<aside> 💡 Here is how to tackle these design-your-role conversations, even with new or part-time team members, to redesign roles based on energy-strengths.
❤️ **Sent here by a friend? This template is part of the larger Free Time Toolkit. Sign-up to get full (free!) access at ItsFreeTime.com/toolkit, and make sure you get a copy of the book that goes with it: Free Time: Lose the Busywork, Love Your Business by Jenny Blake. For a full done-for-you business operations hub like the one Jenny describes in the book, learn more about the Free Time Dashboard »
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Kick-off conversation: What are your energizers and drainers? Homework: Continue observing over the next two weeks, capturing additions large and small.
DYR follow-up conversation: What is your ideal role or job description at a high-level? What do you love that you would like to do more of?
Documenting and rethinking our current workflow: Update the Manager Manual to capture current knowledge, such as small tasks on autopilot, while researching new ways to automate. Then draft a role description for work your team member would like to delegate. Ask around among your network to find new potential team members to fill the open roles.
Onboard new team members: The transitioning team member spends two to four weeks walking through more complex tasks, paralleling and guiding the work as the new person completes more complex sequences for the first time. This also helps the owner avoid answering too many questions during the transition time.
Open space: Only at this stage is there more “room to think.” Let the transitioning team member take time here to continue reflecting. With the older and routine work removed from her plate, Marisol could think more creatively about the business and most pressing problems. We determined that her interim title would be Director of Special Projects.
Define your next role or projects for this person: Do not underestimate the power of the special projects role; for someone freed up from routine tasks, they are available to tackle high-level projects with a discrete start and end date.