Coaching for Better Time Management: Prioritizing Organic Growth in Your Daily Routine

In the hectic day-to-day running of your firm, it's easy to get caught up in the day-to-day demands of client work and administrative tasks, but what about your firm's future?  

Carving out time for business growth is essential but often gets neglected.  The reality of running your firm is that you will dedicate roughly half of your time to billable client work and half to non-billable activities.  If you don’t implement intentional time management and craft a strategic framework to help you prioritize organic growth without compromising client service, you may well find yourself neglecting the business development elements that are critical to investing in your firm's future.

To begin working on your balancing act, you must face the fact that data show repeatedly that about half of your time is billable, client-focused work. To maintain the balance, you must manage your time in both halves of your work life. You can use time blocking, focused client scheduling time. Put in the work to create processes and a routine that helps the client side of the business run smoothly. We ensure that high client satisfaction keeps the whole machine going, so we can’t neglect that half of the business. 

For today’s purposes, we need to look at the non-billable time. That’s all the other stuff! Admin, compliance, strategic planning, and, of course, marketing. This work is not directly invoiced but is crucial for the business’s growth and operations. Unfortunately, non-billable time is often pushed aside due to client work. Keep track of your work so you don’t drift into bad habits. Time blocking and creating appointments with yourself will help you see where the time is going and ensure you do the non-client work. 

Let’s begin by assessing your current time allocation. You don’t have to track time forever, but track it for a few weeks, maybe a month. If you have very different schedules depending on the season, gather some data to cover the various seasons of your business. Evaluate how much time you currently spend on non-billable work vs. client work. Let’s ensure you are in that 50-50 ballpark first. If you are new and have lots of room for growth, you won’t be there, so just fill any empty client time with business development. 

By using some variety of time-blocking, you will define specific work hours that will help you grow your business. “Monday Marketing Day” is one I have heard thrown about; others set aside Friday afternoons for quiet content creation. There are no rules about which days are best - that depends on your preferences and client needs. Just pick days or large blocks and assign them a purpose.  Stick to your schedule as much as possible. There will be rescheduling needs, but give it your best effort. 

Within that 50%, your large categories are operations, business development, and strategic planning. Your ratios of these times will vary based on where you are in your firm life cycle. You can divide them evenly and shift them as you need to. Just make sure nothing gets shoved down into single digits of your time. If you follow along with the math, a solo planner has 5-10 hours a week for business development. A boutique firm of 4-5 people would have 25-35 hours to spread across the team. Your mileage may vary, as they say! 

Within that small time allotment, you will find content creation and curation, networking and referral relationship nurturing, and finally, posting and engagement on social channels. Now, do we see why you need time management tactics for running the business and managing growth? 

Social Media Strategy That Maximizes ROI

You must start by Setting clear business goals for the firm’s social media presence. These goals may include client acquisition, brand awareness, or thought leadership. What is your purpose? Who are you trying to reach, and why? What is the core message? To be efficient and effective, you need to have this dialed in. Defining the goals and setting measurement metrics will help inform and guide social media efforts.

As you begin to create your content, efficiency is the game's name. Remember those time blocks? Use those for batch content creation. You can record multiple videos in a day. Write more than one blog post. Once you are in flow, just keep on going!  

There are two considerations as you begin to create. What is the medium you enjoy - audio? Video? Written? How can you lean into what you want while providing different modalities for different types of followers? The second element is the content purpose. Are you educating? Building community? Promoting?  First, you must develop content that resonates with your audience. Depending on who they are, you can share educational content and financial tips that speak to them. The less generic you are, the better it is to create a relationship and build those classic three factors: know, like, and trust. You can use social media to educate clients and nurture relationships. It isn’t all about growth. Social media can support and complement the client experience. It is viewed as an added value and interaction with your firm, making referrals exceptionally easy for your clients. 

Keep in mind that you aren’t the only source! Curating content is also a great way to elevate your colleagues and position yourself as a resource to your clients. When you create your own content, be sure you are repurposing it across multiple platforms. Use transcripts from videos, post snippets of videos on Instagram, and repost on LinkedIn. Create what you enjoy creating. It will go faster and be more pleasant than pushing yourself to create something you don’t like. Not everyone has to have a blog, a podcast, AND videos. 

Choose one or two primary platforms based on your ideal client profile. You don’t have to be everywhere because your clients won’t be everywhere. Balance this with where you want to be. It’s no fun being stuck on a platform you get no joy out of. 

Repurpose your core content across multiple formats. Keep in mind it isn’t all one kind of content or post. A balance of original content, curated or shared content, some personal “get to know me” posts, and the occasional promotional post. Be yourself, be valuable, and then occasionally ask for the business you want! 

The XYPN Social Media policy manual has one particular guideline I love: 

• Be Upfront
• Focus on the Good
• Do No Harm
• Use Your Best Judgment

Take time to create your own, or live by ours if you want! 

Save time and focus using scheduling tools (Buffer, Hootsuite, etc.) to automate posts. Spend your spontaneous time on social media interacting and engaging with your followers or others in your network. This is an excellent opportunity to outsource. Some experts can do the thumbnails, video snippets, and scheduling for you. They will be faster than you and worth the money if you can swing it. Remember, you can make more by doing your best work. 

Measuring What Matters

If you don’t track your progress, you will have no idea if your social media efforts—or any business development, for that matter—are effective. This will be a slow growth process, but gather data for your website, social media accounts, and client sources. Pay attention to the type of content that gets the most interaction and schedule a periodic review process to adjust your strategy. You will want to see a trend upward in engagement, but it won’t happen overnight. 

Effectively managing your time and prioritizing organic growth through social media is not an overnight transformation.  The compound effect of consistent, strategic effort can yield remarkable results for your firm over time.  Find a sustainable rhythm that aligns with your business goals and personal preferences.  The key is to start, experiment, measure, adapt, and be consistent.  Remember, social media is just one tool in your business development toolkit. By integrating it thoughtfully into your overall strategy and maintaining a client-centric approach, you can achieve sustainable growth and long-term success.  Take that first step today, and start carving out dedicated time to nurture your online presence. 

Your future self will thank you!