Chris Ducker on How You Should Manage Your Agency so it Doesn't Run You to Death | Ep # 29

What do you need to do to improve your business management and get away from being run by your agency and start running it?

In this episode of The Smart Agency Master Class, I talk with Chris Ducker. Chris is a serial entrepreneur that owns and operates three separate business that include a call center, a recruitment company and a co-working space for startup entrepreneurs.

Chris is obviously someone who knows a lot about running a business and he’s going to share with us how he manages it all without being overwhelmed.

Business Management: Why is the agency running you?

Because you’re micromanaging! Let’s face it, entrepreneurs are wired to believe they should be doing everything themselves.

Chris refers to this as “superhero syndrome,” and it’s something every entrepreneur will suffer from at some point. Eventually, though, you will hit a crossroad where one of two things will happen:

A) You’ll burn out and be no good to anyone.

B) You finally build a brilliant team to help you run, grow, and support the business.

Clearly, you want to go with Option B, right? That’s how you build the business, not just run the business. There’s a lot of amazing talent out there, so make sure you’re making the most of it.

Say it with me: I do not have to do everything myself.

But I can do it quicker!

Yes, you probably can do it quicker yourself, but that doesn’t mean you should do it. If it’s a revolving task - say, posting a blog - it makes more sense for someone else’s time to be taken up with completing it. Taking up hours of your time to complete simple tasks just because you can do them faster doesn’t make sense financially.

Next time you’re doing one of these revolving tasks, take a second to record yourself doing it. Show the steps so that your virtual assistant can see how to do it, and BAM! You’ve cleared up some of your valuable time!

But I don’t want to pay someone!

Again, it doesn’t make financial sense for you to be doing it. Let’s look at the math:

Say your time is worth $1,000/hour, but the routine task you’re looking to spend the next hour on can be done by a virtual assistant for $100. Why in the world would you spend your time doing it? You’re literally saving $900 by having the VA do it!

As the agency owner, your time is better spent creating content, meeting with clients, and growing the business. You need to build a quality team and let them handle running the business.

Chris spends a maximum of 10 hours/week on his businesses. Max! The rest of the time he’s out there marketing, working on other projects, and speaking. That’s what you need to be doing, too.

For each task that comes up, ask yourself, “Am I the one that has to be do this?” If the answer is no, then don’t do it. Pass it along to someone on your team who can handle it.

It can be a hard thing to learn, but make a habit of asking yourself that question. Eventually, delegating will come naturally.  This is one of the most important thing I tell people, and that is why I created the Agency Playbook. It allows you to setup systems that make your business profitable without you having to make every decision or do every thing. Check out the Agency Playbook now. 

What's Next

Using the best business management processes will help you run your agency and team rather than your agency run you and make you lose your passion.

If business management isn't your only struggle, I have probably experienced all the different struggles for an agency owner through my own experience and I can help you from what I learned. From what to do with your sales processes, ways to increase your profit margins or how you can build authority for your agency.

I can tell you the best ways to stop losing money on projects, why performance based pricing can be the best pricing strategy for your agency as well as why including remote working or freelancers in your team can be beneficial in the long run.

You can learn more about my career and different experiences as well as tips, tricks and insights by checking out my blogs that cover a wide variety of topics.

Find more from my Ask Swenk series and more of my videos on my Youtube channel. There you will find advice from myself and other agency experts.