I appreciate just how difficult the working day can become. No matter how hard you work, there’s only a limited amount you can do. A working day only has so many hours and there’s only so much you can fit in. It’s easy to become stressed, overloaded with work and feeling you’re letting everyone down.
If you can master the important skill of delegating work to others, you’ll reap the benefits of not only freeing up your own valuable time, but also increase the skill sets of your team and perhaps build greater engagement and stronger working relationships by doing so.
Delegation is about you letting go as much as it is the team…
What do you want to delegate?
Firstly, think about what you want or need to delegate – the best way to do this is to review your fun skill matrix – plot all the tasks you do in the matrix according to the level of skill required to do the task and the level of enjoyment you get from doing the task then, delegate those things that you either have low skill at or you don’t enjoy
How to delegate?
If the person you are delegating to has High Skill but Low Will they either have a loss of confidence or loss of motivation. In this case you will need to support them.
If they are Low Skill, Low Will – this takes longer to delegate as you will need to spend time telling them what to do.
Low Skill, High Will – not ready for those jobs, but has the capability in this case coach them
If they have both High Skill and High Will then delegate
So, where are your team?
The Process of delegation
In the book – The One Minute Manager meets the Monkey by Ken Blanchard.
The ‘monkeys’ are the next step – the next action that is needed to move something forwards.
Ken Blanchard tells the story of a manager in a company who ends up looking after his team’s ‘monkeys’…. Everything they set out to do comes back to him “I’ll think about it and get back to you”; “send it to me for review”, “let me come up with some ideas” so he ends up doing his teams work…. They have given him the ‘monkey’.
And ‘monkeys’ have to be looked after… so they take time. The idea is to give the ‘monkeys’ back, to pass them to the people in your team or your outsourced people – to delegate.
So how do we do that?
WHAT – Define what is to be done. what is it you are delegating be clear on the outcomes expected and by when. Be certain the person you delegate to understands what is to be done; we are taking about delegation not abdication;
WHY – Why you have chosen them to complete the task and why the task is required to be done and within that timeframe;
HOW – Teach how it is to be done without micromanaging – templates to use, the resources/people needed, how long it should take, what is and isn’t acceptable. Be sure the person understands the how-to-process. Set the deadline or completion date to report progress;
AGREE – They need to summarise what they will be doing and agree they have everything needed to do it and by when
Let’s start delegating
So, let’s put wheels in motion and start delegating. Sit down and plan out ten things you could delegate over the next ten weeks. List ten tasks or activities you currently do which could easily be delegated to someone else. Then start thinking about who you could train to take over these tasks. Think about the strengths of your team, their positive attributes, talents, capabilities, etc – and then take that leap of faith and start delegating those tasks out. You never know, that shy, retiring colleague in the corner might even come up with a super-efficient method of getting a job done! Delegation is a process of learning, trusting and working together.
If you have any questions or would like to know more about how to delegate effectively, please do get in touch.
