How to Get Rid of the Fear of Delegation / Ep. 15

In this episode of "Bella In Your Business", Bella is joined by Kate McQuillan from Pawsome Media. They dismantle the myths surrounding the fear of delegation in pet sitting businesses and discuss the profitable advantages of it. Topics Discussed and Key Points Bella leads off by talking about her first delegation experience with the website Fancy Hands a website that for a small fee will perform a few simple tasks for you. But she warns that your instructions need to be clear to ensure the task is done as you expect.  She says it's like “the bootcamp for learning how to delegate.” Doing this, will decrease your fear of delegation. Bella then talks about how she moved up to getting a virtual assistant (VA) and how with that she learned that prioritizing tasks for the VA  is key. She realized that she also needed to communicate how many hours she expected to be spent on the task as it better clarified the expectations and led to both her and the VA  feeling a sense of control over the task.  Kate pointed out that setting expectations on both sides is a very important step. Kate then says that she feels that if you are going to delegate a task, make it one that needs to be repeated periodically. Doing so means that the time you spend setting up the expectations for the task the first time, will in essence, be training the assistant to do it in the future. As you set up expectations and outline the process for each task, you are essentially at the same time building an employee handbook. It becomes time well spent! Kate also points out that you need to make sure you are putting a task in the hands of the right person. For instance, more complicated repetitive tasks are best done by someone like a VA who is consistently the same person, rather than using FancyHands or Fiverr ) where you may not be getting the same person each time.  Bella points out that mindless one-off tasks are better suited for those sites. At this point Kate manages to blow Bella’s mind by suggesting that you have your VA document the process while they are doing the task. As Bella puts it, “Delegating the Delegation!” Bella then tells the listeners not to get discouraged when finding the right VA. She points out that just like hiring, sometimes a person does not work out.  Or, even when you find the right VA, they may have to leave for personal or family reasons.  She reinforces this by relating an experience she had. Kate adds that sometimes you or your needs change and that you should not be afraid to change your VA if things stop working out. Bella mentions that some VAs can be more expensive than others but may bring a bigger skill set that can ultimately make you more productive.  She points out how critical a VA was in helping her organize and publish the first ever comprehensive chart of all the software companies in the pet sitting field. Kate says to think of it as an investment rather than a cost as it may help you and your business make more money. Kate then discusses how one of the biggest hurdles people have in moving to delegating is the fear of letting go. They are afraid that someone else can’t do it as well as they can do it. She says rather than fear it, use it as an opportunity to examine and streamline the process.  You just may make it more efficient! Kate mentions that one online tool she has found very helpful for delegation is Trello. It’s a free tool for putting up lists of tasks (which can be shared with others like your VA) and setting up a project timeline. Bella notes that visually it reminds her of Pinterest. Since they have gotten on the topic of technology tools, Bella points out that most of us probably only use about 20% of the functionality of the tools we use. So she encourages the listeners to take the time to look at the tools website or seek out tutorials in order to really learn how to the get the most out of each tool!  Kate adds that she has tried to take the time this year to do just that. Bella says that business owners should always make sure that their business is healthy and you always have enough money set aside to pour back into the business.  You can then use the “business” money to invest in these tools and processes that will ultimately help you grow your business. Notable Quotes They wrap up by stressing the importance of streamlining the processes and delegating the tasks. Kate also points out that there are some tasks, like contracts, that ABSOLUTELY should be delegated to the appropriate professionals, like lawyers. Bella agrees as she has had other business owners come and ask her for her service contract or her employee manual to use in their businesses, prompting her to ask “Do you want my underwear too?”  A perfect way to end an episode. Transcript: This is episode 15 of Bella in Your Business. Welcome to Bella in Your Business, where Bella will discuss anything and everything about your pet sitting business to help you land on target. So get ready—Bella’s got your chute. Let’s jump. Welcome, jumpers! In this podcast, I had a rap session with the wonderful Kate McQuillen of Pawsomedia. As Kate and I have grown to do more and more in the pet industry and with our businesses, it’s become imperative that we gather a team around us to help us accomplish the goals that we’re looking to achieve. As we gathered a team together, both Kate and I learned some interesting points, such as the proper way to explain what we needed, when and how to produce the content. On this podcast, you’ll get to hear a great conversation for about twenty minutes between the both of us on the topic. Listen in. Bella: Kate, we’ve heard so many times—delegate, delegate, delegate, delegate, delegate—and so many people have delegated, “Okay, fine, do this for me.” They do something, they get it back, and it is a disaster. Have you ever heard of that, Kate, or ever experienced that? Kate: I have experienced that too. I think there’s a lot of things we’re going to talk about today that are going to really help people nail that delegation process, because it’s not hard, but there is a little bit of an art to it, I think. Bella: There totally is, and I think it’s not really talked about that much. In fact, this podcast, I think, is the first time I’ve ever heard anyone really talk about how to delegate. Everyone says how important it is to do it. And you know, I am definitely responsible for being on that negative edge too sometimes. My delegation story started off with Fancy Hands. It’s a website online—it’s called fancyhands.com. You can go there, and for like fifteen bucks a month, they give you five or seven tasks, and you would give them a task, and you literally get back whatever it is that you asked them for. So if your instructions aren’t clear, precise, with an exact goal and how long you want them to spend on it, then you’re going to get however they interpret it. So I actually kind of consider Fancy Hands as like the boot camp for learning how to delegate. Kate: It’s clear you took responsibility for not getting what you want back sometimes then. Bella: Yeah, for sure, you know, because after the fifth time of it not working out, you’re going to start realizing like, it’s not them, maybe it’s me. I remember I had asked them, “Can you give me the top blogs in my area?” Kate, I was looking to maybe guest blog for them or try to attach my page under their page—just kind of a virtual network, right? So I get back blogs that are everywhere in the Southwest, because technically that’s my area, right? The whole Southwest part of the country—that includes New Mexico, Arizona, California, Nevada. Kate: Well, you could say just America. Bella: Right, right. It was pretty large. So my next go-around, I said, “Okay, find me the blogs that are located in this zip code.” And just that example, I think, is very indicative of how I kind of started learning. I actually got a virtual assistant, and she was starting to help me, and I started learning that every task I gave her, I also needed to tell her what priority it was. So like, is it high priority—she needs to do it immediately—or I could wait a week? And it also did need to give her how many hours or how many minutes I wanted her to spend on the task so that I felt a little bit in control, and she felt like she knew, okay, this isn’t like a five-hour task—she wants it done in a half hour. And then she could tell me if it wasn’t realistic. Kate: Yeah, setting expectations on both sides, I think, is really important. Because if somebody knows it’s only a three-minute job, they know, okay, well she’s not looking for me to explain all these websites—she’s just looking obviously for the list of five URLs. Bella: Exactly. And the method too—you know, I didn’t want it necessarily in an email. I wanted it in a Google spreadsheet so I could have it live online and I could access it from wherever I was. So really knowing what you want is going to either help or hurt your delegation. Kate: Yeah, I’m all in favor of, if you’re going to delegate a task, delegate a task that needs to be repeated every day, week, or month, because that initial time you put in to setting up a process for that piece of work—that’s time well spent because you’re training that person to do it exactly the way you want, deliver it exactly how you want, carry it out to your specification. But it’s something that you’re not doing every time you want something done, and you’re actually creating a handbook of tasks that need to get done and here’s my process on how it should be done. Bella: Right. A good example to kind of show our listeners what you mean by that is email marketing. I have one person that helps write my emails—she’s amazing. Beth Green from Paws Pet Care writes these cheeky emails that are very fun to read and open, and they’re also kind of short. And I give them to my VA and say, “Put them in MailChimp and schedule it to come out.” Well,...