Leverage Yourself
Most small business people, especially when you are starting out are cash strapped and basically have to do everything or at least know how to do everything.
Time Limits to Growth
But, there are only 24 hours in a day and you can only do so much. How do you leverage yourself. Because if you don’t figure out how to multiply your efforts, your business is never going to grow very large. It is going to be limited by your abilities.
If it is all based on your work and it is a service business, then the amount you can charge per hour limits how much you can make. And if you can’t work, you can’t make anything.
Similarly, if you are selling a product, there is only so much you can sell, make and ship before you are maxed out. The only way to make more money is to sell more expensive products or hire someone to help.
Where is the Value Added?
So you need to figure out where you can make the most difference in the company, where you add the most value and then see who you can hire (part time, full time, contract basis) that can do some of the work so you can focus on the more important things and on the business.
As soon as possible, you want to hire someone to do the $10/hour jobs so you can focus on tasks that are $100 or$200 or $500/hour in return.
What are You Good At? What Do You Enjoy Doing?
Some things you aren’t good at, others you don’t like because you haven’t learned how or aren’t good at. Some things simply need to be done. Others, you might need to spend some time learning. Once you have practiced something you might find you are good at it.
One of my daughters growing up would try something once and say I am no good at it, I give up, I am not doing this. (Other things she would tackle till she persevered.) Part of the problem was that she wanted to do things perfectly the first time and didn’t like to fail. When this was pointed out, she would get on with things and do fine.
If you are better at technical aspects, then you might want to find someone for sales. If you are great at sales, you might want to find someone who is very organized and can run day to day operations.
Even though you are paying people to do different aspects of the business you will grow larger and faster than if you try to do everything yourself to save money.