About 10 years ago, I purchased a townhouse in Greenwood Village, Colorado. I rented out my condo in Washington Park and was excited about this new fixer upper. It was about 1800 square feet, three bedrooms and about 3 miles from my job as a Director of Procurement for a dot.com company that was growing. I was working a lot and wanted to be close to my office. I also needed more space for my little Pekingese dog, Penney.
What I found out quickly was that I started spending all my free time running to Home Depot, Lowes, and other home improvement and design stores. I'd buy a fixture or a sample, bring it home and often make additional trips to return items. I was getting exhausted; my forte was by no means general contractor to redesign this town home. I knew if I kept trying to do it all myself, this project was never going to get done and it would monopolize my time, money and frustration. I needed to hire an expert - leverage my time and get a better return on my investment of my personal time and livelihood by letting it go to someone who knew better than me. This truly was a hobby, not a critical piece to my livelihood and if I were to try and manage it, it would take away from my primary role at the time, which was my career.
How Can You Leverage Your Time?
So what are you doing that is taking up all of your time? Who do you know who could do certain tasks or projects better? What projects are you stumbling through that could be shifted to someone with that particular specialty?
If you work for a large organization, it may just be about delegating. In my work with companies I see many people sitting around while others are extremely productive. Enlist the help of those people -- they'll be challenged to a new opportunity and you can move on to more fulfillment in your own job.
Work for yourself and don't have staff? Do what I did - "bite the bullet" and hire an expert. It's been a few years, but I recall that in hiring a professional contractor I spent under $10K, loved the new updated town home and when I sold it (in a bum economy no less), I made $50K, a net of $40K - which essentially jump started my new business.
The trick is to find the right person with the right skills, and trust that they will maintain a relationship with you. The work may not be consistent, but you'll keep in touch with the project's goal and vision - and trust that you will be with each other along the way.
Today, I'm leveraging my time and talents and going "gung ho" with streamlining my business resources to be as virtual as possible. I've been researching for years and continue to learn about what's new, easy and cost effective. It's scary because I am letting go of the control of doing things the old fashioned way (which means doing it myself!) and trusting others to do things that I thought I could do best. A surprising benefit of leveraging for me is that it has been freed up time to pursue more personal and professional development. What can it do for you?
This week I'd like to discuss leveraging yourself. We'll take a look at how you can leverage your asset of "time" to get a better return on your investment in time at work -- whether you're in an executive corporate environment, small business or home office. 
Anne McGurty is CEO of Strategize & Organize, a company devoted to training individual's to be more effective with the tools and resources to be productive in their work environment. 