The concept is simple – just delegate . . .
But training a team member is often a rushed process, especially if you are anything like the ‘Business Artist’ I blogged about last week (Artists can be bad for business).
A rushed process leads to mistake-filled work, frustration and many business owners revert back to doing these tasks themselves, because it is just easier & faster!
Not anymore . . .
The method we use to train a team member looks very different. It is super-fast and frees up your time in minutes . . . Minutes to Freedom
That’s the goal. We want to get information out of your head and into your teams world in a way they can pick it up and run with it in five minutes or less.
The first vital point is for you share the context before content. Make sure your team understands why the task matters, when it occurs and where it fits in the big picture.
When your team understand the WHY of a task, the HOW becomes much easier to implement.
The next steps are to teach the HOW. The steps for doing a task. This needs to be provided in a way they can really understand.
The tasks you want to off-load to your team members are probably things you’re unconsciously confident at doing. . . and you are good at it!
You’ve been doing the activity so long and executed flawlessly that it takes zero thought. This means you have unconscious confidence.
The problem is when people with unconscious confidence explain things to people with no confidence, they move through a process really fast and can miss steps.
To fix this, we need to change the way we record the activity.
Instead of explaining how we think we do the activity, we need to capture the process in motion when doing the actual activity.
Think about popular cooking shows on TV. They are successful because the chef takes you through each step, in detail, showing you how to make a particular dish.
We can to do the same thing. We need to record ourselves doing the task live instead of just explaining it.
There are two major benefits of recording the task live:
Your team gets to see exactly how the task is to be done. Exactly how it is to be done, in the right order. Not just the theory or what you remember.
Instead of having to explain and document activities, you can do the task, record it, and give them a complete. You are literally done in minutes.
There are 2 great tools our BBD team can recommend you use Jing or Zoom.
You will effectively be cooking on camera with your device, recording your movements and instructions just like a TV chef.
The last vital point in training your team member is to give them the video and have them document it for you. . .
Oh! Yes! . . . Delegate the documenting part.
That way you only have to do the task once, and it’s their job to document it into a Standard Operation Procedure (SOP). This achieves four things.
1. It frees up your time
2. It will speed up the process of recording SOP’s.
3. When they document the process, they will understand it much better.
4. They have contributed to the creation of the system, so they are much more committed to following it.
This last point is crucial. Delegating the documenting helps take your process from a requirement to a personal assurance that it will be followed.
In summary your job is to record the activities at the speed of doing, then pass it on to your team, and have them write their own job description.
Sean Martyn
PS: Whenever you’re ready . . . here are 4 ways we can help you grow your business: