Knowing how to delegate is an important component of leadership roles.

As an entrepreneur, when you first start your business, you may need to wear multiple hats yourself and deal with everything, from production to customer service and support. However, as your company grows, you'll quickly discover that it pays to have the right team members, be it in your office or remotely through a virtual assistant.

The problem is entrepreneurs often have a difficult time delegating responsibilities and knowing when they need help. It's easy to assume that you're the only one that can deliver the right outcomes for your business.

However, studies by Harvard suggest that delegation can increase the overall performance of any organization. This is when hiring a VA comes in handy.

Delegating empowers your virtual assistant to make the most of their skills and help their professional development. It's also an opportunity to reduce some of the stress on you.

Knowing when to delegate

No matter how hard you try, there are certain issues that you'll want to handle yourself. For instance, you can't have your staff performing their own audits or performance reviews.

Hiring excellent talent will ensure that you can delegate more of your tasks, too.

There are some tasks in your day-to-day activities that you can delegate to your VA, this way you can focus on other aspects of your business. Hiring the right VA with the right qualifications will help you reduce your workload; you will become more productive, and your business will grow.

The most obvious times to delegate are when:

• You don't have the right talent or skill to handle a task on your own.
• Someone else at the organization is more qualified to do the task in question.
• You don't have enough time to handle all the tasks in front of you.
• Other priorities are rising to the surface, and you need to restructure how you manage your time.

Knowing how to delegate

Delegating isn't something that always comes naturally to a leader as you may feel like you're losing control of your business. That's why you need a plan!

Use these strategies:

Get to know your employees. Every employee has specific skills and talents that make them better suited to certain challenges. Your VA might even have goals that they want to accomplish and delegating tasks to them could help them to achieve those goals.

• For instance, if your VA wants to develop their leadership skills, and they're well-versed in finances, you could have them lead an internal audit with the help of your team.
• Great delegation starts with knowing your employees and understanding how to leverage them advantageously.

Define desired outcomes. The projects you hand elsewhere should come with context and tie into the goals of your organization.

•  Know exactly what you want your employees to achieve before you assign them any task and ensure that they're clear on their goals too. Laying out clear expectations can save you a lot of time and money on mistakes.

Provide the right resources. If the person you're delegating work to needs help to get the task done, ensure that they get it. Sometimes, your virtual assistant will require specific training and resources to get through the assigned project.

• Remove any red tape or hurdles in advance.
• Giving your employees all the resources they need initially also means that you can fight the urge to micromanage.
• Trust that the employee has everything they need to be successful in their task.

Establish channels of communication. It's important to have a system that encourages positive input and feedback when your team members have questions, especially when you're working with virtual assistants.

• Think about the most effective modes of communication you have in your business, from video conferencing to instant chat. Setting up regular communication strategies will save you a lot of time and effort.

Allow for failure and reward success. Finally, avoid delegating work with the assumption that your team members are going to fail. Be confident in their skills and abilities, as this will help you avoid micromanaging. However, do keep in mind that things might not go exactly according to plan.

• Recognize mistakes and use them as an opportunity to give useful feedback for the future. You might even learn that you need to give better briefs or be clearer about your requests when you're sharing information with staff.
• When delegation goes well and your VA delivers positive results, recognize it. Pay attention to the effort exerted by your team members and acknowledge their results with awards and praise.

Whether you own your own business or you're a part of an organization, following these strategies will set the foundation for positive outcomes for you, your team, and your business - now and in the long term.

If you'd like to start delegating those time-consuming tasks to someone else, it's time for you to hire a VA. Contact us today at (619) 991-9197 and we will help you take some weight off your shoulders with the magic of delegation.