Why reliable systems are paramount in order to grow your bookkeeping business

Have you taken the plunge to put on another bookkeeper and it didn’t work out?

Have you thought about where it went wrong?

Often the problem is effective delegation. Wikipedia says that “Delegation is the assignment of authority and responsibility to another person to carry out specific activities.”

There are a few key points in this article:

•    Delegation is one of the core concepts in Management and Leadership
•    The person delegating remains accountable for the outcome
•    Effective delegation requires a shift in decision-making
•    Delegation is not abdication
•    The opposite of effective delegation is micromanagement

Robert Bacal from Leadertoday says that there is a difference between delegating and dumping. He says that delegation refers to giving up some control and assigning tasks to others, while delegating tasks without authority becomes dumping, and is often ineffective.

Delegating requires letting go of control which you must if you want to grow your bookkeeping business. However the key is to have thorough systems in place which steps the bookkeeper through the process of how you want the bookkeeping tasks done and which will give you a consistent outcome every time so that you can guarantee the quality of the work.

Trust the system, train your team and THEN delegate responsibility.