I’ve never felt great about delegating work to other people. I feel often that I shouldn’t or I can’t. I thought that if I had a better strategy for delegating that it would solve my problem. However, knowing the components of effective delegation turned out to be only a fraction of the issue. Not being able to delegate meant that I was driven to work late nights and often on weekends. If I took time off the preparation before and the workload after was so stressful, that I didn’t reap the benefits that vacation time was meant to give.

Two major events in my life began to shift my mindset around delegation. The first was giving birth to twin babies in 2010. Twins don’t run in my family, so the news that there were two was shocking to say the least. My husband and I sat in the car after our first doctor’s appointment. We stared straight ahead out the window and I said “how in the world are we going to do this?”.

In 2016, the second milestone in my delegation journey came around. In January of that year, we completed a multi-million dollar expansion of our hotel, restaurant and attractions business. Overnight, my team increased from five to twenty-five. A few months after we re-opened, I was on the verge of burn-out. Something had to change.

Even today, delegation remains a struggle but I’ve improved my ability to delegate by understanding what holds me back from doing it. The answers were hidden in the stories I was telling myself.

I should be able to do it myself…

Early in my career I remember having a project in which I was about to miss a deadline. I took on all the pieces of the project myself and even if I was stuck with something, I wanted to figure it out on my own. Finally, almost at a breaking point, I sought out a more senior colleague to discuss what was happening. I told him that my impression was that everyone else seems to do everything on their own, so isn’t that what I should be doing if I wanted to be a true professional? My colleague looked at me and said “you are not a true professional unless you do seek out others and work as a team.” That one conversation was a seismic shift in my thinking about what it meant to be a professional.

Somebody else won’t do it right…

There were times when I thought about delegating a responsibility, project or a task, but my perfectionist tendencies put a stop to it. I knew what outcome I wanted and exactly how I wanted it to be done. Somebody else couldn’t possibly do it as well as I could (cue the eye roll). Then one day, I had a team member who I trusted enough to take on a task that I normally did myself. Imagine that, she not only did it with the right outcome, but she did it BETTER than I could.

People don’t want to help me…

I do not like to ask people for help. I feel like I am burdening them. I often feel like I don’t have the right to ask them to do something for me. I’m absolutely certain that they don’t want to help me. Then one day I asked myself: how do I feel when someone asks for my help? And then it clicked. It feels pretty good to support another person and provide value to them. When it comes to the workplace, it isn’t even a question about “helping” or not helping. Delegating a task to someone, if done correctly, is mostly likely part of that person’s job. Not delegating to that team member may signal to them that you don’t trust them or the quality of their work.

I can’t delegate that…

Especially as a full-time working parent, I struggle with deciding what I can or cannot delegate. But I’m here to share, there’s almost nothing that you can’t delegate (okay ladies, even if you want to, there are a few things you shouldn’t delegate ?). I have found that it is more about to whom you delegate, rather than what you delegate. When I thought more broadly about who in my circle I could utilize, a whole world of possibilities opened up for me. Your immediate team members are obvious. However also think about: life partner/spouse; personal assistant; online services; cleaning and maintenance services; freelance agencies etc. etc. When I took this step I was able to start focusing on the work and family time that was most valuable and meaningful to me.

The narrative we tell ourselves can be a huge pitfall to delegating. If we don’t question the narratives that hold us back, we are deeply inhibiting our ability to be better leaders and professionals. The next time you sense that a story is leading you astray, engage with your coach about it in your next session or ask yourself some of these questions: What story am I telling myself? What if I looked at the situation as if I was in someone else’s shoes? What if the opposite were true? How can I think much bigger about this situation? You have the power to write a different story.