Entrepreneurship 101: You’re not going to grow if you don’t have time to think. If you’re an entrepreneur and you find yourself busy with no time to spare, that is not a sign of success.

Many entrepreneurs confuse success with lack of time. Not having time to think means you are so involved in the day-to-day running of your company that you don’t have the big picture in sight. Using this lesson on entrepreneurship 101, we’ll guide you through 5 stages of delegation from founder to CEO.

Not being able to focus on new ideas and strategies stops a company from growing. Businesses where the entrepreneur delegates tasks that can be delegated, grow exponentially. Business owners/CEOs more easily achieve success when they work on functions they’re good at and have an eye on the overall growth of the company.

According to entrepreneurial expert, Evan Carmichael, there are 6 layers of a business. Under a CEO, the fiver layers are administration, production, marketing, business development, and general manager.

Starting from the bottom, entrepreneurs should slowly delegate each layer to new or part-time hires. The company will grow when the entrepreneur stops doing the majority of tasks and focuses on big picture stuff that will help make them successful.

Entrepreneurship 101: Administration

Tasks like data entry and bookkeeping are time-consuming and can be done by anyone at a reasonable wage. You don’t need an MBA to do data entry. These are usually tasks you’re not good at or passionate about. The first person you should hire is somebody who can work with a computer and can do all the admin work that needs doing regularly.

Entrepreneurship 101: Production

This layer involves making the product or service that you sell. Remove yourself from production work, and delegate all that behind-the-scenes work that doesn’t deal directly with your clients. Let other people do all the backend tasks. If you have a service based business, move away from delivery as much as possible. And if you find yourself spending a lot of time on one side of your business, consider that as a warning sign. Look for ways to delegate that work to somebody else. If it can be broken down into a series of tasks, hire multiple people to work on it at the same time. It’ll not only speed up production but will also increase your production capacity and lead to greater sales.

Entrepreneurship 101: Marketing

A lot of businesses get stuck on marketing, whether it’s on Facebook, social media, print, websites, etc. Marketing is important, but it takes a lot of time and a lot of brain power. Free up mental space by giving the work to a professional. Hire a digital marketer, or hand it all over to a marketing agency.

Entrepreneurship 101: Business development

Business development is all about meeting people and closing deals. This is where entrepreneurs should be: creating contacts and making deals. The only way you can get here is when you’ve got the other 3 stages under control. Spend some time here and track down where your referrals are coming from. Who are your points of references? How do people find out about you? Identify your customer touch points, and partner with agents, media outlets or local businesses to funnel customers your way. Find somebody to partner with who understands your message and can spread it to other people. If you feel that this layer is under control and you would rather spend your time elsewhere, then delegate this.

Entrepreneurship 101: General Manager

With so many arms and legs in your business, there needs to be somebody on top coordinating it all. Making sure that everything is being delivered on time, paid on time, deals are happening, goals and targets are being met. Most entrepreneurs don’t make it to this stage because they’re so engrossed in the little things below. Once you’ve established a system to monitor and manage business operations, you can hire a general manager to move on and become President or CEO of your company.

Entrepreneurship 101: Becoming a CEO

CEO is the sixth and final layer. The CEO serves as inspiration and sets a future direction for the company, while the GM focuses on the running of the company. The entrepreneur is able to focus on the big picture, and only has to tell the GM what they want to be accomplished and they’ll take care of it.

Entrepreneurs need to constantly look for ways to get up the ladder. It does take money to hire people, but as you move up the ladder, your business will grow enough to pay for new talent.

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