Task Delegation for Small Business Owners

Small business owners understand the value of task delegation and the high costs that
failure to do so can cause. With so much at risk with every business transaction, both
internal and external, sometimes it can be challenging to make sure everything is running
smoothly. But, with the help of these task delegation tips from EBR HR Experts, you can rest
assured that your business will be more efficient than ever.

Delegating Tasks
We’ve all heard it enough – delegating is vital. And while we all know it to be accurate, why is
it that sometimes it can be so tricky? Running a business comes with a never-ending to-do
list, but optimizing your delegation skills is rarely a top priority. Unfortunately, this can be
detrimental to your business. Rather than risking costs associated with doing everything
yourself, here are a few examples of tasks you can delegate out.

Data Entry
Date entry is an excellent place to start when it comes to delegating tasks. Not only are
these tasks relatively simple, but they are known for being incredibly time-consuming. Rather
than spending your precious time working on the data entry, delegate these tasks out to
others.
You can hire remote staff to handle your data entry or task it out internally to other staff on
your team. Whichever option you decide, you’ll be able to instantly see how beneficial
delegating time-consuming tasks can be for you and your business.

Forming an LLC
Forming your business structure as a limited liability company (LLC) helps you limit liability
protection and pass-through taxation. There are several benefits of forming an LLC for your
small business, including:
● Limited liability
● Pass-through taxation
● Flexible membership
● Limited compliance requirements
● Heightened credibility

If you’d like to create an LLC for your company, instead of doing the legwork on your own,
you can avoid spending many hours of your time on this task by using a formation service.
Luckily, you have plenty of options when it comes to finding a formation service for your LLC.
Check out some of the best LLC filing companies, like:
● Rocket Lawyer
● ZenBusiness
● Incfile
● Legal Zoom

Recruitment and HR
As your company grows, you’ll find that your human resources needs will become more
complex and nuanced. For this reason, it’s important to outsource the work to professionals
who are knowledgeable in all aspects of HR, from recruitment to onboarding, compensation
and benefits to training and growth. EBR HR Experts has the HR experts who can take care
of all these (and more) — and well within Fair Labor Standards and anti-discrimination laws.

Tips to Help Delegate
There are countless other opportunities around your business that you can task out to other
people to free up your schedule for more pertinent tasks. You can follow these steps to help
you figure out what to delegate in your business:
1. Determine the tasks you’d instead not do yourself
2. Pick who you will delegate to carefully
3. Set your expectations clearly
4. Delegate based on your needs
5. Make sure to acknowledge who will take over the process
Are you ready to delegate? EBR HR Experts can help you find the best and most
knowledgeable professionals for the tasks you needed done yesterday.

Contact us at EBRHRExperts.com today!

“Critical thinking skills are essential in every industry at every career level, from entry-level associates to top executives. Good critical thinkers can work both independently and with others to solve problems. Issues such as process inefficiencies, management or finances can be improved by using critical thought. Because of this, employers value and seek out candidates who demonstrate strong critical thinking skills.” (https://www.indeed.com/career-advice/career-development/critical-thinking-skills)

Critical thinking: the ability to analyze information objectively, assess different perspectives, and reach a logical conclusion uninfluenced by emotion or personal bias.
Close your eyes and pretend that you are in a very dark place, sitting on a chair.  You can’t see anything and you can’t hear anything.  What’s the first thing you would do?  Whatever your answer is – you used critical thinking to formulate it.  “I would speak to see if someone answers.”  If they do or don’t, you have information you didn’t have before, and can then decide what to do next – critical thinking in action. “I would jump up and run around screaming” – not critical thinking, not productive, potentially dangerous!

There is a process in critical thinking. Following it allows you to arrive at a decision that is fact based, well-considered, and devoid of emotion or prejudice.

Step 1.  Identify the problem – the real problem.  Use the 5 times why process by asking “what is the problem?” and then “why is it the problem” until you get to the bare bones of the issue.

Step 2.  Gather data, opinions and arguments – be sure it comes from reliable sources and is as unprejudiced as possible.

Step 3.  Analyze and evaluate the data – are the sources reliable?

Step 4.  Identify assumptions – are your sources unbiased?< Step 5.  Make a decision/reach a conclusion – decide which – if any – conclusions are possible.  Weigh strengths and limitations of all possible options.  This is the most important step.  Make a decision – not making a decision is making a decision and it’s the wrong one. Your ability to critically think through a problem is nullified if you don’t make a decision and follow through with it. To start working on your critical thinking skills, begin with applying these simple strategies: Ask simple critical thinking questions

• What do I already know?
• How do I know that?
• What am I trying to prove?
• What are my motivations?

Oppose “common sense”  This is where you can lose a good resolution to a problem.

Be aware of your biases

• Confirmation Bias: we always subconsciously assume we’re right.
• Action Bias: we act too quickly before thinking something through.
• Association Bias: why did the rain dance always work? Because they’d dance until the rain came.
• Unconscious Bias: Unconscious biases are social stereotypes about an individual, group or institution. Everyone has unconscious biases about various groups, and they are often not aligned with one’s conscious values. Here’s a place to test your unconscious bias: https://implicit.harvard.edu/implicit/takeatest.html 

You can highlight your critical thinking skills on your resume by using these terms to describe your successes:

“Evaluated and analyzed”

“Identified a major design defect and instituted a work around”

“Interpreted the results”

“Developed a new strategy”

You can develop your critical thinking skills every day by applying the process to small problems that occur and there are some good books that can help.  I recommend Critical Thinking Skills: Developing Effective Analysis and Argument by Stella Cottrell.

I also found this great video from the Department of Labor that can help you understand critical thinking. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hPiI44XEKgs

Until March of 2020, this was the definition of networking:  Business networking is the process of establishing a mutually beneficial relationship with other business people and potential clients or customers.  It still is – but how we go about it has changed drastically and will continue to evolve as we work our way through and past the current pandemic.

In my book; The Insider Guide to Your Dream Career: Mastering Your Job Search in the Digital Age, I discuss networking how-to’s and when-to’s.  It’s pretty simple; you start by getting out there, meeting people, and exchanging information about yourselves.  The next step is being of service in some way to the people you have met, because you know someone they need to meet or you know of someone who provides a service they need, or you know the Hiring Manager of the company they want to go to work for.  Please note that I said –“be of service to them”, because that is the important part.  If your networking goal is to create a list of those who can do stuff for you – you have the wrong attitude and the folks in your network will soon realize that you aren’t helping them, but using them – and drop you.

The hard part of networking prior to Covid-19 was “getting out there”.  Now it’s nearly impossible.  There’s one place where good networking is still possible – it’s just closer to home.

Off the top of your head, can you name someone who works with you who knows how to draft an advertisement for a magazine?  Who has contacts at the nearest college? Who has experience in recruiting and hiring?  If you don’t know this much about your co-workers – you should.

Networking among co-workers should be considered as important as networking in the community.  Have you thought about starting the next Zoom meeting with an exercise where everyone tells one odd talent they have?  That’s networking – because now you have a source you didn’t have before!

You never know when you’re going to need help doing your job.  Most of the time, your company will not be able to afford to hire outside experts.  Who you know can really be as important as what you know.  “It’s great to be able to say: ”I don’t know the answer to this, but I know who will”.

To start your in-house networking, create a list of contacts throughout your company and throughout your industry. Strive to reach beyond your immediate circle.  Reach out to those you don’t already know with a short message that contains your “elevator speech”, why you are interested in them and how you can help them.  If they respond positively, be sure to stay in touch with them – even if it’s just short emails that contain an article they might be interested in or a comment about a recent achievement of theirs.  You don’t know them well enough to pass on the current joke – so leave that to your closest friends!

Your goal is not to have many, many contacts, it’s to have contacts that you can be useful to and who can be of use to you.