Do you ever feel like your to-do list is never going to end? One of the biggest challenges that nominated supervisors and educators face, is staying on top of the huge pile of paperwork and tasks that come their way. What can also happen though is that we take on things that we don't really need to.
Do you ever feel like your to-do list is never going to end? One of the biggest challenges that nominated supervisors and educators face, is staying on top of the huge pile of paperwork and tasks that come their way. What can also happen though is that we take on things that we don't really need to.
Take a look at your to-do list. What's on there? Perhaps it's things like:
And the list goes on.
When you look at your list, what are the things that only you can do? Are there tasks that someone else could step in and do? Perhaps you have someone on your team who would be far more efficient or has a better knowledge or deeper passion for the task than you do. Now, I know what you are thinking - if I don't have time to do the task, how will someone else have time? There are times when we find ourselves overstaffed (okay, right now that seems unlikely - but it does happen) and if you have a list of tasks that someone else could do on hand, when you have a spare person - make the most of it. Also, if someone is likely to be better at the task than you - swap places with them.
You might also consider delegating to someone outside of your organisation. Yes, you could spend two hours high pressure hosing the shade sails yourself, or you could get someone in to do the task for you while you do something that only you can do.
Take another look at your list. Are there things that could be done automatically? Often we find ourselves doing the same tasks over and over again. As a nominated supervisor, I recall getting the folder of daily safety checks out week and manually reviewing them to ensure they were completed and that there were no hazards that needed to be reported and maintenance jobs arranged as a result. What if you didn't have to trawl through checklists? What if you could receive a notification that made it all so much simpler? One of the amazing things about living in a technological world is our ability to automate things. Sure, there are things we don't want automated: greeting children and families when they arrive, having a conversation about child development, reflecting on our practice. But much of our compliance work can be automated - particularly repetitive tasks. This is why Sprout exists - Stay on top of your compliance work with managed workflows for critical processes, such as incidents, checklists, hazards, risks, staff records, child records, and much more. Through clever automation, Sprout saves the average service 1,500 hours per year.
So, spend some time thinking about what you can delegate or automate today - free up your time for the things that only you can do, the things where you can make a difference in the life of a child! And if you want to chat with us about how we can help you lighten the load - click the "Book a Demo" button in top right of your screen.