If you're trying to work out how to run a business around kids, I'm guessing your working day doesn't look much like a working day. It looks like 25 minutes during a nap, an hour after drop-off, a bit on your phone in a waiting room, and whatever's left of your brain at 8pm.
Most productivity advice assumes you've got long, quiet stretches for deep work. Lovely if you've got them. Not a lot of use if you haven't.
I'm Saloni, a strategist for ambitious small business owners who are capped on capacity, and I run my own business in pockets around a little one. This is the set-up I'd hand you if short bursts are all you've got right now.
The quick version
Short bursts feel harder than they should because each one starts with a restart: finding your place, remembering what you'd decided, getting your head back in.
Plan for the pockets you've really got, not the ones you wish you had.
End every pocket with a "where I left off" note for future you.
Sort your tasks by size so you can match the job to the gap.
Keep one default next step ready for surprise pockets.
Decide what can wait (or go in the bin) so your pockets go on what matters.
Why working in short bursts feels twice as hard
When a job gets interrupted, you don't pick it back up exactly where you left it. You pick it up a few steps before, because you've got to rebuild the picture in your head first. Which tab was it? What was I about to write? Did I email them, or did I just think about emailing them?
That rebuilding is the restart cost. In one long session you pay it once. In six short sessions you pay it six times.
There are a couple of other hidden costs hiding in there too. Lots of one-line tasks are secretly full of decisions ("sort the website" is about fifteen decisions that have snuck in wearing a trench coat), and decisions are the first thing to go when you're tired and only half there. Then there's the switch itself: going from wiping someone's face to writing a proposal in about four seconds is a big ask for any brain, and an even bigger one if you're neurodivergent.
None of this means you're bad at running a business. It means the way you work needs a set-up that fits it.
How to run a business around kids: 5 steps for working in short bursts
1. Find out what your pockets really are
For one week, jot down when you actually worked and for how long. Not when you planned to, when you really did. Most people find their pockets are shorter and more scattered than they thought, which is brilliant information, because now you can plan for your real week instead of an imaginary one.
2. Leave a "where I left off" note at the end of every pocket
This is the biggest one. Before you stop (or as you're being called away), take thirty seconds to leave yourself three lines:
What I was doing:
The very next step:
What I need for it (a link, a file, a decision I'd already made):
Pop it at the top of the doc, in your notes app, or on a post-it on your laptop. Next time, you read three lines instead of rebuilding the whole thing from scratch.
3. Size your tasks to fit your pockets
Break bigger jobs down until each step fits in one pocket, then sort them roughly into three piles:
5-minute jobs: reply to one email, schedule a post, send an invoice, add an idea to your list.
20-minute jobs: draft a caption, outline a blog post, update one page of your website, prep for a client call.
60-minute jobs: client work, a section of a sales page, recording content, anything that needs your full brain.
When a pocket turns up, you pick from the right pile instead of spending the first five minutes deciding what to do.
4. Keep one default next step ready
Surprise pockets are the hardest ones to use, because you weren't expecting them and there's no plan waiting. So keep one "if I get a bonus 20 minutes, I'll do this" task ready at all times. When the nap runs long, you don't have to decide anything. You just start.
5. Decide what to drop
If your capacity is smaller right now, something has to give, and it's much better to choose what than to let it happen by accident. Look at your list and ask: what's the bare minimum that keeps my business ticking over? That's your Bare Minimum Strategy. Everything else is a bonus, and some of it can wait or go in the bin entirely.
What can you actually get done in 20 minutes?
More than you'd think, as long as the task is ready before the pocket starts. A 20-minute pocket where you already know the next step is worth far more than an hour where you have to work out what you're doing first.
Some things that fit nicely in 20 minutes:
Write one section of something bigger (one heading's worth of a blog, one email, one slide)
Batch three social captions from notes you've already got
Follow up with two people you've been meaning to message
Tidy your "where I left off" notes and pick your next default step
The boring admin that's been haunting you: invoices, receipts, renewals
What doesn't fit: anything that starts with "figure out" or "decide on". Those need a bit more space, or a bit of help.
How do you work from home with a toddler and still get things done?
Partly by changing what you count as a proper working session. If you wait for the perfect two-hour block, it might not turn up for weeks, and the work stalls in the meantime.
A few things that help:
Plan your week around the childcare and naps you can count on, and treat everything else as a bonus.
Keep a short list of phone-friendly jobs for when you're stuck under a sleeping baby or sitting in a waiting room.
Put your thinking-heavy work in your most reliable pocket, and the easy admin in the scrappy ones.
Expect the plan to wobble. Little ones get ill, naps change, and some weeks you'll have half the time you planned for.
That last one matters a lot. On low-energy days (I call them 40% days), the goal shifts from making progress to keeping things ticking over, and that's absolutely fine.
Can you really grow a business in short bursts?
Yes. Progress in pockets can look slow day to day, but small steps add up, especially once you stop losing a chunk of every session to the restart. I'm a big believer that persistency beats consistency. Showing up perfectly every day was never the deal. Coming back to it again and again, after the gaps, is what moves things forward.
If you'd like to understand what's making your business feel heavier than it should, take my free quiz, Why does running my business feel so hard?. It takes about 10 minutes, and your result lands in your inbox with what it means and what to try first.
If you'd love a hand with the whole plan, a Biz Reset is 90 minutes where we take everything that's rattling around your head and size it to the time and energy you've really got. And if you want shortcuts for the everyday stuff, the Make it Easier toolkit is full of them.
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