Akash and Heidi Sloss together AQrt of delegation and more

May 7, 2013 by Akash Leave a Comment

Art of Delegation: Delegating Tasks and Responsibilities as a Leader

The Art of Delegation

Why is it so hard for some business people to delegate? Is it because they are control freaks or is it that they don’t have the necessary skills in order to know how to prioritize their time and their tasks?
I come across many business owners who tell me that they are control freaks, but I suspect that the real reason that they aren’t able to delegate more is that they don’t trust their ability to prioritize effectively. When I advise people to delegate all the tasks that need to be done, but don’t need to be done by them, I get push back.

Busy Leaders Need to Delegate

People respond with “it takes too long to teach someone to become effective.” Is this you? If so, then you have a lot of company. This is a frequent response to my presentation on my power strategy #2 “The 3 Secrets to Successful Delegation” from my bestselling book, Fortune is in the Follow-Up®: 5 Power Strategies to Reinvent Your Marketing (3L Publishing, 2012) at keynotes across the country.*
Now most business owners know they should delegate more, but they feel so overwhelmed by all they are doing, that they don’t feel that they can take the time out to find the right person for the position and then adequately train them. You can recognize this person because they look like a chicken running around without its heads–all movement, but very little momentum.
These people will respond with how busy are when asked how things are going. But if you ask them if they are making money then they respond with a stunned look in their eyes–you know the deer-in-the-headlights look. They are so crazed that they have lost perspective.
What is really going on here? When you drill down, these business owners don’t trust that they have the necessary skills to be able to find and teach a new person what needs to be done–they are so busy being overwhelmed and think that this is better than taking the time to figure out how to stop the madness, even though they know it will make their lives better.

Photo Credit: kevin dooley via Compfight cc

Reality of Running a Business

In my presentations, I identify this at the Lone Ranger Syndrome and it goes something like this: just because you can do it all, doesn’t mean that you should. The reality of running a business these days is that your priority must be on marketing, which I define as “building a relationship with a prospect, or a great referral source, until they feel comfortable enough to do business with you.” Period. So the tasks that consume your day, should fit into my definition of marketing–does it further your relationships with prospects or not. If so, then continue with the task, if not, then it is time to delegate it to someone else. This can be someone you hire to work for your company or someone that your business contracts with.

3 Steps to Be an Effective Delegator

Your responsibility to your company means you must become a skilled and effective delegator, even if you don’t think you have enough time or know-how to do it. It is time to get over it!
Here are some very practical action steps to help you figure out what to keep and what to delegate.

1. Make a List of Tasks for Next Week

First, make a list of all of your tasks for the next week. List all of those activities that you feel need to be done in the next 7 days. List both personal and professional tasks. If the task needs to be done, put it on the list. Now I know that some people will respond that they don’t have enough time to do this, but they have their priorities all wrong. Instead of recognizing the big picture, they are stuck on the minute details. In other words, they can’t see the forest for the trees. In fact, you could argue that they are stuck on the leaf level! Don’t be one of these people–focusing on getting through the day instead of living a well balanced life.

2.Categorize the Tasks

Second, start to categorize the tasks. Is it important or not really important? Is there a deadline? It is a personal or business task? For all of the business tasks, indicate if it is an income producing task or not–this one is critical because I find many business owners are working on tasks that are not income producing. Remember, it must fit within the marketing definition–it is furthering your relationships with prospects or not. So a good example would be working on your website. Creating the content that go on the site counts as marketing, actually uploading and creating the site does not (unless you are a professional web designer!).
Next think of whether there are other categories that will help you to shift your focus from the details of what must get done to seeing the big picture. Remember the point of having a business has to include supporting yourself, making money AND having a better quality of life!

3. Decide which Tasks You Can Delegate

Lastly, it is now time to roll up your sleeves and figure out which of the tasks on your list must be done by you and which ones could be done by someone else–and most likely for less time and money than you cost your business. Going back to your website example, if you are running a business and maintaining your own website, but you are not in the website business, I can promise that you are costing your business time AND money by not hiring a professional to maintain and work on your website.
Now I know that many business owners fantasize about hiring out their sales and marketing and for some, that is a reasonable goal to work towards, but the reality is for most small business owners, they must be involved in the marketing and sales of their businesses. Remember if you can’t sell your company’s products and services enthusiastically, why will your prospects want to do business with you?

Marketing/Sales

Realistically, you can’t do it all, so I suggest that you delegate everything BUT the marketing and sales. My recommendation is that you spend 75% of your time marketing and 25% of your time on your top “A” clients. Don’t have enough “A” clients? Think how many you would have IF you spent 75% of your time on relationship building activities with your prospects.

Set Your Priorities

So, next time you feel crazed and overwhelmed, stop, take a look at your calendar. What activities are you doing that belong on someone else’s plate? Your priorities are reflected in how you spend your time, make sure yours are spent on effective activities that will make a difference to your bottom line and your quality of life.
Yours,
Heidi BK Sloss
*Note: Some responses also include concerns about the cost of hiring and training new employees or contractors, but that is outside of the scope of this article.

Heidi Sloss is a national sales expert and author of the bestselling book, “Fortune is in the Follow-Up“. She teaches people how to think, breathe and behave more entrepreneurially so they can increase their prospect-to-client conversion rate. (Note from Akash: I highly recommend checking out her blog, where she shares proven tools and techniques on becoming a better leader and entreprenuer).