How Smart Business Owners Create More Time Through Delegation
Have you ever wished you could clone yourself? That’s because we tie our worth to being constantly busy, but that’s a trap. Your value isn’t in how many emails you answer or how many small tasks you check off.
“Don’t be busy; be productive.”
Anonymous
#Delegate_To_Grow
At face value, delegation can feel like more hassle than it’s worth. However, delegating effectively greatly increases the amount of work that you can deliver. When you arrange the workload so that you are working on the tasks that have the highest priority for you, and other people are working on meaningful and challenging assignments, you have a recipe for success.
🧮 The maths doesn’t lie:
If a task takes you an hour, and training takes 40 minutes, you’ve already saved 20 minutes. And if it’s something that happens weekly? That’s hours of your life back every month.
Skilful delegation includes choosing 1.) the right tasks to delegate, finding 2.) the right people to delegate to, and delegating in 3.) the right way.
🔎When?
When done correctly, delegation is a win-win as you get time to work on your business (as opposed to in it) while your team members grow and develop.
- The task should provide an opportunity for growth of another person’s skills.
- Weigh the effort to properly train another person against how often the task will reoccur.
- Delegating certain critical tasks may jeopardise the success of your project.
- Management tasks, such as performance reviews, and tasks specifically assigned to you, should not be delegated.
Ask yourself:
❓Does this really need my personal touch? (Spoiler: Most things don’t.)
❓Am I doing the same thing over and over? (If yes, it’s time to outsource.)
❓Is this task actually making me money? (If not, why am I still doing it?)
❓Do I dread doing this? (Someone else might actually enjoy it.)
❓Do I love this but never have time for it? (Let it go—it’s not serving you.)
Try this: Write down one task you could delegate this week. Then imagine your week without it. Feels lighter, right? That’s your sign.
👥 Who?
Once you have decided to delegate a task, think about the possible candidates for accepting the task.
❓What experience, knowledge, skills, and attitude does the person already have?
❓What training or assistance might they need?
❓Do you have the time and resources to provide any training needed?
❓What is the individual’s preferred work style? Do they do well on their own or do they require more support and motivation? How independent are they?
❓What do they want from their job?
❓What are their long-term goals and interests, and how do these align with the work proposed?
❓Does their current workload leave enough time to take on more work?
❓How much reshuffling of other responsibilities and workloads will delegating this task require?
Hot tip: Try to delegate to the people who are closest to the work. They are best suited for the task because they have the most intimate knowledge of the detail of everyday work. And be patient while they grow in skill and confidence. Delegation is a process, not a quick-fix.
🎯 How?
Delegation doesn’t have to be all or nothing. There are several different levels of delegation, each with different levels of delegate independence and delegator supervision.
The Spheres of Independence
Delegate initiates action, then reports periodically
Delegate acts, then reports results immediately ⤴️
Delegate recommends what should be done, then acts ⤴️
Delegate asks what to do ⤴️
Delegate waits to be told what to do ⤴️
People often move throughout these spheres during the delegation process. Your goal should be to get the delegate to one of the outer three spheres, depending on the task being performed. Make sure you match the amount of responsibility with the amount of authority. Understand that you can delegate some responsibility, but the buck always stops with you!
Set aside enough time to thoroughly review any delegated work that was delivered to you. If possible, only accept good quality, fully complete work. If you accept work that you are not satisfied with, your team member does not learn to do the job properly. Worse than this, you accept a new project that you will probably need to complete yourself. Not only does this overload you, it means that you don’t have the time to do your own job properly.
Of course, when good work is returned to you, make sure to recognize and reward the effort. As a leader, you should get in the practice of complimenting members of your team every time you are impressed by what they have done. This effort on your part will go a long way toward building team members’ self-confidence and efficiency now and in the future.
💡Remember: Delegating doesn’t mean losing control. It means choosing where to focus your energy. You’re still the one calling the shots. You’re just not stuck doing all the work.
Instead of micromanaging, focus on:
✔ Setting clear expectations
✔ Trusting your team (or freelancer) to figure it out
✔ Checking in without hovering
“If you want to do small things well, do them yourself. If you want to do great things, you’ve got to learn to let go.”
John C. Maxwell