If your business is like most custom construction and remodeling companies, it started out small and is growing in response to demand. The first place you will add employees is probably in the field, since your field people actually make you money, whereas office staff is all overhead. But at a certain point, you will realize you need to consider adding office staff.

In the meantime, you yourself most likely serve as office manager, project manager, estimator, carpenter, customer-service rep, bookkeeper, and salesman. As a business grows, it retains those same tasks (though on a larger scale) and adds new ones, such as overseeing a more complex benefits program or launching a marketing effort.

Nobody can do all of this — but it takes some people longer than others to recognize or admit that. You must decide which functions you will continue to perform and which you will delegate to a new hire.

I have observed that there's a strong tendency to believe that the best hire you could make would be a clone of yourself. After all, somebody possessing all your skills could pinch-hit where necessary, would require little training, and would double your own effectiveness. Right?

Wrong.

Complement Yourself

Your clone will possess all your strengths and all your weaknesses. If you are great at sales but stink at paperwork, why on earth would you hire somebody else who is great at sales and stinks at paperwork? Salespeople (forgive the generality) are usually outgoing, gregarious, creative, daring, and assertive. Good bookkeepers, on the other hand, usually aren't.

You may find while interviewing that you are drawn to people like yourself. This is natural. However, keep in mind that you want to choose people who will be effective employees in the role for which they were hired, not necessarily somebody you want to kick back with on the weekend.

So think hard about what tasks your new hire will be asked to perform, and take into account the applicants' personality traits, stated task preferences, and demonstrated skills. Don't assume that you have to hang on to running payroll because it's so loathsome you couldn't possibly delegate it to anybody else. Out there is somebody who would jump at the chance to do payroll, or filing, or any of those other things you're not suited for — or that you're overqualified for.

In short, it's a matter of focusing on the needs of the business, and hiring somebody who will complement — rather than duplicate — your own skills.

Document the Procedures

One word of warning: Before you assign to another person a task you've been doing, you must go through the process of identifying and then documenting what, exactly, it is that you do. Otherwise, the recipient is doomed to disappoint you. Documented procedures allow you to fast-track the training of a new person and can become part of a comprehensive procedural manual that covers all aspects of the company. This adds value to your business, which will no longer be dependent on you for things to happen.