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I knew it wasn’t going to work but he was adamant to give it a go as he didn’t want to invest in additional staff. It didn’t take long for him to realise he had made a big mistake and that no amount of further training would bring her skill level to where he needed it to be. Within 4 weeks he hired a trained personal assistant who was highly organised and could easily undertake
tasks required.
Gary’s Story Gary is Sales Manager of a building company. He manages a team of 15 people. Gary began coaching with me last year. One of his key goals was to finish work by 5.30 p.m. each day. At that stage he was commencing work at 7.00 a.m. and going home at 7.30 p.m. at night. Not much fun right? He had no time for his life. Working these hours he was overstressed, overweight, unwell and long hours took their toll on his family life.
There were a range of other issues affecting Gary’s productivity…the key ones were his poor time management skills, his inability to say ‘no’ and not having competent staff to delegate to. The staff issue was directly related to Gary’s time management skills. When new people joined his department they were left to their own devices with no on-going training. The staff turnover was a direct reflection of his management skills. His regular team’s performance wasn’t monitored and they never experienced any further development. In other words, Gary wasn’t an effective leader.
He had no dedicated personal assistant to delegate basic administrative tasks to and to assist him directly with his role. Gary had to look after clients and suppliers as well as his own team. The ‘people’ issues took up much of Gary’s time, therefore he extended his working hours to catch up on his own tasks… many of which could have been delegated to a competent personal assistant.
Through using our Weekly Planner to record where he was spending his time, Gary discovered he was wasting a minimum of 15 hours a week on administrative tasks which could easily be handled by an assistant. Gary’s time was worth $200 an hour and here he was wasting $3000 worth of his time minimum per week which could easily be delegated to a personal assistant who would cost his company $800 - $1000 per week.
The crazy thing about this was he procrastinated for weeks about hiring a support person. Once he saw real truth, he quickly got off his butt and took action.
The Final Word If you want to have more time to focus on what really counts in your business/organisation, then consider letting go and find an assistant who has skills you need to help you be best you can be.
Lorraine Pirihi, principal of The Office Organiser is Australia's Personal Productivity Coach. She specialises in working with businesspeople showing them how to dramatically boost their productivity, reduce the stress and the mess in their lives and have more time for enjoying their life.
