You are the bottleneck. Every recurring task you still own — formatting blog posts, sending invoices, sorting support email, posting to social — is an hour you cannot spend on what only you can do. The math gets worse every week as your product grows.
The fix is one delegation. Not five. One. Pick the right one and the rest get easier.
Find a task that meets three criteria: you do it weekly, it eats real time, and it does not require your unique judgment. Good candidates are content formatting, design tweaks, bookkeeping, first-line support, data entry, and any manual process you repeat.
Then write a one-page brief before you hire or automate.
task: "Weekly newsletter formatting"input: "Markdown draft in Notion every Monday"output: "Formatted email in our ESP, scheduled for Tuesday 9am"quality_bar: "Links work. No typos. Subject line under 60 chars."turnaround: "24 hours"budget: "$X per send"
Now decide: human or automation. Upwork or Fiverr work for tasks that need taste — writing, design, support tone. n8n or Make work for tasks with clear rules — data movement, notifications, scheduled exports. If you can describe the rules in five steps, automate. If it needs judgment, hire.
Expect the first run to feel slower than doing it yourself. That is normal. The second run is faster. By the fifth, you have bought back hours.
List five recurring tasks. Pick the one that eats the most time and needs the least of your judgment. Write the brief. Post the job or build the automation this week.
One function fully off your plate, with a documented brief showing inputs, outputs, quality bar, and owner. The next time the task comes up, you do not touch it.
You are the bottleneck. Every recurring task you still own — formatting blog posts, sending invoices, sorting support email, posting to social — is an hour you cannot spend on what only you can do. The math gets worse every week as your product grows.
The fix is one delegation. Not five. One. Pick the right one and the rest get easier.
Find a task that meets three criteria: you do it weekly, it eats real time, and it does not require your unique judgment. Good candidates are content formatting, design tweaks, bookkeeping, first-line support, data entry, and any manual process you repeat.
Then write a one-page brief before you hire or automate.
task: "Weekly newsletter formatting"input: "Markdown draft in Notion every Monday"output: "Formatted email in our ESP, scheduled for Tuesday 9am"quality_bar: "Links work. No typos. Subject line under 60 chars."turnaround: "24 hours"budget: "$X per send"
Now decide: human or automation. Upwork or Fiverr work for tasks that need taste — writing, design, support tone. n8n or Make work for tasks with clear rules — data movement, notifications, scheduled exports. If you can describe the rules in five steps, automate. If it needs judgment, hire.
Expect the first run to feel slower than doing it yourself. That is normal. The second run is faster. By the fifth, you have bought back hours.
List five recurring tasks. Pick the one that eats the most time and needs the least of your judgment. Write the brief. Post the job or build the automation this week.
One function fully off your plate, with a documented brief showing inputs, outputs, quality bar, and owner. The next time the task comes up, you do not touch it.