Delegate Effectively

Effective Delegation is core managerial skill that almost all managers can improve upon.  Below we talk about:

• Why Managers Don’t Delegate
• Why Managers Should Delegate
• What Managers Should Delegate
• How to Delegate

Why Managers Don’t Delegate

If Effective Delegation is such a good idea, why do some managers not bother to do it?  There are several impediments to Effective Delegation:

• Delegating takes some up front work so it seems easier just to do it yourself.
• Some managers are control freaks.  (What if it doesn’t get done the way I would do it?)
• Some managers see it as asking for help — which they perceive as weak.
• Some managers feel badly about passing on their work to others.

Why Managers Should Delegate

Regardless of the reasons why managers don’t delegate, there are several compelling reasons to practice Effective Delegation:

• It helps develop the skills and abilities of the people you are delegating to.
• It frees you up to do the work that only you can/should do.
• It makes the business more capable if they were to lose a manager for any reason.

What Managers Should Delegate

The first step of Effective Delegation is deciding what tasks should be passed off to someone else:

• Tasks that someone else could do.
• Who on your team has the knowledge, skills and abilities to do the work?

• Tasks that would contribute to building your team.
• Who would benefit from the development opportunity?

• Tasks that are organizationally appropriate to delegate.
• Be careful about delegating tasks for which you are ultimately accountable for completing.  This is not about passing the buck
• If you are unsure, get alignment with your boss.

How to Delegate

Now that you have decided what tasks to delegate and considered to whom to assign them, you must communicate appropriately to those people:

• Context
• What the work is that you are delegating
• Why are you delegating this work
• How this work is important to the bigger picture

• Clarify
• Clarify the desired outcomes and expectations
• Clarify constraints, boundaries and resources

• Create
• Where possible empower the individual to contribute their ideas as to how the work will get done.
• Create the plan together

• Commit
• Get commitment and alignment to specific timelines, due dates, reviews, follow up meetings, measures of success etc.

• Close
• Wrap it up and express support and confidence in the individual.

3 Things to Remember About Effective Delegation:

1. Do it!  Good Managers get work done.  Great Managers get work done through and with others.

2. Make smart decisions about what to delegate and who to delegate to.
3. Leverage the Wily Manager Coaching Model (Context, Clarify, Create, Commit, Close) to delegate effectively.

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