Delegating effectively to grow your business can be a valuable strategy and support business owners and leaders in maximizing their time better. It frees up time for you to focus on essential tasks and allows team members to engage in exciting projects and scale your leadership team. However, new managers may find it daunting to determine what tasks to delegate and how to do so effectively. Delegating is a leadership skill that can be honed over time.
This article will provide some valuable tips to help you improve your delegation abilities.
“Can’t reinvent the wheel. But you can put your spin on it.” – Lauren Buekes, The Shining Girl
What does delegation mean?
Delegation refers to the process of assigning tasks and projects to other members of the team. This can be done to ensure that responsibilities are shared equally or because the job or project is better suited to another team member’s skills, interests, or priorities.
Knowing how and when to delegate is an essential skill for any manager. Delegation not only helps you complete your most important tasks but also offers team members the chance to participate in exciting projects. Successful delegation can enhance team skills and allow members to develop new strengths and effectively grow your business.
Delegating tasks can seem effortless in theory. It simply involves requesting assistance. However, it entails relinquishing some level of control and relying on others, which can be challenging. Below are a few pointers to assist you in conquering your apprehensions and delegating effectively to grow your business.
Delegating effectively to grow your business involves assigning tasks to team members based on their workstreams and priorities.
What is the significance of delegating effectively?
Are you looking to improve your business growth and operations performance?
If you are the owner or CEO of a small-to-medium-sized business, one of your biggest hurdles will be handing over responsibilities as your business expands.
You have been managing many critical functions for years, and your expertise in these areas has contributed significantly to your company’s success.
Over time, every business must evaluate its operations and management structure. You could want to add revenue streams or service offerings or expand internationally and into new geographical regions.
Scale your business
Nothing is unique about the growing pains of advancing your startup by scaling your business operations. Research the past two decades, and you’ll likely find some common ground with other successful entrepreneurs regarding their successful business growth journeys.
Comparing your startup to similar companies that have carried out successful growth initiatives may assist in simplifying some of your day-to-day processes or provide insights if you haven’t thought of any yet.
If scaling your business and management team is a priority, you must prioritize your desired action steps and business goals to achieve your vision.
What are the reasons why individuals avoid assigning tasks to others?
Delegating tasks can be complex, especially for business owners and first-time managers. Many struggle due to uncertainty about what to delegate.
- They worry that explaining how to do the work will take longer than doing it themselves.
- They don’t always understand the priority of the work and, thus, struggle to delegate effectively.
- Want to work on exciting projects and therefore struggle to delegate
- They feel guilty about assigning additional tasks to others.
- Business owners are often unclear about their team members’ abilities, leaving them unsure who can help with specific tasks.
- They want to feel needed, be a valuable part of the team, and maintain their role as the go-to person.
Delegating effectively to stop the plate-spinning
As an ambitious entrepreneur with large quantities of “vim and” vigor,” you created your startup” directing all” aspects of your business. Like the old variety show performer spinning plates atop several wooden rods, you would rush from department to department to ensure no operation plates were in danger of falling off.
From sales leads to issuing invoices, you ran the complete “ship.” Eventually, you may have hired already or be expanding your team structure by hiring freelancers, contractors, or designated department managers, which will help free up some of your time.
Sadly, you still need to complete many hands-on tasks, and as you become more comfortable delegating effectively to grow your business, you will reduce your workload even further. Instead of fretting over what additional plates you must manage as part of your daily operations, it’s time to develop a fully staffed management team.
Management and Leadership
There is a big difference between management and leadership. Is the goal to free up your time or hire more staff to grow your team structure?
Leaders and managers are intrinsically linked, and an excellent organizational design will have clear lines of hierarchy between business leaders, managers, and operational teams.
Typically, leaders will focus on creating a vision and developing a high-performing team, and managers will focus on short-term day-to-day goals.
Developing your leadership team to support delegating effectively
To grow your business, you must develop your leadership team and support them effectively delegating. Effective delegation helps to empower your team, improve productivity, and foster a culture of trust and collaboration. Therefore, it’s crucial to invest in your team’s leadership skills and provide them with the tools and resources they need to delegate tasks effectively. Think of the structure of a Premier League football team.
The Chairman is considered the ultimate leader of organizations such as Manchester United or Arsenal. However, those chairmen rely on other managers – various directors and coaches – to manage day-to-day operations and make critical team performance decisions, which helps you to delegate effectively to grow your business and team.
Hiring the Chief Operating Officer
When a business expands, the directors often look for ways to take advantage of the opportunity. However, there is usually one person who oversees each club and acts as the primary point of contact for the club’s Chairman. This person is called the chief operating officer (COO) in the business world, or back-office administration in smaller companies.
If you’re unsure about adding another layer to your startup’s leadership structure, don’t worry, you’re not alone. However, it’s worth considering having a “second in command” for several reasons. It not only provides you with time to reflect and focus on other areas of interest, but it also ensures that your startup runs smoothly and efficiently. The COO is responsible for overseeing day-to-day operations, managing resources, and coordinating with various departments to achieve the company’s goals.
Operations leadership in delegating effectively
Many startups refuse to acknowledge the importance of a COO and how helpful the position can be in a successful scale-up, help to improve business growth, and support business owners delegating effectively:
- The COO may be familiar with several critical business operations components of your startup’s various departments: human resources, marketing, supply chain, finance, and accounts. Therefore, having this person in situ should help alleviate your continuous plate-spinning aspect. However, the COO isn’t a cookie-cutter position, so the hiring process is critical to the success of business growth.
- It would help if you trusted this person explicitly. Examine the options of promoting a current employee versus hiring someone from the outside. For example, someone in-house may have already worked within a few departments, providing a well-rounded business operations background.
- Alternatively, bringing in a fresh perspective and extensive experience, which includes a similar successful business growth scale-up process, should also be a strong consideration as your COO.
- An area where an in-house choice may be more favorable.
- To succeed, the COO must maintain (and develop new) business culture and values.
Critical leadership qualities for delegating effectively
Delegating effectively to grow your business is one of the essential leadership capabilities, with words like autonomy, motivation, and communication quickly placed at the forefront of any qualification list.
Autonomy
As part of your role, it is crucial to identify and engage with leaders who desire independent decision-making. However, it is equally essential for all members of the leadership team to understand the value of keeping you informed of their actions and decisions, which can be effectively communicated through the COO. This ensures that you can effectively support the operations of the organization while also empowering leaders to exercise their autonomy.
Motivation
Compelling motivation from leadership is not limited to the conventional ‘rah-rah’ approach. It goes beyond the weekly team huddle or pep talks. Business leaders need to appreciate that different employees have different motivational buttons. Thus, they should use various techniques to inspire and encourage their employees to increase productivity and achieve better business outcomes. By understanding each employee’s unique needs and preferences, leaders can tailor their motivational strategies to foster a more engaged and productive workforce.
Communication
If a person has trouble communicating or avoids conflict, there is little chance of becoming a successful leader without investing time to change their behaviors. Focusing on their blind spots will help aspiring leaders become more grounded and self-aware when dealing with their teams. The business world has finally realized the vast difference between a successful manager and a successful leader. Often, communication skills are the barrier, and those who can articulate, delegate, and inspire truly transformational business growth and improve team performance are the gems you want to nurture within your organization.
Are you ready to try delegating effectively to grow your business?
Delegating effectively to grow your business helps you improve management skills and foster growth among your team. Gaining the perspective and free time needed to delegate effectively to grow and scale your business operations can sometimes be challenging.
Building your personal management skills and supporting professional development across your team can be achieved by effectively delegating work. It is essential to ensure that your co-workers have all the necessary information to complete the delegated task accurately, which can be done with the help of a project management tool. By utilizing a project management tool, team members can access a shared source of truth, which provides them with increased visibility and the necessary context to complete their work successfully.
Get in Touch with Noirwolf
Are you looking to grow your business but unsure where to start? Our small business consulting and leadership coaching services are here to help! We’ll work with you to scale your operations and achieve your goals. Plus, we offer a free one-hour consultation to ensure we fit your needs correctly. Let’s get started!
Contact Noirwolf Consulting today using the website contact form or by emailing enquiries@noirwolf.com or call us at +44 113 328 0868.
