I am a Business Growth Accelerator. I am a Fractional COO. I address your operations and people performance in order to increase the speed of execution toward your goals.
Most of what I do is not considered sexy… (unless you’re me, I think it is).
You know what most people do find sexy?
- Less stress, heartburn, and worry lines
- More time back on their calendar
- Energy for date night with their partner
- Making it to little Johnny’s baseball game on time
- Turning their phone off for 48 straight hours without a worry
- Being able to sleep instead of hashing an event over and over
- Paying themselves at the level that matches their desired lifestyle
- Confidence that they can go on vacation and come back to business as smooth-ual (new word I am using to replace “usual”… What do you think?)
These are the outcomes my clients get when they use me as an outsourced partner in their business. These are also the outcomes they get when they decide to outsource other aspects of their business to other partners and experts.
It would be very hard to have that sexy lifestyle if you are mixed into every aspect of your business. At that point you are not running a business, you are working in a job.
You are working in a job, in your own business, when you are the only decision maker. When you are involved in every step. When you are the “go-to” contact for clients or team members. When you have customers in your direct email inbox. When everything is in your head. When you plan to keep doing it all. When you buy into a limiting belief that somehow you should magically be good at doing it all because you title is “Owner.”
The two biggest questions for most owners are:
“how do I know when to outsource”
“how do I decide what to outsource”
My answers to this straddle the line between practical and intuitive. Decide what fits you best.
- The parts of your business that take you a lot of time
- Determine if there is room to tighten up the process of doing this work, or if maybe it would just be faster for someone else. This gives you time back on your calendar that can be reallocated to effective work.
- What you are not good at
- It is safe to admit that you are not good at everything. Remember that limiting belief I mentioned earlier? The belief that you should magically be good at everything just because you are the owner will limit your business potential – you will be getting in your own way. Let an outsourced expert do the work in which you are less than an expert. They will be doing it right, and right the first time (and probably also faster – see #1).
- What you do not like doing
- We usually don’t like doing things we are not good at and take a long time to do (see #1 and #2). Determine if the things you do not like doing can be eliminated or are extremely necessary to success. If they must be done, seek out someone who likes doing it. Do yourself a favor and release yourself of the burden and allow yourself to reallocate that energy to something more effective and inspiring. It also allows you to provide someone the opportunity to contribute to your business in an area that brings them joy. Their work will probably end up being of higher quality than yours would be simply because they like doing it.
- The tasks and functions that are “below your CEO pay grade”
- Yes, you are the CEO. Place yourself in the position to attend to the most important aspects of the business, like assessing trajectory toward overall goals, making long-term oriented decisions, leading the team to show up as their best selves, reminding everyone of the “why,” envisioning the big bad-ass future for your business, etc. If your work as CEO does not directly protect or serve the linchpin of your business, then consider that this might be a function or task best completed by an outsourced partner.
- **Read more about this concept and the “Queen Bee Rule” in the book ‘Clockwork’ by Mike Michalowicz**
- To challenge the status quo
- One of my favorite idioms is that “You can’t read the label from inside the jar.” As the owner of a business and often for any member on the team, you are so close to what is happening right in front of you that is difficult to see a bigger picture. You are in the jar and you cannot put yourself in a space to think outside of…the jar. Invite an outsourced partner in to expand on thoughts, to offer new perspectives, to challenge the status quo. In the end you are still the decision maker, but inviting collective intelligence from outside the company expands on the potential of the business.
- When you feel like you have lost touch with your customer base
- When was the last time you put yourself in the shoes of your customer/client. When was the last time you were in touch with positive and negative feedback your customers offered? Get outside the jar and be with your customers to understand them. Determine if what you currently offer is still meeting it’s full potential or if there is another area value you are hearing as a need. Be the visionary. And be the visionary that continues to create value for customers and delivers on promises.
One of the best questions I was ever asked was “What are you tolerating?” Boom-shaka-laka! So many lightbulbs came from that conversation. I want you to ask yourself the same question, and decide if outsourcing is an answer for some of your tolerations.
If you are considering that outsourcing may be right, then schedule an introductory call with me (You can do this is a matter of seconds on the “Contact Us” page of the website). I will focus on asking you the questions you need to be asking yourself so you can make an informed decision. We can also talk about WHO to outsource work to, and Outsource vs Delegate. So much good stuff!!
