Delegating too much

Even though you didn’t become an artist just to balance a checkbook, you must know how to balance it.  It’s so important to have a good—though not necessarily expert—understanding of every aspect of your business.  You must know a little bit about every part of your business so you can guide and direct those people you hire to help you get things done, whether as employees, contractors, or vendors.  Only then can you decide what concrete steps you can take to either gain needed skills yourself or properly outsource them to a professional.

A clear picture of the end result you desire is an absolute must in proper outsourcing.  But so is the “follow up” component.  Delegation is not abdication.  No one will be as interested in the success of your business as you… not your employees, not your banker, not even your mother.  I know of a dance studio that nearly went bankrupt when its one employee charged tens of thousands of dollars of personal items on the owner’s credit card.  The owner never reviewed the charges on the credit card statements each month … statements were just passed on, unopened, to the same employee “trusted” perpetuating the fraud.  Not everyone is out to steal you blind, but unintentional errors or customer service missteps can be just as costly.  When it comes to delegation, a smart business owner lives by the motto, “Inspect, don’t expect.”

Not delegating

As a business owner, you have a vision, a product or service, and a business plan.  You work untold hours and in the pursuit of your dream you wear many hats.  Artisans often wear the most familiar and comfortable hats made of creative, flexible logic tasks like generating their art and working with studio staff or assistants.  The less comfortable hats of technical and analytical tasks of business monitoring, money management, legal considerations, and communicating with an audience are more likely to collect dust on the hat rack.  When an artisan’s business fails, it’s usually because they neglected one or more of these crucial areas.

The leadership development experts at The Wendling Group offer these tips:

• Delegate routine activities, even though you don’t want to.  These include fact-finding assignments; preparation of rough drafts of reports; problem analysis and suggested action; collection of data for reports; photocopying, printing, and collating; and data entry.

• Delegate things that aren’t part of your core competency. For small businesses, these include accounting, web site design, deliveries, hardware upkeep, software help, graphic design, travel arrangements, patenting, legal issues, and even HR functions such as payroll.

After reading the routine activities they suggest delegating, I had to chuckle at their comment ‘even if you don’t want to.’  I don’t know many artisans who would want to do any of the tasks they mention.  Instead, here’s the underlying idea: what lower-value tasks are you doing yourself simply because you enjoy them or feel you can’t delegate to someone else?  But first you must inventory your business skills to get a thorough understanding of your strengths and weaknesses, and the value that each brings to your business.  Focus your efforts on the highest value activities, and delegate the remaining tasks to others.