One of the most challenging things that business leaders need to learn is how to let go of workload. If you’re building a business that’s bigger than yourself, it’s absolutely vital that you get proficient and comfortable with letting go of jobs.
This can be quite difficult to do in the beginning of your business, but as your business grows and you take on more and more team members, it becomes increasingly difficult to let go of the work and scale successfully.
It can be tempting to jump in yourself and fix the mistakes that people have made because it seems easier, but this means you get stuck in a cycle of trying to let go, only to grab it back again. Learning to trust your staff members is integral in avoiding this trap, and also means you’re boosting their confidence and self worth. This of course will benefit the rest of your business too. With managers and business leaders spending around 14% – 24% of their time redoing tasks that they’ve delegated, there is a real potential to use your time more effectively.
“Once your mindset changes, everything on the outside will change along with it” Steve Maraboli
Delegation should not be a one off event when you’re putting on a new team member, but an ongoing foundational approach to the growth journey of your business. Here are some very practical tips on how to develop a delegation mindset:
NO ONE THING CAN BREAK YOUR BUSINESS:
The first one, is that no one thing can break your business. Your business is a complex environment of so many factors that create success, and it’s really important to realise that as you’re delegating someone to do work for you. There’s no one mistake they can make that’s going to be fatal for your business.
PUT THE SYSTEM BEFORE THE JOB:
The next thing to remember, is that the system always needs to come before any individual job. You’re building a system of business growth, rather than simply chasing sales or doing individual tasks. By putting the system first you grow your business bigger than yourself, and you create sustainable growth.
REMEMBER GOOD ENOUGH IS GOOD:
And finally, remember that good enough is good. This is a vital one to practice the skill of delegation as an ongoing process in your business. No one will do it exactly the way you would, so it’s really important to get over that perfectionist hurdle and make sure that it’s being done well enough, then let it go.
I hope that really helps you in your journey of delegation, and I hope that you can see opportunities in your business where you can get better at clearing work. If other people that can do the work almost as well as you, then you should be letting it go, which then frees you up to concentrate on other things!
