Are You a Bottleneck in your Agency and What to do About It
Theresa
As the CEO, you're likely trying to avoid being the bottleneck in your agency. It sounds simple, but it's not easy!
But as your agency is booming and clients are flying in faster than you, or your team, can handle, you’re quickly realizing that you cannot do it all and you’re stretching yourself very thin.
Your agency is consistently bringing in steady revenue which gives you inspiration on new ideas to implement. New services, new products, new offerings, that will maximize your profit and help serve more clients.
But, the only problem is you don’t have the time to sit down and work through your ideas, admin tasks, managing and leading your team, and implement what you want. There’s no more headspace to take on more and you’re noticing that business is at a standstill, even with opportunities in the horizon.
Here’s a hard truth; you could be the bottleneck in your agency.
But, the sooner you realize that you’re getting in your agency’s way to achieving higher success, the sooner you can break the bottleneck cycle and find solutions to keep growing and scaling.
If you’ve come to the realization that your agency has a bottleneck, and it is you, this post will tell you exactly what to do about the situation.
Problem 1: Your Agency is thriving and you’ve got too many ideas
Your agency is thriving and you continuously reach your financial goals each month, or quarter!
Clients are lining up to work with you because of the amazing experience and relationship you’ve built with them. The downside to all this, you don’t have the capacity to take on more clients. You’ve had to close your doors and build out a waiting list for new leads and prospects. This may not sound like a problem, but if business continues this way, you know that you’ll reach a standstill without moving forward.
All of the new ideas you have for your agency are pushed to the back burner because you need to focus on and serve your clients, first. Even with your team, you’re all working at maximum capacity.
Although this sounds like a “good” problem to have, it is ultimately a problem that can stall your agency's growth.
When you identify the bottleneck in your agency, you'll be able to craft creative solutions based on your business character, creativity, and culture that will…
Free up your headspace to focus on your vision
Give your team a clear direction on how to move forward
Highlight gaps in the team that can be filled to help smooth out workflows
Problem 2: Your team is amazing but you don’t have the bandwidth to answer all their questions
You’ve begun building a team, and they’re amazing and talented individuals… but, they keep coming to you with questions that interrupt the time you need to focus on your agency vision.
You’re noticing that a lot of your team’s questions come from a lack of workflows, which is causing more havoc than expected. You’re overwhelmed, unsure how to correct the workflows, and integrate your team all at the same time.
If your agency continues like this, I quickly foresee a heavy dose of burnout and an impact on the client experience.
You can quickly create a team survey with questions like:
‘What do you feel I am currently holding up in the agency?’
‘Do you have a create solution to fix this?’
‘Are there any areas/things you would like to take over?’
With this survey, you’ll see where workflows can be streamlined, where the bottlenecks are, and how to integrate your team in different areas to help ease any roadblocks.
After reviewing your survey results, it's highly encouraged to review the roles and responsibilities of your team.
For example, you can review pros/cons as follows…
What are the pros of making changes | What are the cons of making changes |
What are the pros of NOT making changes | What are the cons of NOT making changes |
The Bottleneck in Your Agency
By working through an operations audit, and understanding where bottlenecks are hiding within workflows, systems, operations, or team/client experiences, you’ll be able to make educated and strategic decisions to keep your agency growing at a sustainable rate.
Remember, if you have “too many clients” coming in and not enough time to take care of them, this is still a problem!
And, if your team is amazing and talented but don’t have a clear direction, their talents can’t be utilized to grow your agency like you expected.
Your Move
If you’ve noticed that your agency is stalling, at a standstill, and not growing as planned… that is a sure sign that there is a bottleneck somewhere. Whether you are the main bottleneck or there are multiple others, here’s what to do to find, understand, and change the bottleneck in your agency:
Perform an audit on your systems, team, clients, and management to find bottlenecks
Determine creative solutions based on your agency business character, creativity, and culture
Create a team survey to see what your team needs support with
Review the roles & responsibilities of your team
Finally, review the pros and cons for implementing certain changes
Unsure where to start with assessing and addressing bottlenecks?
Is the bottleneck larger than you imagined?
