Blogtrepreneur | Entrepreneur Blog

Procrastination is something that all of us dread. Whether we’re a blogger, a freelance web designer, an athlete or CEO of a multinational company, the act of procrastination can severely damage your business’ progress and can eat away at your most valuable resource - time.

So what is procrastination and how can you prevent it? First, let’s start off with a Wikipedic definition:

“Procrastination is the deferment or putting-off of an action or task, usually by focusing on some other distraction (compare temporisation). It is Latin for “foremorrowing,” or making some such of tomorrow.”

Let’s put it in context, giving an example of a webmaster hoping to get more traffic to his site. At the beginning of the day, he sets himself a list of all the things he has to complete by the end of his working hours. He starts off opening up Photoshop to create himself a nice graphic banner, he then gets to work editing the template, and then comes the part where he has to write the content in order to get Search Engine recognition.

But, unfortunately for him, his mind is in a daze, and he’s getting quite bored, so he decides to check his emails “only for 5 minutes”. After answering these, he tells himself that he’ll quickly play a game of Tetris and then will get back to work. A game of Tetris turns into an episode of Lost, and before you know it, your time has come and gone and you’ve not completed your list.

This is an entrepreneur’s worst nightmare, and it can lead you to a complete lack of productivity and online or offline growth - ultimately leading to a lack of profits for the time period. Unfortunately though, getting rid of this constant offset of tasks is not just a simple task of saying “Stop procrastinating”. In reality, our human bodies find it difficult to concentrate for long periods of time and have a natural resilience to overcoming hurdles like these (and losing weight for example).

The simple way to preventing the onset of procrastination is to firstly keep yourself very busy. By busy, I don’t mean to completely stress out your life, but to make sure that you don’t have time to think about watching that TV programme or playing that game.

Secondly, break big chunks into smaller chunks. For example, with my exams, I find it difficult to concentrate and revise for a couple of solid hours. So to combat this, I make each revision “slot” 45 minutes each, and then take breaks of 10 minutes in between to catch up on emails, or reward myself with a bit of TV and relaxation - then it’s back to work for the next revision session. Doing this will refresh your mind, and is a basic bit of advice that nearly all time management professionals will teach you.

Also, plan. Now I mentioned that you may already have a plan that you’re not sticking to. If this is the case, then make your plan less specific. By doing this, you avoid missing deadlines and getting yourself annoyed and “behind schedule”, and thus will be more willing to finish off the To-Do List by the end of the day.

Finally, the only way you’re gonna get off your lazy bum and do something, is if you start right now, this very minute. Start doing something, and you’re going to feel more happy about your work. So, just do it!