If You Want it Done Right, You DON'T Have to Do it Yourself

 

We’ve all heard the business saying, “If you want something done right, you have to do it yourself.” I’ve heard it in articles, online and in person from people I’ve worked with.  You know what?  They’re wrong.  In fact, they’re so wrong, that sometimes that mentality can be bad for business! 

  

How can that be when you’ve heard it repeated so often and in so many places?  Simple, everyone that says it is mistaken.  They usually believe it, but they’re still mistaken.  Doing something right is about having the right talent or skills to do it.  

Have you ever had to put a PowerPoint presentation together and been disappointed with how good it looked?  You’ve been building them for years but they never look the way you want.  The youngest person on the team however, put one together and it looked amazing.  Why?  They have a talent for graphic design.  

If you wanted this presentation made right, you would NOT want to do it yourself.  You’d want to have the person with the talent to truly realize your vision do it.  There are many other examples.  You’ve engineered a new product or application.  You want to sell it and make money, but you have not talent or skills for selling.  Should you just do it yourself?  No, probably not.  You should partner with someone that knows how to sell and believes in the product you’ve created.   

While there are somethings that you should do yourself, those are the things that you are especially talented or skilled in.  If a task at hand is something you know you can knock out of the park and it’s not something that someone on your team can do, then go ahead and do it.   

If the task that needs to be done, is something that is not your forte and you have or can hire someone else to do it better, then go that route.  Hire it out or delegate it.  Spend time on the things that you are truly good at.  The quality of your work shines through when what you’re doing is aligned with your talents and skills.  That’s true for both yours and those you hire and work with.  Recognize who is good at what and be sure that they’re the ones that get to shine through their work. 

Finding yourself frequently having to do tasks that others haven’t done to your standard?  Tell us in the comments.