Entrepreneurs these days – especially the digital variety – are often not just content to run their own businesses. They want to run their own businesses, while seeing the world, and enjoying the fruits of their labour in the here and now, rather than just decades down the line.

What that means, perhaps first and foremost, is that the new generation of entrepreneurs want to live the dream of Tim Ferriss’s “4-Hour Work Week,” and to find as many ways of working “smart” as possible.

Here are a few general tips for working fewer hours, but getting more done in your professional life.

Use the Tools at Your Disposal as Effectively as Possible

Effectively leveraging the tools that you have at your disposal can make all the difference when it comes to freeing up your time, and allowing you to be more dynamic and flexible with your schedule.

Inevitably, every business requires plenty of tasks to be handled that will be innately time-consuming, but that won’t necessarily need your specialist expertise in order to achieve. If you’re a solopreneur, then, and you get bogged down in these kinds of activities, you can easily lose the bulk of all your time doing things that are more or less “busy work.”

Fortunately, there are all sorts of tools and services out there today that can allow you to offload some of the work involved in running a business – whether it’s more specialised, or more generic – ranging from managed services companies such as www.umbrella-ms.com, to the sorts of digital assistants that Tim Ferriss has previously described using to compile reports for him, and even to plan his holidays.

Be thoughtful about using the tools at your disposal as effectively as possible, so that you don’t get caught trying to juggle a dozen different roles at once.

Get Serious About Deep, Focused Work

In his book, “Deep Work,” the academic and writer Cal Newport makes an impassioned case for the need to resist distraction, and to do deep, focused work.

Among other things, he points out that this kind of “deep work” is often key to maximising and showcasing your skill set. But there are other benefits to getting seriously focused on your work and closing your messenger apps, too.

For one thing, a huge amount of time is lost out of every workday due to sheer procrastination and inefficiency. The better able you are to focus on the task at hand, for long stretches of time, the more quickly you’ll get things done, and the more productive your hours spent “at the office” will be.

Take the 80/20 Rule to Heart

The 80/20 rule, also known as Pareto’s principle, is often used in business circles, and is explained as “80% of your returns will come from 20% of your efforts.”

If you want to get more done while working fewer hours, it’s essential that you take this principle to heart, and that you always strive to identify, and dedicate the bulk of your time to the handful of activities that are actually going to make the greatest possible impact.

Instead of filling your day with lesser tasks and projects, say “no” as much as you can, and see how far you can get just focusing on the big stuff.