Recently I discovered a fatal flaw in myself that I believe applies to most business owners. Yet when this barrier is removed it’s amazing how our productivity increases. I believe the scientific term is “I can do anything better than you…”
[We will return after this short musical interlude]
Sorry… I was getting feedback that this blog didn’t contain enough musical numbers. Back to the point… if I had one.
Being a business owner means a huge responsibility. Not only do we need to ensure our business is successful to support ourselves and our families but we have countless other people relying on us from clients to suppliers and all the stakeholders in between. This can create a little pressure to get things right all the time.
The problem with being the best
We get into trouble when our business starts growing and suddenly we’re overwhelmed with more and more work. So we hire people to help us out but we don’t make (notice I didn’t say “have”) the time to train them properly. The new employees make mistakes… we take back the work and say “if you want it done right you have to do it yourself!”
And so our business reaches a level where we’re constantly stressed out and working ridiculous hours. Luckily growth stops because we definitely don’t have time for (or need) marketing. But we’re now trapped in a prison of our own creation.
Systems are the answer
We’ve all been told that to have a successful business we need systems. These systems allow us to hand over work to other people and focus on the really important work in the business. But the hard part is making the time to create the systems.
But we choose how we spend our time so we need to put aside that time for systematizing our business. We have to decide that training our staff is more important than fighting the latest fire. And we have to embrace the fact that time spent well now will lead to greater productivity down the line.
How to systematize your business
Take some time to write down everything you do in your business. First take some time to eliminate things you’re doing that aren’t really helping your business at all (there are usually a few) and then divide the task into things you must do and what staff could handle. You need to be ruthless here as you’ll probably try to hold onto tasks that aren’t mission critical in the process.
The important thing is to take the first step and start entrusting tasks to other people. Personally I think you’ll be amazed at what they can do… I know I have been for my business. An added tip is to put your ego aside and try to hire people who are better than you!
What you do next
If you’re like most business owners you probably feel overworked and underpaid for what you’re doing. So follow the steps above to systematize your business and start to remove yourself from as much as possible. This way you can focus on the bigger picture items and get a lot more leverage… which means more income at the end of the day.
