What does Richard Branson have that you don’t have?

In 1986, Richard Branson sat down to write a letter brimming with gratitude to a man named Jack. As he tells it in his article at Entrepreneur, Jack was the very first accountant for Virgin (Branson’s company then and now).

“It is not an exaggeration to say that we would never have got off the ground without you,” he wrote. Branson went on the tell Jack what he meant to him and why he was so grateful.

Yes, grateful to pay someone to handle his money. Sure, it probably comes easy to Richard Branson. Even back in the 80s Virgin was a wildly successful company and Branson had plenty of reasons to be grateful, right?

Or maybe it was his gratitude that made his company thrive. Gratitude that came along with a serious investment in learning to delegate.

See, Richard Branson wasn’t always the world’s best delegator (though some would argue he holds a top spot in that category today). However, from the early days of his business, Branson lived by one of my personal favorite sayings:

Just because you can, that doesn’t mean you should. <<Click To Tweet

It was a skill he needed to learn. “If you really want to grow as an entrepreneur, you’ve got to learn to delegate. When my friends and I started up Virgin, I knew that I was lacking vital knowledge on some subjects, and so I started learning this skill [of delegation] very early on in my career.

I was never any good with numbers. Rather than act as our business’s accountant and do the job badly, I found Jack, who shared my vision for the business and wanted to get involved, but who also understood the difference between net and gross!”

Branson knew what smart CEOs know: you can take the time to learn the skill and then hold every position in the company for perpetuity or you can take the time to learn to delegate and play the role of CEO every day. It’s a choice, though sometimes a tough one.

As Alison Coleman points out in her Forbes article profiling Branson, “the very idea of delegating can go against the grain. After all, many entrepreneurs are so accustomed to the ‘do-it-yourself’ style of running a business that taking a hands-off approach will simply feel like a loss of control.”

Sound familiar?

Delegation, like the majority of leadership skills, takes practice. Most solopreneurs I know shy away from delegation, hiring, and handing off tasks inside their business for one of three reasons:

1. It’s too personal. “No one will ever do it like I do,” they say.
2. “What will I do?” If they delegate tasks inside their business, they won’t have any busy work left and they’ll be forced to lead and grow the business. Eeeek. Scary.
3. It hasn’t worked in the past. They’ve delegated before (or thought they did) and it was a disaster. It’s easier to just do it themselves than to try to teach someone else.

And I get it. However, delegating is the key piece of the puzzle in growing your business. To go from solopreneur to studio, you have to move from what you can do personally to what you can manage.

Here’s how to tackle those objections and start delegating like a boss:

1. You’re right. No one will ever do it like you do. When you hire the right person, they’ll actually do it better, and they’ll improve on your process when you can provide them autonomy in their work.”Delegate the entire job,” says Brian Tracy, leadership speaker and coach. “One hundred percent responsibility for a task is a major performance motivator. The more often you assign responsibilities to the right people, the more competent they become….You need to delegate in such a way that people walk away feeling, ‘This is my job; I own it.’”
2. Freeing up your time and brain will allow you to invest in developing yourself and your book of business. Imagine taking more potential client calls while a skilled developer codes away. Think about what it would be like to finally launch the podcast you’ve outlined but don’t have time for all because your design assistant is diligently working on the wireframe you started. Could you write another guest blog post if your virtual assistant were scheduling your social media for you? You’ll even be paying for your team as soon as you hire them since you’re now able to bring in more business than ever before with your newfound free time. Delegation is not just about giving things away; when it’s done right you should always get back in return.
3. Don’t forget that there will be people who aren’t the right fit for the role. “Match the requirements of the job to the abilities of the person,” says Tracy. Mapping out clear job descriptions with expectations up front saves you time in the long run. I encourage all of my clients to run a test project with every hire to be sure it’s a good fit before engaging in a more permanent way. When you choose a project strategically, you can test out their work and your delegation skills. You’ll know quickly whether it’s working or not and you can decide if and when you want to move forward.

Have you heard that creativity abhors a vacuum? A lack of delegation creates a vacuum in small businesses. So what is a growing business owner to do?

“All leaders should be hiring for the day when they will delegate even top leadership roles, so they can step back from the business’s day-to-day operations to focus on what’s next,” Branson says. “While delegating and handing over control can be tough, the challenges become less if you have the right people on board.”

So, do you delegate like a boss? I want to hear your favorite delegation tips and tricks! Share them in the comments below and help others learn to become the next Richard Branson.

Originally published at www.valgeisler.com on November 5, 2015.