Is being a control freak hurting your business?

by Andrea Beadle

The issue of control has been coming up a great deal in the last few weeks and it is one that impacts on the success of our businesses.

When we start out in business for ourselves we have to learn to do a great deal of things. Chief cook and bottle washer as well as juggling all sorts of other roles. If we don’t have a huge budget to start with we hang on to those roles with the intention of relinquishing them when we start to make more money.

But sometimes that holds us back and keeps us small.

We think that doing these things ourselves will benefit us in the short term but when the time comes for us to be giving things up there is often a real battle! I’ve done it and I see people doing it all the time. Holding on to tasks that we can do in an attempt to save some money or because we don’t like to ask for help.

It appears that there are so many reasons we don’t want to relinquish tasks. It can be a trust issue, we don’t think anyone can do the job as well as we can, it would take longer to show someone else than to do it ourselves, we feel that asking for or accepting help shows weakness, we don’t have the budget… the list goes on!

In the end, it probably boils down to either being a control freak or some kind of paralysis issue within your business about moving forwards.

Sometimes we need to relinquish control to move forwards!

If we struggle to complete tasks that frustrate us or are beyond our capabilities it can take 5 times as long  for us to do them.

Multiply that by the number of tasks you are doing that you shouldn’t be and by the number of weeks a year, you are probably wasting hundreds of hours on tasks that someone else could do quicker, better and cheaper.

Not to mention that your time is probably far better spent on activities that might actually make you the money to pay someone to do them!

Ultimately we can’t do everything and there are some things that are just best left to someone more capable!

A good way to think about it is to list the tasks that only you can do, or that are within your “zone of genius”. Not just things that you prefer to do or think that you can do quicker than explaining it to someone else. Things that your clients absolutely expect YOU to do. The thing that makes a critical difference to your clients. The things that you LOVE to do.

These are the tasks that you should be doing!

Everything else you should be looking to outsource as soon as possible if you want your business to grow.

Consider also the hourly rate that you want to be earning in your business. If the task you are doing is possible to be outsourced to someone at a much lower rate, why do it yourself – you are undervaluing your time.

It takes a leap of faith to trust other people to do critical tasks in your business but it can also be a huge relief when you do.

I’ve had clients tell me that it felt as if a weight had been lifted from them or that tears of relief ran down their face when I took over a troublesome technology task for them and that it freed them up to focus on moving forward in their business.

So the challenge for you today is to take a look at the tasks that you are doing and ask yourself “Is it really necessary for ME to do this task?” and if the answer is no, consider whether you can outsource it to an expert in that area!

Tagged as: business support, outsourcing technology, technology for the terrified