by Mandy Green, Selling for Coaches 

Since beginning my work with Selling For Coaches, I have spent most of my time working with coaches on team and personal development.  For many of these coaches, with so many things to get done every day, there is just not enough time in the office to accomplish the goal or goals that they set for their recruiting, team, staff, or for themselves.
 
We all have the same 24 hours in a day, yet successful coaches manage to accomplish more in their days and weeks.  How? Because successful coaches have prioritized their goals and have set aside blocks of time in their day where they do nothing else but focus on accomplishing one task. 
 
Coach, you will get more done, be more effective, and still have time left over when you "time-block" your day. You need to schedule time daily to send emails, to plan practice, to do administrative work, to return phone calls, to recruit, to manage your team, to meet with staff, etc. These activities should be clearly blocked in your schedule at specific half hour, hour-long, or however much time you need to accomplish the task time slots.
 
To get started, put all of your important activities into categories.  Let's say for example that the 4 categories you come up with are administrative, recruiting, team, and personal: 
 
Administration time is when you need to troubleshoot, get your paperwork done, schedule games, do your game reports, go to meetings, etc. 
 
Recruiting time is when you focus on nothing but recruiting your future team.  Use this time to set up your recruiting plan for next month, analyze how your recruiting is going this month,  write hand written letters, send emails, mail letters, plan what interesting questions you will ask on your phone calls that night, schedule on-campus visits, etc. 
 
Team time is when you work on your team.  This is when you're reading, planning, strategizing, thinking.  This is when you're implementing and executing.   How can you improve your productivity, their commitment, what is your training session going to be.  Scheduling time in your day to develop you team enables your program to grow and will help bring value. 
 
Personal time is when you set all of your work aside.  This is time for you to focus on you.  Personal time may fall in the middle of the week, in the middle of the day, at your gym time, or at lunch.  It can also be when you have some spare time on the weekend to spend with your family.  This is your time to get recharged.  Allow yourself some time to relax and decompress mixed into your schedule. Giving yourself 15 minutes of relaxation time will enable you to stay focused and sharp during the course of your day.

Once you have categorized your important tasks, it is time to "time block" these tasks into your day.  Make sure these tasks get scheduled and done at the times you are least likely to get interrupted, such as early morning.

For example, from 7-7:30am you do administrative work, 7:30-8:30 is only for recruiting, 8:30-9:30 is when you focus on your team development, 9:30-9:45 is your personal time when you get up and stretch, get water, go to the bathroom, etc.  

Again, during these blocks of time that you have set up, you focus on doing only that task.  It is important that you don't allow yourself to check your email and you don't answer your phone during this time.  Checking your email frequently during the day is a major contributing factor to why most coaches don't get done what they need to.  Change your voice mail and e-mail message so you can let all would-be interrupters know when you'll be returning calls and getting back to them. 
 
Every day you must block out time for all of your high priority activities.  

Time blocking will allow you to experience consistent growth with more balance and less chaos in your day coach.  Trust me, I have been time blocking for a few months now and I love it!  I am getting so much more work done and now have a ton of more time at the end of the day to work on things that in the past I never had time for.  

Get into the habit of blocking out time for your most important activities on a consistent basis and you'll be unstoppable!

Successful team development is the key to taking your program from "good" to GREAT!  Selling for Coaches and Mandy Green specialize in working one-on-one with coaches who want to eliminate the waste in their day, and maximize their organizational lives as college coaches.  For more information, email Mandy directly at mandy@sellingforcoaches.com.