Have you ever thought about where the seven-day week comes from? In this episode, Joe talks about his brand new book, Thursday Is The New Friday. The seven-day week was created four thousand years ago, and the forty-hour workweek was built in 1926. We are the post-pandemic generation that gets to say, do we want to do work the way we used to, or are we going to create something new? Tune in as we chat about productivity, slowing down, and the importance of outsourcing.

Meet Joe Sanok

Joe Sanok, MA, LLP, LPC, NCC is the person behind the #1podcast for therapists, The Practice of the Practice. Joe has helped hundreds of private practice owners in growing and scaling their private practices. Joe has also been a mentor and coach for Gordon in his journey and inspired him to start The Practice of Therapy.

Joe says, "In 2012 I launched Practice of the Practice to blog about what I was learning about business, marketing, and private practice. Since then, my income has gone up over 2,000%. In the beginning, I was making around $1000 per month. In 2015, I grossed over $200k! In fact, every month I post exactly what I made and how I made it. It's important to me, because we don't usually talk about money and how to make it in an ethical way. I want to increase your influence and your income!"

Where Did The Seven-Day Workweek Come From?

Where did the seven-day workweek come from? How do we understand just this concept of time to begin? A year makes sense: it's when the earth goes around the sun. Also, a day makes sense: it's how long it takes the world to spin. However, the seven-day workweek doesn't make sense. When the Babylonians over 4,000 years ago looked up in the sky, they saw seven essential things: the sun, the moon, earth, Mercury, Venus, Mars, and Jupiter. With that, they said we should have a seven-day week. The Romans had a ten-day week, and the Egyptians had an eight-day week. We think that this seven-day week is just how it is. Well, we could have had a five-day week and had seventy-three of them in a year.

The Industrialists Gave Us A Forty-Hour Workweek

Fast forward to the 1900s; the average person was working ten to fourteen hours a day, six to seven days a week. There were protests around this – people wanted a forty-hour workweek. There was a national lockdown because they were scared that these protests and the uprising would spread. In 1926, Henry Ford said he would start the forty-hour workweek. Henry Ford wanted to sell more cars, and he knew people were not going to buy a car to get to work faster. However, if they had a weekend and wanted to visit their friends and family quickly, they would buy a car. The industrialists gave us this model of how to view the world.

It's Time To Slow Down To Get More Done

The research shows that when we slow down, when we're not maxed out and stressed out, that's actually when our productivity and our creativity go up. When we slow down correctly, we truly can do better work. You shouldn't check your email after your kids are in bed; maybe you shouldn't work as hard on a Friday, perhaps you should rein in some of those hard and soft boundaries. When you are ready to kill it, how do you do that? We can use neuroscience to inform the way that you work so you get more done. Gordon is a fan of using the Full Focus Planner. It forces Gordon to slow down, think about things, and process stuff in a different way. Most of us are on our phones all day. With the paper planner, we can focus more on what we are doing.

Stop Getting Distracted From What Means The Most

Whenever you are distracted from your business for one minute, that's one minute less you will get to spend with your friends and family. If you spend half an hour roaming the internet, that's half an hour you could be playing with your children. When you do things that distract you, you are really stealing time from the people you love the most. Often, when we get distracted, it's a lack of planning. If your day is sketched out, then you won't have time for distractions. Think about what is the highest use of your time. Make sure that you blackout time to get done what you need to get done.

The Importance of Outsourcing In Private Practice

Thursday is the new Friday which means you are giving yourself less time to do the same tasks. If you have 20 tasks in a week, and you give yourself 20% less time, most likely, you're going to drop the ball on some things. That gives you some critical data of what's essential. You're not going to do the fifteen least necessary tasks. Instead, you're going to do the fifteen most important tasks. It's time to outsource the things that you can! There are those things that are not a great use of your time that you hate doing that still need to be done. Find a virtual assistant who can take things off of your plate.

Being transparent… Some of the resources below use affiliate links which simply means we receive a commission if you purchase using the links, at no extra cost to you. Thanks for using the links!

Joe's Resources Practice of the Practice Thursday is the New Friday: How to Work Fewer Hours, Make More Money, and Spend Time Doing What You Want Killin'It Camp Joe Sanok | How To "Kill-it" In Private Practice | TPOT 041 Joe Sanok | How To Level-Up and Grow Your Practice | TPOT 011 Resources

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Gordon is the person behind The Practice of Therapy Podcast & Blog. He is also President and Founder of Kingsport Counseling Associates, PLLC. He is a therapist, consultant, business mentor, trainer, and writer. PLEASE Subscribe to The Practice of Therapy Podcast wherever you listen to it. Follow us on Twitter @therapistlearn, and Pinterest, "Like" us on Facebook.