By Linda Feinholz

Are you still trying to sort out how to do it all yourself?

If you just 'ducked' your head in embarrassment or nodded in acknowledgment, you're in good company. I've got to confess it's a trap I fall into myself at times. And so many of my clients say they're stalled and need to delegate... and then cannot take even the first step to identify how to use others.

Take my client, Leslie, for instance. She's an emerging expert in her profession as a Financial Advisor. She could win the prize for Do It Yourself business building! And the more she tries to do it herself, the more she gets stuck and even starts thinking things must be more difficult than they actually are.

As we talked about it last week, I was able to unveil 3 teams she wasn't using that would immediately boost her results.

Your First Team - You and Yourself

The first team, the one we each have the quickest and easiest access to, is ourself. It's the part of us we have mental conversations with. Not necessarily out loud! Sometimes those conversations are running quick as lightening in the background.

I bet you see it in action every day.

Where and when? When you're planning how you'll spend your time, for one thing. One of the key exercises I give my coaching clients is a daily 'clear out' of all the mutterings of their mind, followed by deliberately scheduling their day. This exercise helps them take back ownership of their time throughout the day. Go ahead and try it for 14 days - you'll find it creates a new focus of your time and boosts your productivity when you're working on your own, or with the other 2 'teams' you'll read about here.

Your Second Team - Your Peers

Hidden in every Rolodex, pile of business cards, or email database is an eager team ready and waiting to assist you. It's your peers. Think of the people around you inside your organization or in your wider world who have their own experience and expertise... It's all there available to multiply your own!

I've seen it in action in MasterMind group gatherings, in advisory boards meetings and even in quick phone calls to colleagues.

Leslie was spending too many hours mulling over how to pull together teleseminars of interest to her clients. Weeks, in fact. It never occurred to her contact long time friends, former fellow managers, and referral sources that have areas of expertise that she can call on with one quick email or dial of the phone.

It took her 5 minutes to list 15 people who 'might' be a source of ideas and even participation. It took six calls and she had her list of topics. She even had 4 guest speakers ready to go! No more mulling. On to the next stage of her project, just like that!

Your Third Team - Your 'Assistants'

Over the years I've worked in fast food making the fries and taking orders, in manufacturing operations producing custom products for customer delivery, in hospitals managing the staff of out-patient clinics, in the corporate world teaching business leaders to become strategy and operations experts, and more. In every single one of those pursuits and a hundred others I've consulted to, job titles muddy the waters. So let's dispense with them and re-frame this issue.

In every business endeavor, each person in the chain of activity in getting it done is an 'assistant'.

For Leslie, that includes her partner, her receptionist, and her claims processors. It also includes vendors like the insurance company staff she works with to develop the asset protection strategies for her clients. A 5-minute conversation, a 1-hour work session, a 90-second problem solving discussion - each makes use of Leslie's Third Team to get the work done quickly and well.

And guess what? Their timely involvement often prevents issues from escalating to even needing her attention at all.

In fact, the more Leslie has made use of her 'assistants' over the past month, the more she's come to understand she's an 'assistant' in their world too!

© 2008 Linda Feinholz  Management expert, consultant, and coach Linda Feinholz is "Your High Payoff Catalyst" If you're ready to focus on your High Payoff activities, boost your professional and personal results and have more fun, get her FREE audio mini-course "7 Quick & Simple Steps to Increase Your Focus, Ease Your Effort & Accelerate Your Results" and the free weekly newsletter The Spark! Visit http://www.YourHighPayoffCatalyst.com