Lessons in Delegation: What I Wish I Had Known Earlier in My Career

I wish I had known as much about building organizations and effective delegation earlier in my career as I do now.

Like most business owners and leaders, I was the rainmaker in my business. While I had a team, I made most of the decisions. However, as my business scaled, I felt that this approach was becoming the limiting factor. Recognizing this, I took it upon myself to learn how to enable effective leaders below me and mentor them in doing the same.

Fast-forward to today, and I’ve learned much more about delegating effectively working with Kaseya. One of the reasons I sold TruMethods to Kaseya was that I had been running operating companies for more than 25 years and didn’t want to do that anymore. It was time for me to move on from that stage of my career.

Kaseya presented me with an opportunity to help more MSPs. I would be in charge of an organization of people across TruMethods Peer, Powered Services Pro, industry events, and the Global Partner Program. While I wanted to use this platform to make a difference in our industry, I didn’t want the day-to-day minutia, so I took business planning, organizational design, and delegation to a new level.

In an organization of 70 people, I have only one direct report. We have meeting rhythms, metrics, and accountability in place at every level. Each level down needs to do the same until every contributor is aligned with our team and goals. Most importantly, everyone in my organization must understand the difference between delegation and abdication.

Most leaders abdicate instead of delegate. They work until they’re overwhelmed, and then they offload things onto someone else. This contrasts with delegation, where you put process, metrics, expectations, and reporting in place so that with very little time, you can manage the area you’ve offloaded and mentor the leader to do the same.

Reflecting on my career, I could have done a much better job delegating in the past; my business, team, and customers would have benefited. We all can do better to empower our people, enjoy our leadership roles more, and achieve results beyond our current expectations.