Stephen Kelly says do boring tasks today instead of postponing them. Evan Carmichael offers a framework: eliminate the task if you can, automate it with software like Sage, or delegate it to part-time help. Both agree that clearing administrative work fast frees you to focus on what matters.
Questions this video answers
Stephen Kelly: Do it now—bring the task front and center, complete it today, and you’ll find it less daunting once finished. Evan Carmichael: Apply the eliminate‑automate‑delegate method—if the task is necessary, automate it with software like Sage or hire part‑time help to handle it.
Here's a question from RL. Hello to Stephen Kelly. How can I stay focused on the one thing I find boring but still have to do it? I have a problem concentrating on stuff that must be done but are boring for me.
Yeah, that's a good one, RL. You know, I'll be honest, probably some of the sort of, actually, you know, things like tax returns and the administration and the red tape and the company registration, all that sort of stuff. Honestly, that's probably not the most exciting thing in the world, but you got to do it. There's some parts of the business you just have to do. They're regulatory compliance, all that sort of stuff. You just got to do it. You got to tick the box and you just got to get it done. My view of that is never leave till tomorrow what can be done today. Because you and I know if you leave it, you leave it again, you leave it again, you spend more time worrying about it and you could have, in that time you worried about it, you could have done it, could have just crushed it, could have knocked the ball out of the park. So anything like that, anything you think, oh, I don't like doing that, whatever it is, I'd say bring it front and center. It's really critical to building value in your business. Do it now. Just crack on, do it. And the other thing is, always with these things, once you've done them, they never seem as bad as they were.
Eliminate, automate, delegate. I don't know the context of what he's doing that he feels he needs to do, but I would challenge, do you absolutely have to do it? If you do, then can you automate it, right? If you hate doing bookkeeping and tax returns and all that stuff, get software, right? Get Sage. Like, that should be one of the easiest first decisions that you make as an entrepreneur because you don't want to be spending your time in an Excel spreadsheet inputting this stuff in, right? To spend a low amount of money to then be able to save your time and put it in something high value, right? There's tons of ways that software can help. So eliminate, automate, and delegate, right? If that actually has to be done and there's nobody else you can give it to— sorry, there's no software you can give it to— then hire somebody part-time. The first guy I hired was 1 hour a day to do stuff for me that saved more than an hour of my time a day. And, uh, you don't have to hire a full-time person. You think, oh, it's so expensive, I can't afford that. Part-time. There are people who do it part-time work to help you get it done.
Yeah, interesting. I've got Nancy Harris here who's our fantastic country manager of Canada. She's just organized for me to meet tons of accountants and bookkeepers who are partners of ours. It's interesting when you start a business, particularly, it's a really good thing to get one of the accountants connected because not only do they do all the stuff that keep your business whole, pay your people, all that sort of stuff, but also they give you nuggets of advice. They've seen 1,000 businesses before. They know what startups go through. They know the pain, they know the cash flow issues, and they can give you good counsel. They could be a great mentor to you as well.
