Delegation is an essential skill that some small business owners may find hard to master.
If you’ve built your business up from scratch you may be used to doing most of the work. But you’ll reach a point where delegating becomes necessary in order to increase your impact and maintain a reasonable work-life balance.
From identifying tasks to delegate to taking advantage of new delegation opportunities, these four simple strategies will help you at every step of the delegation process.
Learn to Prioritize
The first step is identifying which tasks to delegate. To do this you can apply the Three D’s rule. With any new task, ask yourself whether you’ll Do it, Delegate it or Drop it.
You may decide to take on the tasks that have a direct, immediate impact on growth, while delegating to other members of your team the tasks that are more strategic, that is to say, they take longer to complete and have a more long-term impact.
Communicate Clearly
Communication is one of the keys to successful delegation. Communicate your expectations clearly and outline results and deadlines with precision.
Use these simple strategies to communicate effectively when you delegate a task:
- Include instructions if necessary: Make sure they’re clear and concise.
- Communicate delegation face to face: This encourages feedback and avoids misunderstandings.
- Use rephrasing: Ask the other person to rephrase the instructions, deadline and expectations to make sure everyone’s on the same page.
- Communicate to other members of your team: Be sure they know that the delegation has happened.
Set Milestones and Monitor Progress
As the old saying goes, trust but verify. Set milestones to monitor the progress of the tasks you delegate. This way you’ll avoid micromanaging your team, ensuring that you focus on results and not on procedure details.
Take Advantage of Opportunities to Delegate
Once you have mastered the delegation process, take advantage of new delegation opportunities. Factoring your receivables, for example, is a smart way to delegate because it turns your invoices to cash, effectively delegating the collection activities of your small business.
At ACS Factors We are able to advance cash on receivables for companies anywhere in the U.S. We are located in Upland, California, and have many clients in the distribution and logistics corridor which includes Ontario, Riverside, Fontana, Jurupa Valley and Moreno Valley.
Reach out by email (info@acsfactors.com), telephone (909-949-5599) or through our social media accounts on Facebook, Twitter and YouTube to learn more about the benefits of factoring your invoices to get cash today!
