MBA2562 How To Master The Art of Delegation and Grow Your Business

0:05If you don't learn how to delegate in your business, you will be trapped. Your growth will be capped, but more importantly, you'll be trapped forever in your business. You'll be a slave to your business and not be able to break free and have that time freedom. Hey, everyone. Welcome back to the$100 MBA show. I'm your host, Omar Zinhome. And in today's lesson, you'll learn how to master the art of delegation. This is so that you can grow your business beyond just yourself. This is where true entrepreneurship lives, right? This is where it's at, right? This is where you want to go. So if you're trying to do everything yourself, you're not just overworking yourself, you're holding your business back.

0:43Delegation is the key to scaling, avoiding burnout, and focusing on what you do best. Let's break down how to delegate effectively and take your business to the next level. Let's get down to business. Did you know that 21 % of entrepreneurs say they work over 60 hours a week? That's not sustainable. That's a study according to Small Business Genius. a research study in preparation of today's episode, which is all about delegation. And I just want to get something out of the way. Delegation isn't just about getting some help. It's about understanding that you're being mindful of creating a business that thrives without you, that doesn't require you to micromanage every part, every detail of your business.

1:24Today, I'm going to show you how to build a team you can trust and delegate like a pro and get over all your hangups at stopping you from doing that right now. Step one, identify your zone of genius. Delegation starts with understanding what only you can do. Your zone of genius is the work that drives most value to your business. What is the thing that you're special at, that you're pretty damn good at, that allows you to bring in revenue into your business? Whether that's strategy or product creation or building relationships, What is the thing that you really bring to the table that leverages everything and makes your business tick?

2:07The reason why we want to identify this is because your goal here is to only do these things. Everything else should be delegated. For example, my zone of genius is creating valuable content and steering the vision of my business. So throughout all the businesses I've run, that's what I focus on. I focus on creating things like this podcast, running sales webinars, creating videos, creating sales copy. This is really where I really love to work because this is where I shine. This is where I can add the most value. This is where I can actually influence the business in a positive way to bring in revenue.

2:44And I got to get really focused on what am I really good at? And really, it's the delivery of the content. Everything else I need to delegate, like editing, like admin work, like customer support, like calendar management, like everything else. And that's where I am right now. I only do the things that are my zone of genius. Now, sometimes things creep in and I gotta catch myself and say, why am I doing this? I should be delegating this to somebody else. Not a good use of my time. If not all of my time should be learning new things, cultivating my mind through reading books or taking courses or going to events or conferences, is building relationships, is creating great content.

3:20That's really what I should be doing only. So as an action step for you, I want you to list all the tasks you do in a week. This might take some time. I remember when I did this exercise the first time, it took me like the whole week, right? Because I would keep remembering things that I do and jot it down, right? And I had like a list of 400 things. I'm not joking. It was like over 400 things on my notepad that I do in a given week. Now, after you've written all these things that you do in a week, circle the things that are in your zone of genius. It shouldn't be that much. When I did this exercise, I had 400 things on the list.

3:56I circled like seven or eight things. Those are things I get to own. I could do myself and do not pass on to somebody else. Everything else, like 393 things on my list gets delegated. Step two, we're going to start small to build confidence in our delegation skills. I know that delegation can feel risky, especially if you're used to doing everything yourself. So I want you to start small with some small tasks that are not going to crush your business if they go wrong, okay? They're not going to completely destroy your business, all right? So one of the easiest things you need to start with is with some administrative tasks, some admin tasks.

4:37And the first hire I made was a virtual assistant, somebody who was my assistant and did all the menial tasks that I just didn't want to do anymore. The things that are bogging me down, taking too much time and not really adding a lot of value. These are things like calendar management, booking appointments, getting me on other podcasts, responding to emails from customers. Even if that response was just responding to the customer saying, got your email. Thank you. I'll get back to you with an answer shortly. And then that VA would ask me the question and I would reply. And then that person would learn that that is how to reply to those questions.

5:12You know that often on the show, we offer a worksheet with our episodes. Now, I used to create these worksheets myself in Canva. But then I realized, why am I doing this? This is not my zone of genius. I need to create the content. Once I've shot the video and I shot the actual episode, I can pass it on to somebody who can create a worksheet out of it and do it better than I can. So if you're new to this, start small. Even if it's just documentation of the procedures in your business, what are the rules when it comes to when you get inbound emails? How do you respond? What is the procedure? What's your leave policy?

5:44Get that document. Create a company handbook. So whatever it is, get somebody to help you do these admin tasks that don't require you to do. You can literally just talk into a mic or on your phone and just dictate what you want and get that done by an assistant. So as an action step, I want you to choose a repetitive task you currently handle, and that should be on your list of things you do each week, and delegate it to a team member or a contractor or an EA that you can hire. You don't need to hire somebody full-time. They could be 20 hours a week, 10 hours a week. Again, you can go to a site called onlinejobs.ph.

6:17Great talent out of the Philippines that can help you out. Just set clear expectations and review their work regularly. Very simple. It just gets you in the habit of delegating. Step three, document and systemize. I hinted at this earlier, but to delegate effectively, you need systems in place. You need to document your process to ensure consistency and make sure it's easier to onboard new team members. So for example, when I was first training our first EA, who's still with us, by the way, Cindy, she's fantastic. She's now a production manager. She's moved up the ranks over the years. But when I first trained Cindy, I would just shoot a screen capture video about how do you publish a podcast episode on our website.

7:00And I walked her through step by step. Her first task was not to do the task. Her first task was to document the procedure and to put it into a document, a Word document, which became our manual, our SOP, our standing operating procedure for that task. So again, we create SOPs, which are called standard operating procedures for everything we do in our business. Why? I want to make sure that no matter what happens, somebody can step in, read this document, and be able to do the task. We do this right now with our company, The$100 MBA. I did this for Webinar Ninja, our software company. And guess what?

7:33When we went to get acquired, when we sold the company, these SOPs were like gold. It allowed us to have really good bargaining power and really negotiate the price we wanted because it's very plug and play. The new buyer can just read these documents and know how to run the business. Now, guess what? Those SOPs are owned by the person that's working for you that you delegated the task to. They can update it. They can improve it. They can train other people off these SOPs. Brilliant. So as an action step, start with one key task that you want to delegate, record a video or write a step-by-step procedure of how to do it, and then share with your team or share with the person that you've hired to ensure it's clear and that they know what to do.

8:17Ask them to produce an SOP so that you can review the SOP and say, okay, that's exactly how you're supposed to do it. Now do the task. Step four, hire the right people. Delegation only works when you trust the people you're delegating to. You need to invest the time in finding team members who are skilled, but also align with your business values and goals. They understand what you're trying to build here. Another huge hint on how to make a good hire when it comes to delegating tasks or finding somebody to take things off your plate is they got to be a quick study. They'd be able to learn things quickly and implement.

8:54They got to be able to use a little bit of creativity to improve upon your ideas, improve upon your procedures. They got to be a go-getter. Again, I'm going to talk about Cindy, who is one of our first hires still with us still today. Super amazing team member of ours. And when she was in the interview, I remember this like it was yesterday. She told us, hey, I saw the job description. I asked you a bunch of questions here on the interview. I can do everything you are mentioning that I have to do, but I will learn. I will figure it out. I'll make it happen. And when I heard those words in my head, and I know Nicole was thinking the same thing, she was on the call, I said, she's hired.

9:30Because you really can't train somebody to have that kind of attitude. Once you find somebody that is willing to figure it out, to make it happen, to be a learner, to be somebody who's willing to grow and to push themselves, that's an instant hire for me. Because I can always train new skills. I can't train attitude. That's got to come from within. You got to have the right attitude coming in. So for me, that was a no-brainer. I'm so glad that we made that hire because that bet really paid off for us because Cindy's been with us for so long and she's been a great hire, like I mentioned. But the point here is that make sure when you're hiring, look for candidates that have a track record of self-management.

10:09They have problem-solving skills. Ask them some questions that are a little challenging and see how they respond. Ask situational questions to gauge your approach to particular challenges. This really helps you to know, are they a lateral thinker? somebody that's looking to solve a problem and help you figure things out and take things off your plate. At the end of the day, when you make a hire, you need them to be able to help you work less. Okay. If they're creating more work for you, that's a problem. You need somebody who's going to be able to be a quick study, pick things up and say, yep, I could do that.

10:41I can also do this by the way. You didn't mention this, but I could do this as well. Let me take that off your plate too. That's a great hire. Step number five, one of the most important steps. I learned this from my buddy, Carl Taylor, and that's Let Go of Perfection. Carl Taylor runs an agency called Automation Agency, and it's an agency where you can find great VAs, like I mentioned, and we'll link up to it in the description in YouTube as well in the show notes. But Automation Agency is all about hiring assistants to help you build your company. And when I was having a hard time delegating earlier in my career, and I had a hard time with maybe the quality of the work, I always said to him, hey, you know, I always delegate, but it's never as good as I want it to be.

11:25And he's like, you're right. The truth is that 80 % done is what you should expect, right? But he says 80 % done by someone else is better than 100 % done by you because it frees up your time for high value work. Because remember, when I do my zone of genius, I bring in the big bucks, right? If I spend one hour on something and it brings in$10 ,000, that's better than me spending one hour on something and brings in$1 or no dollars. because this is something that just I need to do to run the company. So he said, if you just expect 80%, that's good enough, and she should be happy with that. And that readjusted my expectations, and I thank Carl to this day for that.

12:02And what I realized is that, yes, it got to 80%, and I was okay with it, but eventually that 80 % became 90 % and became 95 % because they got better and better at the job and started improving. And in the meantime, I gained my hours back and was able to focus on high-value, high-revenue tasks. So as an action step, set clear expectations, but allow your team, the new hire that you just hired, the flexibility to approach tasks in their own way. Trust the process, right? Try not to micromanage them. Focus on the outcome rather than the process. Look at what they actually create and do for you at the end and say, okay, this is actually quite good.

12:39Thank you so much. This is what I would change, you know, and not worry so much about how they got there. You got to give them some autonomy for them to feel ownership of the job. Step six, focus on communication and feedback. Effective delegation relies on clear communication and regular feedback. And this might seem kind of monotonous, and it is in the beginning. It seems a little unnatural, but you need your team to understand your expectations and feel supported to do their best work, right? In the beginning, you gotta do some hand-holding, right? It's almost twice as much work than you doing it yourself.

13:15You just gotta admit it, right? Instead of you doing this for the rest of time to infinity, you're going to spend twice as much time on doing the task right now to teach them and train them and to coach them and give them the encouragement they need. But then it will allow you to be freed up forever, which is great. So as an example, I like to schedule regular check-ins with new hires to discuss their progress or address any challenges and give them feedback. Right. And just in time feedback is so important to give them feedback when they need it most, when things are not the way you expect. So they know.

13:47Right. You got to allow them to know how to win. It's not fair for you to be like, oh, you lost, you fail, you're fired. No, that's not fair. You have to be fair and tell them, hey, this is what I expect. Remind them what you expect. Show them how to get to that expectation so that you can have a happy and fulfilled team member. So as an action step, establish a communication rhythm like weekly meetings or daily five-minute stand-up updates like we used to do to keep everyone on the same page. I say used to because people were new. Now they're not so new. You can use things like Slack or Asana or whatever team communication app, Google Chat if you want to.

14:24It's free. But the point here is that you want to be able to check in, especially in the beginning, to make sure everybody's on the right track. So let's wrap up this whole talk about delegation. It's not just about getting tasks off your plate. It's about empowering your business to grow. It's an understanding that real entrepreneurship is you just focusing on your zone of genius and your vision, your leadership. That's it, right? At the end, all the little tasks that make the things work every day, you can go ahead and delegate that. My barometer is really, can I go away for a month or two without doing any work, right?

15:00So for example, I go away sometimes for four weeks, five weeks, six weeks, seven weeks. And I've recorded all these podcast episodes in advance. They're in the can. My team is working on them. They're editing. They're getting them out on social media. And I don't touch anything because I've delegated everything else because I don't want to be owned by my business. I want to be the business owner, right? I want to be able to take the time I need to reflect, to learn, to have new experiences, to grow as a person so I can give back to my business. Thanks for tuning into the$100 MBA show. So if you found this episode helpful, share it with a friend, send them a message, send them a WhatsApp, get them a link, right?

15:38Just go to 100mba.net if you want to just give them the website link and show them, hey, all the episodes are here. Check them out. They're pretty cool. And don't forget, you can't do it all, right? And if you're trying to do it all, you're doing it the hard way, right? You don't have to do that. And I'm teaching you out of experience. I was super, super covetous of all the tasks on my business. I realized that that's not really being an entrepreneur. That was self-employment. That's me buying a job, right? I want to be able to be free of the day-to-day and be able to grow an exponential business that grows beyond just my time.

16:15Thanks so much for listening, and I'll check you in the next episode.