VA Series: Why delegation is the most important skill for business owners to develop

Artwork for podcast What Was I Supposed to Be Doing?

Episode 19 • 12th November 2024 • What Was I Supposed to Be Doing? • Lauren Glynn

19 - VA Series - 05 - Delegation

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Speaker: it's really important as a business owner that you learn to delegate because you can't do it all yourself. I know it feels like you have to, and it feels like you should, and it feels like you potentially could, but Your business is unique and it has unique challenges and it's really important that you learn how to bring other people into your business so that you can grow or you can take a day off.

Hey everyone, welcome to today's episode of the process of profit podcast. Today, I'm continuing my VA series all about how to find, hire, onboard, and now work with your VA and actually effectively delegate to them. Because delegation is really the key to having a VA. If you're not going to delegate, if you're not able to sort of loosen your fist a little bit on some of the work that has to be done in your business, then your VA will be much less effective in your business.

So let's get started. In our previous episodes in this series, we talked all about how to decide if you need a VA in your business, how to actually find a VA, how do you hire them, what are their legal process for actually hiring someone in your business, and then how do you effectively onboard them to be able to actually get into your systems and work on things and all of that.

So now we're going to be talking about actually delegating the work to them. First, before we start digging in, I do want to remind you that there is a free workbook that goes along with this whole series. It has all kinds of exercises and checklists in there for you to follow along, to prepare, to bring a VA into your business.

It is at laurenglynn. com slash resources. You're going to want to look for the VA or virtual assistant roadmap, and you can go download that totally for free and for free. follow along here as we work through some of this stuff. So let's go ahead and dig in.

So, like I said, we're going to be talking about delegation because delegation is a key factor in how successful your VA is going to be in your business. So a lot of entrepreneurs really struggle with delegation because they feel like they don't even know where to start.

They don't know what they should be delegating. They know that there's a lot of things happening in their business, but they don't know what those things are. could potentially be delegated to people. They also might think that I am the face of this business. I am in charge of things. I want things to be done the exact way that I would do them and no one else can do them as well as I can.

They also might not be sure if their VA can actually handle the tasks that they're asking them to do. Especially if you're adding to their workload that You know, more than their initial thing that they were hired for. You might not be sure if your VA can actually handle the new things. You also might have a hard time prioritizing what you should be delegating to your VA because there's just so much of it and you don't really know what the most important things are for you to be handing off to your VA so that you can stay in your zone of genius.

Can be focusing on strategy in the bigger picture. So what are the most important things that you should be delegating to your VA? And then finally, if you don't have clear processes in your business, if you don't have documented SOPs,

You don't have really clear ways of managing projects and processes and tools, and it's all in your head, then it can be really difficult to delegate anything to a VA because you are not clear on what the processes are. They're not clear on what the processes are. They have to ask you a lot of questions and constantly be following up with you.

And it can be really, really difficult. Detrimental to the delegation process. If you don't have those clear processes, they're not documented and everything's just kind of living inside your head.

But it's really important as a business owner that you learn to delegate because you can't do it all yourself. I know it feels like you have to, and it feels like you should, and it feels like you potentially could, but Your business is unique and it has unique challenges and it's really important that you learn how to bring other people into your business so that you can grow or you can take a day off.

Maybe you don't want to grow, maybe you don't want to like become an agency and add more clients, but you're still going to want to be able to delegate to someone so that you can take a day off once in a while. So that someone else is dealing with all of the things that you don't want to be dealing with and doing the admin work so that you can focus on the big picture strategy.

So it's really important that you learn how to create a delegation strategy that works for you, for the way that you work, for the way that your mind works, and the way that your business works.

And for your own strengths and weaknesses, Because maybe you're really good at writing. So you don't want to delegate that, but you could delegate posting, you know, figuring out what it is that you enjoy doing, that you like about your business and what you could potentially delegate to get rid of from your business.

So you don't have to do it so much.

And I really work with my clients to help figure out all of these things. When we're looking at, you know, even if we're not looking at hiring someone, we always want to make sure that we have a clear understanding of what the processes are within the business, what the step by step things are to actually do the whole system, What the tools are that we're using, we're making sure that our tech stack is really clear.

We're making sure that you have a clear process for prioritizing your work. We have a clear process for documenting everything so that it's all in one system. Even if you're the only person, because we want to make sure that, That it's super clear to yourself and that you're prepared to bring someone on when you're ready to do that.

You're already set up for success because you have systems in place, you have everything documented, you have the work prioritized. So now it's really easy to bring someone in and then delegate out work to them. So that's a lot of what I work with my clients on is getting all of those sort of backend systems figured out, getting the prioritization figured out, understanding how to manage your own time so that it's really easy to bring someone in when you're ready.

And it's hard to do this with sort of generic advice because everybody's business is different and everybody's way that their mind works is different. It's really hard to figure out how generic advice sort of applies to you and your business. Which is why it's so important to sort of bring someone in to help you figure all of this out because You also have sort of a microscopic view of your business It's hard to take that step back in that 10 000 foot view of your business and see All the processes end to end when you're just really living it every day.

You're focusing on it every day and not taking that sort of third party approach that sort of Detached is the wrong word, but less emotional approach to how your business is set up and documenting all of the processes and seeing everything from that high level. It's hard to do that on your own without someone else coming in who's not as attached to your business and not as in the weeds in your business.

So by bringing someone in to help you figure all of that out, we can sit down and figure out what delegation style works for you, what are the tasks that you want to delegate to your VA, what are the things that you enjoy doing that you want to make sure stay on your plate, things like copywriting, if you really enjoy that, I do not, but some other people might enjoy it.

So, So you want to make sure that you're keeping that on your plate and by talking it through with someone who is used to figuring all of this out, someone who has done this with lots of other businesses before, it gives you a sounding board to kind of talk through what you're thinking, what you're feeling.

And also someone who, like I said, has done it before and may have other ideas for how you can effectively delegate within your business. What are some other approaches that maybe you haven't thought about? Or some things that have worked with other clients. I can help you figure all of that out to become the most effective delegation master in your business.

We'll consider your working style and preferences. We'll make sure that your systems and processes are in place. Or if you don't have systems and processes, I'll help you set them up. But we'll make sure that you're set up for success when you're delegating in your business. Even if you're not quite ready to do it now, at least you will have everything set up in the background and running and ready to go.

So the way that I do this with my clients is we sit down right at the beginning of our work together and we do a comprehensive business assessment. And what that looks like is I use a tool called Mural and it's a digital sticky note board basically where we sit down and we map all of your processes from end to end.

This is how you are acquiring clients, this is how you're onboarding clients, this is This is what the ongoing process of working with you looks like. This is what the off boarding process looks like, and we document all of those processes or lack thereof, end to end, and we figure out what steps it might make sense to delegate within those processes.

But not only that, we sit down and we talk through your way of working, your way of thinking, the way that your mind works, and we develop a strategy and an approach that actually works for you. my client, Yvette. She was very tech agnostic. She did not want to work with technology, she was very happy with her notebooks, but she had a team of two part time people that were helping her.

And so if she was writing something down in a notebook, then they didn't have access to that information. So I worked with her to figure out, okay, I know that you really like working in your notebooks, How can we incorporate that into a bigger strategy that will help you more effectively delegate to your team members so that they know what it is that you're expecting of them, they understand the processes that you're trying to create, and, but you can still sort of work in the way that works for your own mind.

And we created a process within her business that allowed her to start still write her notes and use that to keep track of what it is that she's working on. But then we put them into a larger system so that her assistants could actually see the information. So I am not about sort of the cookie cutter.

generic advice to gener to delegation. I am very much about helping my clients figure out what works for them and how their mind works and their preferences. And then we work together to create a customized plan around how we can then effectively or more effectively delegate potentially to team members.

I also work a lot with my clients on automation, you know, what can potentially be automated instead of delegating it to someone else, or can part of it be automated and part of it be delegated. We talk through a lot of those things. And then we also talk through prioritization and what are you spending your time on versus what should you be spending your time on?

Where is your focus going? What is pulling you away from that? And how can we better. Prioritize your time because your time is very precious as a business owner. There's only a finite amount of it. So making sure that your time is being well spent on the things that drive the business forward would really help you to understand, okay, these are the important things I've prioritized them.

These are all the not important things. Maybe those are good candidates for delegation. Maybe they're good candidates for automation, or maybe we can just not do those things, but you don't know that until you sit down with someone and actually prioritize the work that you have to do within your business.

I also help my clients with all the steps that we've talked about with bringing on a VA. I help them figure out what the processes are in their business, what tasks would potentially be delegated to a VA. And then I walk them through the process of finding a VA, having them apply, an interview with them, you know, onboarding them, getting them to work.

set up for success. Those are all things that I help my clients do once we've figured out, okay, I'm ready to delegate. I'm ready to implement this delegation strategy that we've, we've created together. Now I need to find someone. So I support my clients through that whole process of figuring all of that out, finding the person and getting them onboarded.

And then finally, I also help them. Like I said, onboard the VA, but also work with them ongoing. What does that look like? How do they continue to support the business? How does their role evolve as the business grows? I help my business owners and my clients figure all of that stuff out and work through it so that they have a customized plan to move forward with delegating and working with their VA ongoing.

I was talking about my client Yvette earlier and I actually did an interview with her on this podcast. You can catch that in the full episode list. I think it's episode number six, right around there. And she talks all about how I helped her figure all of these things out together. And I helped my other client, Sylvia. She, it works with clients. Getting their Italian citizenship through dissent and she was working like 60 hour weeks.

Speaker: She was doing everything herself She was following up with clients. She was following up with the towns. She was working with she was following with the landlords Where she was helping clients find somewhere to live She was working with all the clients to get their own paperwork like it was a lot It was a lot for one person But she didn't have any processes in place to bring anyone else on to help her So we sat down and we figured out, okay, what does onboarding look like?

What does it look like when you're helping someone find their paperwork? How do we want to reach out to these towns to start processing their paperwork? What does it look like to start talking to landlords to potentially rent out their apartments with your clients? What does all of that look like? And so we created processes, we documented them, we started implementing systems, and then she was able to actually onboard a full Full time admin now to support her and her business.

And now she spends her time talking to clients and talking to the towns and doing the parts that she enjoys rather than chasing payments and chasing down paperwork. And, you know, doing all of those admin things that you have to do in Italy to keep your business running legally, because it's a lot. So she spends a lot more time doing the things that she enjoys as opposed to all of those, you know, Admin things that she didn't enjoy, but it was taking up so much of her time and now she's able to take on more clients and she's able to actually take a vacation during, you know, August when everyone else is on vacation in Italy.

So, when it comes to delegation, there can be some pitfalls that can occur when you're just starting to delegate, or even if you've been delegating for a while, there are some common issues that can come up. The first one is delegating the wrong tasks. If you delegate something that is really more strategic, or really should include your zone of genius in it, or really needs, you know, maybe it's outside of the skillset of the VA that you've hired, but you wanted to kind of give them a chance.

That is a problem when you first start delegating is, you know, delegating the wrong thing. And one of the things that I work through with my clients is figuring out the right things to delegate at the right time with the right people. Another issue with delegation can be unclear instructions.

We've talked a lot about documenting processes, documenting systems, you know, making sure that you have the right tools access, but if you are not crystal clear on what it is that your person that you're delegating to, your VA should be doing, if you're not crystal clear on the process or you missed a part, then that can potentially lead to a lot of heartache and a lot of extra work for you and potentially extra work for your VA.

So you want to make sure that you are being super clear with your instructions. And that's another one of the things that I really help my business owners figure out is, you know, making sure that the. The instructions are step by step. They are really clear. Maybe doing some screen recording so that we can actually do a walkthrough.

Maybe even setting up time with the VA to walk them through doing it rather than just sending over a document or a video. Whatever it takes to make sure that the instructions are crystal clear so that there are as few mistakes made as possible. Now mistakes are going to happen. Let's be honest. We're all human and it's, you know, a fact of life and it's a good thing because we learn from them.

But we want to minimize those mistakes in this situation as much as possible so that we're not creating, you know, negative client experiences. We're not losing money, things like that. So I help my clients figure out and make sure. So I help my clients really make sure that they are being as clear as possible with the instructions that they're giving to their VA.

Okay.

And then the final potential pitfall of delegation is micromanagement. And we talked a lot about the instructions being clear, but, you know, taking that a step too far is sort of watching over their shoulder and checking in with them all the time and really following too closely what it is that they're doing.

You want to make sure that you're hiring someone that you can trust to get the work done in the way that you need the work done on the deadline that you need the work done, but you don't want to be hovering over their shoulder to make sure that they're doing it exactly the way that you want or exactly in the timeframe that you want.

Obviously you want them to meet the deadline, but

you want to make sure that you're not hovering like an anxious parent and you know, giving them the space to actually do the work. And that is yet again, another thing that I work with my clients on is balancing supervising your VA, making sure they have the support they need versus micromanaging and hovering and making it so that it's uncomfortable and they can't even do the work because you're just always there and always getting in the way.

There are some long term benefits of working with someone to make sure that you are delegating correctly. By understanding how to delegate correctly, you are potentially increasing the productivity in your business. You're increasing the potential for business growth. You are creating a better work life balance for yourself and for the people that you're delegating to, to make sure that everyone has a good work life balance.

You're creating a much more scalable business model so that In the future, when you hire more people, it's a lot easier to delegate and it's, and you're creating a much more scalable business model so that when you are ready to hire more people in the future, it's a lot easier to delegate to them because you have the skills you've worked with someone to make sure that, you know, the effective ways to delegate, you have your processes in place, everything set up.

And by having all your processes in place, it means that now is the best time to invest in your delegation. It's the most important skill that you can develop as a business owner within your business outside of like marketing and actually doing the work with your clients. But it's one of the most important skills that you can build as a business leader because even if you don't want to grow into this multi million dollar company, even if you don't want to scale or become an agency, you are going to want to grow.

Some help in your business so that it just doesn't take over your whole life. And so by learning how to delegate early on in your business, it really sets you up for success going forward because now you're, I already talked about that.

And so by learning how to delegate early, it's really setting you up for success moving forward in your business. If you don't learn how to delegate early on in your business or you've already had your business for a while and you've still never really learned, then you're potentially costing yourself money.

You're not You know, wasting your own personal time that should be spent strategizing your business and you're spending it more on the admin things. You've never really kind of learned to let go of those things and you're losing out on potential opportunities because you just don't have time to go out and find them to go out and actually do them because you're spending all that time doing admin work because you never learn to let go a little bit to find the right person to make sure that you have your systems and processes in place.

So by not learning how to delegate, you're really doing a disservice to your business and to yourself.

And also by learning how to delegate now, you're giving yourself the potential for rapid growth, rapid improvement. By finding the right people at the right time, you're ready to streamline your business. You're ready to move forward. You're ready to scale or to grow or whatever the next steps look like for your business.

And by learning how to delegate earlier, learning how to delegate now, it's much more effective. It's going to have a compounding effect by consistently delegating over time. You're building up your team. You're building up people within your business that then can potentially take on more work as you grow, as you need more support, as you can pay for more support.

And so by working with someone to learn how to delegate now, you're really setting yourself up for success in the future of your business.

So to recap, it is super important that you learn how to delegate in your business. If you are a new business owner, if you've been in business for a while and you've just never really gotten the hang of delegation, you've never felt comfortable handing it off to someone else. That is exactly what I help my clients do.

Do in my process to profit programs. And if you are interested in learning more or talking to see how I can potentially help you learn how to delegate better, maybe we can work together to find your first VA. You can go to laurenglynn.com profit and book your free strategy session, where we talk all about your business, your structure.

Where you're at, where you want to go, of where you can, and you come away with a personalized roadmap of the steps you should take to build your business. However, that looks to you. So again, laurenglynn. com slash profit book, your free profit to process. Book your free process to profit strategy session where we can talk all about delegation in your business, among other things.

Thank you so much for listening. If you found this episode helpful, please go ahead and like and review. It helps other people find this podcast. I would love to hear what you thought of the episode. Come find me on threads. I'm at Lauren G consulting, and I would love to hear if you are already delegating in your business.

If you haven't delegated before and you're nervous about it. I want to hear all about it. So come find me on threads and I will talk to you again in the next one. Next week we're going to be talking about working with your VA long term, ongoing. What does it look like when your relationship evolves? What does it look like when you start adding more VAs?

So tune in next week for all of that. Go back and listen to the original episodes. Go back and listen to the earlier episodes of the VA series to get all the foundational information. And remember your systems are the backbone of your success. I will talk to you again soon. Bye.

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