Small business owners really are lousy at delegation – this one I can say with some passion in my most self incriminating voice.

You know, nobody can do it like you, it takes more time to explain it than to just do it. And, frankly, it’s the work you enjoy, it’s where you get the greatest satisfaction and you can’t really let go of it because what will happen then. And yet, something truly magical will happen in your business when you finally realize you must delegate most of what you do today.

Larry Ryan founded Ryan Lawn and Tree over twenty years ago on the back seat of a tractor. Today, he is the CEO of one of the largest lawn services in the Midwest with over 150 employees and he still admits, “the hardest job I have is getting out of the way of my people.”

Growth requires delegation, not to be confused with abdication, and delegation requires systems and processes. Getting all the successful ways you do what you do documented can seem like a monumental task if taken as a grand project one day. The key to delegation and systems thinking is to employ technology married with a checklist mentality.

What I’m really talking about is an operations manual and set of processes that anyone, perhaps several virtual anyones, can operate. Now, don’t freeze up at the suggestion of a manual. Think simple baby steps first.

There are two technologies that I would suggest you take a good hard look at employing staring tomorrow. Let these technologies follow you around for about a month as you note what you do and you may finally find yourself free to properly put a universe of employees or virtual associates to work in your business.

Wiki Intranet – think of a wiki like a high powered scratch pad with built in database, search and formatting. This is the online tool that will allow you to organize and document everything that you do. Here’s the cool thing though. Anyone in your organization can edit and update whatever you create using a wiki. As long as you can scratch out a few action steps, your team or virtual assistant may very well be able to finish and refine your processes. I’ve recently started using Central Desktop for this. This tool allows me to create workspaces, essentially intranets, that I can grant access to various groups for collaboration purposes. So now, when I explain something that I need done, I jot the steps down and capture them in sortable, searchable utopia for all of time. (Central Desktop does a lot more than this and that’s what makes it worth investigating over some of the simple wiki tools.)

Email Management – Email, while the enabling technology of the Internet, has caused some real issues in business. It’s hard to manage, track, sort, respond to and delegate. A new kind of technology is available to even the smallest of business that allows you to create mailboxes for everything you might get email for – sales, service, questions, joint venture offers, quotes, speaking requests, etc. and then set-up collaboration processes that can make it easy for you to build response routines that can be delegated to virtual assistants or anyone, anywhere in your organization. I use Email Center Pro from Palo Alto Software to help manage email follow-up and delegation. I can assign tasks, view responses and filter requests from a dashboard. The best part about this is that even with the flood of email we receive, I can see that nothing gets lost. This is far more powerful from a marketing standpoint than help desk software as it still allow us to delegate, but respond as humans to every type of request, even when some of the staff is on vacation. (Disclaimer: I have a partner relationship with Palo Alto Software for Marketing Plan Pro, which, by that way, also allows me to talk about the software and the incredible people behind it.)

So, you see, by employing technology, like Central Desktop and Email Center Pro, you can document your success systems and perhaps finally start getting effective assistance in a way that will allow you to grow your business beyond your current capacity to wrap your arms around.

Posted by: John Jantsch

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Team building and teamwork skills are critical for your effectiveness as a manager or entrepreneur. There are two critical factors in building a high performance team.

The first critical factor of a teamwork success is that all the team efforts are directed towards the same clear goals, the team goals. This relies heavily on good communication in the team and the harmony in member relationships. The other important element is the diversity of skills and personalities.

Here are some additional team building ideas, techniques, and tips you can try in your situation.

1. Make sure that the team goals are totally clear and completely understood and accepted by each team member.
2. Make sure there is complete clarity in who is responsible for what. Do your best to avoid overlaps of authority.
3. For issues that rely on the team consensus and commitment, involve more the whole team in the decision making process.
4. Make sure there are no blocked lines of communications and you and your people stay fully informed.
5. Build trust with your team members by spending one-on- one time in an atmosphere of openness and honesty. Be loyal to your employees, if you expect the same.
6. Allow your office team members build trust and openness between each other in team building activities and events.
7. Be careful with interpersonal issues. Recognize them early and deal with them till full resolution.
8. Never miss opportunities to empower your employees. Say thank you or show appreciation of an individual team player’s work.
9. Do not limit yourself to negative feedback. Be fare. Whenever there is an opportunity, give positive feedback as well.

Finally, though teamwork and team building can be challenging, the rewords from high team effectiveness are well worth it.

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Sergey Dudiy, Ph.D., is a personal growth writer and web entrepreneur, founder of Time-Management-Guide.com, the definitive guide to personal time management and goal setting.

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The title of this post might sound like fighting words for some, I mean, you work and sweat and pour your life into this thing and I have the nerve to suggest it’s not worth anything? According to my guest for this week’s episode of the Duct Tape Marketing Podcast,  John Warrillow, author of Built To Sell, only 1 in 100 business owners is successful in selling his or her company each year.

It’s the biggest shame in the entire small business world to think that people slave away at something, often times sacrificing far more in terms of health, family and wage then those employed by BigCo, only to discover that there is nothing to sell at the end.

Creating a business that’s an asset is done intentionally and doesn’t happen automatically, even for very profitable businesses. As Warrillow and I discuss in this session, one of the first keys is to think in terms of building a business that can run without the owner. Any potential buyer is going to look beyond a P&L to discover if the business is really run by the relationships of skills of the owner. If that’s the case, if the owner can’t walk away without any dip in productivity, then the asset is significantly downgraded.

If you find yourself thinking, I want to start a business or I might want to slow down a bit in five years, now is the time to add Built To Sell to your strategy and planning must read list. It’s essential to start setting the value building process and tactics into motion and nurturing a view of your business as a potential.

The first step in this process is to find a way to remove yourself from sales and marketing and product innovation. Until you can successfully do that, you’ll have a hard time convincing outside buyers,

The next very important step is to focus on creating positive cash flow. I know every business has that as a goal, but if you began to look at cash flow as something over and above the debt service the buyer just took on to buy you out, it might look a little different.

Built To Sell is the first book I’ve come across that speaks about building a business to sell in the practical, simple terms that any small business owner can access in a systematic way.

My favorite quote from our interview – “Most small businesses run their business like they watch a movie, they have no idea what the ending will be.”

Posted by: John Jantsch on Feb 16, 10

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Many brands and idea promoters are in a hurry to rack up as many Facebook fans and Twitter followers as they possibly can. Hundreds of thousands if possible.

A lot of these fans and followers are faux. Sunny day friends. In one experiment I did, 200,000 followers led to 25 clickthroughs. Ouch.

Check out the graph. The curves represent different ideas and different starting points. If you start with 10,000 fans and have an idea that on average nets .8 new people per generation, that means that 10,000 people will pass it on to 8000 people, and then 6400 people, etc. That’s yellow on the graph. Pretty soon, it dies out.

On the other hand, if you start with 100 people (99% less!) and the idea is twice as good (1.5 net passalong) it doesn’t take long before you overtake the other plan.  (the green). That’s not even including the compounding of new people getting you people.

But wait! If your idea is just a little more viral, a 1.7 passalong, wow, huge results. Infinity, here we come. That’s the purple (of course.)

A slightly better idea defeats a much bigger but disconnected user base every time.

The lesson: spend your time coming up with better ideas, not with more (faux) followers.

Posted by Seth Godin on February 16, 2010

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By Scott Steinburg for Entrepreneur Magazine Online

Call it the Apple iPad, “Jesus tablet” as some media insiders have, or just Steve Jobs’s latest high-tech obsession. Either way, there’s no getting around the seismic cultural impact of the consumer electronics industry’s latest high-profile launch. However, as many tech experts have been quick to note, hype aside, there’s little compelling reason for everyday shoppers or business owners to make the upgrade. Or rather, there isn’t quite yet–a fact it may take months to remedy, and that leaves a gaping void just waiting to be filled by legions of budding entrepreneurs.

At surface value, the iPad–a 9.7-inch LED touch screen-equipped computer that offers multi-touch input, Wi-Fi/wireless broadband access and user-friendly multimedia storage, shopping and playback–promises power on par with a mid-range notebook PC. Debuting in late March in multiple configurations starting at $499 and up and ranging in size from 16GB to 64GB (3G high-speed cellular connectivity optional), Apple sees it spearheading a new category of mobile computing device. It sits somewhere between a smartphone and laptop in power and cost, and offering a 1Ghz Apple A4 chip that promises more advanced processing and graphics power than the iPhone. Consider, though: There’s no telling yet whether this potential vertical exists.

Still, measuring up at just 0.5 inches thin and 1.5lbs in weight, yet offering a full range of productivity functions, respectable horsepower and support for “nearly all” 140,000 current iPhone apps, it’s a curious experiment. Resembling nothing so much as an overgrown iPod Touch, a comparison some critics have made with derision, the big question mark is whether it can address small-business owners’ needs. Blame a range of intriguing, but not necessarily must-have built-in features, and current lack of killer apps–two major issues that could ultimately torpedo the tablet PC’s sales and market adoption rates.

Not that the iPad isn’t doing its best to swing for the fences. Going straight for e-readers’ throats with its iBooks virtual bookstore, bookshelf and reading application, it’s hard to see how pricier, single-function models such as the QUE proReader will compete. Not only should the iPad make browsing, purchasing and skimming business books and publications easier, it may also make the process much richer and more informative, thanks to digital literature’s integrated support for multimedia audio and video content. The device further promises to offer an array of functions from word processing and spreadsheet composition to options for screening music, movies and TV shows–all for a fraction of the price of traditional e-book players.

In many ways, it’s anticipated to do for aspiring business and non-fiction authors what the App Store did for legions of bedroom coders. Providing a ready means to connect with an audience, build a following and establish yourself or your brand as a subject-matter expert, potential marketing and advertising applications are boundless. Moreover, the iPad could grow the e-book audience to the point where small presses actually have the opportunity to readily experiment with new formats, packaging strategies and prices. Or, for that matter, shift copies of their latest works, compelling case studies and innovative methodologies in respectable numbers, or at least profitable ones, given the relative cost savings of digital versus physical content delivery.

Steve Jobs and company have also taken great care to demonstrate marked support for the professional user, as illustrated at the gadget’s recent unveiling. Out of the box, the iPad doesn’t just spare you the headache of having to purchase software programs you own on the iPhone again, many of which can also be “pixel doubled” to fit the device’s display and take advantage of its enhanced visibility, brightness and larger screen real estate. It also has the capacity to run more advanced productivity apps (downloadable, bite-sized software applications) that offer better, more ergonomic touch controls, a greater range of complex features and expanded online connectivity options. Whereas current office suites for the iPhone provide limited functionality and a smaller feature set as compared with desktop alternatives, make no bones about it: The iPad is a true portable computer, not simply an enhanced smartphone (although the iPhone and iPad do share an underlying operating system), and software utilities for the iPad will better approximate full-fledged desktop cousins.

Among its main benefits to business users is enhanced Web surfing, with sites readily visible in either portrait or landscape mode, and user input facilitated via intuitive gestures and an on-screen virtual keyboard. The experience benefits from greater room to scroll by swiping a finger, zoom in just by pinching, and, at odds with smartphones’ cramped screens, more closely resembles what you’d resemble from the traditional internet browsing process. Alas, support for the Flash software platform still isn’t included, limiting access to certain videos, sites and online games. Nor can users multitask (switch between simultaneously running programs), which seriously calls into question its ability to serve working professionals.

Downloading and viewing standard or high-def online video through YouTube or iTunes is a much more enjoyable experience though, and may open a wider audience for digital footage, making it a ready platform for entrepreneurs to serve taped testimonials, webinars and commercial spots on. Extensive e-mail support is also offered (as is sideways or vertical message viewing) through a cleaner user interface than that found on the iPhone, whose split-screen views, drop-down menus and pop-ups make scanning your inbox and responding to queries a snap. Extensive support for multiple calendars and notes is also featured, and it’s easy to quickly add and browse contacts, pull up important phone numbers or access full-color maps as needed as well. Far-reaching search options allow you to quickly skim the entire device for names, details and addresses.

Given the not inconsiderable price, which swells further when you consider the pressing need for a monthly data plan, more storage space and accessories such as a physical QWERTY keyboard and carrying case, let’s be frank: The iPad is destined to directly compete with standard laptops. The most pressing issue is whether you’ll consider it a worthy replacement for your current portable PC workhorse, especially if features like a dedicated 3-D video card, Web camera, high-end CPU, multitasking performance and Windows compatibility are potential sticking points.

On a positive note, Apple’s put on a convincing show of demonstrating how its Microsoft Office-like iWork application suite–which consists of Keynote (slides/presentations), Numbers (spreadsheets) and Pages (word processing) programs–empowers small-business owners. At just $9.99 each for the motion-sensing applications, which support standard desktop documents and PDFs, it’s a relatively simple matter to create and edit charts, graphs, functions, formulas, slides and documents. Multi-touch input further makes all intuitive to browse by tapping or dragging a finger. But as much as we appreciate the ability to access slideshow templates with a poke, shuffle pictures and text layouts just by swiping or scroll through marketing plans with a flick of the wrist, let’s be honest: Gesture-tracking commands are nice, as is compatibility with Mac-built and Microsoft Office documents. Still, we find it hard to believe road warriors would be well served without owning a dedicated, real-world keyboard; options for easily swapping between multiple programs; or having the option to easily expand internal memory or processing hardware.

Because it’s primarily a digital lifestyle device, we don’t see legions of entrepreneurs making the switch in 2010. But once enterprising entrepreneurs begin to crank out productivity apps and other programs (social media clients, cloud computing tools, voice-over IP services, etc.) en masse, the device could quickly come into its own as an entrepreneur’s best friend in the next 18 to 24 months. The iPad isn’t the be-all, end-all portable computing device that tech experts envisioned. But as it’s done with the MacBook, iPod and iPhone, Apple will surely continue to innovate on the hardware, while competitors such as HP, Lenovo and Microsoft toy with the possibility of introducing competitors of their own.

All of this could add up to a potential renaissance for the entire tablet PC category. In terms of features, convenience, value, price and performance, that’s a potentially huge win for entrepreneurs and everyday consumers seeking a more portable, flexible and lifestyle- and value-minded solution for accessing treasured digital content.

Tecnology expert Scott Steinberg is the publisher of tech product reviews site DigitalTrends.com, and a celebrated gadget guru and video game expert who frequently appears as a technology analyst on ABC, CBS, FOX, NBC and CNN, and has contributed to 400+ outlets from The New York Times to Playboy and Rolling Stone.

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