M11 — Delegate Worksheet
Six pages. The point: turn the handoff readiness audit from M9 into action this month — a categorised queue, a live AI workflow, a first SOP, a first-hire spec or hold decision, and the audit cadence that keeps the system from rotting in quarter two. A worksheet that won’t let you confuse “I planned the delegation” with “I shipped the delegation”.
Page 1 — The delegation queue (measured, not estimated)
Run after prompts 1 and 2. Every recurring task off the founder, with the hours that prove the case.
Measurement week (the real week you tracked): _____
| # | Task | Hours/week (measured) | Frequency (daily/weekly/monthly/ad-hoc) | Cognitive load (L/M/H) | Downstream bottleneck (what doesn’t happen if this takes 4 hrs) | Category (AI/Human/System/Outsource) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
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| 15+ | ||||||
| TOTAL hours/week recoverable | ||||||
- Categorisation check — % of queue in each bucket: AI ___% / Human ___% / System ___% / Outsource ___%
- (If Human is above 60%, re-test the queue — most founders default to Human when AI or System is available.)
Page 2 — Priority + the irreplaceable list
Run after prompts 3 and 4. What gets lifted first, what protected.
Top 5 lift-off priorities:
| Rank | Task | Hours/week | Category | Why this one before the others | Lift-off week (W1-W12) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | |||||
| 2 | |||||
| 3 | |||||
| 4 | |||||
| 5 |
The irreplaceable list (target: 10-15 hours/week):
| Founder-only task | Hours/week | Why genuinely irreplaceable (judgement / voice / network) | Protected calendar block (when, where) |
|---|---|---|---|
- Total irreplaceable hours/week: _____ (if above 25, the irreplaceable list is hiding undocumented tasks — re-run prompt 4)
- What goes into the freed hours (deliberately, not by drift): _____
Page 3 — The AI workflow spec (ship in 7 days)
Run after prompt 5. Live by day 7 of starting M11.
Task being lifted: _____
Trigger: _____ (form submission / email arriving in folder / scheduled time / manual paste)
Brief — the prompt or prompt chain (paste exactly what’s going into Claude/GPT):
_____Voice rubric reference (from M6): _____
SOP rules embedded in the brief (from page 4 below): _____
Output:
- Format: _____ (draft email / structured table / one-page brief / Slack message)
- Destination: _____ (founder inbox / team Notion / customer inbox after approval)
- Quality bar: _____
Human checkpoint:
- First 30 days: every output reviewed by _____ before going live
- After 30 days: spot-check 1 in _____ if quality holds
Failure mode (what happens when input malformed / AI wrong / system down): _____
Launch date: _____ (must be within 7 days of completing this prompt)
Week 1 daily checklist — review every output, every day:
- Day 1: _____
- Day 2: _____
- Day 3: _____
- Day 4: _____
- Day 5: _____
- Day 6: _____
- Day 7: _____
Page 4 — The SOP (the document that runs the AI and trains the human)
Run after prompt 6. Target: 600-1,200 words. The hardest page in the worksheet.
SOP title: _____
1. Purpose (one paragraph, no jargon — what this task achieves and why):
_____
2. Inputs (named, specific — what triggers it, what data is needed):
_____
3. Steps (the decision tree, including if/then branches, written for a smart person who has never seen the business):
- Step 1: _____
- Step 2: _____
- Step 3: _____
- If [condition], then [branch]: _____
- If [other condition], then [other branch]: _____
- Step 4: _____
- Step 5: _____
4. Quality bar (what ‘done well’ looks like, with examples):
- Example of a GOOD output (paste in full): _____
- Example of an UNACCEPTABLE output and why: _____
5. Escalation list (specific situations where the task stops and routes back to founder):
- _____
- _____
- _____
6. Review cadence:
- Next scheduled review date: _____
- Trigger for off-cycle review (catch a failure): _____
Honest check — which step did you have to think hardest to describe? _____ (that step was on autopilot in your head; making it explicit was the whole point)
Page 5 — First-hire spec OR hold decision (with economics)
Run after prompts 8 and 9. The hire or the explicit reason to wait.
Diagnostic:
- Top human-category task consuming 8+ founder hours/week: _____
- Specialist or integrator? _____ (circle one — never ‘generalist’)
- Fully-loaded annual cost at the judgement level actually needed: _____
- Cash position supports 12 months + 3-month productivity ramp? Y/N _____
Path A — HIRE specification:
| Field | Detail |
|---|---|
| Role title | |
| The ONE task lifted in first 30 days | |
| The 3 tasks lifted in first 6 months | |
| Fully-loaded annual cost | |
| Start date | |
| Job ad post date |
First-30-days plan:
- Day 1 SOPs the hire is reading + executing under supervision: _____
- Week 2 task owned end-to-end (founder reviews output only): _____
- Week 3-4 tasks owned (founder spot-checks): _____
- Day 30 milestone — tasks owned without daily founder involvement: _____
- Day 30 decision trigger (founder calendar lighter or heavier net of management?): _____
- Weekly check-in cadence (time, day, agenda template): _____
Path B — HOLD decision:
- Reason for hold: _____ (cash / no clear role yet / AI substitutes lifting enough / other)
- Cash threshold that triggers the hire: $ _____
- AI delegations or system builds substituting for the next 90 days: _____
- Re-evaluation date: _____ (next quarterly audit)
Page 6 — The audit cadence (4 quarters blocked now)
Run after prompt 10. The review that prevents SOP rot.
Quarterly audit — 4 calendar entries blocked now:
| Quarter | Date (2 hrs blocked) | Audit agenda items pre-filled |
|---|---|---|
| Q1 (90 days from now) | SOP currency + AI quality + hire output + creeping tasks + irreplaceable list re-test | |
| Q2 | (same) | |
| Q3 | (same) | |
| Q4 | (same) |
Audit template (filled at each quarterly review):
1. SOP currency:
- SOPs edited this quarter: _____
- SOPs untouched 6+ months (likely silently wrong): _____
- Updates required this quarter: _____
2. AI workflow performance:
| Workflow | Day-30 quality rate (original) | Quarter-end quality rate | Change | Likely cause |
|---|---|---|---|---|
3. Human hire output:
- Tasks owned this quarter: _____
- Tasks ready for promotion to bigger ownership: _____
- Tasks to re-allocate (not working at level needed): _____
4. Tasks creeping back onto founder:
| Task that should be off founder by now | Why it crept back | Lift-off plan (which prompt to re-run) |
|---|---|---|
5. Irreplaceable list re-test:
- Last quarter’s irreplaceable hours/week: _____
- This quarter’s irreplaceable hours/week: _____
- Growth means: founder has taken on new founder-only work — scrutinise
- Shrinkage means: more successfully delegated — reallocate the freed hours deliberately
M11 closed — signed and dated: _____ Date: _____