Stop Washing Your Car: Outsourcing for Empowered Productivity

Katie Bell: 1:13

Hi, everyone, welcome to another episode of the treat your business podcast, we’re going to be exploring a time management technique that might just surprise you why you should consider outsourcing the task of washing your car. I’m your host, Katie Bell, and let’s dive into this insightful topic. So do you wash your own car? If the answer is no, I applaud you. I actually love washing my car, I like a really clean car, okay, but it bloody takes forever to get all of the stuff out that you need, and all the equipment do it properly. And the reason that I want to talk about why you should not be the one to wash your car yourself is because time is not a, a, a renewable resource. How we allocate it can significantly affect our well being our productivity. And we often find ourselves don’t we’re juggling a million different responsibilities thinking, we’ve got to spin all of these plates between work and families and trying to keep fit and trying to eat well, and writing patients notes and doing their programmes and moving the business forward and leading your team and, and Dun dun dun dun. So with so much on our plates, it’s really, really essential to evaluate all of the tasks that we do that could be delegated, or could be outsourced to free up valuable time. I had a call with one of our mastermind members a few weeks ago, and this was the topic we were talking about, because this lady is a super busy mom of two fabulous girls, and she has a wife, and she’s a business owner. And she’s an apple player. And you know who you are, if you’re listening. And she loves all of the finer things in life. And she loves to she’s a social person as well. And she’s a hard worker, and she’s got somebody off in her business at the moment on maternity leave. And there is a million things that are happening. And we talked about the fact that time is the most precious resource, but it is non renewable. And her life and her time was being pulled in so many different directions that she needed to get needed to go on Project simplify. And project simplify is looking at what tasks in the day and I’m not always talking about business tasks it we can come on to that. But what tasks in the day do you do that somebody else could do for you. We talked about food prep, we talked about shopping, we talked about the fact that she’s always running out dog food. We talked about the fact that I have toilet paper on subscription, we talked about the fact that there are ways that you can simplify your life. We have a new flower bed installed at home installed as I write word Bill created whatever. Okay, very proud of it. Not about natural gardener, but I’m working hard. It’s looking fab you lists but one of the things I can never be asked to do is water it because I have to stand there with a hose I can’t really do anything else at the same time. So I decided that in my project simplified because I do this in my life as well. I would find an irrigation system something that I can put in the bed and I just click my hose onto it and then it just waters it for me. Okay, now this seems like a really small thing doesn’t it but this is like literally 15 minutes every day in the summer that I need to do that for I added that 15 minutes every day over the over the time that we don’t have much rain or and believe it or not in Sheffield, we actually don’t have that much rain all the time. That and this bed needs a lot of watering. It’s phenomenal amount of hours. So I simplified it I thought what can I do? What can I get? The other thing I have a doc he’s a lab hair everywhere all the time. I got a robot Hoover. It Hoover’s 10am every day except for Monday to Thursday and the cleaners come every single day it goes round on its little route round all of the downstairs and Hoover’s when I come back in for my in my office, at the end of the day, I have a hoop house. I believe there is also one with a mop. I mean, that’s the next level. Wow lover. But can you see it’s about thinking about all of these things that take up your time that mean? The time that you want to spend maybe on your business, maybe moving your your business forwards, maybe with your family, maybe with your partner, maybe with your kids, whatever it is, if you’ll feel like you’re being pulled to doing all of these other things and maybe think well catered, they’re really not important things to me. Okay, fine. But there’ll be other things that are important to you. But sometimes you don’t want to be the one to have to do that. But it’s important that they get done. It’s important to me that my house is clean, but I don’t really want to be the one to do it. Because I could be spending time working on my business when somebody’s cleaning my house. And we go back to the example of washing your car. Think about the last time you washed your car. How much time does it take. And beyond the time spent washing your car, consider the effort, consider the supplies, consider your equipment. And it might have felt like a straightforward task, but it actually ate up quite a substantial chunk of the day. washing the car, having a clean car is a bit like making your bed in the morning, you want to make sure that your environment is of a standard that sets the tone of how you’re going to run your business. If your cars are shipped tip, trust me, your business is going to rely one. Okay, we need to have that environment for success. Then let’s add in the cost of the car washing, the water usage, potential detriment to you and your body. I don’t know whatever all these factors to consider. So then let’s look at the opportunity of the cost or the opportunity of what you could make. In that time. If you decided to spend that one hour, two hours, however long it takes to wash your car, or moving your business forward doing a task that is going to make you more visible, that is going to create more sales more revenue that is going to increase your profit margins, that’s going to make your team work more effectively, more more efficiently. So when you choose one option over another, where you choose to spend your time washing your car, what are you missing out on? I mean, like you could say that it’s time to focus on spending quality time with your family, it could be that you get to go for a run, it couldn’t just be that you’re going to lie on the sofa and recharge. So you’ve got to evaluate the opportunity cost. And when you outsource these sorts of things in your business, and I don’t care whether you are a solopreneur, you’re a one man band, or whether you’ve got a massive clinic, okay, this is relevant. It’s all relevant for everybody listening to this. Think about where your time is being spent, it is not a renewable source. Outsourcing car washing is not just a convenience, it’s strategic time management. you’re entrusting the task of somebody professional washing your car, who do a much better job of it than you do, because that’s what they love to do. And you’re gaining back those precious hours in your day. Think about that freedom. Think about that ability to dedicate that time, to activities that align with your priorities and your goals. Okay, it comes at a cost, what does outsourcing your car wash, I don’t know 25 quid for somebody to come and do it for you. But all of you, in fact, there is not one person that I’ve ever spoke to in their business that is charging themselves out at less than 25 pounds an hour. So it’s essential to weigh that cost against the value of your time. If you calculate your hourly rate based on your income, or the value you’re bringing to you to your work, you’ll probably find that paying for a carwash is a really wise investment because it in your overall productivity and your well being or benefit. So I use car washing, as a little bit of a funny example. But I want you to start to list things in your life that could be outsourced that could allow you the freedom and the opportunity to go and work within your zone of genius. It’s not about avoiding responsibility. It’s not about saying, Well, you know, I should be the one to do these things. I should be the one to do the weekly shop, I should be the one to do the food prep, I should be the one to put the washing away. They shouldn’t. Who says who says when you’re a business owner, it’s about looking at where you spend your time. Is that is being strategic. It’s about making intentional choices to create a much better balance in your life and building these a time. management mindset involves recognising that tasks that drain your time and energy will be the things that hold you back in your business and you need to find ways to optimise them. So what time management strategies can you put in place? What things could you do and they don’t always have to cost loads of money. For example, you go and do the weekly shop please explain to me why anybody goes to a supermarket. I do not understand have that concept, I’ve not set foot in a supermarket for so long, I can’t even tell you and go to my local Co Op. Okay, and I’m whizzing past with the dog and I grew up like some blueberries or whatever it is. But the rest of the time the big shop concept, don’t understand it, don’t understand it when they have a delivery service for five pounds. When your value in your business and your self worth is way more than five pounds, and it takes you way longer to drive to a supermarket, do the shop, pay, load it, drive it back, unload it way more than an hour, five pounds, just get somebody to deliver it for you. Or next level leverage that you have a weekly shop that you get delivered, create a shopping list that’s automated. And it just adds it automatically into your basket is the same stuff every time. And then you can just add the other frilly bits around the around the side, if you want to get a robot Hoover, get a drainage system and get a robot lawnmower, if you say wish, get a cleaner. Get somebody to wash your car, get somebody to wash your windows, get somebody to put your washing away actually cleaner, can they do more roles and responsibilities, go into the ironing, if you don’t like them to do and then leave your eye on the side because you can’t be able to put in washing away getting to put the washing away as well. Because the bigger the the more that you can be strategic how you manage your time, the more impact you make on the world. Like I always think if I was to have to close both of my businesses, it’s not only my direct team that are massively impacted, but it’s that external network of people that we make an impact on as well like I provide an income to win massive amount of people. As you all do, because we all need services, we all need things to keep our lives running. So the more I can grow my business, the more I can make a bigger impact on all of these other people that have businesses that need my work. And it’s that ripple effect. So you deciding to not wash your car has a huge ripple effect. It might seem like a small step. But it’s a really powerful way to start reclaiming some of these hours in your day and creating space for what truly matters to you. So go make a list. Go and think about anything that is taking up your precious time and start to outsource it start to leverage it start to find ways of getting back that non renewable resource. Thank you for tuning in to this episode of the treat your business podcast. If I really hope you found today’s chat useful and valuable and please please please press subscribe, share it with friends, share it with colleagues, but until next time, please remember that your time is the most precious resource and use it wisely.