Play to your strengths: where founders should focus their time

When you start a business, you can find yourself doing almost everything. Researching, selling, delivering, organising and dealing with whatever needs attention next.

In my first business, much of that responsibility initially sat with me. In my second, it was shared.

Being involved in everything gives you a close understanding of the business. But as it grows, the same pattern can leave important work waiting and other people depending on you for decisions they could make themselves.

Playing to your strengths means understanding where your contribution is most useful and building support around the rest.

That requires an honest look at what you do well, what you enjoy and what the business needs from you now.

Look for evidence of your strengths

Start with situations where your contribution has made a useful difference.

What were you doing? What did you bring to the situation? What changed as a result?

You might be good at making a complicated issue understandable, building trust with customers or helping a team reach a decision. Your strengths may be less obvious to you because they feel natural.

Ask people who have worked closely with you:

• When have you seen me make the most useful contribution?

• What do you come to me for?

• Where do I make things harder than they need to be?

• What could I give someone else more room to do?

Look for specific examples. “You’re good with people” is encouraging, but it leaves a lot unexplained. Understanding how you help people will give you more to work with.

Separate what you enjoy from what you do well

Enjoyment matters, particularly when you are considering how you want to spend your working life. It is one part of the picture.

You may enjoy something you are still learning. You may be capable at a task that leaves you drained. You may also keep doing familiar work because it feels comfortable while a less familiar responsibility needs attention.

Consider three questions:

Am I effective at this? Do I want to keep doing it? Does it need to be me?

The answers can point towards different decisions.

Something you enjoy and do well may still be better owned by another person if your attention is needed elsewhere. Work you find difficult may require development or support before you can responsibly hand it over.

Review where your time actually goes

Look back over a typical week or two.

Include the small requests and interruptions as well as the planned work. Where did your time go? Which activities needed your judgement? Which reached you because that is how things have always been done?

For each recurring responsibility, consider whether you should:

• Continue owning it.

• Develop your ability to handle it.

• Share it with someone who brings complementary experience.

• Hand it over with suitable support.

• Stop doing it because it no longer serves a useful purpose.

Pay attention to work only you can currently do because the information is in your head. That may be a sign that you need to explain or document something, rather than a reason to keep it permanently.

Match your role to the next stage of the business

The work that helped you get started may differ from the work that helps the company progress now.

Perhaps you were the person who won the first customers. You may now need to help someone else understand the offer and take responsibility for sales.

Perhaps your detailed involvement kept delivery on track. With a larger team, you may need to clarify expectations and improve how decisions are made.

Ask what the business most needs from you over the coming months. Then compare that with where your time is going.

If you are planning to hire, use that gap to inform the role. Your team and hiring plan should reflect the work ahead and how your own responsibilities will change.

Build support where you need it

You do not have to become the best person at every part of running a business.

You do need enough understanding to ask useful questions, assess progress and recognise when you need specialist help.

For example, you may rely on someone else to prepare financial information while making time to understand the assumptions and decisions it supports. A non-technical founder may need experienced technical input to assess delivery risks and options.

Support could come from an employee, a colleague, an adviser or someone working with you part-time. Choose the arrangement to fit the need and the resources available.

Be clear about what you expect and what remains your responsibility.

Give other people room to contribute

If you are used to being the person who solves a particular problem, stepping back can feel uncomfortable.

Someone else may approach it differently. They may need time to learn. You may spot something you would have done another way and feel tempted to take over.

Agree the outcome, boundaries and support before handing over the work. Make clear which decisions the person can make and when they should involve you.

Then judge progress against those expectations.

Different does not automatically mean worse. Where the work needs improvement, explain what matters and help the person develop their judgement.

Repeatedly reclaiming responsibility can prevent you from discovering what they are capable of.

Notice when a strength is being overused

An ability that serves you well in one situation can become unhelpful when applied everywhere.

Moving quickly can help a business make progress. It can also leave people unclear about what has been decided.

Attention to detail can protect quality. It can also draw you into decisions that someone else should own.

Being helpful can build strong relationships. It can also lead you to accept more work than you can manage or solve problems other people need to work through.

Ask when your usual approach is useful and when the situation calls for something different.

You can retain the strength while becoming more deliberate about how you use it.

If you are working on your own

You may not have the budget to hand work over yet.

Start by making the workload realistic. What can you simplify, postpone or stop? Where would a small amount of experienced help make a meaningful difference?

Group recurring tasks where that makes them easier to manage. Create a process for work you repeatedly have to figure out from scratch.

Be honest about capacity when setting deadlines and making promises. A plan that requires you to be excellent at everything at once needs reconsidering.

You can also seek perspective from peers or a mentor without asking them to take responsibility for the work. Sometimes a useful conversation helps you make a decision you have been circling for too long.

Make one practical change

Choose a responsibility that currently takes more of your attention than it should.

Work out why. Is there a gap in someone’s knowledge, an unclear decision or a habit of involving you unnecessarily? Are you holding on because you enjoy being needed or feel uneasy about losing control?

Decide what would improve the arrangement and discuss it with the people involved.

You might clarify ownership, provide training or agree a gradual handover. You might also decide that the work should remain with you and reduce something else to make room.

Review the effect after an agreed period. Look at the outcome for the business, the other person’s development and how your own time has changed.

Keep reviewing your contribution

Your role will continue to develop as the business changes.

Return to the question of where you contribute most, especially when you feel stretched or find yourself involved in every decision.

Understanding your strengths can help you make better choices about your work. So can recognising where you need support and allowing other people to bring something you do not.

If you would value space to explore your contribution, responsibilities and the role you want to grow into, explore working with me through founder coaching and mentoring.

Cheers,

Duncan