We’ve all heard about advisors who take extended vacations while still managing to have a successful practice. How? They’re great delegators.
Here are the 3 strategies they practice:
Proper preparation
Think through what you want to achieve before providing guidance to your team.
Read: Sharing, delegating that work load
Take the example of client acquisition. Most advisors only want to work with wealthy clients. If everyone on the team knows your minimum account size, it empowers them to determine if a potential client is a right fit, instead of just taking orders.
Communication
Too often advisors spend a considerable amount of time with a client in person, or on the phone, and then emerge from the meeting and quickly pass on the key tasks to an associate or assistant. That can result in missed deadlines and improper client service.
Read: How to build a million-dollar practice
It’s better to include the associate in the meeting or provide him or her with a written summary of the discussion.
Autonomy
Successful advisors let their team members have greater levels of autonomy. In his book Drive, author Daniel Pink shows that once a person takes care of his basic needs, financial incentives don’t work. Instead, what people really want are autonomy, mastery, and purpose: like they are doing good work and have input into how the task gets done.
Read: Outsourcing your HR department
I once sat down with an advisor who thought he was capped out in his level of production. But in the past 15 years, he’s learned to give up more control to his team and have them take on more responsibility. Now, his book is three times the size it was, and he has room to grow.
If you want less stress and a more profitable business, you need to learn to delegate effectively.