Studies have shown that efficient financial advisors are adept at time blocking, or having a clear plan of attack for their day. 

Instead of being pulled in ten different directions, those financial advisors allocate specific activities to pre-determined periods. That way, they can maximize high-impact activities like building their pipeline and attending networking events while still conducting all the other tasks that are part of a successful practice. 

As a small business owner, you can’t afford to misuse your time. To ensure that you spend time on revenue-generating activities, delegate the following tasks to junior members of the team:

• Excessive and unprioritized email reading
• Researching prospects on the web
• Entering information into financial plans
• Filling out forms
• Looking up data online

To make time blocking work for you, consider following these three steps:
1. Track and log your activities for one week. Try to put approximate times around each type of activity, but don’t stress about being exact.

2. At the end of the week, create a summary of the main categories of activities and estimate the percentage you spend on each. Again, aim for a relative weighting, but don’t worry about being precise.

3. With a better sense of where you are spending your time, try grouping activities together that make sense (e.g., returning emails and phone calls). Then, organize your day by placing high priority activities during periods when you feel most energized and motivated. 

Here is a sample time block that suggests how you might organize your day. Many top financial advisors dedicate at least six hours each day to two activities: client meetings and prospecting.