Identify Tasks to Delegate Using the Five Ts Criteria

According to a study from The Alternative Board, entrepreneurs spend roughly 68% of their time working “in” their businesses by performing day-to-day tasks and putting out fires, while only about 31% of their time is spent working “on” their businesses through strategic planning and working towards long-term goals.

The result? Not only do entrepreneurs spend more total hours working than the average employee, they spend the majority of that time on tasks that could be delegated.

If reading those stats makes you wonder what you’re really spending your time on (and how much time you could save if you didn’t spend all day on Slack), identify tasks to delegate by keeping the Five Ts criteria in mind.

Tiny

Small tasks – like answering emails and scheduling appointments – may seem inconsequential, but they add up fast. Small (but straightforward) tasks can and should be handled by another team member.

Teachable

Some of your biggest “brain drain” tasks might not be small enough to instantly hand off to an employee, but if they’re teachable, they can be translated into a workflow and passed along with you providing quality checks and final approvals.

Time-Sensitive

Sometimes it feels like there just aren’t enough hours in the day to get everything done, let alone get everything done on time. Delegate small but time-sensitive tasks so they can be done in parallel to the larger projects you’re working on.

Tedious

Repetitive tasks (like manually inputting a 100-item list into a spreadsheet and color-coding it) are probably not what you should be spending your energy on. Delegate tedious tasks to another team member so you can dedicate yourself to solving more complex problems.

Terrible-At

Most entrepreneurs can’t – and shouldn’t – have a hand in every aspect of their business. If there’s a task that doesn’t fit within your zone of genius, like software installations or PowerPoint design, hand that off to someone else.

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