Let's Talk Responsibilities
"Delegation requires the willingness to pay for short term failures in order to gain long term competence." - Dave Crenshaw
Introduction to Delegation Poker
Delegation Poker is a game-like tool from Management 3.0 that is designed to foster better understanding and alignment on delegation levels within a team. It not only clarifies who is responsible for what decisions but also actively involves team members in the decision-making process. This tool is particularly useful in environments where roles and responsibilities are dynamic and require frequent adjustments, such as in agile product development teams.
Explaining the Practice
Delegation Poker involves a set of cards that represent different levels of delegation. From one, meaning the manager makes the decision alone, to seven, where the team decides entirely independently, each card signifies a level of authority and decision-making power. Team members play these cards during the game to express their preferred level of delegation for various tasks and decisions. This visual and interactive approach helps everyone on the team see how their views align with others and facilitates discussions on achieving a consensus. The 7 levels of delegation are:
What does the crew decide on its own?
Our product development team had grown significantly over the past months, and with new members on board, it became evident that there was a misalignment between current and expected decision-making processes. We decided to use Delegation Poker to realign our team’s understanding of each person's role and responsibilities, especially to clarify decision-making boundaries and enhance our communication efficiency.
Application of the Practice
We used Delegation Poker in one of our gatherings with the entire development team and all of the crews. We had multiple poker session, one for each example question that we wanted to gather insights on and come to a joint agreement. The question or decision in question was asked and everyone was picking a playing a card to represent their view on the delegation level they believed was appropriate. However, we did two rounds. One to reflect on the perceived status quo, and the second round how we would expect it to be. We then discussed our choices openly, which not only helped in understanding the diverse perspectives in the team but also in aligning everyone towards a common approach.
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We started with 2 questions that we hoped to get little room for discussion to get warm with the game:
We identified only a minor gap between reality and goal. However, after these warm-up questions, we dived deeper into more controversial decisions that brought up some misunderstandings on all ends that we could easily identify and mitigate.
Learnings
As a facilitator, one of the key learnings was the importance of creating a safe and open environment where all team members felt comfortable expressing their opinions. It was crucial to ensure that everyone understood that the purpose of the game was not to challenge each other, but to collaborate towards understanding and improving our workflow. I learned that the way questions were framed before each round greatly influenced how team members perceived the task and their level of engagement.
Takeaways and Future Considerations
The experiment helped our team clarify who is responsible for what and reduced the time spent on clarifying decision-making in meetings, thus increasing our operational efficiency. For future sessions, I would ensure to have even more structured follow-up discussions post-game to solidify the decisions made during the game. Additionally, integrating this tool regularly as part of our team meetings could be beneficial to continuously align on changing responsibilities instead of doing it as a "one shot event".
Other teams may learn from our experience the value of involving team members in the process definitions. This not only improves the understanding of each person’s role but also enhances overall team cohesion and effectiveness and prevent a boss micromanaging the teams.
In conclusion, Delegation Poker from Management 3.0 proved to be an excellent tool for our growing team to realign and understand our processes and decision-making hierarchies better. It is a practical, engaging, and effective method to foster team involvement and ensure everyone is on the same page in a dynamic working environment.