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Why You Need to Get Comfortable with Collaboration and Delegation If You Want Your Business to Thrive
(This is a contributed post)
Entrepreneurs are well known to be workaholics, as a general rule. While it’s obviously important to maintain a decent work-life balance, it just kind of goes with the territory that those who want to be successful in running their own businesses, typically have to work very hard to do so.
Another stereotype about entrepreneurs which is often true, is that they are control freaks, and feel the need to micromanage everything. This is understandable, since many entrepreneurs start their business ventures solo, and do indeed need to do everything themselves at the outset.
Unfortunately, though, this desire to micromanage can absolutely sink a business venture as it expands. In fact, one of the key skills that successful entrepreneurs need to develop over time, is the ability to collaborate and delegate.
Here are a few reasons you absolutely have to get comfortable with collaboration delegation if you want your business to thrive.
Logistically, there are just certain things that you won’t be able to achieve on your own – at least, not well
The bigger your business gets, and the more successful it becomes, the more it will require specialisations that you just don’t have.
If, for example, you have a large item of industrial machinery that needs to be moved, do you think you’re going to be able to do a good job of towing it around using an improvised winch system, and your own car? Almost certainly not. Instead, you should contact a company like Swan Towing to do the job for you.
The same principle applies in all kinds of different scenarios. As your business grows, you need to produce more and more written marketing materials. But unless you’ve got experience as a professional copywriter, that job will be intensely time-consuming for you, and you’re unlikely to do it well, either.
If you try to do everything yourself beyond the point where you have the required skillsets, you will inherently sabotage the progress and performance of your business.
Your time is arguably your most valuable resource, and if you try to micromanage everything, you will squander it
Money is a pretty important resource for entrepreneurs, of course. But the thing about money is that it can be passed back and forth, amassed, spent, and invested.
Your time, on the other hand, is an absolutely finite resource, and once you’ve spent it, you never get to earn it back.
Successful entrepreneurs are always good at managing their time, and allowing their employees and contractors to do their jobs, so that they themselves have more time available for the “big picture” stuff.
As a quote attributed to Warren Buffett says: “the difference between successful people and really successful people, is that really successful people say no to almost everything.”
Focus and “simplification” are essential if you want to avoid burnout
Entrepreneurs are notorious for burning themselves out, and experiencing major health issues as a result of their workaholic tendencies.
It should go without saying that the risk of burnout rises in direct proportion to how many different complex tasks you are trying to micromanage at the same time.
Instead of trying to oversee and handle everything directly, you need to work on “simplifying” your professional life. That doesn’t mean “making things easy.” It just means having a clearly defined and narrow sphere in which you operate, so that you can focus, and maintain proper balance.
