Delegating Your Way to Better Efficiency

Owners and managers are always on the lookout for the latest management trend to provide answers to some of business's most pressing questions. Sometimes the best answer, however, isn't the most exciting.

Delegation is one of those topics that many business owners just roll their eyes at. "I know, I know. I need to delegate more than I do." The rewards of proper delegation, however, can be increased efficiency in several areas of your business.

Here are three ways that delegating can help you be more productive:

1. Delegate to Your Employees

One piece of paperwork that owners and managers can instantly push off their plate is compiling timesheets for their business or department.

Employees are the best people for the job of filling out their own timesheet because they can go into extreme detail. This in-depth information can then be used to generate useful management reports that can identify such items as your most (or least) profitable customers or projects.

Find out what automated software your peers are using in your industry and delegate the vital task of accurate timekeeping to the people who can perform it best - your employees.

2. Delegate to Your Vendors

You spent years upon years and thousands of dollars to become an expert in your particular field. Why not spend your time helping your clients while billing out at your top, hourly rates? Instead of pinching pennies by performing routine operating and administrative tasks, take advantage of your most limited resource by outsourcing as many tasks as possible.

Spouses and close friends are common people who are recruited to help with these seemingly mundane tasks. Little do these business owners realize is that at some point, a professional usually has to be called in to fix whatever mess has been created. For example, in an effort to save money, an owner will have a spouse "keep the books." When it comes time to prepare that year's tax return, however, the owner's accountant usually has to spend several hours correcting mistakes made during the year.

Do things right the first time by delegating as many daily, routine tasks to outside vendors who are experts in their particular field.

3. Delegate to Your Clients

A client drops off a stack-full of documents. The CPA firm then produces an audit, tax return or a set of financial statements, followed by a PDF document consisting of all workpaper documents as well as a copy of the final product. The PDF is then moved to the firm's archive.

Does this scenario sound familiar?

When a CPA firm says it is "paperless," what the firm really means is "our storage system is paperless." To improve efficiency even further, CPA firms should encourage their clients to submit all their documents as PDFs on the front end of an engagement. Delegating paperwork duties to your clients by requesting PDF copies of documents, not paper copies, will save you and your employees precious time scanning, sorting and organizing paper documents.

Do you want perfection when someone completes a task for your business? Or would you instead be satisfied with a job that is done "fairly good" with the end result of being paid more per hour by your client? According to a previous blog article, “7 Tips I Wish I Knew When I Started My Business” by Shafat Qazi, CEO and Founder of BQE Software, you should learn to trust your employees, vendors and clients to help you perform your job more efficiently. That way, all parties will come out a winner.