When starting a small business, usually you’re the only one behind the whole operation. You wear many hats, from CEO to clean-up crew. As you pour your heart and soul into your business and it begins to grow, the amount of work involved grows with it.
A small business’s primary focus is survival, meaning they pay more attention to the bottom line. This makes a lot of sense, but it also leads to being seriously overworked.
There will inevitably come a time when you must consider letting go of some control and paying others to take over some tasks.
Here are five signs that it’s time for you to start outsourcing tasks:
You’re overwhelmed and stressed
If you find that there isn’t enough time in the day, you’re losing sleep, you’re not your usual self, and free time is a thing of the past, you’ve reached burnout. This is not a maintainable place to be, and it would be wise to start outsourcing or even offloading some activities ASAP.
You’re spending time doing things you hate
Nobody goes into business hoping to spend their days completing tasks they loathe. It starts with an idea or a dream for how to improve on things. Or even have an idea for how to make more money. Whatever reasons you had for starting a business, they probably did not include doing unenjoyable chores.
When deciding to outsource, start with functions that are eating up your time in a tedious way. Once you start letting these go, you’ll find your purpose again because you can focus on what you loved about your business to begin with.
Quality of work has gone down
When you’re working hard and trying to manage all aspects of your business, it can be easy to miss the signs that you’re not going as well as you thought. The initial signs often come from a customer complaint, often along the lines of delivering a low-quality product or forgetting something in your services.
When the quality of your work starts declining, it’s definitely time to hire some help. If you’re not satisfying your customers, your business will start to suffer, and then you won’t need the extra support after all because there won’t be a business to run.
No time to grow
To grow your business, you need time to plan for it. If you’re just getting by and not able to plan your next steps, you need to start outsourcing some tasks. When you find that you’re barely holding it together, struggling to get everything completed, and there’s no time for anything else, get help. No business gets to the next level by completing the bare minimum.
No personal time
When your work life is taking over your personal life, it’s time to enlist some help. It isn’t sustainable to work so hard that you have no time for family, friends, or enjoyable pursuits.
You might save a bit of money, but you will also exacerbate your stress and miss out on the enjoyable parts of life. Did you get into business so you could work 16 hours a day, seven days a week? Probably not, but you may find yourself doing that for weeks or even months at a time.
If that’s the case, you’re going to burn out. It’s time to get some help.
Final thoughts
It’s a problematic mindset shift for an entrepreneur who has spent all their time trying to save and earn as much as possible. But needing to outsource your tasks is actually a sign of success. When you take the leap and hire someone to share the burden, you will be pleasantly surprised by the many ways that it pays off.
If you have any questions about outsourcing and how Precision may be able to help, feel free to Join the conversation…