Sometimes, it’s hard to focus – what with all the social media, 24-hour-news cycle, and the endless distraction of the internet, our minds are constantly hopping from one subject and stimuli to another – or taking in several at the same time! With wedding planning, it’s easy to get distracted, especially if you are a wedding planner overseeing many events at once. Here are tips on how to stay focused during wedding planning.
Be Organized. Like, Really Organized.
Use a project manager, like Monday, Asana, or AislePlanner to keep organized. AislePlanner is great because it’s shared with your clients, so you don’t have to email them as often with any changes – once the budget or timeline is updated, they can see the changes in seconds. The more organized you are, the more focused you’ll be, with less wasted work or energy trying to manage hundreds of details.
It may sound intimidating at first, but these systems are very user-friendly, with intuitive user interfaces and lots of web tutorials. You’ll earn back efficiency and time, and your clients will appreciate your modern approach to the planning process.
Delegate the Easy Stuff to Stay Focused.
Hire freelancers to do the ‘easy’ stuff – secure COIs, confirm call times with vendors, and double-check your work. It’s very, very hard to do everything yourself, and in the process, you’ll miss key details. But it’s easy to delegate simple tasks, and just about anyone with admin experience can complete them.
And, if you’ve implemented a project manager like Asana or AislePlanner, you can easily assign tasks to your in the cloud for seamless collaboration.
Manage Your Office Hours.
Make sure clients know they can’t bug you at all hours. In fact, office hours should be listed in your contract. Do not reply to clients outside of those hours; feel free to draft emails to them, but schedule them to be sent when your office hours are in force. You need ot be able to compartmentalize your time, and i fyou sit down for dinner with your family only to be interrupted by an email, your focus will stray and your mind will scatter. Also, your brain needs down time in order to properly function; it’s just good mental hygiene. And managing boundaries with your clients will help you take care of yourself mentally and stave off burnout.
By implementing these concepts, you’ll maintain focus and manage all the many details of your clients’ events with accuracy. it may take some practice and getting used to new systems, but the result in added focus and more time to recoup mentally is worth it!