We effectively are paid by the hour or by the job, and how many jobs we can do in a day is limited. This makes time management a front-and-center consideration for photographers.
Lawyers and many other professions work with the concept of the billable hour (though in the case of lawyers this seems to be the billable minute). Many photographers do not think in those terms, but we should.
In most areas of commercial photography we are primarily providing a service, rather than providing a product. As business people we must become very clear about how much time is spent on the main task, as well as the time spent on all of the background tasks associated with it. We must keep track of how much income we earn from the amount of time spent.
There are habitual dangers for a photographer. In the beginning, we may develop work habits that are appropriate when we are starting out and perhaps do not have enough work to fill our time. Then we tend to try very hard to continue these habits when we get busy. Or, these work habits might develop while we are still hobbyists and we try to continue them as professionals.
People are creatures of habit and we will often go to ridiculous lengths to avoid having to change. This habitual inertia is a psychological trick to get us to believe that there is more stability in our lives than there really is (and perhaps than it is good for us to expect or desire). This is why some people will work 12-, 14- or 16-hour days, seven days a week, so they can take on more jobs. In reality, it would probably be smarter to streamline their work processes so that they can do more work in less time.
Here are some of the ways in which we can waste time:
· Perfectionism
· Social networking
· Updating our knowledge
· Cleaning the studio
· Reorganising files, equipment or our computer files
· Reading or listening to the news
· Having open-ended communication with clients
· Accepting every client that shows up
Many or all of the items listed above might seem like good practices to you. And the truth is they can be, but only as appropriate. Let’s look at them in turn.
Perfectionism can be a great trait in a photographer. It can make our work stand out from the competition, give us a reputation for getting it right, and give us great personal satisfaction for a job well done. It can also mean that we spend ridiculous amounts of time on a job that pays little relative to the time commitment. It can mean that we keep delaying something because it is not quite right. It can mean that we never start something because the conditions are not perfect. Do you get the idea? If perfectionism means striving to do the best you can as appropriate to the situation, then it serves you well. If it becomes obsessive/compulsive, it does not serve you at all.
There is an oft-misunderstood concept called ‘good enough’. This is often interpreted as slapdash, but what it really means is an appropriate level of finish, service, or result for the circumstances. Now to stand above your competitors you may want your “good-enough” to be better than theirs, but have you spent the time to work out just which areas of your work are the most critical ones?
Computers are wonderful tools but they’ve opened up a whole range of time wasting activities, from email to social networking and browsing (often called research). Email is certainly important. And social networking services, such as Facebook and LinkedIn, can also be valuable. Google had definitely made knowledge extension much more efficient. But there is appropriate use and inappropriate use of each of these tools.
Do any of these behaviours sound like you?:
· You check email constantly during the day, even when you need to be concentrating on something else.
· Social networking interaction has become an end in itself rather than a defined and measured means to an end.
· There is an almost obsessive-compulsive need to obtain yet more research before taking action on something.
If any of those sound like you, even if only at times (like when you should be doing some part of your business that you do not enjoy), then you are using the Internet as an avoidance mechanism. To overcome this, try:
· Setup email rules and filters that sort your email by sender, subject line (useful for enquiries from a website contact form, for example) or content keywords. Create separate email addresses for different purposes.
· Develop a schedule for email handling, only looking at emails in certain mailboxes at certain times.
· Put a sign above your computer that clarifies your priorities and objectives for social networking.
· Develop discipline and reward or punishment schemes (as appropriate to your personality) so that you will spend appropriate times on tasks.
· Recognise that you will never know everything you could possibly know about something. So learn to accept this and take reasonable risks.
Over cleaning or re-organising of your studio can also be avoidance mechanisms. Schedule the appropriate amounts of time for cleaning and organisational needs and stick with the schedule.
News addiction should be a diagnosable mental illness (in fact it probably is). The reality is you can function as well (or better) without having other people’s bad experiences or opinions echoing in your ears all day.
Try this experiment: Watch the news as usual. Then do not watch the news, listen to news on the radio, read a paper or visit news websites for a month. At the end of the month, see how you are feeling. Then get a news fix. You will probably find the news is close to what it was a month ago. So what have you missed by not watching it? Nothing. Save the time and depression. Form your own views about the world from your own experiences.
Managing your clients is critical, and so we will make this a separate part of the series. In Part 3, we’ll talk about What to Charge.
