I invited my colleague Brian Minick, Chief Operating Officer (COO) at ZeroBounce, to talk about his routine and how he finds time for his family.
Brian gave us some useful productivity tips – I’ll have to try gaming music soon! What’s more, he told us about the one thing that’s kept our team together, through good and bad, and has helped us achieve success.
Let’s begin!
What does a typical workday look like for you?
It consists of managing a lot of different activities. I have my hands in a lot of different pieces of ZeroBounce. I have to juggle how deep into those pieces I get, otherwise, other things will sacrifice.
In the morning I do the quick checks with team members and teams. I meet with our sales team every morning at 10 a.m., for about 15 minutes. We talk about what happened yesterday, and what’s happening today. Occasionally we throw some fun things into the conversations.
I’m constantly staying in touch and synced with the other executives at ZeroBounce to make sure we are always info sharing and up to speed on updates.
I try to take projects and put placeholders on my calendar to make sure I give them the attention they need, and it also serves as a nice reminder. I’ve never looked at a workday as ‘9-5’ – it’s always been 24/7 for me, and work is just part of my life.
What are some of the best productivity tips you could share?
For me, it’s limiting distractions. One of the best ways I have found myself accomplishing this is by listening to podcasts or having something playing with headphones on. I’m easily distracted, so having something that drowns everything out usually helps me.
A pro tip I can share would be if I need to get heavily focused, I’ll put some ‘gaming music’ on in the background. It’s a good way to get lost in your work, and not hear other things.
Since switching to remote work, how do you strike that work-life balance?
In general, I find myself working more since we’ve all gone remote. But I get to spend more time with my daughter which makes me happy. It’s a good way to break up the day. An hour or two of work, then five minutes with my daughter while she’s playing. It brings me joy and a mental break at the same time.
In general, I feel like my work-life balance is very good since working from home. The only issue is there’s not much you can do on the personal level right now outside of your home. So, “bored” is a good word to describe how I feel when not working.
What do you wish you had more time for?
Spending time with family members and friends outside of my house.
I miss going out with the guys for a beer at the bar or grabbing a random lunch with my parents. This isn’t so much a problem of working from home, but a COVID-19 issue. I look forward to those types of things resuming, when the time is right and it’s safe for all.
What advice would you give entrepreneurs who are struggling to keep their businesses afloat right now?
- Stop doing things that aren’t working.
- Don’t love your ideas so much that you have to prove something, even if it fails. It’s ok to be wrong. Adapt and pivot.
- Try new things, all the time. If you try 10 things and one works, that’s success. Failure is nothing more than a learning experience. Take the learnings and move on.
- Talk to your customers, what do they need right now? What challenges are they facing? Can you solve them? You have to adapt to your customer base.
What is the one habit that has helped you be more successful at what you do?
One of the things that I did throughout my whole career, and still do, is to not ask anyone to do anything that I wouldn’t do or try myself.
So, when I hear an idea or a new venture our team wants to go down, I will go down the path with them. As COO of ZeroBounce, it’s my job to make sure that our team members have what they need to be successful and are supported in every which way we can.
Ask anyone on our team, I have their back and I can proudly say, they have mine. Through the good and the bad, we’ve always found a way. No one person in our company can do it alone, we have to rely on each other.
Surround yourself with people that have the same type of mentality. Create a culture that embraces what you value. A mentality of ‘it doesn’t matter what it is, or what it takes’ will take you further than anything else.
Want to learn more about Brian? Connect with him on LinkedIn or get in touch via the ZeroBounce email validation and deliverability platform.