What’s Stopping You from Achieving Success?
February 4th, 2008 by Liz Fuller
Deleegation is the key to success.
I know many Women Entrepreneurs don’t want to hear that and don’t believe it - but it’s true. As long as we try to do everything ourselves - we limit our effectiveness. We are constrained by our own time, talent and energy. And we put a limit on how big our business can grow.
When we delegate - we increase our power and our productivity. We leverage other people’s time, other people’s talent and other people’s energy. We take the limits off of our success. 
Reasons I hear for not delegating are:
- money - it’s cheaper to do it myself
- skill - no one else can do it as well as I can
- time - I can do it myself faster than explaining how to someone else
All three of these reasons are limiting beliefs that will get in your way of achieving success.
Money - You may believe you are saving money when you do everything yourself. But in reality all you are doing is wasting time and energy. That time and energy could be spent on doing more profitable and more important tasks for your business.
Skill - It may or may not be true that no one else can do the task as well as you can. But even if it is true, the question to ask yourself, is “does it matter?” As heretical as it sounds - not every task needs to be done to perfection. Some tasks just need to be good enough. Anything more is a waste of time and energy.
Time - Time is important. It is your most finite resource, even more than energy and money. You can increase your energy level, and you can make more money - but you only have a limited amount of time. The only way to increase time, is to use other people’s. And the only wise way to do that - is to invest the time upfront, once, to get their help.
In the coming weeks, I’ll discuss more about how to decide what to delegate, and who to delegate it to.
In the meantime, let me ask you - what is stopping you from delegating for success?
Photos by jsc*
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This entry was posted on Monday, February 4th, 2008 at 8:01 am and is filed under productivity, delegation, goal setting. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
February 5th, 2008 at 4:12 pm
Hey Liz,
Very good insight. And it’s usually the case that entrepreneurs (male or female) refrain from delegating because of a fundamental lack of trust. That old addage, “if you want something done right, do it yourself,” seems ingrained into peoples’ heads. Not to mention, Authentic Leadership skills are taught by almost no one on the planet, so the status quo is propogated again and again.
If people are afraid to delegate, then I’d suggest expanding that idea into Developing, Duplicating and THEN Delegating.
Build people, so they can begin to think on your wavelength, then you can empower them with your vision, your hopes for the future, and if their own hearts begin to beat in rythm with yours, then you will be able to treat them like your equal, giving them things to do that previously you kept to yourself, although your time might be better spent elsewhere.
As the legendary NFL coach, Mike Ditka said, “Treat men like men, and they’ll act like men. Treat them like children, and they’ll act like children.”
In so many words, that is the truth!
And then as one’s firm grows bigger, having Authentic Leadership Development a fundamental part of one’s business is imperative for long-term growth and success.
Talent alone won’t take you where you want to go, and neither will just hard work. You have to develop your timeless Leadership (not management) skills.
Eric Patrick Marr
February 7th, 2008 at 4:09 pm
As a budding entrepreneur myself, I want to create a Freedom Business System, so that delegating is NOT an issue. In fact it is built into the system immediately.
The art of delegation does require trust, and also requires a clear and concise explanation of the process to reach the outcome for the task delegated. That is much more difficult to accomplish sometimes than trust.
I think starting any business without the intent of moving out of doing 99% the work eventually is where lots of women tend to go wrong. We learn to multi-task early in our lives and it’s usually because we take on the task of juggling family, life and and business.
As you said Liz, “The only way to increase time, is to use other people’s. And the only wise way to do that - is to invest the time upfront, once, to get their help.”
Start with the end in mind.
I look forward to hearing more about your thoughts on delegation.
February 7th, 2008 at 5:51 pm
This sounds like a pure plug but James Brausch released a new product this morning (2-7-08) that covers this exact subject of delegating.
jamesbrausch.org/24-hour-special-9
Actually delegating the creation of products to sell. Somehow, he pulled it off.
February 10th, 2008 at 8:29 am
Eric - You’re right that at the bottom of not delegating is oftentimes - a failure to trust. That is particularly true with entrepreneurs - because we care so passionately about our business that we don’t want to risk putting it in anyone else’s hands. And yet - sometimes not doing so is an even greater risk!
Ria - Great thoughts - it’s so important to look at both the work that needs to be done and the system for doing it - we need to create systems that are sustainable - without our constant involvement!
Ted - Thanks for sharing the link - it’s always great to get additional perspectives.
May 29th, 2008 at 11:51 pm
Nice post Liz. The delegation part is very important. Lack of assertive delegation leads to improper time management. You can’t have one without the other.
Understanding the critical missions points - WHAT needs to be delgated is of crucial importance.