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You aren’t exactly overbooked, so why should you have office hours? Two reasons:
- You need to be able to tell clients and other professionals what hours you work.
- You need to have a boundary or target work schedule to help you manage work/life balance.
Your work hours may change as your professional and personal life changes. You might start out with a 10-hour workday, or decide to work nights and weekends. At some point, most entrepreneurs want to reclaim some of that time for themselves and their families.
A work schedule can be something to grow into. When you have too much time on your hands, a schedule will keep you on track. If you decide your workday is 8-6, then plan marketing & business activities within that day. Be specific, do you have a block of time to write an article? Will you be scheduling networking lunches or meetings on a particular day of the week? What about selecting a research service or billing software? Get into the habit of using your calendar to plan and manage your day, even if most of the appointments are with yourself.
When you’re solo, it can be hard to stay motivated and in action. When it’s office hours, you need to be focused on building and managing your practice. When it’s not- then please, stop thinking about work, lack of work, or how to get work. You can only obsess so many minutes in a day!
I did a complimentary consultation recently; we focused on getting clients. As part of the follow-up, I asked John to create a list of absolutely everyone he knew, from business and legal contacts to his dentist and even family members. He agreed, and here’s how it went:
B- Great, John, and how soon can you have that done?
J- I’ll get it done by Friday
B- OK, and when will you be working on that?
J- Hmmmm, I can do it at night.
B- John, creating this list is part of creating a business; it’s legitimate work. We’ve been talking about how we can fill your practice, I know you have open time- why not get it done during your workday?
J-…silence….I guess I will!
You get the picture. Define your office hours. Then use them wisely. That’s a different topic.
2 Responses to “Good Question: What are your office hours?”
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Barbara, you’re right about setting office hours. A deliberate and regular schedule is especially important for solo practitioners who don’t have wranglers to keep us from wandering off.
I am perfectly capable of not coming to work at regular times. If the morning sun is seductive, I might spend the first office hour cultivating the herb bed. Nothing like starting the day already an hour behind.
Clients and potential clients have come to expect the business world to run on regular schedules. If they can’t reach me when they think I should be available (at least to get the voice mail and return the call that day), they go elsewhere. In fact, some of my clients chose me because I answered the phone. “You’re not only the first attorney to take my call, you’re the first one who answered the phone!”
And the flip side is equally important. Your clients know when they should not expect you to be available. Clients become frustrated when they call during regular business hours and their chances of talking with you are slim. I think they will be frustrated even if they routinely talk with you after normal business hours. Some of us routinely take client calls outside business hours, say, on the way to an evening social event. The conversation goes well but you don’t have notes of the call and you forget to calendar a meeting for the next day. Because you accepted the call, the client has a reasonable expectation that you’ll remember what you talked about, and will be frustrated to learn that you forgot a key point.
Your date won’t be any too pleased either.
It is SO true. Unless you define your office hours you could find yourself working at all hours of the day attempting to meet deadlines or worse, find yourself missing them because you didn’t properly allocate your time vs expectations.
Not to mention, if you don’t put parameters on your time you become a slave to your business instead of having it enable your life.