The Profit Builder Unscripted

A Lesson About Letting Go

• Vicki Suiter • Episode 23

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Have you ever handed off a project, only to find yourself back in the middle of it?

That was me recently—stuck in the weeds, frustrated, and unsure how I got there.

The problem? I wasn’t clear about the goal, and I kept micromanaging instead of letting my team lead.

In this episode, I share how I broke this cycle by redefining accountability and creating space for ownership. It’s all about asking the right questions, setting clear outcomes, and trusting the process.

If this resonates, you’ll want to hear the full story. It might help you delegate with confidence and free up time to focus on the big picture.

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welcome back to the profit Builder unscripted today I'm sharing a story about how I got to relearn about uh how to delegate well and how to actually um get myself out of the middle of the minutia where I definitely do not belong and probably you don't either all right let's jump in this week I had the opportunity to learn again or learn learn more about how to actually delegate well um how to be a good leader and how to actually Empower my team to take ownership in more powerful ways and it came out of which is often the case for us like it came out of a breakdown that happened uh I had uh found myself in the middle of the mix of all the minutia in the detail of trying to work through some Social Media stuff and some marketing things and and it was a in in the whole marketing side of the business I had asked somebody on my team to take on and take the lead in driving that several months ago and slowly but surely what I realized is I've been taking little pieces of it back or I've been trying to micromanage little pieces of it and this week I realized that um I was in the middle of too many conversations of too many details and it just wasn't making any sense it was like there was nobody driving the process and so uh I I got on a call with Dortha today who's who's the person on my team who's driving this or who who's supposed to be leading this piece of it and I said I I I think we have a breakdown I think we have a problem I realize that um we're we're kind of talking about all this detail and all this minutia and I don't like I'm not the right person to be in the middle of that conversation one of us has to own it and it needs to be you not me and I don't think that I have been a like I think we kind of agreed to that several months ago like I'm sure we did but I don't think I've been very clear about what does that look like all along the way I haven't been clear about making sure that we're paying attention to what are our big picture goals like what do where do we want to get to and is all of these initiatives that we're taking on are they driving to reaching those goals first of all and then second of all is are you like what's your plan as opposed to me continuing to pick and ask different questions which is what was happening which then gets me into the mode of micromanaging which then had her sort of shift from I'm driving the process to I'm responding to Vicki can you relate to any of this um because it was just like all of a sudden I was like this is this is this is not going the way I had planned like why am I in the middle of this and why am I driving it and I realized I had to really I had to own and I said to her you know I I have been slowly but surely like I ask all these questions and I kind of pull them into but what about this well what about this are you doing this are you doing that and even though we have like a project board we have a project plan and I've been asking her to I last week asked her to come up with deliverables with by when but it wasn't like we were kind of missing this whole like really her taking it and coming up with a plan it was more all these little pieces which was creating overwhelming confusion for her and so today when we were talking I said I let's let's just put a put a a pause in how we've been doing this and let's just agree that I need to get out of the middle of it like I know that you and I need to be in agreement and on the same page about what we want to do but I need you to actually drive it and come up with a plan so we agree that there's certain a couple of steps that are going to happen one is for her to really look at if she's going to be focusing on the big picture of things the a bigger you know bigger project of what are we doing in terms of marketing which covers a lot of territory does she need some support some lower level support doing some of the you know minutia stuff that she's doing that doesn't really require her skills and talents I said secondly then how about you just do like an entire data dump about what it is that you're doing and then look at all right what are our goals because this is the other thing marketing is such a funny thing it's such a slippery slope because there's all these things that we think we should be doing right we should have high SEO we should be on social media we should be doing videos we should be doing you know uh email marketing we should like there's all these shoulds about what we should be doing even a couple weeks ago she had come to me with this plan of like she goes I have this whole social marketing plan thing that I think we can do in terms of like promoting you know your client testimonials and telling people how amazing you are and all this good stuff that you've done and and um you know in Sharing more information on social media and at first I was like oh that's great she's taking an initiative and then a couple days later I was like yeah but is that the right thing for us to do which even just asking that question started us on a journey of asking the question for the sake of what are we doing it so how often in our businesses do we either a delegate something to somebody and then take it back which is what I was starting to do little by little and then B that was I really clear with myself and with Dortha about for the sake of what are we doing any marketing or social media like what are we trying to get like what kind of customers and what are we what are we selling right and what's the offer and is it really clear and is and is the strategy whatever the strategy is that we come up with to reach those ideal customers is it the right strategy that is going to get us the to the results that we want and so it's been a really great learning couple of weeks for me and for Dortha in terms of asking those two questions like how like what is owning that project really look like so today in our conversation we identified what that looked like when she for her to actually own it means she comes up with a project plan and that that project plan is secondarily and and really important in service to what our goals are so having a clear outcome of all these things that we're doing what is it in service to what's our goal what do we want to get out of it and then B what does she think is the best strategy for getting there you know and it's kind of like a construction project as you know I said it's like you start with the end in mind and you work your way backwards before you build a project you start with a blueprint or a schematic or some kind of a design that says here's what we're building to here's what we're what we want to accomplish and then standing with the end in mind you look backwards and I think that's just it's true for every part of our business and the more clear that she and I have been getting on these two things and coming up with some measurables I'm like I'm super excited right now first of all I'm super excited and grateful that we were able to have this very open honest conversation with each other and that we could you know declare a breakdown and that we started a new like we came up with a new plan I'm like all right like let's just take the next step and as much as I want it like I want to get into action right now I'm like the next action is just to know where do we stand right now like what are all like if this is our goal this is what we want to get accomplished by the end of the first quarter 205 and the end of you know by the end of the second quarter 25 we have measurable goals then looking at that and going how can we accomplish that like what are the relationships we have what are the what's a smart strategy and I I said instead of me figuring that out I need you to come to me and tell me what you think is the right thing to do and if you're not sure then maybe we maybe we hire somebody else maybe we run that by someone else but you drive it and she was very excited it's great um you know because that was my first question when I declared the breakdown the first thing I said was one of the important things I need to know from you is are you are you the willingness and the desire and the capacity to do this right so I said because that's going to be really important before we talk about strategy or anything else are you willing and do you have the desire and do you have the capacity do you have and and once she said yes I was like okay great then let's talk about what's working what's not working what do we need to have be different so I wanted to share that story with you because I just thought maybe you could relate to it maybe you found yourself in this situation where you have given something away to somebody on your team because you're you know you're trying to grow your business and then you took it back and you found yourself back in the middle of it like I did and you know I think just sometimes we have to be noticing when it when that and part of it was just like I I didn't even know that I was doing that until I really stopped and went why am I so anxious why is this so frustrating to me and what was great is that she said when she started to say like I'm really confused I'm unclear about what I need to do so and and so forth and I'm like I've created I have created that lack of clarity because I keep picking and pushing on all these different things as opposed to asking her and it's and it was even interesting in this conversation I had with her that I noticed that I wanted to go to she wanted to ask me what I wanted to do and my first I I had to stop myself because my first response was I wanted to give her an answer and our team does this PE our employees do this with us all the time right like they want to know what we want them to do and I had to I started to answer and then I stopped myself and I said well what do you think needs to happen what do you think is a good strategy and um and I and I got to watch myself like have to like take a breath and listen and watch her like have to stop and go all right what do I think my answer is to this and offer that up and and there is this other element of like timing and timing of when things need to happen that instead of me wanting to push or drive that and maybe alter her answer I had to stop and I had to go okay well what's your thoughts about this or how do you see that happening or how do you see this working or when do you think that we could that could get done by like learning to sort of stop myself and stop ourselves as leaders from always wanting to be the one to have the answers and asking other people you know what I know is that it helps our team and our helps our employees build more confidence and strength and the more confidence and strength they have the more ability they have to take ownership and to really and to really take uh on that higher level of responsibility that we're asking people to take on so uh that's my learning for the week I hope I hope you found something to be useful and helpful for you in this and um just a reminder that if you find this the content that I that I share here on the podcast to be helpful and useful to you um you might want to check out my book The profit bleed how managing margin can save your contracting business um it's really a a lot about like all the areas of your business where profits start to leak out but also about how do you create systems and processes to stop the leaks from happening in the first place so um you might want to check that out you can find it on Amazon or there's a link below and if you like these videos please make sure that you follow me or subscribe share it with other people that you know who might get value from it and I look forward to seeing you next time on the profit builder unscripted thanks for being here

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Vicki Suiter

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