Typically, business owners are control freaks. For a smaller company or a one-man operation, this might be the only way to keep going, and perhaps the best way to ensure a successful business and happy clients. However, for a larger, growing company, an owner who can't delegate responsibility will hold back a company — or perhaps even sink it — during its development.
In defense of owners and managers, there are many credible reasons for why they seek domination. Most have never worked for anyone else, and if they have, their boss was most likely a control freak as well. There is a huge comfort in knowing everything that's going on, or maybe there is a lack of unconditional trust between owners and their employees.
If you don't have a system in place to give up control or understand how it would work, it's only natural to fear this drastic change. However, the reality is that if you don't learn how to delegate control, you will never be able to achieve a successful company whose profits and employees are continuously growing.
Self discovery
I discovered these control-freak traits in myself early in my career. Having a lot of pride in what my business had already accomplished, I had concerns about how to give up my authority, yet still feel as if everything was intact. Looking back, the hardest thing about letting go of this power was actually just making myself do it! And the reality of how well it worked out was astonishing.
One day, I was riding with a local realtor friend to look at a few properties in my area. As he drove down one of the main streets in town we passed one of my company's project sites. The realtor looked over to me and said, "What type of project do you have going on there?" I had to be honest with him and tell him I had no idea. In fact, I didn't know who the client was, and for that matter, didn't even recognize the trade crew that was doing the work. That's when it hit me: "It really works!"
Make a plan
In order to facilitate giving up control, consider the following when developing your plan for change:
- Commit to the changes.
- Prepare for the changes.
- Implement the changes.
- Support the changes.
- Manage the changes.
- Delegate the responsibilities required to make the change to trained and skilled employees.
Participation of your employees will also aid the implementation of this process, saving you valuable time and effort required in selling them on the plan. Together, make a bulleted list of things your company needs to accomplish in order to divide and share the control and management of your typical day-to-day business activities. These bulleted lists should include such things as the following:
- Job costing
- Forms and check sheets
- Ensuring the sales person keeps a pulse on the clients' satisfaction levels during projects
- A system for employee reviews and advancement
- Consistent management and production employee meetings
- Customer quality audits after project completion.
Last, decide who would be the best person to assign each responsibility to and why. What you choose to do, or not to do, as part of that plan, will speak volumes to your employees in terms of their future as well as the future of the business
Mistakes will happen
If it's not an obvious consideration already, you quickly will find that making this significant change will lead to mistakes, on your part as well as your employees. These mistakes should be viewed as learning opportunities rather than major problems. Remember, there's a reason for everything you do.
If you make a mistake, understand why it was made, then determine what you can do to correct it and how you will avoid the same mistake in the future. This is something that business owners can help employees evaluate and accomplish. Fortunately, in building and remodeling, nothing is a mistake unless you can't fix it! Typically, serious concerns should be addressed only if that same mistake happens again.
