Your Guide to Effective Delegation! 

Effective delegation is always difficult. You feel as if you are slacking off, you fear they will fail, you know they will not do it the same way as you, so you keep putting it off.

There may be some truth in your assumptions, but if you keep putting it off you will never know.

Delegation is not a sign of weakness. It’s an opportunity to empower and discover potential, new talents and skills. It is about sharing the vision and the direction for success

It’s also a mutual learning process, for both you and the delegatee. Effective delegation is a very powerful tool to enable employee empowerment.

Here are some tips for effective delegation that teach you to work smart not hard! 

Plan your Delegation Process

Develop a delegation plan. Look at all your tasks and decide what to delegate. Choose a job that is not exclusively your competence (e.g performance reviews) but yet is realistic and challenging. The selected task must significantly reduce your workload and at the same time stretch the potential of your employees.

Give a Vote of Confidence

Effective delegation is not just about choosing the right task, it's also about giving a vote of confidence to the people around you. Hand down an important task that requires capabilities and skills, efforts and commitment. Your employees will appreciate your trust and will maximize their efforts to succeed.

Choose the Right Person for the job

Assess and analyze your employees' inventory of skills. Select a person who you know fits the qualifications to fulfill the task. Consider his/her schedule, workload, personality, skills etc.

Don’t Dump – Delegate!

Provide the necessary resources, information and guidance to the employees.

Communicate expectations clearly as well as budgets, timelines etc. Share relevant information: reports, best practices etc. 

Speak the Same Language. Agree on expected outcomes and indicators of success. 

Be clear about their boundaries and their operating space. Outline their level of authority. Explain that they are in charge and it’s up to them to resolve issues, make decisions and implement tasks independently. Coach but don't micromanage!

Delegation - An Opportunity, Not a Trap

Provide a “safety net” for your employees. Remain accessible. Communicate and stay connected with their challenges. Deliver the message that you are both on the same page and both ready to enjoy the results or learn from the mistakes. Isolation in itself brings insecurity and creates grounds for failure.

Don't  reprimand your  employees if they did not raise to the challenge. It may only be an indication of an inaccurate skills' assessment, lack of proper training etc. Instead sit down together with them and analyze what happened.

Embrace the Differences

Effective delegation is about accepting the differences. He/She may not be able to accomplish tasks exactly the way you would, as they may have a different style and a different approach to details. However, it’s all-good, as long as the final product, the end-result remains the same.

Praise the Good Job

When the task is finalized, give feed back and praise the good job. Let them know you appreciated their efforts and that their hard work did not go unnoticed.

A few remarks: Effective delegation is closely related to your organizational culture. Some organizations have embraced employee empowerment and have created a road map on how to best utilize skills and expertise of everyone on reaching organizational goals. Integrate the big picture into your effective delegation plan.  

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