So in the past 12 years, there has been one consistent problem that I have seen ruin really good organizations and even to level of local governments. The issue is micromanagement sure there are plenty of books on this but it has been the issue in my working life that has been a hydra-like issue. I’ve seen so many projects that had great potential perform subpar with their potential due to one tyrannical or sometimes just inexperienced person in power’s need for control in fear of the outcome. The sad part is the fear of failure or the psychological process of loss aversion isn’t rooted in any anecdotal or empirical proof. 

If you can’t automate then, delegate if you can’t delegate then eliminate. This is a great lesson from the four-hour work week and I personally use this in professional life across my revenue streams. Because effectively I try to maximize the amount of time I actually have for projects that I am working on as well as time for my son which as a single parent is paramount. But returning to the subject it is important to automate tasks such as figuring out certain types of emails regarding your work tasks that are the most common questions and to automate responses. For example my current 9-5 as the economic development officer for the Kiitigan Zibi band I have generated 5 types of emails regarding my work tasks. Primarily dealing with different loans and grants that are the most common I get all are copy-pasted for such responses other than the name of the person sending it. The same goes for a lot of my consultation agreements I also have an email landing page for managing payments and invoicing due to a lot of my time being spent invoicing clients. That or automating advertising with various software platforms such as email auto-responders and targeted social media ads is a very simple form of automation that effectively routes time spent on client acquisition.  

It is important to communicate and delegate tasks and entrust them to people handling them (assuming they are competent). This is important to ensure growth and success at any level. Delegating tasks to professional people based on the need and skill required to accomplish the task is essential for the person in the leadership role to maximize their time and oversee the operation as a whole. This keeps things effective although more expensive in overhead but the long-term benefit is expansion. For example, entrusting your tasks to your assistant to communicate the adjectives you need accomplished to your team or entrusting the manager of your departments (or for Native bands we have “officers” and “Directors”). A common problem I see happen with native bands and organizations is the delegation of tasks to an assistant isn’t made clear so the leader such as the chief will often have to intervene or interfere depending on the political agenda for the tasks to be accomplished. Although this is primarily a communications issue… it is related that assistants and managers should deal with the everyday monotonous tasks of dealing with complaints and/or small issues that come up. But from personal experience, everything is at the mercy of the Top-down command structure’s interest instead of distributing the tasks and allowing the judgment to competent department leaders to decide on a course of action instead of overcumbering leadership with tasks. I’ve also had this happen in my early years of working in the film industry primarily from producers… one going as far as sacrificing some of the primary scenes’s due to micromanaging logistics from departments which ended up costing the production more money and not achieving the planned outcome. 

The final step is the Elimination of the task. This is just a simple case if it is not cost-effective, hindering time, and can not be passed on to another process to eliminate it. For example, a redundant task I have had to eliminate especially due to high gas prices in both consulting and work is client visiting or personal meetings without financial compensation. Although I can write it off in taxes for my consultation I have a hard time for meetings with my work due to having to move up and down the command chain for permission. I also have to do unnecessary paperwork due to the finance department other than just filing for travel claims listed in the policy. It wasn’t just a money thing it was extremely time-consuming living in Maniwaki and traveling 2 hours to Ottawa for meetings. So… I eliminated the task to focus on other projects and would rather attend zoom meetings unless mandated… 

Although this is the premise of the 4-Hour Work Week by Tim Ferris. It is essential as a leader or an entrepreneur to learn to list boundaries and create space for the physical and psychological tasks so that you can focus on newer tasks related to your growth. Because of the largest risk to mitigating his or her loss of time.