Are you delegating enough? 5 tasks to pass on to free up your time

Have you got more time than you know what to do with? Have you got nothing to do? Are you scratching around for extra tasks? No, I didn't think so. Here are five things that I think you should be delegating in order to free up some of your time. Sit down and see what's going on with the queen of salons. Hair, beauty, and more successful tips for business owners. It's all on Build Your Salon. Hello, hello, hello, my salon friend. How on earth are you? Achingly well, I hope, as we march into October and into Q4, which is the exciting one for lots of salons. It shouldn't be this way, but for a lot of people, this is when they make their real money. As we get through some of those big promos, as we start looking into Halloween and, of course, Black Friday, and then into Christmas and New Year season, it's when a lot of salons are actually making some really good cash. That said, it's not quite how I want you running your business. I'd love it if you are really profitable in every quarter. But what have you got going on? What's exciting for you? Let me know. Phil at buildyoursalon.com. I love hearing from my salon owner friends. But what are we talking about today? Well, we're talking about your time, my darling. The one resource that we never get any more of. We can't create time from anywhere. We're only given a certain number of days on this earth. So we've got to make sure that we're making the most out of every single one of them. Part of that, of course, is finding the joy in every day. The other part is not wasting your time on stupid little tasks that we don't need to be doing. We should be passing on to somebody else. We should be delegating. Perhaps it's because it's my birthday next week. Perhaps that's the reason why I'm thinking about aging and time and the certain number of hours that I have left. It's not a big birthday, but they all feel big these days, darling. Oh, the aches and pains, my dear. Anyway, what should we be delegating? What can we be passing on to other people? And why should we be bothering at all? Why can we not be a complete control freak? The thing is, if you're doing everything yourself, you're becoming a generalist. And a generalist has two things against them. The first thing is that you can't really charge an awful lot. If you want to charge a lot, you need to be a specialist. A specialist is when people will travel further for you, pay more for your knowledge and expertise. But it's also where the economies start to kick in. It's when we start to be able to scale the business a lot more quickly because you get quicker. You get better. You get better results in less time with less effort by specializing, specializing, specializing.

And of course, niching down means that you can charge more anyway. The other thing that happens when we're a generalist is we are very chaotic and our time gets sucked up by all sorts of dreadful tasks that we shouldn't be doing at all. So we need to learn how to delegate. And I think this is a vital skill for any business owner of any size, whether you're a solopreneur or you're running a chain of 25 salons. I don't care. You need to get better at delegation. We're not very good at it. Part of that is trust. We don't trust other people to do things our way. But if you think about that, my dear, I don't want to start lecturing you. Your Uncle Phil's not here to make you feel bad. But how arrogant to think that your way is the best way every single time. It's shocking that somebody might be able to take over a task and do it in a different way to you. And that's actually a better way than you. It means we're not taking other people's input into our business if we're not allowing people to run with tasks. The other thing that I think we get wrong with delegation is it becomes abdication. We delegate things that we don't understand. We throw them at other people without any kind of measuring or any kind of feedback loop. And we just expect them to get on with it. And we don't interfere in that again unless things go horribly, horribly wrong. So we hand over a task, ignore that task until we realise that there's a big problem in the business. Jump back in and usually pull it back into our own inbox and away from anybody else. So that's not what I want you to be doing. We need to learn to delegate properly. That means understanding the outcome, first of all. And I'm going to jump into my first example of something that I don't think you should be doing yourself. I don't think you should be doing your own bookkeeping and accounting. I don't think it's, even if it's something you enjoy, I don't think it's something that you can do as well as a professional generally. And there's a few little features of that delegation that need to go on. Firstly, a good accountant should be paying for themselves really. In terms of firstly your time that's not being taken up. But secondly, in terms of things like strategy for tax or minimising the amount of tax that we're paying, helping you financially plan, the accountant should be worth their bread and butter. And if they're not giving you the information that you need, if they're not contributing to your business in a meaningful way, if all they're doing is filing your returns, darling, we need a different accountant. But this brings me on to my delegation point quite nicely. I don't understand the nuts and bolts of what my accountant and my bookkeeper do.

I don't need to understand the nuts and bolts of it. I don't need to understand all the regulation around His Majesty's Revenue and Customs. I don't need to understand all of those filing responsibilities. I expect them to know that. But I understand the outcome. The outcome is that I get accurate information from my bookkeeper and I get my returns submitted on time and I get an estimate of my tax liability in a timely manner as well. So those outcomes I understand. And when we're delegating something, we need to understand the outcome. You don't necessarily need to understand the process. And in fact, if you delegate something without really understanding the process, that's when their creativity can come in and they can start to build systems and processes in your business in a much more creative way, but also in a different flavor to the way that you would do things. And I find that kind of interesting and exciting in your business, too. So task number one is accounting and bookkeeping. Pass it on to someone else. There are some weird people out there, you know, who do this for a living and actually enjoy it. So let them get on with it. Let them find the joy in those dreadful tasks. Now, the one thing I will say, though, is we have to get useful information from our accountant and particularly our bookkeeper. We should be getting up to date information regularly in a format that we understand. If you don't understand the information that's coming from your accountant, ask again and again and again. You're the customer in this situation. Keep asking until you get the information you want in a format you understand. My accountant came up with like a traffic light system for me and it was awesome. So I could see all the stuff in green. I didn't need to pay any attention to the things that were in amber or red. I needed to ask a few questions, dig a bit deeper and find out what was going on to that bit of my cash flow forecast. Task number two, stock control. Now, I'm going to point an accusatory finger. I'm going to tell off our salon software companies for this and I need you all. Listen up, salon software companies. Either get to grips with stock control or delegate it out and find someone who can do that for you. Let's have somebody else build an app that is solely dedicated to stock control in a useful, interesting, but easy way. And then integrate with all the software systems that we have. Somebody go out there. There's a million dollar idea right there. Go and build us a stock control app because the salon software systems that I've used do this appallingly badly. They make it so convoluted and so difficult that, in fact, I don't use the salon software system for stock ordering.

I'm afraid I've gone old school. We have a clipboard with stock sheets and we do a stock count and that's how we come up with our order. And it shouldn't be a manual process in that kind of way. But definitely this is something that we can be delegating. So how did I do that in my salon? Well, my assistant manager was in charge of stock control. We had minimum and maximum levels for all of the products on the shelf. Yes, it took some time to set up and they were reviewed every year as well. I would have one meeting with our manufacturer's rep at the beginning of the year. That's when they would set out their vision for where the business was going over the next 12 months. I would set out what I need from them for the next 12 months. And then I didn't even meet the reps after that. And my assistant manager was allowed to order up to a certain level to replace the stock that we'd sold. He also had the authority to spend 10% more than that if it meant we were getting a deal. And you understand how this works in our businesses. You know, if you order a certain amount of products, but you hit a certain threshold, they give you a load of freebies or a load of samples or whatever. So he was allowed to order up to 10% over what we needed if it was going to get us a deal. So that boundary was set in place. He was not allowed to bring a new product in without consulting with me. And he was not allowed to discontinue a product without consulting me. So that entire setup, that entire process was delegated to someone else. And I had a very light touch. But there was a feedback loop put in place. And this is where delegation differs from abdication. By having that annual meeting with my assistant manager and with our sales rep, by also hearing about stock control levels and making sure that we had a certain percentage that was tied up in stock. And that was a feedback process from my bookkeeper. I was keeping tabs on what was going on without getting involved in the nitty gritty. I didn't have to do it myself. Third up, laundry. My God, the number of salon owners that I know who take laundry home with them, which is even worse. But doing laundry tasks during the day, I promise you, just book one extra service a week. And that will more than pay for your laundry costs. Particularly if a hair salon where you can use a lot of disposable towels and things these days as well.

You should not be doing your own laundry. It's not a great use of your time. It's something that needs passing down. Now, where I see a big problem, though, is it gets passed down to the cheapest member of the team. And normally that's your assistants or your apprentices. Be careful with that. When I sit at home as a 16, 17, 18, 19-year-old newbie to the industry, and I have a picture of how my career is going to look, it probably doesn't look like getting lots of teas and coffees and doing lots of laundry. It's very demotivating to fill your assistant's day with these menial tasks that it's not worth your time to do. So I'm talking not just about delegation, but I would be looking at outsourcing your laundry to an external company. Similarly, and number four is deep cleaning. So the everyday cleaning, yes, of course, we need that doing. But deep cleaning, yes, it might be something that your salon team can manage together. It's not something that should be down to you. And I know a lot of salon owners that go in when the salon's closed once a week or once a month, and they do the deep clean because they don't trust their team members to do it. My goodness, what a waste of your time. What a waste of your free time to be going in and doing that. So let's get that systemized delegated. And yes, you can systemize cleaning. Let me give you an example. I systemized the cleaning of our retail shelves. Small task, but it needs a system. It needs a process. Because I had a few little niggles, a few things that I wasn't very happy with. The first was when I saw people cleaning the retail shelves, they used to put the products on the floor. And I thought, oh gosh, these nice posh products that we're trying to sell our customers that feel like a treat. And they're all piled up on the floor while you clean the shelf. That doesn't look very nice, does it? And also the thing that used to really piss me off on my days was when the products went back on the shelf and they weren't where they were supposed to be. They weren't in the order that I'd set up. So I systemized it. I timed how long it would take to clean the retail shelves. I had a photograph of where each product went on the shelf. And all of that was in a basket with the cloth that I wanted them to use, the product that I wanted them to use. And guess what? When they took the products off the shelf, they could put them in the basket while they were cleaning instead of on the floor. Just a small example of how we can systemize those menial tasks though. And finally, and the big one, and the biggest frustration that I have when I'm coaching people one-to-one is you can't be doing tasks that you're paying your manager to do. And I see this a lot with salon owners. They're paying a manager or an assistant manager. And honestly, when I dig down, and it doesn't take a lot of digging,

to realize that the manager or the assistant manager isn't doing anything over and above what a stylist or an esthetician or a front of house manager would do. They're not doing any of the tasks that I would expect a manager to do. They're not taking part in the performance management of the rest of the team. They're not helping with any marketing initiatives beyond maybe a few social media posts. They're just literally key holders, to be honest. And that's because the salon owner refuses to delegate, refuses to let go. So if you're paying your manager to do it, if it's in their job description, they should be doing a task. My God, let's get to the stage where you're comfortable and they're confident and competent to carry out that task and let them bloody get on with it. Makes their job more interesting. Makes you able to specialize and stick to your lane and reduces some of the stuff in your inbox as well. Now, the final thing that I would say about delegation, it's the same with policies and procedures and processes too, is if something doesn't work, if we build a system, if we build a process and it doesn't work, that doesn't mean we abandon the system. It doesn't mean we abandon the delegation. We go back in, figure out how we can make it work. And yes, that's time consuming. Yes, it's frustrating for a short amount of time. But the long-term gains of finally getting something delegated to someone who can do the job properly for you is enormous. I mean, it's when we start to take the lid of the potential in your business is when you start to let things go. So I hope that's been useful to you. What have I missed? What are you delegating in your business that you think other salon owners should be delegating to? Reach out, let me know. Phil at buildyoursalon.com. Take 30 seconds to click follow or subscribe. Take another 30 seconds to give me a five-star review. That would be awesome. Just seven short days until I'm coming in your ears again. And I'll be a year older by then. How exciting. I'm off to Belfast tomorrow, in fact, for a weekend of coaching, but also a little bit of celebrating too. Until we speak again, take care. Sit down and see what's going on with the Queen of Salons. Hair, beauty and more. Successful tips for business owners. All on Build Your Salon.