Emily, I love this question you asked:
If you can’t afford to hire someone to do a key piece of your offering, does that mean you’re doing it without compensation?
Ouch! That’s a hard question to answer!

This is also something to keep in mind by managers (whether owner-operators or employees). Don’t waste your time doing jobs just because you can do it better or quicker than your staff. They need to grow so they will be valuable employees for you as time goes on. At first you might spend more time directing, evaluating, correcting their work than it would take for you to just do it by yourself. But that initial investment of time should pay off in the long run.

I also think that sometimes it’s helpful for owner-operators to perform a task on their own for a while before outsourcing. This way you can learn the ropes of that task so that you’re well-informed when farming the way out to someone else. It helps you to manage the task later, to not be taken for a ride by freelancers, to better understand what needs to be done or what is being done.