It was the night before Christmas when all through the house not a creature was stirring except…Wait, why am I still at the office?
Ever feel like you are the only one working; or for that matter, the only one who cares about your business and if it is successful? I know I have felt that way, and I know I will be working on Christmas Eve (at least in the morning). The thing is, I know I need to learn how to delegate to my employees and trust that they will get the job done. That is very hard for me as I know it is for most business owners. It is not because we don’t want to trust, it is just because i haven’t learned that I can, yet.
When you first start a business, it is like a baby that needs to be nurtured along. I find the hardest part of delegating is that it is my baby. When my oldest son got married it was very difficult for me to accept that he didn’t need me to keep track of things any more. I didn’t have to go to his doctor appointments or make sure he had a winter coat. When my youngest got married I think he was disappointed that I had learned those things from his older brother and was not as inclined to continue babying him. I am hoping that will rub off in my business now that I have employees. Granted one of those employees is my youngest son, so it is still difficult at times to not revert to nagging him like I use to do with his homework; but I think I am learning.
The second issue is the illusion of time. I know that I can do things faster than I can train someone else to do it. However, that is a trap. If I don’t take the time to train them how will they ever be able to take on a project without me being worried that they will miss something? Not only that, would it actually be a disaster if they did miss something? I mean, most mistakes can be fixed fairly easily, and I would know what I still need to train my people on.
I know this blog post is mostly for me- a reminder that I don’t have to do everything myself, and I’ve recently hired a business coach to help me find more ways to improve my business and give me more time. My goal is that next year I can take a week or two off and know that everything is still chugging along. What do you see as the problems with delegating? Oh, and go home. It’s Christmas! Your business will still be there on Monday.