(Extracted from a smart bear by Jason Cohen)
Introspective young founders appreciate this, and often the stated solution is “delegation,” as defined by: I’ll do it myself, then I’ll understand it, then if further investment is warranted, I’ll have the experience to hire and instruct a new person.This is how I did it when I was young and naive, and I see the pattern repeated all the time. And it’s wrong.The trouble with this form of delegation is it results in a team that is not materially better than the founder, at anything. Which is incredibly limiting for the company, and sadly quite common.It’s actually a variant of the rule that if you think a certain position at the company isn’t useful, it’s because you’ve never worked with greatness at that position. When you’re looking for someone who knows what you know, you’re not finding greatness, you’re finding a substitute for your already-not-world-class performance, and of course you’ll get exactly that.Whereas, as the founder, your job is the opposite: To build an organization in which each person is incredible and inspires others to become better. In fact, worse: To hire people who are better than you at every position, because only then is your organization increasing its strength and abilities.
… But doesn’t this mean that ultimately leaders are managing a set of people, all of whom are better-qualified than that leader to do those jobs? And isn’t that difficult to manage, after all how do you argue with those people, and how will you earn the respect and confidence of those people? Yes, that is what it means, and yes that is difficult. And it’s your job, because anything less is by definition holding the company back.