How To Delegate Tasks: A Basic Guide

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Updated: September 12th, 2024

What Is Task Delegation?

Task delegation refers to shifting authority and responsibilities for a particular function, task, or decision from one person to another.

In entrepreneurship, task delegation can lighten your workload, while empowering your team.

Thus, task delegation is critically important to growing your business and it is one of the most powerful qualities a business leader can have.

Task Delegation Key Takeaways

Effective task delegation calls for choosing the right person for the job.
If you are delegating a task to a team, it helps when you provide context for why you are giving them the responsibility.
A good delegator provides basic and important information without micromanaging
When you delegate tasks, make sure the person assuming the responsibility has the right tools and skills to complete the task.

Understanding How Delegation Works

For owners of startups, it's second nature to wear a ton of different hats and feel like you need to do everything yourself, or else it won't be done right.

By adjusting this mentality and delegating your tasks to other team members or outsourcing platforms, you may create more time to get the critically important stuff done.

To successfully delegate and ensure expectations are met, you may want to consider a few things first:

Articulate your desired needs and outcome, or else your task most likely won't be done right. Loom is a great platform for this. You can record an educational video that your team member can always go back and refer to.
Provide a timeline/deadline
Communicate the importance of the task to your team member
Understand who's completing the task, and what their workload currently is

Real World Examples of Entrepreneurs Who Believe in Delegation

1. Richard Branson

Richard Branson, an entrepreneur and founder of virgin Group, is a veritable encyclopedia of knowledge when it comes to launching and running a company.

Branson’s vision of building an internationally recognized brand would not be possible without handing over the responsibility of daily operations to others. In this video, Richard explains why delegation is key to the success of any business.

According to Branson, delegation is crucial leadership skill since it allows the business leader to find a better work-life balance. He argues that delegation is a balancing act, but getting it right is what is critical to attaining business growth.

2. Bill Gates

Bill Gates, is a household name in the world of computers.

Delegation is one of the key formulas to his success. For Bill Gates, hiring the right people who possess a slightly different set of skills than him has helped him to execute his vision of success.

Getting Started With Tasks Delegation

Reflect on your key strengths and weaknesses
Identify elements of your business that you feel are time-consuming and demanding
What areas of your business require improvement?
Use the findings above to guide recruitment and evaluate your existing team
Shift from the culture of hierarchy to a company culture where every idea is welcome
Now that you have a loyal and trustful team, sit back and start looking at the big picture

Tasks delegation is a critical business practice. Getting started is simple and less expensive. You can find talented freelancers to assist you in business operations.

Here are leading platforms where you can recruit freelancers to help you with business tasks:

Upwork

The largest freelancing website, where businesses connect with talented freelancers.

Pricing: Freemium
Twitter: @upwork
Website: upwork.com

Businesses using Upwork:

598 successful businesses are using Upwork ➜

Get Upwork ➜

Fiverr

Freelance services marketplace at affordable costs.

Pricing: Freemium
Twitter: @fiverr
Website: https://www.fiverr.com/

Businesses using Fiverr:

534 successful businesses are using Fiverr ➜

Get Fiverr ➜

Learn to Delegate

Delegation is critically important to growing your business and is one of the most powerful tools a business leader can have.

Especially with small businesses, it's second nature to wear a ton of different hats and feel like you need to do everything yourself, or else it won't be done right.

By adjusting this mentality and delegating your tasks to other team members or outsourcing platforms, this may create more time to get the critically important stuff done.

To successfully delegate and ensure expectations are met, you may want to consider a few things first:

Articulate your desired needs and outcome, or else your task most likely won't be done right. Loom is a great platform for this. You can record an educational video that your team member can always go back and refer to.
Provide a timeline/deadline
Communicate the importance of the task to your team member
Understand who's completing the task, and what their workload currently is

Valerio Celetti, founder of Loop learned to delegate, which led him to focus on the important stuff for his business:

Case Study

"During Loop’s first year, we worked too much and delegated too little. We were both dangerously close to a burnout. Things started to go better when we finally decided to only focus on key activities."

We built a company as a team for two reasons. We felt that working alone was limiting us in terms of potential revenues (our fiscal plans forced us to keep our individual yearly revenues under a certain threshold to have taxation benefits initially). We also felt that while our focus and specialization were somehow useful initially, it proved to be somehow limited in a scale-up phase. Potential customers wanted more services and a more structured interlocutor in some cases - the bigger the prospect the higher the project complexity in most cases.

Our personal values are concreteness, respect, responsibility. It may sound trivial, but we’re really happy to wake up every morning and turn on our computers while sipping a good coffee. We truly hope this is the same for our partners!

how-we-started-a-35k-month-online-advertising-agency

Valerio Celletti, on starting Loop ($115,000/month) full story ➜

meet the author

Pat Walls

I'm Pat Walls and I created Starter Story - a website dedicated to helping people start businesses. We interview entrepreneurs from around the world about how they started and grew their businesses.

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