Without any doubt, your most valuable resource is your time. I will not repeat here my arguments that a financial advisor who has survived the first few years in the business is worth $1,000 an hour meeting with and talking to interested qualified clients and prospects. This is a given.
Instead, let's answer the question: How do I get more time for clients and prospects? There are two principal tools: The first is your team, which buys selling time by taking over the prospecting, service and computer operations that can otherwise consume your day.
The second is your Model Day, which optimizes the time purchased by your team.
To create a Model Day, you need some resources. You need some samples, a worksheet, a "Daily Planning Checklist" and a list of model days that you can tweak to your own business style. I have created these resources and put them at www.billgood.com/modelday, along with a copy of my February Research magazine article, "Time Management: The Key to Boosting Revenue." All resources are free.
What Is a Model Day?
It is a chart expressing your plan to perform certain kinds of actions at certain times. No chart? Your plan is just a wish.
By performing similar activities in their own frame of time, and then prioritizing within the activity, you can create a "roll." A "roll" results from doing the same thing over and over.
I call the time blocks that make up your Model Day "mini-days." Like any 24-hour day, a mini-day must end. If you say, "My call mini-day is from 8 a.m. to 10 a.m.," at 10 a.m. that mini-day is over. The next day starts.
Mini-days are success factors. Each success factor is necessary to success; all taken together are sufficient.
Let's say you decide to make a big push to get new clients. You spend six hours a day cold calling. What about investment research? That's clearly a success factor. What about service? Returning client calls? Writing financial plans? You could win the new accounts battle and lose the business war.
What you need most is a roll in sales and prospecting. But in order to have this, all the other activities that tend to consume our lives have to be done. To get them done, they need to be prioritized and contained. If you don't set aside time for them, they won't get done. And if you don't prioritize them you'll wind up doing less important things while leaving something that can come back and bite. By isolating all necessary types of actions into their own mini-days, you can create a roll throughout your business life.
The Model Day has three purposes that are constantly at war. Find the right balance, and your career will zoom: (1) Maximize sales contacts in the time available for work. (2) Develop a momentum in every area of business by grouping similar activities into their own mini-day. (3) Complete the most important tasks in each mini-day.
Preparing Your Day
The Model Day starts (or ends) with a planning mini-day. At the end of your planning mini-day, you are ready for all meetings and calls scheduled for today. You have delegated or scheduled any service issues. Urgent emails are done. Tasks assigned to each of your mini-days are prioritized.
