How to get twice the work done…in half the time.

Time is money

I don’t know about you, but my ‘IN’ box never seems to get close to empty. Voice mail, email, snail mail, periodicals, industry journals, client projects, travel schedules, kids on vacation, family time, the operational demands of running three different companies and of course writing, writing and more writing.

People routinely ask me how I manage to get it all done. I work only about 45 hours a week, I’m typically able to take about 6-8 weeks of vacation every year, I’m able attend the majority of my kid’s school events and still manage to build the profitability of each business on pace, each year.

I’m not the smartest guy in the world, I don’t have 26 hours in a day, but I do have very well developed delegation skills and I’m developing a greater ability to sort, prioritize and say no to distracting offers. I also make it a point to surround myself with people who can think through problems, follow through on projects, accept responsibility for their efforts and then I LEAVE THEM ALONE. The word micro-management is not in my vocabulary.

Training, mentoring, coaching, developing and responsibility are and I’m willing to take the time with a person to do the first four so that in very short order they can take on the fifth.

The keys to delegation are as follows:

Determine what your time is worth, by the hour. Delegate anything that can be handled by someone who is paid less than that rate. There’s profit in your time, use it wisely.

Delegate with all of the relevant information, clearly defined outcomes, a time frame for completion and any designated meeting times. As an example, a three month project should have weekly or bi-weekly status meetings…set those dates now as you’re delegating the project, set the start and end times of these meetings and unless there is some huge issue, the next time you’ll discuss this project will be at the next status update meeting.

Delegate with responsibility. Make sure that the person that you assign to a task has the tools and the authority to get the job done. There is no value in assigning a task and then having the person assigned coming back to you repeatedly for either permission or more information. Those disruptions are more costly than doing the project yourself.

Bob Holdsworth - Delegate Tasks for the most efficient time management in the workplace

Don't let everything fall into your hands

Delegate with plenty of time built in to your deadline. Especially if the person you’re delegating to is new to working with you, leave plenty of time to fix any issues with the final product well before your real deadline. As you get more comfortable with their skills, diligence and timeliness you can shrink the safety margin. Many people make the mistake of creating a deadline the day before a project is really due only to find they are working well into the night to fix issues that should have been dealt with along the way.

Delegate and get on with the next item on your TO DO list. Once I delegate a task and have the next agreed upon progress meeting(s) scheduled, that item is simply a meeting note for me and I move on the the next item. I routinely have 5 or more key projects in the hand of others.

In fact, as I’m spending my time writing this, one person on the team is editing a document for the members section of our website, another is editing a video for me and another for a client, a third is running analysis reports for a different client, a fourth is researching some technology for the office and a virtual assistant in Manila is working on a Facebook project for me. All of that is happening while my operations manager is handling the daily routine of an entirely separate business.

Six major things happening at the same time that I’m writing this article. Oops, have to end here…the editing of the document is done and now I need to work on that while he moves on to creating an email marketing sequence.