How can you help employees delegate more effectively?

Identify delegatable tasks: Not all tasks are suitable for delegation. Analyse the workload and identify tasks that can be effectively handled by others, considering factors like complexity, skillset requirements, and time constraints. Choose the right person for the job: Delegate tasks to individuals who have the necessary skills, experience, and interest to handle them successfully. Provide clear instructions and expectations: Clearly communicate the task objectives, deliverables, timelines, and performance expectations. Delegate responsibility along with the necessary authority to make decisions and take action. Provide constructive feedback to help employees improve their delegation skills.

Delegation makes some managers uneasy. Some don't like delegating because they fear they'll lose control of their direct reports and projects. Others see delegating as giving up responsibility. As a Managers if you are reluctant to delegate, try these tactics: - Keep a daily log of how you spend your time. After a week, look for patterns. You'll probably find that you're spending a lot of time on low-leverage activities that someone else could handle. - Make delegation part of your process for creating staff development plans. Make delegated tasks part of the performance review - Ask your people to hold you accountable for delegating. - Envision yourself as a leader by fostering a sense of ownership and accountability.

You must create an environment where your team know it’s OK to try and fail. They need to know that you trust them to do their best. That you are available to when they need something, but are expecting them to take that initiative to come to you. This is needed in addition to all the good suggestions about clear intent and expectations. People need the safety of knowing they are trusted and will not be punished for attempting new things.

Delegation is mostly about readiness and timing. Generally, employee's career in the company is going with this direction: Stage 1: High motivation-Low knowledge/experience. Manager should act like mentor. That means working on only the worker's competencies. Stage 2: Low motivation-not enough knowledge/experience. The manager should act like coach - Working on both motivation and skills. Stage 3: Middle level motivation-nearly enough knowledge/experience. The manager's role is motivator. There is only a little more motivation the employee needs for development. Stage 4: High motivation-High knowledge/experience. At this level, employees motivation and skills are enough for delegation and new responsibilities.

For employees to delegate more effectively, one mindset shift that I found particularly important over the years is to help them see how the tasks they delegate can make their colleagues (the people they delegate to) learn and grow. Sometimes we hang on to tasks because we believe we will overload others if we give them "more work to do". But it is often the case that they need that work to grow, and we need to let go of that work to focus on other things that will make us grow. Ultimately, delegation is a powerful tool to develop other people, oneself, and the business.

Set clear expectations and objectives. Define the task, its purpose, and the desired outcome. Provide any necessary resources, tools, or information. Establish a timeline and milestones to track progress. One common mistake leaders make is not providing a clear timeline and milestones to track progress and efficiency.

One thing that I have found helpful for leaders when delegating tasks is to be specific in what success looks like, timeframe to completion, and availability to answer questions along the way. All too often a leader might have felt they communicated their expectations clearly although they failed to be specific with their team members which can cause confusion, lack of clarity, and an unsuccessful conclusion. Ensure you are clear on the expectations when you delegate, prepare in advance so that you can gather your thoughts and make sure to be clear in order to have a successful result.

Once you've identified the right employee, clearly communicate SMART expectations, including task details, importance, measurement metrics, resources, constraints, and deadline. Define authority, accountability, and communication frequency, and utilize a structured Jira board for efficient progress tracking and resource accessibility.

Lead by a good example, since they are your subordinates, be practical enough, delegate some responsibilities to them and follow up, when they satisfy your requirements then ask them to do the same to their subordinates and demand feedback. Ensure you follow up. When you show them the art of effective delegation they will learn and such will spur them to action on delegation. Do not expect perfect result at the first experience but as time goes on they will achieve perfection.

This process must be a conversation and the person or people being delegated to should be given the opportunity to provide their input into what’s required, by when and how this can be achieved. These should be agreed upon rather than given as orders. Agreement on these key points will ensure you have a more motivated individual or team and a better outcome for all involved.

A checklist I find helpful when delegating a task: 1. Handover. Have I shared all the relevant information? 2. Tools. Do they have all the tools they need to complete the task? 3. Access barriers. Do they have same level of access to relevant systems, people, and information as I do? 4. Challenges. Every task contains multiple challenges within itself - strategic, administrative, operational.. Are they confident with all of them or should I provide additional support with certain aspects of the task? 5. Regular check-ins. Is there a plan for regular check-ins to discuss issues and adjust approach? The extent of support needed for each of these points will vary, but it is a useful starting point to enable someone taking on a new task.

If you took the time to identify deliverables and deadlines, why not include check-ins as part of the plan? If you want to find that balance between trust, accountability, and support, you are going to need to have consistent and anticipated lines of communication. Consistency is a key component of great delegation. If you establish mutually agreed upon check-in dates, you won’t be creating stress or a perception of micro-management. When you check-in ask for updates and ideas as opposed to making suggestions and telling them how you want the task to be done. Remember, you want self-directed employees who anticipate the business needs. Delegation is how you develop these skills.

Do not just delegate and forget. Keep a close watch and be available for any Gyan session that might be needed for the individual to think with a different thinking hat or to make course corrections in due time.

As Michael Bungay Stanier says, "Talk less and ask more. Your advice is not as good as you think it is." Be curious when an employee comes to you for direction. Don't assume the actual issue will be clearly articulated in the first two minutes. Probe until you have identified the real problem your employee needs to address. Sustain your curiosity in a way that draws potential solutions up from their subconscious. They probably know better than you do--after all, they are on the front lines--and you can serve as an excellent sounding board as they give voice to their ideas, possibly for the first time. There is a time and place to advise, but only after you clearly understand the issue at hand.

EISENHOWER MATRIX Top left: critical and urgent = do Top right: critical and not urgent = schedule Bottom left: Not critical but urgent = delegate Bottom right: not critical not urgent = delete

Micromanagement is often identified as a significant impediment to organizational success. When a manager adopts a micromanagement approach, it becomes challenging to comprehend the intricacies and nuances of the work at the grassroots level. This is largely attributed to the tendency to excessively scrutinize and oversee every aspect of the work process, without consulting all relevant layers. Such a managerial style can prove exhaustive for the team, leading to time wastage, instead of focusing on more constructive activities such as coaching, development, and effective delegation to optimize the capabilities of the team members.

Micro-managers should be improved or removed because they are to an organization what cancer is to the body: toxic. Micro-managers believe delegating is simply telling people what to do, when to do it, and how to do it. You can lead an unlimited number of people. However, you can only micro-manage a small number of people. High impact leaders leverage delegation to grow and develop people. They don’t use delegation as a quick and easy way to hand off work they don’t want to do as micro-managers do. High impact delegation means others are recommending to the leader what they should do next. They don’t wait to be told, and they don’t ask. They take responsibility. They think. When they recommend, the leader learns how they think.

I agree, micromanaging is one of the quickest way to demotivate employees. If you have hired the right people for the different roles in your organisation, allow them the autonomy to make the right decisions. Give employees room to express their skills, experience and knowledge. Focus on the goal and give feedback at key milestones.

Managers need to learn to trust their employees. Trust your employees to take ownership of their delegated tasks. Resist the urge to micromanage, but also be available for support if needed. Empower them to make decisions and solve problems on their own, fostering a sense of ownership and responsibility. This is crucial to employee development.

Trust is most important in effective delegation. Micromanaging often stems from a leader's insecurities, hindering team growth. Leaders must recognise that empowering others fosters innovation and new approaches. Building a collaborative environment where autonomy is respected can help employees to leverage their unique skills. The other basic requirements include clear communications, clear expectations, and regular check-ins. These will ensure that delegations create a sense of ownership among team members.

It could be that even in situations where there is mutual trust it might happen that there is an employee or a team that is reluctant to ask for help and keeps digging into a problem, trying to find themselves the solution, without raising the flag of "help needed" and potentially putting at risk the project. In these situations it's important to help the team to identify the root cause, support them in finding solutions but it's also extremely important evidence them that asking for help, doesn't diminish their authority or professionalism.

Need to build a safe environment for the team. Aware that failure is a possibility where we could use it for learning. After that, try to understand the failure reason and define the next actions needed.

I found that ensuring the team to know when to ask for help is crucial to any delegation project. One of the repeated issues is needing to know when to ask for help and when to dig for the solution ourselves; especially if the team is very motivated to complete the project, they can easily get carried away into the rabbit hole. Leaders must keep checking the progress and ensure the team is aware of the support they can count on from the leader and the rest of the group. Educating the team is one of the quick solutions leaders can use by simply being the example, asking for help, and making it the norm in the group to do so.

Challenges, errors, being stuck at a point, these are inevitable. Leaders should be open and approachable, which creates trust and confidence that they could learn from their leader. As leaders, instead of removing the obstacles, get to root cause and help employees, make them understand how to remove them or educate them how to deal with the challenges effectively.

Problems are common everywhere, but leaders should always look for solutions instead of spending more time on them. However, to do that constantly, leaders and managers should look for the root cause and workload, understand and assess that employee's official and personal circumstances (e.g., any welfare issue, mental well-being), and then look for efficient and realistic solutions, and must apply Transactional Leadership style, not Transformational.

Reviewing results is crucial in delegation, involving evaluation of outcomes, acknowledging successes, and pinpointing areas for improvement. Offering feedback, recognition, and rewards boosts the employee's morale and confidence, fostering a sense of value and motivation. Additionally, take time to self-reflect on your delegating abilities for future improvement.

It said that "an unexamined life is not worth leaving". In view of this, it is imperative to review results of the deligated task. Depending on the enormity of the task, the review could be done intermittently/progressively. However, care should taken not to micromanage in the process. The review will help measure performance and give the appropriate feedback. The sandwich approach of giving feedback can be used; talk about both the good and the downsides of the outcome by putting things in proper perspective. Give praise where necessary and admonition where appropriate. It is much better where there exist predetermined success criteria/performance indicators to which the outcome of the task can be compared.

- Include an additional review panel for feedback and encourage collaboration with feedback from peers. Implementing effective 270/360-degree feedback offers a comprehensive perspective, offering a sense of accomplishment and valuable learning from successes. This also helps them to be prepared for new challenges.

Complement reflective learning in delegation reviews with 'future-focused action planning.' Post-reflection, develop action plans with your employee for upcoming tasks, setting clear steps based on learned insights. This transforms reflections into practical improvements for future projects, emphasizing continuous growth. This proactive approach ensures that the lessons learned are not just theoretical but are translated into tangible improvements. It also signals to your employee that their development is a continuous journey, with each task providing an opportunity for growth and skill enhancement. You then create a dynamic cycle of learning, applying, and improving, which is essential for both personal and organizational growth.

Give them a voice. Ask them what they need. Sometimes we don't need more support or less micromanagement (although that is a pervasive issue!) Sometimes, we need a safe space to say what we need to thrive. Programs for employees that encourage their wellbeing are becoming increasingly paramount as we see burnout and attrition rates skyrocket! We need to ask employees and make sure they know they can safely speak up (hopefully that's true!) Provide the environment to thrive!

Fear of delegation is real and most times it has deep internal roots. A valuable approach is to stat by changing one's own mindset. Coming from a place of fear that the other will not do as well/fast/successful as you is recipe for failure. Instead try to ask yourself relevant questions to reveal things of importance to you. Once you know those, ask yourself how delegating can relate and impact those things. If your focus is moving to another position / taking over different projects, delegating will create more space for you to grow and demonstrate leadership If your focus is supporting others grow, delegating to them will support them by learning new skills, increasing their visibility and confidence.

On the flip side, negative delegation, where tasks are assigned to expose weaknesses, can lead to a toxic work environment. It erodes trust, stifles creativity, and hampers productivity. Rather than inspiring growth, it instills fear and diminishes morale. A positive delegation's power lies not in exposing the incapability of others but in providing support and fostering growth. When delegation is wielded wisely, it transforms a group of individuals into a cohesive, high-performing team, also it promotes a sense of ownership among the team members.

[1] Use delegation as a strategy to ensure all team members are working towards the same strategic goals. [2] Create a company-specific delegation playbook that provides practical frameworks for assessing tasks for delegation, matching tasks with employee growth paths, and guidelines for support and accountability. [3] Shift the focus from tasks to development. Each task delegated should be viewed as a chance to expand the employee’s capabilities and a step toward their professional advancement.

This may be counterintuitive, but one way to show the proof of if the need of delegation is to give the mentee a bit more than they can chew. What this does is to allow them see execution of the task is more important than one person getting to do everything. This culture must value feedback and teamwork for a good system of delegation to be effective and sustainable