That project for your client isn't finished yet, today's social media post hasn't been published, and on top of that, you still wanted to write an invoice. Your to-do list is getting longer and longer, and as you make one phone call after another, notes are piling up on your desk and lots of unanswered emails in your inbox. Does this situation sound familiar? Welcome to self-employment. Handing off tasks isn't your strong suit? Not yet!
Almost every self-employed person knows moments when the workload is extremely high. True to the motto "self and constantly", many self-employed people work around the clock anyway and only allow themselves a few rest periods and downtime. But at some point, everyone reaches their limit. Your creativity is waning, your enjoyment of your work is waning, and your efficiency is dropping noticeably? Then it's time to change something. You need support and must learn to hand over tasks.
We would not claim that handing over tasks is easy. On the contrary, it sometimes requires quite a bit of trust. After all, many self-employed people are Sole proprietor and take care of almost every aspect of their self-employment themselves: from A for "acquisition" to Z for "monitoring incoming payments". As a self-employed person, you will most likely not only take care of your actual job, but also marketing, accounting, customer retention and many other tasks that you would not usually take on as a salaried professional.
The concern that familiar processes might suddenly run differently than before if you hand them over and let someone else take over is therefore justified. After all, no one is as passionate about your business as you are. And why should an outsider be as dedicated and do your tasks as well or even better than you? But there is a fallacy here. You can't expect to stay really efficient in the long run if you take over every little thing yourself and are completely overloaded after a short time.
If you find that you're physically or mentally pushed to your limits, so it's imperative that you get some support on board. Still not convinced? Then we have four unbeatable arguments why you should definitely hand over tasks as a self-employed person:
So far, so good. But how and, above all, to whom can you actually hand over your tasks? And which tasks should you outsource at all and which not? Basically, you can outsource everything that other people can do faster and better than you. If you're a freelance designer, for example, it's a good idea to have your taxes handled by an expert. On the other hand, if you're a self-employed tax accountant, you could let an expert handle your marketing. Hand off what keeps you from your core activity and has nothing to do with your actual job.
What exactly your support looks like depends entirely on the tasks and the scope you want to outsource. In the following, we therefore present four possibilities to whom you can hand over your tasks.
Tax consultants, lawyers, marketing experts, web designers, graphic designers - the list of experts is long. Usually these are other self-employed people or freelancers, sometimes also law firms or agencies. Find out who can help you best and listen to your gut feeling. You can trust experts. They will work on your tasks much more efficiently and professionally than you can do yourself. The investment is worth it!
Of course, you can also use your own employees. You don't have to hire someone full-time, but have you ever thought about a working student, an intern or a mini-jobber on a 450-euro basis? This way, the costs remain manageable and you still get active support.
When it comes to research activities, social media posts, travel bookings or similar areas, virtual assistants are very handy. They work independent of time and location and assist you with your daily to-dos. You can book them by the hour, by the day or by the project and only pay them when there's actually something to do.
That's right, sometimes it's even enough to get technical support to hand over tasks in this way. Many handy tools and apps help you work faster and make your everyday life easier. These include tools for finances, accounting, design assignments, editorial plans, image editing, and social media marketing. You can try many of these services in a free starter version. But be careful: You should think carefully beforehand about which programs are really useful. Some tools are very complex and end up doing more work than they actually do. We hope you enjoy submitting your tasks!
