How I Only Work 24 Hours a Week
“On the days you have only 40%, and you give 40%. You gave 100%.”
My name is Gemma and I am a compulsive people-pleaser.
Every employed role I have ever had, I have gone above and beyond to flex when possible and give what I could.
With anxiety and depression, some weeks were easier than others and I remember in one of my roles being told that I missed out on a bonus because I wasn’t consistent. I gave 100% every day. It’s just that some days I only have 40% to give. But I always gave 100% of that 40%.
So when I decided to start out in my own business, I was determined to take some of these “life lessons” and use them for my benefit - this is the birthplace of my business boundaries!
I created a set of rules that I intended to live by to ensure that I never over delivered again.
Of course, I was cured of my over giving ways……
Well, not quite.
The place I am in now is very different to that of 4 years ago and those boundaries have flexed, shifted and evolved. But the core values and principles remain the same.
What even are boundaries?
As I said, I like to think of boundaries as a set of guidelines or rules to live by and, as a process-driven person, they are essentially the standard operating procedures for running Gemma 2.0. For years I gave my power away, letting others control my life and make my decisions, not truly understanding what having boundaries really meant.
Why have boundaries?
Quite simply - for your sanity.
Having some structure or guidance about how you want to live and work is actually a core decision-making factor when starting your business. No-one ever goes into business for themselves to work twice the amount of time for half the amount of money.
Your boundaries determine your work schedule, your play schedule, your income and much more.
Without some form of guidelines on how you work, rest and play, you are at the beck and call to everyone - putting yourself last at all times.
How I Only Work 24 Hours a Week
So as well as going into business for your own happiness, you are now stressed, overworked, not taking care of your health, and stretched in a number of ways.
But what if you don’t have a business - this still applies to you. Boundaries are imperative in all areas of life; for ensuring grandparents don’t overstep with the children or your family understand when and how you are replenishing your energy.
Here are mine:
I will not work weekends - after working Saturdays for 4 years while my children were little, I refused to ever go back to that!
I will not start work before 9:30am - I want to take time to wake up, do the school run (though they are teenagers now so slightly different), decompress after nagging said teenagers in the morning. I want the time to make sure I feel replenished before I begin to serve my clients, however that needs to happen
I will only be available one late afternoon per week - I have clients in the USA and Canada so I need to have some availability in my calendar but my peak energy times are between 10am and 2pm so working until 6pm every day serves absolutely no one!
I will be available for the children when they are home - this is flexed in the holidays but for majority of the time, if I am working after school, it is on admin tasks only. I do not take calls after 3pm
I will book calls in for 3 days per week - this is so that I can batch my energy and tasks while also leaving quality time to get the other tasks on my list done
I will schedule in time for self care including a regular day off - I don’t think I need to explain this one right?
One thing you will see here is that my boundaries are really quite specific. There is very little opportunity for ambiguity. When I or my team are booking things in, we all know that I stop client facing work at 3pm, not that I don’t work afternoons. I start work at 9:30am - clients know not to expect a response from me before this time. It is clear and serves all involved.
Having these guidelines are the reason why I have been able to work 24 hours per week without struggling to complete work or even have a negative impact on my income (see my other blog about how I increased my income by 53% working only 24 hours per week - coming soon).
Ok, Gemma, that’s great. I now have this set of rules to work by - what exactly do I do with that?
This is where it gets fun. You cross it out in the diary. You make these boundaries visible to all who need to see them, even you! You book the things in and block the things out.
I am a huge advocate of time-blocking and while there are a number of different ways to “do it”, this is literally just a case of showing only working hours in your calendar.
The second you see that when you only have 6 hours to get your work done, you suddenly become pretty motivated to get sh*t done - especially if you have fun things planned in too.
So, in my diary, I have grey blocks from 7am-9:30am every day called “Morning Routine”. I don’t need to create overwhelm in my diary by adding every little thing I do in that routine, but I do need to block out the time so I honour it and so my team doesn’t book in any breakfast meetings.
Another block (in blue this time) is 30 minutes for lunch every day. It moves as per my workflow but I have 30 mins for me. I can walk, stretch, watch TV or generally do whatever I need to replenish my energy for my afternoon session.
I grey out my diary from 2:30pm so that no meetings can run past 3pm. This block runs to 6pm and is my “no meetings” block. Why not afternoon routine? Because this time is admin time - for business, for family, for life. This block of time is my flexible window and I use it for whatever needs my attention. Sometimes hoovering, sometimes report writing. Just never client meetings!
So how do I prevent myself from working weekends? Well this one is partly my “family time” time-block, which acts as a visual reminder that my family takes priority at the weekend, but also because I don’t bloody want to work. I don’t get caught up in the “I am a business owner, I should be working all hours” mentality.
I also don’t save any of my computer based life admin until the weekends. When the laptop is open it is all too tempting to just check the inbox. Life admin that needs the computer is done during the week, or if absolutely necessary, I use my phone. Can’t do it on my phone? Well then it waits until Monday.
Is it hard not to work weekends? No. I don’t want to and you can’t make me.
Of course if I get a wave of inspiration and I want to do something then that is different - that is a choice that I made. A beautifully empowered choice.
Want to know something else? Since I enforced my boundaries…
my health is actually so much better. I don’t take at least 2-3 days off a month from sickness or depression related illness.
my clients are all fully aligned and don’t ever ask me to work outside of my standard hours.
I didn’t get that horrible Sunday night dread feeling.
I get up each day excited to work
I take holidays completely unapologetically
Convinced yet? Of course you are. Get that dream list of boundaries and start enforcing them. You don’t have to go hard and start telling everyone no or that you aren’t available. Take it easy, communicate and do it in a way that feels aligned to you. It took me time to fully embed some of my rules.
And if you are feeling completely overwhelmed and like you have no idea how to reclaim your time back, grab a copy of my free eBook “Reclaim 5 Hours Per Week”. It does exactly what it says on the tin.
