Stitch In Time Create an up-to-date file of key literature and information you encounter when seeking service providers; constantly add to it. Align your life with people who can free up your time. You’re worth it.

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5. Take stock of your grid. If you don’t have good options for some of the tasks, it’s time for some fieldwork. Go to your local library, supermarket, or community center and read the bulletin boards. Often you’ll find business cards or small ads posted by local entrepreneurial talents. Start collecting these leads.
6. Talk to your local librarian. Talk to the job-placement officer at your local high school, community college, or university. Ask around. You’re likely to get many names of people who can help you.
7. Consider running your own advertisement. A small classified ad in a suburban shoppers’ newspaper will probably cost you less than $10. Go ahead, splurge!
8. Start calling potential helpers (or better yet, get your seventh-grader to make exploratory calls for about $3.00 an hour; you won’t miss the money).
9. Interview, interview, interview. Over the phone is fine, in person is better. Map out what you want done; break in your helpers gently but systematically.
10. Start a file of the literature or information you’ve collected on all the different types of helpers you’ve been seeking and talking to.

Once you have a file of helpers, keep adding to it, keep it current, and use it.