How I work 2 hours a week and get more done.

00:00:00
Hey, in this video I’m going to show you how I’ve structured my business such that I spend about an hour to two hours a week on actual client work. Um things like receiving emails, sending off to my team, um coaching and training some um individual project stuff. And the rest of my time I spend it working on emotional labor, learning new things, uh strategic level stuff, making mistakes, um trying new stuff basically in order to uh forward the prog progression of my business. So as they say, don’t work in

00:00:35
the business, work on the business. I’m going to show you how to get to that uh stage. So there’s uh three levels of types of work that we can do. And at the bottom is going to be chores and tasks. So these are things that we have to do that don’t push the needle forward. So things like even doing taxes. Um it’s not really client facing. If you don’t do it, you’re going to get in a bit of trouble. Um so it’s a bit of a chore and a task to do. Uh and then all the way to

00:01:10
things like client work where if they come and they need a website um all the decisions that need to go on there to make a website these fall into chores and tasks. Um what characterizes chores and tasks it’s it’s typically solved. We know how to do it best. Um you can train someone else to do it for you. Whereas at the top of the levels these this is the work that is exclusive to you that only the decision maker can be doing. um or at least the when I say decision maker I mean the leadership uh because

00:01:38
as you’ll see we’ll need to push decision- making downwards um yeah so that’s going to be exclusive to you but these are things that are solved that you can train people how to do all right and one step above it is going to be outsourced so now we take a step we add another thing to our plate to do instead of just the chores and tasks we add all the work that is involved with doing outsourcing stuff. So, hiring, training, um creating manuals, SOPs, all this stuff falls into outsource. So, as as you don’t want to

00:02:15
get into a position where you’re overwhelmed with so much chores and tasks that you can’t work on this outsourcing stuff because this is going to be crucial to get getting you to the um third level, which is going to be emotional labor. So emotional labor is the realm of the unsolved. It’s where we go out, make mistakes, try new stuff, you know, take the blame, um be criticized. These are all emotional labor work. And this is what actually pushes the business forward, gets us innovating, doing

00:02:52
things that the industry hasn’t seen before. And we want to make sure that we can free up our time from chores and tasks as soon as possible so that we can put most of our time into emotional labor. All right. So when it comes to actual chores and tasks and getting to outsourcing, um this is where I’m going to be primarily looking at right now. When I’m when I say outsourcing, I don’t mean like we are going to ship all our work overseas to somewhere else. Although you can do that. What I mean by

00:03:20
outsourcing is like you as an individual just basically leaving it up to someone else to do. So it could be someone inhouse in your team um you know in the states with you. Uh we could still consider that outsourcing. Okay. So the framework that we’re going to follow to first get rid of this from your plate is going to be to eliminate automate and then delegate. So, I see a lot of business owners jump immediately to delegation. Uh, which is great in the short term. Um, you don’t think it’s going to happen again. It’s a

00:04:05
quick way to get it off your plate so you can focus on what you consider the important stuff. But the problem is that it creates so much mess within downstream within your teams that um I really don’t recommend you just delegate stuff um half-hazardly. It’s excuse me it’s incred incredibly disrespectful to the people who just gets stuff piled onto them. Um I’ve worked for companies and um you know as a freelancer and stuff and I’ve had things delegated to me and trust me it’s not a good feeling.

00:04:39
Uh and also it creates a lot of mess. It creates delegation just becomes an op like it becomes a way of solving problems to that business owner now. So whenever he runs into a problem he won’t go through the elimination and automation steps. He’ll just go straight to delegation. So it becomes a very quick shortcut to shove problems under the rug uh without addressing it properly first. All right. So from chores and tasks we need to get these tasks um or chores and tasks outsourced. we need to get someone else

00:05:08
to do it. But before we go into doing this and going straight to delegation, first think can we eliminate this chore in tasks. Um and understanding how when you can eliminate stuff. A lot of it can be trial and error. Um a lot of it can be just understanding that this isn’t necessary anymore or um when you change strategies like um you see the landscape uh shifting and you realize that okay, this isn’t something we need to invest in anymore. For whatever reason it is, there’s plenty of chores and tasks that

00:05:38
you could probably find that you could eliminate that you can just totally get rid of, have your team stop doing, you yourself stop doing because it might not have the actual um value to the people you choose to serve as the amount of time and effort and energy that and the investment required to actually deliver that. So if you can identify those things, just eliminate it. It’s not going to have a positive impact. it’s costing you a lot, so why keep doing it? And why delegate it to someone who um is going to do it? And

00:06:11
they’re smart, too. Trust me. Like, I’ve worked with uh entry level people. I’ve hired um people with like no experience, but these are still people, and they have brains just like ours, and they’re able to see a lot of the times that the work that we’re handing them is kind of useless. And when that happens, um that’s where demotivation comes from. They lose their sense of purpose and and so on and so forth. Anyway, after we eliminate stuff, then we go on and ask, can we automate this thing? So, a lot of

00:06:41
tasks are surprisingly automate um there’s a lot of solutions to automate things. So, uh think of is it recurring? Is it um is it like are the steps to accomplishing that thing the same? Then likely there is some sort of automation that exists. um particularly when we look at creating jobs and like roles um they’re going to be doing some consistent work. So, I’m always looking for my team as well. Like, I’m always seeing, can I find some automations for them? And I’m always encouraging them,

00:07:11
hey, can you automate your job to make it easier for yourself to so you can do less? Um, because if you do find a way to do that, I’ll actually give you a bonus and you’ll have to work less and I won’t pile more stuff on top of you. You’ll make the same amount of money. So, there’s this big incentive for um us to just automate stuff. And what that does is one, it allows your team to work less, so they can do less work yet still make the same amount of money, which is great for them. And also because you

00:07:40
remove the human element from that step, um the automation becomes much more scalable, it becomes um less prone to error. Uh so always look for automation. And when you can automate it, then again, you don’t have to delegate. You don’t have to create more mess downstream. All right? And let’s say you have a chore in task, you really can’t eliminate it, you really can’t automate it. Um, then you move to delegation. And one quick note about automation, there’s so much there’s so many new so much new

00:08:10
technology that comes out on a daily basis um that it’s really worth going through the biggest um recurring actions, recurring activities that you have to engage with as a business and seeing if there’s a way to automate it. if there’s something new that’s come up this quarter or the next quarter. Um because it’s really surprising. AI tools are very good at letting you know what’s available out there. Google search, you know, still does a pretty good job. So, uh always be

00:08:41
looking for better ways to automate. It’s going to help you scale so much. Your team’s going to love it. Your clients are going to get better results because it removes the human element. Um you get the idea. Finally, delegation. Now, delegation is where the bulk of the um outsourcing or not the bulk of it, the bulk of it should be eliminated and automated to be honest. But when it comes to delegation, this is where it trips people up the most. Uh because delegation has to do with decision-

00:09:09
making. I think proper delegation has to do with decision-m. If we just delegate tasks and we say, “Hey, do this,” and we’re just telling them how to do it every time, um they’re just acting as a proxy for us. And at the end of the day, we’re have we’re having to make all the decisions and that comes that hurts scalability a lot. So let’s say this is the org chart. This is you and these are the people who are your direct reports. Let’s say you have I don’t know four of them.

00:09:48
Um, what happens here is if you just delegate tasks and have them do stuff and whenever they run into something new because the landscape is always changing, you could set like standard operating procedures, checklists for things and one day the platform changes or one day how the platform works changes because the market is always changing. If that happens, there’s going to be constant need for you to um go back and forth with decision- making. And at the end of the day, you are the decision maker

00:10:20
in in in the wrong way to do it. You’re making everyone’s decisions. So, as you get more and more people, the number of decisions that you have to make goes up. And there’s a lot of things about making decisions, a big one that you shouldn’t be aware of is called decision fatigue. So when we have to make more and more decisions the our ability to make good decisions drastically um gets less ineffective um drastically gets ineffective and so with decision we want to remove as much decision fatigue as

00:10:58
possible so that we’re not making decisions at this level and all our decisions are going into very clear um like good quality decisions with emotional labor. Uh Carl Icon who was a um he he was a corporate raider. He would go and buy businesses, try to like get them to sell at lower value than it was actually worth, he would go and what he would do is when he would go to the negotiating board with the company he was trying to buy out, um he would just get them really fatigued. he would get them to

00:11:33
stay up late um to do and then he would show up like having slept in and all this stuff just so that they would make worse decisions. Um you want to remove yourself from this framework because you’re going to make some terrible decisions and it’s going to really uh be a ceiling to how far you can grow. Okay. So from here what we should do instead is we should make each of these people decision makers in their own right. So if you are familiar with any sort of leadership program or leadership I don’t

00:12:08
know even frameworks or books um what they’ll always be teaching is that leaders create other leaders. That’s what true leadership is. And this is that’s very true in business as well. If you aren’t creating people who are able to make their own decisions, then you aren’t able to create a system that is resilient. Um, a resilient system has many components that are all working in their own selfish interests and those selfish interests make that system work. If it’s just like the previous framework

00:12:40
where it’s only you as the decision maker, sorry, just being a little sick. Um, if it’s just you as a decision maker, then what happens is the entire system is very fragile because it’s dependent on you. If you’re sick like me, then your your entire system goes kind of out the door. But if you’ve done the work of creating decision makers at every point, then you don’t have to be available all the time. They can be making their own decisions. They understand how to do the things.

00:13:09
Um, and they they not only understand how to do it, but they understand why they do it. They understand the purpose behind it. They understand the roles of each other team member so they can support each other and they can do their work in a way that’s not only like gets the job done for them but also is in in alignment with the other people as well. And the only way you can do that is by if you um push decision- making down. So you give them autonomy, you give them agency to make their own decisions. And at first,

00:13:43
this is very costly because um they’re going to make a lot of mistakes. They’re going to create a lot of mess, but this is part of it. It’s like having an infant kid. Um they’re going to go and create mess, but once they mature a bit, now you have another person who’s on your side. Um same thing here. They’re going to make a mess. They’re going to create uh a lot of issues for you, especially at the beginning. But that is part of the process. like think back to when you first started and how many

00:14:10
mistakes and issues that you made. Um it’s just a reflection of that and you have to allow that to happen in order for them to reach the next stage of maturity which is when they truly understand what’s going on and now they’re able to make good decisions on your behalf. Uh once that happens now you uh you graduate from the outsourcing level. Um here what’s important is you need to get uh standard operating procedures that work is only as important um for well quality assurance and also to get

00:14:42
them to understand uh how everything works. So when you create an SOP, you go into so much detail to the most minuscule like details that and and um with our SOPs there’s like an explanation for everything why each decision is made and when they can understand all of that like they start to think like you um they start to get all the insights that you had and then put their own spin on it and it becomes like really like I see some of my uh team members and now they’re better than me and now they know

00:15:15
way more than me um and they’re putting their own um spin on things and it’s becoming incredible. All right. Um so once you can push off decision making again um the worst thing I think an organization could do is when they as they scale to withhold decision- making to keep their nodes to keep their people in the dark to keep them separate from each other. Um I I I put them as nodes here but really they’re all interconnected here. just like this. And in my organization, everyone is always talking with each

00:15:51
other like this. Um, these are this is kind of like how it looks inside our messaging. And when this happens um you create a lot of resiliency and the decision like okay when you take decision-m away from people uh it creates a lot of frustration it creates a lot of like insight that they have that you no longer have access to because um for your with your limited understanding you’ve created a decision that they don’t understand. Um so what’s important to do is to delineate who’s going to be

00:16:31
responsible for which decisions. Understand which decisions are going to come up regularly or that are going to be important. And um as soon as like you get new decisions that have to be made into your organization. Um figure out is that something that’s going to be for you or is that something that’s going to be uh for someone else to do in your organization. Send it to them. Um later on when you get like like juniors and you have the senior there like you could have the senior like just send it to the

00:16:59
senior and say like hey this is probably for your department and have them send it off. Now another like terrible thing you could do is have a single decision. So let’s say this isn’t a person. Let’s say this is a decision that has to be made. The worst thing you could do is to have like a committee that’s created around it. to have like multiple people in charge of making this one decision when it could have been done by uh just one of these people or someone else um who is maybe one level above them.

00:17:29
They’re senior. And the reason this is so terrible is this creates an environment. It creates the conditions for deniability, for um you know not taking responsibility, for basically not not being the one to mess it up, not taking ownership. Whereas in this model, we’re giving someone a specific decision. Um we’re saying that, hey, this is for you to control and own. You own the outcome, you own the results, you own how you’re going to do it, and all this. Um it’s it’s a very

00:17:59
different dynamic. this. We’re experiencing this at one of our organizations. Um, it creates massive lag. No one wants to be the one to make a mistake. No one wants to be the one to step up. It’s incredibly frustrating to work with because now I’m trying to like deal with these people trying to say, “Hey, can we make a decision on this?” And I don’t even know who to talk to. Um, so avoid committees unless it becomes a necessity because of workload. Uh, but that’s a completely different

00:18:25
thing and you should still have a committee head at that point who’s in charge of the decisions. Um, all right. So, all that now you’re finally outsourced. You have people um who are working on your side making helping you with the decisions so that you aren’t decision fatigued. Um, so that you can have a clear head to make the best decisions at the emotional labor level. Um, so I hope that makes sense. That’s how I’m able to spend about an hour to two hours a week just working on client stuff. Um, and then

00:18:55
the rest of my time is freed up to work on the important stuff like developing my course, shooting videos like this, um, getting the, uh, word out on this new thing that we’re building, um, all that emotional stuff, the the difficult stuff that no one wants to really do, public speaking, um, you know, making sure that our business is going to last, like what’s our business strategy for the next two years, five years, 10 years. Um, yeah, I think you get the idea. So, if you’re in a situation where

00:19:26
you’re uh where you have a team underneath you or you’re looking to get some teams uh underneath you, first thing I would do is start listing out all the choices and tasks. What are the recurring roles that you have or the recurring activities that you need? Um who would be a good fit for that or and then always be practicing this. So what I’m always practicing what I always practiced at the start was creating SOPs getting very granular with each step so that when someone came on board I can

00:19:52
show them all the different steps that were involved and they can kind of put their own thought to that. Um so creating SOPs I thought I found very valuable. Um hiring I found very valuable. uh whenever I worked with um a at at the beginning I think I interviewed like maybe 20 people to find one person and then as I went on um it kind of went into a like a uh inverse parabola where I started off interviewing a lot of people and then I started interviewing like I think for one position I was interviewing like 70

00:20:26
people and then uh it dropped off again as I kind of understood what to look for kind of how to really like um remove bad uh fits at the beginning and then now I’m back to maybe interviewing around 20. Um get good at hiring is what I’m trying to say. It’s very important. Um understanding the different dynamics, the different processes, finding good hires is going to be probably one of your best leverage points. If you can find someone who makes really good decisions, think of how much it’s going

00:20:54
to impact everyone else in the system. um if you get someone who is just bad at making decisions or is just a bad person in general, it’s going to really drag everyone else down as well. And we’ve certainly had uh many of those people and we we I think now we have like some of the best decision makers ever. Um but uh you’ll get better at finding those people or figuring out how to quickly get rid of them if you find that those have snuck in um and so on. So always practice also eliminating and

00:21:25
automating. So, I love elimination. It’s one of the quickest ways for me to cut costs. It’s one of the quickest ways for me to um get my team doing less so that they can enjoy life more, their time more. Uh and then automation as well. I love digging into automations. I’m usually the one doing the automations. I’m usually doing the emotional labor. Um I ask my team to look for automations as well, but uh I don’t think they’re as um familiar with that. So, one thing I would recommend

00:21:54
you to do is like get really familiar with how to automate stuff. Um, and there’s a lot of stuff you can do without coding these days. Um, there’s a lot of pre-built solutions. Even Zaps like Zapier and um or Zapier, I don’t know how it’s pronounced um integrately. There’s a lot doesn’t have to be integrations, but look for automations. And then finally, delegation. When it comes to um delegating to your team members now, your new team members, you have to be very clear with what you’re

00:22:24
looking for, you have to take ownership of all the mistakes that they make. You have to be encouraging. Um you have to at every point you ask them to make a decision or that you tell them a decision of your own, you have to explain your process behind it, why you made that decision. um that’s going to be so important because if they don’t know why you’re making this these decisions, they’re never going to be um learning from you. And later on as you get to delegate more and more um after

00:22:53
eliminating and automating uh your role transforms from that of like someone who’s commanding people to do stuff, it it shouldn’t really be like that. It should be uh it should be it and eventually becomes more of a coach where you’re instructing people, hey, this is um how you should approach it. Have you thought of it this way? Have you thought of it this way? Um what resources do you need? Who can you ask for help? Like we’re just trying to get them to open up their own resourcefulness and own um

00:23:23
like ability to do as a human being and we’re trying to help them unlock it for themselves. Um, yeah. So, I think I’ve beaten this pretty much to death and I think you get the idea. I hope you find this really valuable. Um, if you are working with a small team or and are looking to get to a bigger team or you don’t have a team at all, um, this is going to be very helpful. Thanks for watching.