For ADHDers, a big part of the decision to go self-employed is being able to be ourselves. If you’ve spent years in traditional employment feeling like a square squiggly peg that doesn’t fit in any of the regular-shaped job holes, becoming your own boss can feel like a huge relief.
Finally, you can stop pretending your brain works like everyone else’s and let your technicolour burn bright! There’s just one problem…
When you’re a sole trader you have to do EVERYTHING yourself. Right?
Actually, no.
Trying to manage every aspect of your business, from marketing and sales to financial forecasts and tax returns, is a recipe for overwhelm (and would be for just about every entrepreneur, regardless of their neurotype or cognitive style).
Delegating some of your tasks to others lets you free up your mental space and energy for what you do best – creating, innovating, and leading your business. You don't have to be the master of all trades - be the visionary leader who drives your business forward.
So let’s chat about how outsourcing some tasks to freelance professionals could help you take the next steps with your business.
Share your worries
From our coaching conversations, ADHD entrepreneurs seem to share some of the same reservations about bringing others on board to support their businesses. The worries include:
If other people get involved it could dilute my vision for my business
My business is so important thing to me, I’m frightened of losing control of it if I let others in
I don’t think I can handle managing what anyone else is supposed to be working on, I can barely manage my own workload
It’s totally rational that you’d have these concerns, and it’s natural (although fairly impossible!) to want to keep a tight grip on every aspect of your business. But if you’re going to make the most of that brilliant brain of yours, you need to work out where your true strengths lie and, importantly, where they don’t.
If you’re unsure of your strengths, you want to talk things through with an ADHD Business Coach before you start outsourcing. Handily, I am one! Book a call here.
So, NO you don’t have to do all of it yourself and YES it’ll still be your business if you outsource some of the work. Let’s dig into the details a bit more…
How outsourcing makes business ownership more enjoyable
Find the tasks that light you up
It’s a super smart business decision to outsource work that drains your energy and gobbles up hours of your time. On the other hand, it doesn’t make a lot of sense to pay people to do the work you love, or tasks you’re particularly skilled and efficient at completing yourself.
To work out which aspects of your business to outsource to freelancers and which ones to keep doing yourself, consider how skilled you are at different business activities, and, importantly - how they make you feel. If you’re not an expert at something (yet!) but it's your favourite work thing to do, don’t rush to get rid of it!
Here’s an example. Let’s say your business uses social media marketing. You love creating social media graphics, reels and animations but get stuck in the process of scheduling posts and lost in the depths of Google when you start trying to track analytics. You could work with a technical social media expert to share the load.
You get to keep the design aspects that fuel your creative fire, they’ll take your lovingly crafted content and share it with the world, dealing with all the niggly bits that you don’t like. Having someone to handle the reporting and give you the highlights could even make you better at what you do - creating content that your audience is likely to engage with.
Your energy is precious - protect it
Business ownership is a lot more complicated than the old saying “time is money”, but it can be helpful to keep that phrase in mind when you’re thinking about your outsourcing options. As an entrepreneur, your time and energy are THE most valuable assets to your company. You have the vision for your business and you need time to nurture it in ways that only you can.
When considering whether to outsource a particular business activity, ask yourself these questions:
How much time will it take me to do this task?
How much energy will it take from me and how am I going to feel afterwards? (In other words, if you do it, would there be a negative effect afterwards on your ability to do other stuff?)
Would someone who specialises in this area get it done a lot faster?
If I got that time back, what other tasks could I focus on that would be more suited to my strengths?
ADHDers may find business activities involving structured timelines and strict deadlines are where the support of freelancers is helpful, as these are when overwhelm is more likely to occur. For example:
for help completing your tax return on time, get a small business accountant
to ensure you’re on top of all your client meetings and business appointments, hire a virtual assistant (VA) to manage your diary
preparing the text for your new website to launch is easier when you enlist the help of a digital copywriter
Paying someone to take these tasks off your hands is worth it if it saves you from getting overwhelmed and allows you to do more of the things that light you up, and helps you generate more of that precious income.
Look at the cold hard cash
As well as protecting your time, energy and creativity, outsourcing some business activities to freelance contractors needs to make financial sense. If you’re trying to rationalise the expenditure, work out whether an hour of your time is worth more to your business than your freelancer’s rates.
Let them work on the stuff that leaves you drained and unproductive, while you apply your strengths to generating income for your business. And remember, if they can complete the task in half the time it takes you, it’s probably worth it.
Get ready to start delegating
ADHDers often possess an innate ability to see the big picture. If this sounds like you, you can use this skill to your advantage to build a team of freelancers who fill any gaps in your skills and complement your strengths.
You don’t have to be a ‘team leader’
It might seem obvious, but moving from a ‘team of one’ to ‘one + few freelancers’ will require a bit more communication. If you’re naturally introverted or get easily overstimulated in social situations, a reluctance to increase the amount of time you spend communicating directly with other people might be part of what’s holding you back from outsourcing.
There’s an answer to this struggle: you can assign someone else to handle communications within your business. Whether it's a virtual assistant, a communication manager, or a project manager, you can bring in someone to bridge the gap between you and your outsourced team.
This person can be responsible for keeping everyone in the loop, setting up regular check-ins, and ensuring that tasks are progressing. With this structure in place, you can focus on your strengths and ideas, while the details are taken care of by a professional communicator.
Prep for freelancer FAQs
Getting the results you want is easier if you can create some supporting documents to share with the people you hire. Having a set of ‘brand guidelines’ and ‘target customer personas’ will reduce the need for anyone supporting you with marketing to ask you questions.
The more insight you can give them upfront, the more likely it is they’ll be able to crack on with the job at hand. But sharing your passion, ideas and dreams for your business with other professionals requires building trust.
Trust that people really do want to help you
If you’ve been doing everything yourself up until now and have poured your heart and soul into building your business, it can be tough to relinquish control. For this reason, you may prefer to work with people you already know or have crossed paths with before, or freelancers who come recommended by someone you’re close to. Networking can also be a great way to find freelancers who are looking for short-term or long-term contracts.
Depending on what your experience of traditional employment has been, building trust with people in a work context may be effortless for you or it may be extremely difficult. Remember that you may have quite a lot in common with other sole traders looking for work. For one thing - they’re self-employed too!
Keep it profesh
Building a successful team isn't about making friends with everyone who supports your business. Don't feel the need to be everyone's BFF, there’s really no need to invest loads of your time and energy in understanding the complexities of everyone else’s personal life.
Keep your catchups focused on work and wherever possible, have a conversation upfront about how you’ll end the collaboration on good terms if it doesn’t work out.
While personal connections can make working together more fun, the relationships you form should be based on productivity, trust, and a shared commitment to the success of your business.
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