Read time: 1 min, 45 secs

Hey there - it's Brian 👋

Business owners LOVE bragging about delegation at networking events.

They'll tell you about how their team does everything…

But then they spend 3 hours every morning reviewing work that should already be right.

Their designer waits 3 days for a "quick approval."

Their writer sits idle while they nitpick copy.

Their developer can't move forward without sign-off.

Here's what kills me: you didn't hire reviewers, you hired doers.

But somewhere along the way, you became the person who has to check everything and your team learned that "done" means "ready for your review."

So in today's issue we're going to cover:

• Why your team creates drafts instead of finished work (it's not what you think)

• The one mindset shift that eliminates 90% of your review time

• How to get work that's right the first time without lowering your standards

This is for you if: You're spending more time reviewing work than actually leading your business.

Let's make your business an outlier 👇

Your team isn't bad at their job - they're trained to need you

I used to tell people I delegated while literally rewriting their emails at 11 PM.

I convinced myself I was "maintaining quality standards" when really I was just terrified of letting go.

But I had to.

And I slowly realized my team would make different choices than me.

But different isn't bad quality. Different is different.

The more I empowered them the better they got at quality.

Here's what everyone gets wrong: you're supposed to gradually reduce approval needs as trust builds, but instead you've kept them permanently dependent on your sign-off.

You trained them to depend on you.

Every time you said "let me take a quick look before you send that," you taught them their work isn't done until you've reviewed it.

Every time you made changes to something they thought was finished, you showed them their judgment isn't trusted.

The real problem isn't that your team can't do good work.

It's that they never graduated from needing your approval.

Here's how to break the cycle:

Write down exactly what finished work looks like for each type of task.

Not perfect work - finished work that doesn't need your review.

Pick one recurring task and walk through your standards with them once.

Show them what good looks like.

Then the next time they do that task, don't review it.

Let them send it directly to the client or publish it themselves.

Start with something that won't kill your business - internal communications, social media posts, or routine client updates.

The work won't be exactly how you would have done it.

But it'll be good enough to move your business forward without you being the human spell-checker.

Good enough without you beats perfect with you

When your team knows their work is truly done when they finish it, everything changes.

Projects move faster.

Your calendar opens up.

Your team makes decisions instead of waiting for yours.

You'll get your time back to actually run your business instead of proofreading everything.

See you next Thursday 👋

Brian
[email protected]
Twitter
LinkedIn
TalentHQ

P.S. here's a tip to do this way faster:

Use ChatGPT to turn your mental standards into actual checklists.

Copy-paste an example of work you recently approved and use this prompt:

"You are a business operations expert helping a 7-figure business owner.

Based on this approved work example, create a pre-submission checklist that my team can use to self-check their work.

For each item, write it as: 'Verify that [specific, measurable criteria]'.

Focus on the 5-7 most important elements that differentiate polished work from rushed work.

Make each point specific enough that different team members would reach the same conclusion."

You'll have clear, usable standards in 5 minutes instead of trying to explain your invisible expectations.

P.P.S. Want help finding amazing marketers in LatAm? Let’s chat

🙋 Vote: How did we do?