How Can Small Business Owners Get More Time to Drive Value in Their Business?
Entrepreneurs often see an opportunity to start a business based on their skills and the fact that they enjoy the work. They also enjoy having the autonomy to make decisions regarding their business and career. Since they are good at what they do, they see success and growth within their business. As their business grows, they begin to realize that more and more of their time is needed performing task that they never knew were required and often they do not enjoy doing. Spending their days invoicing, bookkeeping, ensuring their internal policies and procedures are adequate, developing marketing materials, managing people, and reviewing financial documents (amongst other tasks) become a large part of their role. They are not able to spend the time doing the tasks that originally set them on the path of entrepreneurship or the things that they really want to be doing.
If the business owner is spending most of their time functionally working in the business, then who is working on the business? Someone needs to be working on strategy, looking for opportunities, being aware of changes coming, and ultimately driving value for the company and the employees. Distinguishing between the many different roles that a business owner performs can be a good starting point, but ultimately it comes down to two main roles: the CEO and the manager. The CEO in a small or medium business is the visionary and provides the direction and guidance to the organization (i.e. working on the business). The manger works in the company executing tasks and ensuring the business runs smoothly. If the owner is constantly pulled into the manager role, then there is no one providing corporate oversight and ensuring the team is all collectively working towards a common vision.
Often the rationale for a business owner to be working in the business is that they do not have enough time to work on the business. But they are taking on many of the roles within the organization and performing tasks which are outside of their technical expertise and competencies. This in turn takes more time as they learn and grow into these roles. By delegating some of these tasks they are able to work on the roles that match their skills, and the other tasks are completed efficiently as they are completed by someone with a skill set that matches the task. Now with more time they are able to focus on the business ultimately driving value and opportunity.
When the owner is having fun and working on tasks that they enjoy the work is completed more efficiently. The only way to ensure this happens is by having the right team in place. Owners need to identify the tasks that they are not able to complete efficiently and do not enjoy in order to hand them off. Sometimes this means bringing in additional full time or part time resources to take on the tasks where the team does not have the required expertise. A Fractional Executive can be a low risk, high impact way of giving the owner the support in identifying their path, what skills the company needs, how the company can afford these skills, and ultimately how to get the owner the time that they need. By targeting specific expertise based on the needs of the company a Fractional Executive can help drive value quickly and ensure that the company’s resources are allocated effectively.
