DELEGATE, DO NOT CONTROL

The primary job of leaders is to ensure that the team is performing their assigned tasks collectively in order to achieve common goals and overall mission of the organisation. Effective leaders have to know which responsibilities to delegate and which to allow themselves to perform. Planning, strategizing and decision making can be done in a collaborative manner within the organisation, whereas, execution can be done by delegating specific tasks to individuals. Delegation of tasks superimposed with periodic supervision, honest feedback and creative advice is a very successful method of achieving positive results.

Leaders need not do all the work themselves as they have to devote time to plan for change in economic conditions, communicate with other leaders of teams to develop new strategies or improve operations. Additionally, they have to remain abreast with the latest trends, technologies and techniques relevant to their organisation and industry.

Leaders who merely dump tasks on subordinates without assigning responsibility along with authority for their outcomes are simply trying to get the job done through others yet retaining the privilege of taking credit for the task in hand. This leads to employee dissatisfaction.

Many team leaders are sceptical of delegating jobs to other members because primarily they think that they are better than them or that they lack trust in the team member’s motivation, capability or commitment. Sometimes leaders think that they could complete the job more efficiently themselves rather than delegating it to someone else. At other times they suffer from guilt of overloading their teammates with additional responsibility. Whatever be the situation, leaders should delegate jobs within their teams to distribute the workload, get tasks done by specialists qualified to do that particular task and to encourage development of team members’ capabilities.

Once a task is set to be delegated to any individual, it must be communicated in a coherent manner with a preferable face to face meeting. It is imperative that employees are made aware that they have been selected specially because of their capabilities. A two way dialogue with the employee would put that person at ease and also encourage them to seek clarifications on the task given. A very important aspect during the delegation discussion is to ensure that the person has understood the task in hand and also the end result desired. Sometimes confusion prevails because the task has not been understood correctly by the employee.

Before delegating any task, good leaders should examine as to who else in the team is capable of performing that particular task. It should then be given to someone who has the expertise, experience, skills, confidence or who needs to be groomed to step up in their jobs. By giving greater responsibility to a team member, a leader should also delegate the authority level connected with it such that employees know that the responsibility of the outcome of either success or failure rests on their shoulders. It needs to be clarified to the employee as to what level of temporary authority they are going to wield during the execution of the task. This is required such that the other team members and the organisation know about the authority wielded and extend their cooperation accordingly. For delegation to be successful, consultation within and outside the team gives good results. A very important aspect of delegation which is very essential is to permit freedom of thought and method of execution by giving broad guidelines, setting timelines, laying down requirements of progress reports and a completion deadline. Leaders should make it clear that they are always available to give guidance at any time.

Leaders should give the impression to the team that despite of the delegated tasks, they are still going to be responsible to their superiors for attaining the desired results of the overall project. During the ongoing delegated task, leaders must ensure that continuous feedback and coaching are an essential part of the activity. A very important aspect of delegating a task is to extract the lessons learnt for the whole team as well as to the leader specifically and adopt possible new best practices that could have emerged during the activity for documentation and further sharing within the organisation. Also, performance evaluation is required to be carried out in order to give feedback on the person’s performance and areas of improvement, if any.

Succession planning is an important aspect of any leader’s responsibility. Ensuring employee development and growth through training and delegation makes a powerful statement to the team members about their trust worthiness, competence and worth to the organisation. By doing this, leaders will be in a position to identify future leaders and prepare successors fit for different echelons.

Good leaders should ensure that they do not abandon the person whom they have delegated the task to and should give confidence to them about their availability for guidance and coaching always. They must be accessible for questions and clarifications ensuring that periodic reviews are conducted to ascertain progress. On the other hand by trying to control all activities and tasks unilaterally, leaders tend to take on too much work upon themselves and sometimes fail in the expectations of their superiors. This also leads to employee dissatisfaction and disgruntlement. The trap of micromanagement is that it breeds resentment and disloyalty.

In these modern days of disruptive changes and uncertainty, too much reliance on technology should be avoided and the focus should remain more people centric. The inherent longing of people to be heard, seen and appreciated can be encouraged by creating an environment where they feel safe and are comfortable to express themselves thereby making the atmosphere conducive for increased productivity through delegation of tasks.