Share thisThere you are: too much to do, deadline looming, shorthanded, struggling to just keep your head above water…and now the boss wants you to take on a whole new project. It’s going to take lots of time, more time than you have.What to do? Delegate!
Delegation is an essential skill for managers. Yet many managers—especially those who are new to supervision—see delegation as something not quite legitimate and fear it. They worry about giving up control and lack confidence in their employees. But effective delegation has two terrific payoffs: it frees up a manager’s own time and helps develop the skills, and therefore the value, of employees.
A sometime hard-to-swallow fact of life is that none of us is an expert in everything—not due to any lack of intelligence, but because we lack specific training or experience. We must accept this realistically. Smart managers will thoughtfully choose between which activities to do themselves, and which to delegate to others
Often, delegation is misunderstood and seen simply as ordering an employee to do some specific job. But delegation can also involve giving an employee major responsibility for complex projects. For example, you might delegate a project of investigating and evaluating prospective vendors for major new equipment. Or you might delegate an employee to head a task force to develop plans for in service training.
Projects like these might be completed fairly quickly or might require several months and involve a lot of the delegatee’s working hours. Therefore, very careful planning of your delegation is needed.
When you delegate, you work with an employee to establish goals and give them clearly spelled-out authority and responsibility. The delegatee should be given substantial freedom to decide how the goals will be achieved. But as their manager you must remain available to monitor performance and help out when needed. Ultimately, the responsibility for the project’s outcome is still yours.
At the simplest level, delegation can be used just to rid yourself of time consuming, routine tasks. Think about the simple activities that routinely take your time. Might any of those activities be delegated? As a general rule, any task that you must do routinely and repeatedly should be considered a target for delegation; managers should spend their time planning and organizing their employees’ work.
At a higher level, delegation means turning a project over to a subordinate, even though that’s not always comfortable. Partially this may be because you know you can do it better yourself; partially it may be due to your fear of looking bad to your own manager and losing power and stature. Yet, delegation can free up your schedule while you are helping an employee develop leadership skills. Remember, the more successful the members of your work team are, the more recognition you will receive.
While specifics will vary from situation to situation, the following rules for effective delegation should be carefully considered:
Select the right person for the delegation. Assess the skills and capabilities of your subordinates and match those skills to what will be required for successful project completion. Delegate the task or project to just one person so that he/she feels responsible for the complete success of the project.
Don’t underestimate a subordinate's potential. Delegate slightly more than you think the person can readily handle. Expect them to succeed, be available to help, and you could be pleasantly surprised as you watch your employee stretch and grow.
Keep a record. State explicitly what a successfully completed project will look like and put it in writing. This will be an “official” record of what is to be done, who is to do it, deadline for completion, limitations on spending, and other important factors. This will avoid possible conflict and confusion. Keeping such a record not only clarifies and concretizes accountability for task completion; it helps the employee feel more secure, knowing precisely what his/her responsibilities and expectations are.