Peer Corner: Leveraging Your Time as Your Business Grows

When we first started growing our business, one thing I had plenty of was time.

I could spend hours at networking events, get involved in local organizations, schedule one-on-ones, meet referral partners for coffee or lunch, and really focus on building relationships in our community. And honestly, I believe that was one of the most important things we did to grow our business. Those relationships, conversations, and connections created opportunities that we simply wouldn’t have had otherwise.

But as the business grew, something changed: I had less and less time to do everything myself.

The same activities that helped grow the business were now competing with managing employees, overseeing operations, handling customers, working on financials, and everything else that comes with running a growing company.

That’s when I realized I needed to start looking at my time differently.

I began paying attention to what I was actually spending my time on each day and started putting tasks into three categories: $15-an-hour tasks, $50-an-hour tasks, and $100+-an-hour tasks.

It wasn’t about assigning an exact dollar value to every task. It was about asking myself:

“Is this really the best use of my time?”

Some tasks were things I could easily delegate. Others required my experience or involvement. And some were activities where my time could have a much larger impact on the business.

The hardest part was often letting go of things I was used to doing myself. As business owners, it’s easy to think, “It will be faster if I just do it myself,” or “I know exactly how I want this done.” But eventually, you reach a point where doing everything yourself becomes the thing holding the business back.

Learning to delegate isn’t just about getting tasks off your plate. It’s about creating space for you to focus on the things that only you can do—or the things where your time creates the greatest return.

I’ve found that this same principle applies to business development and marketing.

One question I ask myself is:

“How can I make an impression in front of as many people as possible in as little time as possible?”

Instead of trying to have 20 individual conversations, maybe I can speak at a chamber event and get in front of 50 people at once. Maybe we sponsor the food at a luncheon and put our company in front of an entire room of potential referral partners. Maybe instead of sending individual updates, we create an intentional monthly email campaign that reaches our entire network.

Social media works the same way. Being active on platforms like LinkedIn and Facebook allows you to share what your company is doing, educate your audience, showcase your work, and stay in front of hundreds or even thousands of people without having hundreds of individual conversations.

I still believe strongly in getting out into the community, meeting people face-to-face, and building genuine relationships. Those things helped build our company, and I don’t think they ever stop being important.

But as your company grows, you have to become more intentional about how you spend the limited hours you have.

For me, leveraging my time has meant asking myself three questions:

What am I spending my time on? What can someone else do? And where can my time make the biggest impact?

The goal isn’t necessarily to work more hours.

It’s to make the hours you already have count for more.

Do you have a story you’d like to share in our Peer Corner series? Please reach out to [email protected] to let us know!