Are We Too Controlling?

Many of my friends are business owners or top executives with their companies and the level of control they hold onto for their business varies widely. Some have a completely hands-off approach to most of the daily aspects of the sales process. Others feel the need to hold tightly onto every detail for fear someone else will make a mistake.

Try Not to Micro-Manage
I personally lie somewhere in the middle. I have employees that I trust implicitly and know that they will do what needs to be done on a timely basis. I am not a micro-manager. I trained them and they know their job. I don’t need to stand over them and make sure it is done right.

However, there are clients that I am very protective of and take over big projects for them. So, I guess I don’t trust so implicitly as I think I do. Partly it’s because most of the big projects are custom programs and I have the most experience. And secondly, they are typically larger volume orders with a great deal of money at stake. However, I don’t take complete control. The team still does the lion-share of the work.

Where do you Draw the Control Line?
I was speaking with a small business owner today and she was complaining about how much administrative time she was spending now that her business was taking off. Her sales had shot up from her efforts but now she was working until 11 pm trying to keep her head above water. Processing orders, following up with vendors, getting proofs approved by clients, making sure orders were shipping timely, paying bills, invoicing the client, just to name a few of her tasks. It’s exhausting just reading the list!

We all want to make the most money possible. But at what cost? She and I have spoken many times about her hiring help. Finally, today she agreed to hire a virtual assistant. At this point, she wants to try it out for a few hours a week. And she admitted, her past hesitation was the fear of letting go of total control not the out of pocket cost.

Letting Go to Grow
She finally recognized that if she didn’t start to let go then she would never grow to the size of business she really wants. The three hours she spent this morning with that litany of items above was the final straw. Because she didn’t get to make those new business calls and set up new appointments. And she realized that if she kept spending all her time filling current orders, soon there would be none because her pipeline was empty.

We all believe we have the answers and can keep all the balls in the air successfully. Unfortunately, that’s not typically the case.

Last year I realized my assistant couldn’t provide me with the help I needed. So I went from an assistant to a business operations manager. She came on board with experience and yes, I pay her substantially more. And she is worth every penny. In her first week, she streamlined several processes and improved our efficiency! She handles most of our administrative tasks which keeps me from working till all hours of the night. She also recognizes those issues that she can handle and keep me out of it.

Work on the Bigger Picture
And by her handling those tasks I can work more diligently on the bigger picture. While I am not the exclusive salesperson for my business, I am the primary rainmaker. I bring in accounts and hand them off to account managers. I typically keep a toe in the water with them, but overall once they are handed off, I stay out of it.

Now I will say I keep on top of the finances. I do watch my accounts and I review invoices before they go to clients.

One reason I stay on top of my accounts is that years ago I had a part-time bookkeeper arrested in my office. Yes, you read it right. They put her in the frisk position leaning on my assistant’s desk!

Checks and Balances aren’t Controlling
Luckily, she didn’t succeed in taking anything from me. I had realized the books were a mess and had put her on notice when the police knocked on my door. At is it turned out, she had been embezzling from another company. She had set up bogus vendors and was cutting checks for non-existent bills. Of course, the checks were going into her personal account!

Because of that experience (and others I have heard about) I will never not have my eye on my finances. It saved me. I am sure of it. She had started off following our processes and slowly worked to change them. I know our vendors, I have checks and balances and for me, this is a necessary “controlling” step.

I also like to review my client invoices before they are released. It doesn’t take much time but I prefer to catch those little mistakes that are easily made. I know some owners feel the dollars aren’t worth it. Granted, looking at hundreds of invoices sounds like a lot (maybe I should rethink this) and it is on some level. However, making sure some of the nuances clients request are followed saves me time in the long run.

We all have our way of working. Sometimes letting go of just a little can give us a lot in return.