How to see your blind spots and make adjustments

One of the biggest problems I’ve encountered working in small businesses and start-ups are the devastating effect blind spots have.

You might be thinking, “Hey, isn’t that important to every person, every business, and every conscious living thing?” Yes, it’s important across the board. I’m talking about the realm where blind spots can crush everything around them. One end of the spectrum feels the impact far more than the rest: smaller groups and individuals.

Why is this?

One word: resources.

The larger the group, the more resources the group has. While not all groups are equal, having many more people means there is a higher chance someone in the group can handle a certain task at any given time. If any task can be handled by finding the right person to do it, blind spots are less of an issue.

When you are working in a small group, blind spots become a larger issue. Often times each person has to take on a wider variety of tasks. As the sole full-timer at a start-up I had to sell our products to stores, promote products inside the stores, negotiate with our vendors, coordinate production schedules with manufacturing, invoice customers, answer the phone, respond to questions through our website, and sometimes make and package the products if no one else could do it. (I just reread that and thought, “Wow, every day I did that…how?”)

I’ve seen my colleagues and bosses in similar situations. There are so many responsibilities each of us has to prioritize and hope we get the most out of our time.

Then the real dilemma comes. We see what we’re good at, or we see what we want to handle first, and that’s what we go for. Prioritization has just been flushed down the toilet! That’s when we start holding on for dear life.

Here are some questions to ask yourself so you can figure out your blind spots and handle them better.

1) What parts of your job you have the least experience in? If you’re weak in some areas find someone who has more experience and can help you grow in those areas. Look outside the company if you have to. Find support somewhere.

2) What parts of your job do you not enjoy doing? Put them in two categories: those you have to do, and the ones someone else can do. Tackle the first group and find someone who is better suited to handle the others whenever possible.

3) What parts of your job do you enjoy and are the best at? I bet these are the tasks you try to spend the most time on whenever possible. The more of these tasks you can do, the better you will perform. On the flip side, anything not in this category is a potential blind spot.

4) What feedback are you getting from your colleagues and bosses? Think about what they tell you. If you’re a supervisor ask for feedback. I cannot remember a boss sitting me down, asking me for feedback. As a supervisor I realize I need to do this more, because I just wrote it.

5) If you could rebuild the business or department from scratch, how would you do it? Your current system should look exactly like your ideal situation, taking into account what resources you have or could get.

6) With the first five questions answered, what is your plan? Asking all these questions will help a lot more if you do something with it. This is not wishy-washy idealist propaganda! This is fix things before the entire ship sinks while you were too busy paying attention to other things.

While this may not clear up all your blind spots right away, if you create an open dialogue with your employees and yourself you can make major strides to improving things.

Do you have any ways you’ve helped uncover your own blind spots? Share them!