Realizing your strengths in business
August 7, 2008 by ShannonCherry
Filed under Business
One of my interns, after weeks of training, could not get the hang of writing press releases. As much as I reviewed it, as much as I taught – and as much as he tried, he really was not improving. And it was taking him hours just to write a release based on a template. It shouldn’t be so hard.
But he is a good writer, especially on other marketing copy, so I couldn’t get my head around what was making this so difficult.
When we discussed it, it turned out, he hated journalism and press releases, but loved the other marketing-related stuff he was doing, including market research, writing sales copy and promotional materials.
Once we got that clarity, I realized (as did he) PR wasn’t for him – and that, upon graduation in a year, he should pursue advertising or marketing, which he loves.
What are you doing in your business that’s hanging you up? For me, it was bookkeeping, so I happily have outsourced it to a certified bookkeeper who specializes in small businesses. I also use not one, but two VAs to do my scheduling and handle some of the back-end work, like writing up contracts, etc.
Perhaps you can find the things you’re not that good at, and start outsourcing them too? In the long run, it will save you time – and money!
I do hear this topic on outsourcing from colleagues over and over again. So I decided to be a little proactive on the subject. I went about putting a plan in order (since time management is my “thing”) I wrote down what I do, then what I like to do and don’t next to what I do. Then I wrote down in another category “what it would look like” when it was time to outsource that duty to someone else and who I would give it to when I do want to outsource it (prices etc. attached). It not only made me aware of the projects I like and don’t like but the ones I don’t like will eventually be done by someone else. The benefits of having this information at my fingertips is that it connected me to the process’s of my business and the progress of it too. So when it comes to that VA and when to turn something over to them I know what, where, when and who! Hope this is a good idea for you all!! Enjoy.
I can’t get the taxes part down. (I know — so stereotypical of a woman, right?) I just do what I can and then take a few deep breaths and turn everything over to my tax accountant. Doing it myself is just not worth the stress.
It’s interesting that you should bring this up as this is something that I was thinking about blogging about also. I’ve long been a great supporter of outsourcing tasks to others. Its a great way of getting relatively low cost work achieved in a much quicker time frame and usually at a better quality than you could do yourself. I’m a great advocate of replacing what would otherwise be a weakness with outsourcing.