Leadership Thought #345 – Focus on What You Do Well

Leadership Thought #345 – Focus on What You Do Well

Focus on what you do well and then delegate everything else you can. Many leaders spend too much time on things they aren’t good at and are below their pay grade. Leadership is about effectively growing, leveraging, and deploying assets. What does it say about the company if its top personnel resource is used ineffectively? Time is finite, and once it is wasted, it is gone.

If you spend considerable time being mediocre or slightly above average, you don’t help yourself or the company. Moreover, time is money, and if senior people are focused on lower value-added activities, the organization is not maximizing the return on its people investments. I sometimes ask my clients to conduct time/activity audits to track what they do daily and weekly. It can be an eye-opening experience for them.

One of my colleagues repeatedly tells his clients to put a Post-it on their computer screen with the question, “Whose job am I doing right now?” What a great question to always have top of mind. I prefer to modify it slightly to say, “Am I the right person to be doing what I am doing right now?” Especially in smaller companies, my concern is less about role and responsibility and more focused on time and talent. We often get hung up on hierarchy and titles in this country, which can be very much to our detriment. The goal should be to get things done in the most effective way possible.

I contend that to be genuinely good at something, you must like to do it. Leaders often complain that they spend most of their time doing things they dislike. I always ask them the same question in response, “Why?” You have the authority to determine the structure of your company and assign responsibilities. Why would you burden yourself with tasks and responsibilities you don’t like or do well? This doesn’t mean you will be 100% happy with what you do every day. However, on balance, you should feel like you are using your role effectively to benefit the business. In addition, this mindset should trickle down throughout your organization, including factoring into your hiring decisions. Imagine what would happen if everyone in your company got to do what they were best at most of the time, starting with you.

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