Are You Working Too Much or Too Little In Your Business? | Ep 43

Speaker A

00:00:00.240 - 00:18:06.930

This is episode 43, and on it I talk about the challenge of doing too much or too little in your business as the owner and what it should look like at different revenue plateaus. This is the Bottleneck Breakthrough podcast.

I'm Josh Long and this is all about helping you find and fix the biggest challenges in your business to unlock growth and profits that last. Hey there. Excited to dig in with you on this topic of are you doing enough? Are you doing too much?

Seems to be quite the knife's edge for most business owners that I deal with. They get into their head that, oh, I need to work on my business, I need to get out of the day to day, I need to outsource these things.

And it's way too premature for most of them when they're going down that path.

And then there's the ones that do everything and get trapped and become the cog in the wheel and everything revolves around them and they just stack up bottlenecks one behind the other that they can't get done because they won't delegate. They don't know how to delegate.

So I'm going to go through this session to talk about how do you figure out which camp you're in and what you should be focusing on, really, based on revenue plateaus? I go over revenue plateaus through the book. I come back to them over and over in all of my consulting. And I think, right.

Sizing your expectations about what you should be doing and which parts of your business you should be involved in and which parts you should be delegating or outsourcing, I think should help you get unstuck and have better expectations. Because it's those misguided expectations that I think get so many owners tripped up and unable to move forward.

So for most business owners, you fall on the side of the spectrum of doing too much. The classic line I talk about in my book, that it's just easier if I just get it done, it'll be done right, it'll be done better.

Other people are lazy or flakier. They just don't do it right. They don't care.

All of those excuses cause business owners to take too much responsibility and become the cog in the wheel that nothing can get past.

And so as your business grows and as you start getting to certain revenue points, figuring out what you should be doing to hand things off is really important. And I think the simple stuff, and this is probably, if you're listening to this, you're probably way past these points.

But the simple stuff of basic customer Support, get that off your plate as soon as possible. Get tickets, updates and headaches.

There's all the little things that you can train somebody to solve and you can create some frequently asked questions or a knowledge base and get that off your plate. So you're just not putting out fires and dealing with the minutiae after fulfillment.

If you're in an expert space and you are the genius that delivers the outcome, you can still get somebody else to help facilitate scheduling, do some minutiae on follow up on invoices or things like that. You don't need to be available for the clients at all times.

I think that's where a lot of professionals services in like the real estate, financial services or tax services fall victim is. Well, they're the ones that have the relationship with the client. They're.

They're the ones that do everything for the client so the client expects to talk to them.

I know I had a friend who's an attorney and he tried building a big law firm and all of his clients would not deal with paralegals or the junior attorneys that he had built the relationship with over decades because they were just used to getting him. And so his history trapped him into that. So get that stuff off your plate. Next I would say bookkeeping. This is a funny one.

There's so many bad bookkeepers out there. Bookkeeping services are a dime a dozen. I don't know how these bookkeepers stay in business.

I think it's because most business owners just don't want to deal with it, don't look at it, don't realize that so many of their books are miscategorized, misplaced things fall behind and aren't updated regularly because the business owners aren't looking at it. But getting a bookkeeper is critical and a competent one, obviously, because you're just up a creek if you get a bad one.

And they just make things worse. So get a good bookkeeper. This is not somebody that should be paying all of your bills or writing all of your big checks.

But they're reconciling it, they're organizing it, they're putting things in order, they're keeping things timely so that you're getting a stack every week of things that need to be cut, things that you need to send out. And you're not stuck reconciling everything. You can go over the reconciliation with them.

But that minutiae of dealing with reconciliation is such a time suck for so many small business owners that they just let it fall to the wayside and then they're just managing books by their checkbook or bank account. And that's also a recipe for disaster. So as you're moving forward, then you start thinking, oh, well, we need more leads.

I've been managing lead flow. I'm going to get an agency. And this is another kiss of death. Most agencies are completely worthless, less than worthless.

I think they're more damaging than good. Very honest. I've got friends that have agencies. A lot of them are really good.

But for the most part, most agencies create more of a problem than a benefit. And it's because their business model is broken. They're in the business of getting you set up, making it look like they're doing a ton of work.

They get a ton of work done in the first 60 to 90 days. Hopefully they get enough leads that you're happy.

And then they put you into maintenance mode and turn you into an annuity that takes as little effort as possible and keeps that monthly check coming in so that they can focus on the next new clients that they can wow with their onboarding and stuff. So I know I'm not going to make any friends in the agency space, but I don't really care.

Every client I've ever worked with, I've gotten their agency fired or quit or canceled or whatever because they're all just steaming pile. And so when you look at, well, how do I find somebody that can do marketing for us? I think there's a couple ways to go about this.

One is there's a lot of really great freelancers out there. They're hard to find. I like finding them on upwork. I think, like, I think it's marketers hire is the other one.

Toptal might have marketing help, but the thing with freelancers is there's so many good ones out there and you're able to get directly contact with them, have them work closely, meet with you regularly, give you way more attention than any agency is ever going to do. And you may say, well, but an agency has an account manager I can call anytime.

And it's like, yeah, but that account manager is just running interference. And then they've got to go back and figure out who's actually doing the work.

And they shield you from the lackeys that are just out of college or overseas that hardly speak English and they're doing all the work and you don't ever get to talk to them.

And so there's this huge disconnect from the account rep that is just trying to keep your account alive and keep you happy and it's really like a lobbyist almost for those agencies.

So working with freelancers, you're able to get direct access to somebody that's talented, that isn't bloated in all their fees and you can get them in any size engagement that you want. You may get somebody that just comes in and gets your ad account set up and configured and turned on, but then they hand it back to you.

Or maybe it's somebody that you give them all the creative ideas and all of the marketing strategy and then they just go turn the wrenches and get it done. And so there are thousands and thousands of these types of freelancers out there.

And I always recommend business owners start with them, get them going.

And the beauty is a lot of times you can bring them in house, you could work with them part time, full time, they can be with you until you decide to bring somebody in house full time that can do it. But I think that that specialization with freelancers is such an unlock.

I've got a client, she was trying to do everything herself and I told her just get somebody that can take over your email marketing because she's got a big retail or e commerce brand and needed regular emails going out. And it was like, just test that out, get it off your plate.

And that gave her some freedom to free up her time and go work on some manufacturing side of things, get some processes down and you're able to do quick tests, low risk. You're not signing a big contract like you are with an agency. And that's the other thing I hate about agencies.

Their cancellation clauses can be so egregious.

I had a client two years ago, their agency required them to give a cancellation notice, but it didn't count until the end of the quarter that that cancellation was given in and then it had a two quarter buffer period. So they put in their termination notice in early January, but that doesn't count until the end of Q1, which is the end of March.

And then a two quarter buffer. So all the way through to September they were supposedly on the hook for this big monthly contract.

And obviously I negotiated that around that and talked the agency down and got my client out of it. I'm saving them like 25,000amonth on that.

So I think all to say that there are so many great freelancers now the effort is finding them, working through them. Obviously I've worked with a ton of them and have some to recommend, but it is like kissing frogs.

You get, but that's where you do quick tests, small tests and you may say, well, but I just need this off my plate.

And I think that's the crux of all of this, is the typical business owner is running around with their hair on fire, fire extinguishers in both hands, trying to put out the fires that they probably started, and they can't think about the space or the time to get ahead or to be proactive about these things.

And so when you think about, gosh, I don't have time to find a freelancer, I don't have time to interview people or do tests or try things, then I think that is indicative of how buried you are in this. And so go through my process with bottleneck breakthrough and start removing huge time sucks off of your plate.

And I think that's where the balance comes in, that you're putting out fires all day, every day you're running around, you've conditioned yourself to be in the middle of the business, be there every day, and you have no space or time to think about it.

And so whenever I work with a client, that's the number one thing, is get your time back, and then we can be proactive and go from there to be strategic on what actually needs to be added, what's going to get solved, what's going to move the needle. So as you think about, gosh, I'm just not into meeting new people. I don't want to interview all these people, I don't want to do these tests.

Then I think that's a reflection on a big Achilles heel a lot of entrepreneurs have that is that they're just not extroverted and don't enjoy working through the management side of things and dealing with people. And so if that's the case for you, then you need to develop an operations manager that is great at that stuff.

You need to compensate for your lack and shortcomings in that area of leadership so that you can get somebody on your team that you trust that can interview people, can review people, can manage people, and that oftentimes isn't available until you get to a million dollars in revenue. If you're not at that million dollars, then maybe it's an assistant and you just find an assistant that you overpay.

And instead of having to pay 100 to 120,000 a year for an operations manager, you're paying that assistant Instead of, say, 50,000, you're paying them 60 or 65,000 so that they can develop some of that management skill set or oversight with freelancers and be that buffer for you that's doing that outreach, doing those connections and then managing those projects or tests and bringing those results to you. So I think that's on the getting things off of your plate side of things. Those are some patterns that I see with business owners.

And then the other side is the business owners that say, oh, I just have to outsource everything. I can't be involved. I had a client a few years ago, they said, oh, look, we're trying to sell our company.

The owner was just like, I cannot get involved in the day to day operations because the more I'm involved in any of it, the less value our company will be when we go to sell it. And I was like, man, that is such a line, such a bill of goods that you're using to avoid doing real work.

And he wasn't too happy with my feedback on that because he just wanted to be the absentee owner that just showed up to some meetings, demanded everything from everybody and then left. And they were trying to launch some new services that were not polished, not getting figured out by his staff.

And he really did have the scheme skills to solve it, but he would not show up and roll up his sleeves. And so that's rare.

That is definitely more rare in the small business world to have those owners that are just so checked out or so sitting in their ivory tower, looking down at everybody and not getting things done.

But I have seen it and I do think that for companies that get to a point where maybe they are a cash cow, they're doing 2, 3, 4 million and they've been running really, really great. But now things are declining and the owner doesn't know why.

The owner needs to get right back in the mix of things, roll up their sleeves, investigate everything and get it back to the stability that it had before. Because to think that, well, I've gotten it to this stable point and my staff just needs to figure things out.

Well, the reality is that the market probably changed. The staff isn't up for the task of solving this problem.

And the reason they're not up for the task is because if they were, the business would have kept growing. Because people who proactively solve problems and who are able to see what's going on in a marketplace tend to continue growing companies.

But if you've stepped out and you're no longer the catalyst driving the solutions and driving the answers to the challenges and the issues that are showing up in the marketplace, you've hired people who can maintain what you've built, but they're not going to build it further. And so It's a catch 22, because you think, oh, well, I'm finally out of the business. I can just work on the business. I can be an absentee owner.

I can go do all the other things I'm interested in.

But then the market changes, the business slips up, and things start dropping, and you got to get back involved because you're the one that created that business in the first place. So I have seen that a number of times.

And it's typically business owners who've been in the company, in the business for 10, 15, 20 years, they've gotten comfortable. They've almost atrophied those muscles of problem solving, of rolling up their sleeves. And I know life changes.

I know that we don't always have the piss and vinegar in us to go conquer the world and figure everything out. And it's unfortunate when the changes happen in a stable business, and all of a sudden you're now surprised.

Revenue's going down, profits are going down, and you're frustrated. But this is why you get paid the big bucks. This is why you're the owner.

And so in those cases, I think that every owner should be rolling up their sleeves or hiring somebody like me to come in and just look in every crack and crevice, look under the covers, in the shadows, and figure out what in the world is going on in that company and start turning things around. But it's unfortunate when I come in because that owner typically abdicates everything to me, and then I get to be the bad guy.

And that owner oftentimes doesn't have the guts to confront or deal with the issues that are coming up.

And so I end up having to push really hard to get those owners to take responsibility, have the confrontations, and make the ultimate decisions of who gets let go, who gets replaced, who gets promoted, whatnot.

So I enjoy helping business owners that want to fix these things, but I do not enjoy helping business owners that want to abdicate and just pass the blame to me to try to solve these problems in their business that I've obviously had nothing to do with, but am stepping into trying to fix a problem. So I'd love to know your feedback as you think about being involved in your business.

Where do you fall on the spectrum between being too involved, having too many things on your plate that oftentimes aren't necessarily critical, but are backed up because you can't get to them, versus being too disconnected and not really having a finger on the pulse, or knowing what's going on and just letting the kind of the inmates run the asylum. And I'm not saying that all employees are crazy or bad. There's a lot of things that get built over time.

Just like we're looking at our federal government right now that's being cleaned out, that just gets built that you're he'd look at and you're like, why are we doing it that way? Who said who? Who approved this?

And the amount of companies I step into where that kind of stuff happens and it's just kind of a Frankenstein that gets pieced together because the owner's taking their hand off the wheel too much is very, very common. So shoot me a note. Podcastottleneckbreakthrough.com Love to know where you're at on that spectrum and if this resonates.

What stuff are you struggling with?

Either handing off, finding freelancers, outsourcing, building your team, or where do you struggle with feeling like you're atrophied and you don't want to work and you're not sure what to do to re engage your team or get things kickstarted because revenue is just dropping and you don't know what exactly to do. So hope this is useful. Always appreciate your feedback. Have a great day.

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