A few years ago I was going to a seminar in Florida. I always hated booking my own travel so I would procrastinate it, put it off to the last minute, and get horrible fares or lose the room availability at the hotel. So this time I was determined to do it early.

I got online, researched fares three months early, and booked my ticket and my hotel room. I was so proud of myself!!! It felt really good to be ahead of the game.

One week before my trip I was confirming my flights and making sure I had all my itineraries organized. I pulled out my ticket to Ft. Lauderdale and checked my hotel reservation for…Orlando! Argh. With a $500 change fee, I was back on track but it was a costly mistake.

I realized that booking my own travel was not my core competency and immediately fired myself by creating a system for my assistant to do it for me. I’ve never had a problem again.

Since then I regularly take great pleasure in firing myself from certain jobs that cause me angst, that cost me too much money to do myself, or that I procrastinate. Up to this point I’ve fired myself from:

• Trying to find the right venue for an upcoming Platinum retreat (or any kind of live event).
• Updating websites, shopping carts, auto-responders, etc.
• Packing my suitcase/boxes for a speaking engagement.
• Creating forms, sales copy or flyers (I spend hours trying to get it “right”).
• Being the operations or project manager (whew, that was a BIG one!).
• Having to figure out how all the details work to get a product out the door.

I can probably make a list of 101 things that I delegate to others to free up my time and energy for more important things (well, as a matter of fact I did make a list and you get can a free copy here if you haven’t already.)

But the important thing here is, are you doing tasks that are causing you to be less than effective?

When you spend your precious resources on any task or role that is not a “high payoff activity,” you are wasting time, money and energy. When I mentor clients or speak on the subject of leverage I always say, “What can someone else do faster, cheaper or better than you?”

I’ve found that when I focus on the tasks that only I can do– write, speak, lead the company, hold the vision of the end game, continue to inspire my team and my clients to take action – then that’s when I hit my sweet spot.

Here are five ways to fire yourself so you can tap into more energy and results:

1. Figure out what you are doing that isn’t effective. Do you make a lot of mistakes? Does it burn you out? Would you rather go to the dentist for a root canal than complete the task? Get real with yourself and stop doing them. Find someone else to do them faster, better or cheaper than you can.
2. Stop learning how to do things that aren’t high ROI. I always tell people that I make it a point NOT to learn how to update my website. If I don’t know how then I won’t be tempted to try to figure it out. It’s a waste of my time and money to do it myself and I know better.
3. Get ruthless. It can be a lot of little seemingly insignificant things that add up to big time wasters. If you were determined to create more time for what’s important then what would you fire yourself from doing immediately? Buying office supplies? Figuring out whom to do your product distribution? Doing all those social marketing posts?
4. Create an exit strategy. For the bigger roles that you are more integrated into (like project managing or handling the operations) you may need to follow the steps of many successful CEOs and create an exit plan – what can you do over the next 6 months to replace yourself in that role?
5. Change your mind about what’s important. If you are a control freak or regularly find yourself holding on to something because no one can do it as good as you, then it may be time for a reality check. I guarantee that in one Delegation Hot Seat I’d be able to find at least 10 tasks or roles that you could get off your plate. So start being realistic about what you can really accomplish and fire yourself from the rest of it.

Be willing to clear the decks of everything that is getting in your way of the most important things. When you look around at the people who really do enjoy a lifestyle business, who make consistent income in the high 6, 7 or 8 figures and are enjoying some level of sanity in the process, you’ll see that they never try to do everything and often they do very little. Sir Richard Branson said in an interview once that it is easier for him to run his multiple billion dollar companies today than it ever was to run a small company.

Something tells me he figured out how to fire himself from a lot of tasks!

About the Coach:

Melanie Benson Strick, The Million Dollar Lifestyle Business Coach, teaches entrepreneurs how to stop feeling overwhelmed so they can create more money, more freedom and more prestige.

Get the Entrepreneur’s Secret Weapon to revolutionize your results and get on the fast-track to a freedom based business at www.thepowerofthevirtualteam.com

 

 Fire Yourself! 5 Ways to Instantly Create More Time and Energy in Your Life [10:22m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download (1290)

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This entry was posted on Wednesday, June 18th, 2008 at 11:06 am and is filed under Business Goals, Success Strategies, Virtual Team/Delegation. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.