A few weeks ago, I wrote a post outlining more than 40+ tasks that you could start delegating right now. They included personal and professional tasks that can free up your time to focus on business growth (and improved lifestyle.)
Now, I want to handle one of the next most common questions I get when a solopreneur is considering hiring their first person to help… when is the right time? The simplest answer is before you think you’re ready… because too many people wait WAY too long to get the help they need and hamstring their business growth at the beginning.
I don’t think every business needs to become a huge, complex mega-corp. However, I do believe that most businesses function better with a team pulling and leveraging each member’s strengths. Whether your team will be two or twenty people (or two hundred), you’ve gotta start somewhere… which means you’ve got to start.
Therefore, I want to walk through the three attributes to “knowing” you’re ready to start hiring and delegating.
Show Me The Money
Here’s the biggest challenge in most people’s experience. You’ve built your business to the point where it’s supporting you, but you’re on a cash flow roller-coaster. Some months are great, and others are really tight. Usually, things average out, but you’re still walking the line and feeling an occasional crunch.
This is going to sound crazy, but now is the time to hire someone. Why? Because if you free up even 5-10 hours of week of your time to focus on revenue generating activities, then you might be able to turn that roller-coaster into a carousel of cash.
When you’re not yet making any money it’s too early. When you’re making consistent positive profit, then you’ve probably waited too long. Why? Because you could likely be making even more if you leveraged your own time better through delegation.
It’s going to feel confusing and scary to take on another overhead expense when you still have tight months, but freeing your time can help grease those tight months with more of your time to dig into the activities that bring in the cash. It’s time to stop doing all these things, and start focusing on more cha-ching activities (sales calls, speaking, building/refining your ad campaign, etc).
Define & Document Your Systems
The second consideration prior to hiring concerns your systems. In other words, have you optimized your own effort as much as possible by defining and refining your systems. It’s really hard to delegate an ill-defined task to someone else.
You want to start by figuring out what tasks you want to delegate and documenting your current process for completing those tasks. This can be a great time to reflect on your current processes and make improvements. After all, if you shave another 30 minutes off the task for yourself, that’s also 30 minutes you won’t be paying someone else to do later.
Often people cringe or freeze up when I suggest they start documenting their processes… “Ugh, I already have enough on my to-do list. Do I have to?” The answer is “yes,” or you need to hire someone who’s good at documenting the processes as you teach them (and have patience because it might take them a bit longer to learn).
Often this is a step that I help my clients complete. We start with a quick & dirty version that walks through the steps (it doesn’t have to be a perfect, screenshot-filled, outline to get the job done.) From there you can refine, looking for the additional important information, lessons learned, and resources needed.
You’ll want to at least have the most common and important processes outlined prior to hiring because it will set your new team member up for greater success when they start with you.
Prepare Your Mindset
Here’s the deal, you’ll likely going to have a bunch of emotions the first time you hire someone… so feel the fear, and do it anyway. As Ray Bradbury said, sometimes you have to “jump of the cliff, and learn how to make wings on the way down.”
Summon up your courage, and just start making it happen. Draft up a job description for the right person. Document the core processes that person will need. And, make your hiring plan.
Be aware of these common potholes in the process:
* Team members will come and go, so take care of them well and recognize that hiring isn’t something you will just do once. Open your heart to these new relationships, and let them fly when it’s time.
* No one will love your business the way you do, but they can come close.
* You have to be ok with occasional mistakes. Let go of control, but don’t allow for carelessness.
* Hire slowly, fire quickly. When you know that something isn’t working, don’t wait hoping it will improve.
* As your team grows, recognize that your new job becomes taking care of your team because they will take better care of your customers/clients.
Next Actions
Where are you in your business growth process? Have you recognized yourself in some of the descriptions above? If you’ve been wondering whether it might be time to start bringing on a team, then it’s almost certainly time to make it happen.
You can start by taking some of the actions recommended above, or you can apply for strategy session to explore how I can support your path to growth through our Solo2Team Intensive or Infusion Program.
If you want to learn even more about hiring, then you might enjoy this FB Live I did on the 5 Common Hiring Mistakes that Even Smart Business Owners Make:
