3 Hacks to More PRODUCTIVITY as Busy Work at Home Moms

Hey love!

In today’s episode we are talking about something SO NEEDED for busy work at home moms as summer approaches, our kids start getting (back) out of school haha, and we try to maintain our sanity amidst a routine shift. PRODUCTIVITY! I dug deep and asked myself, what are the top 3 things I do that help me stay efficient and productive as a WAHM?

I came up with some ideas that I think might change the game for you. Grab and notebook and pen, this one is FULL of juicy tacticals that you implement right now.

If you’ve been feeling pulled in all directions or like you can’t seem to keep up with home, work, or motherhood – please listen in! I pray this blesses you.

FULL EPISODE TRANSCRIPTION:

Hey girl. Hey, welcome to today’s episode. We are going to be talking about three hacks to be more productive as a work at home Mom. These are three things that I do with massive intention, and I think that they create a big shift in my every day in my productivity, in my output, and allow me to still be present and have more time and space. You are going to love these. You’re going to need a pen.

These three hacks are something I hope that you write down post up in your little corner closet, wherever you work from sister, no judgment over here and implement on a daily basis. You’re going to love it. Don’t y’all love some hacks and strategies.

I’m So here for hacks and strategies, let’s go here are three hacks to be more productive as a work at home. Mom, these are my strategies. This is Stef Gass, tried and true. The stuff that I actually do and have come up with on my own. I know that there are 101 ways that you can be productive. There are a hundred million different people that you can follow when it comes to productivity coaches and organizational coaches and declutter peeps.

But this is just stuff that I do. And I think that any of you can do, it’s super simple and easy. Number one, I proactively plan. I know so groundbreaking, but as I sat here and I was like, what are the three things I actually do? Like just really tactical. The first one that came up is like, I have an action plan every day. Not just every day, every week, not just every week, every month and not just every month, but every year.

So I proactively plan. I start with a vision statement at the beginning of the year, I create my big goals in each of the areas of my life, spiritual, a family with my kids in my hubs, right. Um, my health and fitness, my home and my business. And I create my top three goals in each of those areas. And then I reverse engineer them. I know what I have to do in order to achieve the things that are on my vision board.

And I believe that running after the goals and the things that God has planted in your heart is absolutely not just okay, but it’s necessary because then you know where you’re going. You know what I mean? Like Isaiah says, know where you’re going. This is the way walk in it. So then from there I put it into my monthly plan and this is stuff that I’m putting into my Horacio planner and it’s a paper planner.

P.S. Use my code STEF20 and receive 20% off your purchase at Horacio Printing!

And then all of those appointments are also happening, uh, in my Calendly. So I have them, yes, I have them in Calendly. But at the same time, I have the, in my planner, those appointments and things I have going on both professionally and personally get moved into the weekly plan. I have my weekly plan at a glance. I can see when I’m my morning routines, when I’m doing my client appointments.

When I pick up my kids, who’s dropping off the boys, who’s picking them up. What am I doing? My workout each day? When am I doing, uh, what are we doing for dinner each day? What are we doing? When am I going to fit in blink, blink, blink, you know, Oh, I have lunch with a girlfriend. Where’s that going? So I know at any glance, within 10 seconds, what is happening today? I also have on my daily view, the top three things that I must accomplish that are non negotiable.

So I proactively plan every single day. Now, now believe me, this is flexible. Cause I got kids. You know what I’m saying? I have a life, I get it. But if I don’t achieve something that I had on the plan that today, I just pop it over into tomorrow. No problem. And I don’t let I, 99% of the time make sure that everything has been done. That was on the weekly plan by Sunday night so that I can start the following week fresh.

It is one thing I’ve been doing for the past 10 decade, a decade of my life. I’ve been doing this same system. It works. It takes time and intention and it is super worth it. How do you do this? How do you do this? Number one, you have to find a system that works for you. So for me, it’s paper planning.

All right. Now, once I scaled the business, I realized I’m going to have to have some automation and some technical solutions here. So I use Calendly for all client bookings. I use a sauna to communicate appointments, um, launches and whatever we’re doing as a business with the team. Other than that, my life is in a paper planner. All right. And then number two, you need to create a annual vision for your life. Okay? Where do you want to go? What you want your business to look like?

What are, what are really those, those goals and dreams that God’s planted in your heart reverse engineer them into the top three goals for each bucket of your life. And finally proactively plan on at the last day of the month. Okay. For the following month. And then also I do every Sunday, I plan the following week, changed my life forever.

I will never go back. Number two, hack number two, I have daily straightened sessions. I was thinking about this. And I’m like, one of the things that really, really helps me stay proactive is the fact that my home is some what I’m talking somewhat, not a hundred percent of the time straightened up on a daily basis. If the dishes start really overflowing, the state of your home is a state of your mind. Right? And so it starts to trigger me. And I can’t really focus.

I feel kind of scattered, especially like the laundry starts getting crazy out of hand. I really do better if I can stay on top of things as best as I can moving scale. But here’s what I do. Here’s why I’ve found that really, really, really works for me is that I carve out roughly two 30 minute or 15 minute sessions a day, depending on my schedule.

And I call it a straighten session. What can I bust out in 15 minutes? I mean, when you turn, you set your phone down, you forget everything else. You just get to work. I can power through two rooms. Let’s pick things up. I can power through a sink of dishes. I can power through one load or half a load of laundry and get it put away.

If I’m proactively doing that every single day come Saturday, Sunday, when I really want to just be with my family, I’m not wasting four hours cleaning, doing laundry and dishes it’s already been done throughout the week in the little mom cracks of the day. So this was a strategy that I just had an aha moment of something that I do that I think will bless you too. Now here’s the important part. You have to plan it into your day though, because when you have that mom crack, what do we tend to do?

Get on our phone, right? Um, Oh, I need to get back to the DMS. No, no, no, no, no. And I’m gonna talk about that in hack. Number three here. It’s Oh, I scheduled and then I’m going to go do a power, uh, power straightened session. Let’s get it set a timer. 15 minutes go girl. There’s so much you can get done in 15 to 30 minutes. All right.

Number three, final hack to being more productive as a work at home. Mom output first communicate last output. First communicate last. What does this mean? This means that when I’m looking at my daily plan and I’ve got my top three things I must accomplish, I’m going to ask myself what if this is output? For example, I’m recording a podcast episode for you guys right now. This is output. This is me to many. Okay. If I had an Instagram post to put up, that would be output.

If I had to do a Facebook live, which I actually just did in the Facebook group, that’s output. All output should be done first, because that is the most important part of your business mamas. Now, secondly, now what do we tend to do? We tend to communicate first. Be reactive first. Oh, let me clean the inbox. Let’s go to the inbox zero real quick. Let me reply to my five DMS. Let me reply to my Instagram comments. None. No, no, no, no.

Those are not output. They are communication-based right? Aka, they are reactive. Save all your reactive stuff for the end of the day. Why your energy is going to be higher. And in the morning when you’re fresh, number two, sometimes the things we save for the end of the day or the things that don’t actually get done. So what happens if my inbox doesn’t stay at zero?

Nothing. What happens if I don’t reply to my Instagram comments? Nothing. What happens if, um, I didn’t reply back to that Voxer message. Nothing but my output, if this podcast doesn’t happen, that has a huge implication on my business. If that Facebook live, where I’m promoting into the workshop, next Wednesday didn’t happen. That has a huge implication in the success of the workshop. So output first, every single day, communication and reactivity.

Second. So after I’m done with all the output, this is the last output item that I have. I have all my coaching clients today, which I’m going to do. Today’s a really, really busy work day for me. I’m going to be done with those 3:00 PM. I will take one hour and clean the inbox and reply to people now, whatever I don’t get done in that hour. Okay. It’s going to wait because we’re going on a family bike ride and my priorities and my boundaries are laser solid.

Okay? However, this stuff is the most important. So that’s the final hack for you, which is output first communication. Last let’s recap. Three hacks to be more productive as a work at home. Mom, number one, proactively plan your year, your month, your week, your day, number two daily least straightened sessions, 15 minutes to 30 minutes once or twice a day, pop them in the planner. Number three, do your, all of your output. First on a daily basis, your communication and your reaction. God bless you sis!