The Business of Independent Service Provider Contracting

In the last blog post about time management, I recommended tracking your tasks. Did you? If you really want to fix an issue, you follow a process.

So, if you want to improve at managing your time and tasks, you gotta start with accurate facts. It’s the first step to discovering time to do things you'd rather be doing.

Now, it’s time for the next step.

Looking again at Todd Duncan’s book Time Traps. You need to categorize and know the traps keeping you from freedom The first trap is called the Identity Trap.

Are You Addicted to Work?

The Identity Trap is when a person spends so much time focusing on their work that it becomes their identity. How true is this for Contractors (CSP’s) running a Lifestyle Business? We’ve been defining a Lifestyle Business for attendees of our classes.

A Lifestyle Business is identified by an owner who's fully involved in managing the “operations." That’s not the only component of a Lifestyle Business, but it’s a significant part of the definition.

What happens when an owner spends all their time running the business? They become consumed. And it happens a lot more often now because of recent changes. Most terminals are new to DRO, seven day operations and expanded e-commerce volumes. The changes have led to an increased frequency of the Identity Time Trap. Demands on running a FedEx Contracting business in 2020 are more time-consuming than ever before.

What else happens when an owner manages the daily business operations? More important aspects of owning a business are ignored. If you employ a competent manager (BC), you should be delegating those daily tasks. Your job as the owner is setting your future course then communicating that vision.

Even if you run only a few trucks, you should be focusing on where your business is heading. If you’re a great leader of a small operation, you should be growing your business. And if you're only focusing on the operations, you're not seeing the horizon. Expansion won't magically appear. Growth doesn’t happen for owners consumed by their daily operations.

To regain the ability to focus on the future, you must free yourself from your time traps. Most CSP’s don't intend to be workaholics, it just happens.

Have you become something you never intended to be? What you invest your time in defines who you are.

Duncan continues by recommending that, “In order to capture your true identity you must accomplish two things:

1. Determine how you are wasting your time.

2. Determine how to spend more time on the things that produce the life you desire.

Your true identity will be shaped and your path to freedom will become clear as you accomplish these objectives.”

What does he mean by freedom? It’s doing stuff you want to be doing instead of the tasks you're currently doing (because you're not delegating them).

Let’s go back to the beginning one last time - determine how you are “wasting” your time.

Can you delegate more? Does your family see you working seven days a week? If your answers are "yes," then you need to break free from the Identity Trap.

Stay tuned for more blog posts about improving your task management.