Why is my business so disorganized when I'm good at what I do?

Because the things that made you good at starting a business are not the things that keep one organized.

Most business owners I work with are people people. They are great at relationships. They can sell, they can inspire, and they can see where the business should go next.

They are usually not so good at details or accountability. The visionary often does not like details. So the consistency and organization inside the company are not great, and everyone who works there feels it.

I know this one from the inside. In my own business I hired people who were a lot like me: independent and driven by the vision. Nobody wanted to do the detail work, including me.

It is not just my story. I have used the Predictive Index, a workplace behavior assessment, for 15 years and have assessed close to 300 leaders. The results have shown this same pattern the whole time: strong on people and vision, light on detail and follow-through.

Understanding your own workplace behavior is as important as understanding your people's.

This is not a character flaw

It is a gap, and every leader has one. The mark of a good leader is knowing where their own gap is and hiring people they can trust to own that part.

Three things to do about it

1. Name your gap out loud. If follow-through, paperwork or holding people accountable is the part you avoid, say so. Your team already knows.
2. Stop hiring people who are just like you. We like people who think the way we do, so we hire them. Then the company has five visionaries and nobody who finishes things.
3. Hand over the part you avoid, and mean it. Find someone who enjoys the details, give them real authority over that part, and do not undo their decisions.

Then go back to building the business you love. That is what you are best at, and it is what the company needs most from you.

Want to see your own pattern? Sign up for my owner's update and I will send you the link to the workplace assessment. It takes about six minutes. Then we book a short call and I explain your results in plain English.

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