Kaizen...continuous improvement in Japanese.

As an Industrial & Systems Engineering student, I hear about this a lot. One of the biggest aspects of constantly improving a company's productivity is to ELIMINATE ALL WASTE. Waste as in things that do not contribute to the success of the company.

Well, you think of this as a business, right?

If so, then think of things this way: if you're able to eliminate some extra steps you take to "be more productive", you'll find yourself getting a LOT more work done, and thus: making more money!

Here's what I Was doing before:

Every morning, I would get up, get ready, and get on my computer. I would check my ClickBank stats, my email, my Squidoo account, and my other affiliate networks. After about 45 minutes or so, I would login to Base Camp, a productivity management software tool, and use my template to get my day rolling. Basically, my template was just copy/pasted every day, with things like my goals for the day, some quotes that get me pumped up, etc.

Then, after I decided on my goals for the day, I would open iCal, my calendar software, and arrange the tasks I needed to achieve my goals, by times throughout the blocks I had free around classes.

So, after about 75-90 minutes, I was ready to start working...WOW, what a waste of time!

Now, don't get me wrong: you should plan your goals, and you should check your email (though that will be much easier soon), but here's how I do things now:

1) Every Sunday night, I sit down, and write 2 very different projects I have going on that I want to work on in a notebook.

2) Then, I decide on some goals I have for each of them, and make it tough to squeeze it for the whole week.

3) I run through the goals, and break them down into tasks I will have to do to achieve them. (All of this takes 30 minutes tops...)

4) Each morning, I look at my notebook, and write tasks I think I should do that day into a small notebook, with no times involved. (I doubt I was EVER right about the times, anyway...) THEN, I check my email (which has been purged, only bookmarking things for later if they might take more than 10 seconds to look over) and my aff. stats (3 minutes max!).

5) As I get time to do my tasks, I do them. I cross them out when I'm done.

6) I check my email at some point in the late afternoon or early evening, because checking it at night can cause you trouble.

7) At the end of the day, I have (hopefully) gotten all of my tasks done. Now, I go to my bookmarks, and check them out to see if they're worthwhile. I delete anything I won't need again.

8) I then check my aff. stats for the second time in the whole day, just in case I've gotten another sale. That just helps me get to sleep faster, you know?

9) Next, I look at my list, and see how I did for the day. I cross things off my weekly list as I achieve the goals at this point in each day.

10) Lastly, I read. Sometimes I order business books on Amazon, sometimes I just print off ebooks or blog posts. Other times, I just read online. Other times I just watch some TV. The key here is to unwind.

The process above is much easier than you think, and it will help you "continuously improve" your business...Instead of chasing new products, wasting hours on blogs & forums, or 'managing your tasks' for hours every week, you'll be steadily building a business based on residual income, and you'll be proud of your accomplishments!