What your current team challenges say about your delegating style
How you are showing up for your team sets a precedence for how they are going to show up for you. While delegating may seem pretty black and white - get the things off your plate that you shouldn’t be doing - your delegating style is either creating a monster or creating your dream team. Following are three different delegating styles. What’s yours? The Ostrich You are great at giving your team the freedom to work independently, your schedule is free from team meetings (which you consider a waste of time), and you have successfully delegated things you don’t have to do, and never looked back! The challenges you are facing with your team: You are constantly let down by the outcome of your projects and you don’t understand why. Balls are dropped on a regular basis and you get constant text messages and emails from your team with questions you think they should have the answer to. What your team is experiencing: Your team is just trying to keep up with your next idea and they are in constant reactive mode and doing things last minute. They only know the plan for the next month (or less) and they don’t have a clear picture of what success looks like for the projects they are working on or how they contribute to the big picture. The Paranoid Parent You have reluctantly delegated some basic tasks but still hold onto things only because they are too important to have someone mess them up. The things that you have delegated you have created step-by-step instructions for how they should be done. Your time is split between serving your clients and running your business alongside your team. The challenges you are facing with your team: Your team never takes care of things proactively. You always have to ask to get something done - if you don’t ask, or if you don’t bring it up, it won't get done. You get constant questions about how things should be handled and most of the time tasks end up back on your plate for you to handle yourself. What your team is experiencing: Your team cruises along, getting the tasks done just like you have instructed them to. However, it’s a little boring because there aren’t any opportunities to add in their personal creativity or feedback. And, it’s really frustrating because they lack any confidence to handle something that comes up without running it...
When should I hire a Virtual Assistant?
A Virtual Assistant can help you serve more clients, have more time to work on your business and work towards your big mission, and give you more free time to enjoy life outside of your business as well. A great VA can help you do all of this by doing the things in your business that you should not be doing. However, you need to be ready to bring on a team member. Here are 3 tips for knowing when the time is right. When you can afford help First and foremost you need to be able to afford to commit to a team member long-term. Your business should be generating enough money where you can save for taxes, generate a profit, pay yourself, and pay for your expenses and someone to support you. A good VA will charge anywhere between $30-$65+ / hour (rates will vary greatly depending on experience). You can work with a VA for a few as 10-15 hours a month. And, if you find the right person who is excited to grow with you, you can increase the number of hours as your business grows. TIP: If you are implementing Profit First in your business, your team expense should be no more than 50% of your operating costs. When you are (pretty) clear there are things that you should not be doing It’s not necessary to be 100% clear about everything you want to delegate. In fact, if you wait to make sure you are 100% clear, you might be procrastinating! Have a good starting point and at least an idea of the things you can get off your plate. Keep a running list on your desk and write down the things you do that you know you could delegate to someone else. A great VA will jump in and take these things on AND help you see other things that you can hand off. TIP: You do not need to know HOW you are going to delegate these things. You just need to know what you want to delegate. Your VA will figure out the HOW! When you are ready to commit to a long-term partnership with your Virtual Assistant The magic in working with a VA really happens when you are working with someone long-term. If you are looking for someone to just handle a few tasks for you on an off and you aren’t really looking for a long term commitment,...
3 things to look for when hiring a Virtual Assistant or Online Business Manager (#3 is where the magic happens!)
Finding a great Virtual Assistant or Online Business Manager can feel really overwhelming. They are out there but if you don’t know what to look for, you might end up making a poor hiring decision. In fact, I hear from so many Transformational Coaches and Leaders that they have been putting off finding the support they need (and deserve!) because it’s just too overwhelming or they just don’t know where to start. The truth is, there are people out there who want to support you on your mission and free you up to do what you do best - coach and serve your clients! You just need to know what you are looking for. When finding the perfect fit for your team you are looking for someone who meets the mark in 3 key areas. 1. Skill Set: The knowledge and learned skills to do the work! This may seem like a no-brainer but I want to emphasize two things here around skill set. First, you really do need someone who has experience in working in a virtual environment. It’s not the same as working in an in-person setting. He/She needs to know how to ‘show up’ and make you feel like they are there to support you even when they are in a time zone (or more!) away. Second, you don’t need someone who can do everything. In fact, you just aren’t going to find this unicorn and you are going to limit your search. You do need someone who is resourceful enough to find people who can do the things that he/she can’t do. 2. Strengths: The striving instincts and strengths to do the work This is different from skill set. Skills and knowledge can be learned and acquired over time. Your striving instincts are ingrained at a very young age and don’t change over time. These are the natural strengths you need to work within in order to really do your best work and thrive in any role. For example, if you need someone on your team to create air-tight systems and processes and see every little step to get your team from point A to point B you need someone who has these natural strengths. Someone who does not have these natural strengths will always struggle to do this kind of work, or they might get by doing this work but they will not enjoy it. I recommend the Kolbe Indexes as a tool to help...
One concept to help you increase team efficiency
Working with a team in a virtual environment has lots of challenges. To ensure things run smoothly and your team is supported to get sh*t done, keep this one concept mind: Centralization. How can you centralize everything so that your team has one place to go to find information, get updates on tasks and to-dos, and communicate with each other? Conceptual business illustration with the words centralisation Centralize Information - If your team is constantly coming to you with questions, try this! You want your team to have one place to go to easily easily access information, written processes and systems, links, etc. If your team is constantly coming to you with questions or it seems like no one is on the same page, this could be a quick solution to try. Having documented systems and processes in one central location (preferably your project management tool) will empower your team to answer their own questions and find the information they need. If/when information needs to be updated or added, you only have to do this in one place. Everyone on the team has access to the latest and greatest information on any project you are working on. You never want your team storing documents and information on their personal computers. Any documents or information should be stored in one place where everyone can access them. If anything were to happen to your team member (or if they were to take a vacation - YIKES!) you don’t ever want to be searching for a document that only they have access to. Centralize Tasks - If balls are being dropped or there are constant open loops, try this! If you have a virtual team, even if it’s just you and your Virtual Assistant you need a project management tool. I LOVE and recommend Teamwork (<- this is my affiliate link, if you prefer you can go to Teamwork.com). For those who love organization and checklists, prepare to dork out! If balls are being dropped or your mind is constantly flooded with open loops that your team hasn’t closed, this could be a solution for you. Centralizing tasks allows you to see in real time what the status is for your projects. Teamwork also allows your team to make comments directly on a task so you can also see any communication or questions that are happening around tasks. Centralize Communication - If communicating with your team is feeling overwhelming or exhausting, try this! There are...