Part of being a responsible business owner means taking the medicine that you often prescribe to others.
Understand the difference between knowing that you CAN accomplish all of the tasks on your own, versus accepting that your time is limited and equals money.
Take the time to identify and separate out the tasks that require your specific expertise or oversight, and which ones can be delegated.
Story: The Super Executive who can’t setup her voicemail.
Moral: If you’re too busy performing all of the tasks, you’re not leading your team.
I learned this lesson as a young project manager just starting out. The firm I worked for made the business decision to eliminate their entire leadership team and bring in a new and innovative team from a Fortune 500 company.
They were very intimidating, we were all terrified. Noella was our new director of operations; we never saw her. We did receive reports from her, sent all hours of the night from the different countries she was travelling to.
During one of her travels, our company had a new phone system installed. Me, being ever-helpful, mastered the set up installation and helped everyone figure out how to use these 100 button phones.
Noella returned from her trip to a phone that she hadn’t used and couldn’t retrieve her voicemails.
I panicked when I saw her name come across my phone. She had never made eye contact with me let alone talked to me!
“I hear you’re the person to call when you need help. Can you come down here?”
“Sure, I’ll be right there!” I left my cubicle, poked my head into another senior project manager’s office and said “NOELLA JUST CALLED ME, SHE NEEEEDS ME!” Both of our eyes bulged, she laughed and said “well, don’t keep her waiting, she makes $300/hour so every second might cost you!”
I helped set up her voicemail and headed back to my cubicle.
I stopped by the senior project manager’s office, closed her door and told her that I set up Noella’s voicemail. “I can’t believe that someone who makes that much money doesn’t know how to set up a her own voicemail.”
The senior PM surprised me with her response. Usually we were on the same page when it came to our opinions of management. Instead she said, “honestly, I think that’s a good thing.”
“This company spends a lot of money to have them here, I want to know that the time they spend is on things that are worth it.”
I hadn’t considered that. With that comment, I began to compartmentalize my own tasks. I had project coordinators who were supposed to be building my plans, invoicing my clients and scheduling my teams travels. I wasn’t using them because I knew that I could do all of that on my own. But, I wasn’t focusing on the things that actually needed my attention as a project manager.
Your responsibilities as a manager are tasks that other employees may not monitor proactively.
- Finances & Bookkeeping: Know all of the money coming in and going out.
- Auditing: Spot check and audit client/business accounts on a recurring basis and keep a record of the audit.
- Employee Strengthening: Meet with your employees regularly in a group setting and individually to make sure their questions are answered and they are taking good self care.
- Financial Planning: Plan for how and when your business, clients or accounts will grow. Set goals for your employees to strive for.
- Operations Management: Oversee all of your departments. Help remove barriers that might prevent them from doing their work. Don’t just do the work for them.
- Reporting: Keep good records and data. Even if you don’t have anyone to “report” to, you owe it to your employees to show them the growth that has been achieved to validate their hard work. This will also help support a business case in the future should you want/need to explore funding options.
The moral is, know your worth. As a manager, there are tasks that you are solely responsible for. If you’re too busy performing all of the tasks, you’re not leading your team.