Delegating Effectively

Table of Contents

Objectives
Steps to Delegating Work
Self Assessment for Delegation
Additional Notes

Objectives

Clearly and comfortably delegate both routine and important tasks and decisions; broadly share both responsibility and accountability; trust people to perform; let direct reports finish their own work.^[1]
Understand how to delegate effectively to meet changing priorities.
Understand the role of delegation in time management, resource utilization, job satisfaction and overall team productivity.
Use a delegation process that ensures employee participation, involvement, and success so that what needs to be done gets done — properly and on time.
Establish an employee’s responsibility and authority for a delegated task — creating a framework for accountability and personal growth.

Success Criteria

Verifies the employee’s acceptance of responsibility
Specifies a method of accountability
Establishes authority equal to accountability
Monitors progress and completion

Advantages to Delegating Effectively

A more equal distribution of work load
More time to devote to other work
Help employees become competent and self-confident
Enrichment of the jobs of employees

Note	Leaders are always accountable for the work of their work groups. Leaders are also accountable for the effectiveness of their delegations.

Typical Delegation Blockers with New Leaders

A new leader may dislike asking others to do things
A new leader may be unsure of how to teach employees
A new leader may be unsure of what tasks to delegate
A new leader may be concerned that someone will be able to do the work better than they can do it
A new leader may be worried that they will be blamed for the mistakes of others
A new leader may be worried about getting the effort done on time
A new leader may believe that people don’t want more work.

Steps to Delegating Work

Prepare to Delegate

Prioritize assignments, decisions, and other work.
1. Consider both importance and deadlines before establishing priorities for each job.
2. Divide the work into tasks that can be accomplished by individuals.
3. Make sure that all people have enough tasks to challenge their capabilities. Recognize their potential.
Decide which jobs can be delegated (Recurring jobs of a routine nature, and challenging develop- mental opportunities).
Decide who should be given the assignment.
1. Analyze the capabilities of people and decide who can handle the assignment. Some assignments can be handled by anyone. Others demand special competence. It’s up to you to decide who can best complete each task.
2. Take advantage of specialized skills where you can. Assigning work is always an opportunity to develop and train individuals or work teams.

Be reasonable in what you expect them to do.

Caution

Failure Hazard. Misunderstandings at the beginning of a project or assignment may result in valiant effort being applied in a direction that does not help, or worse hurts the team. No one wins when the result is not what was needed. To avoid this frustrating experience for all involved, and potentially more damaging consequences, take the extra minute or two to test for understanding.

Clearly outline the assignment in your own mind.

Delegate the Effort

Meet with the person to explain the assignment and its purpose.
Explain the task clearly.
Explain the time and other limits.
Allow the person to help develop the plans to carry out the assignment.
Tell the employee how you will check their work, or how they are to report completion.
Specify responsibility and authority.
Make sure that everyone involved knows that the employee has the authority to carry out the work.
Review who does what.
Set up a time for review.
Test For Understanding.
Make sure the employee understands the assignment and the accountability for it and that they agree to do the work. Check their understanding of what you have said.

Note
Checking for their understanding is especially important for new or complex tasks, or for people that need more specific instruction.
Explain that to give them the best chance for success, you want to confirm at the start that their image and your image of the project or assignment end state is the same.
Ask them to explain in their own words what the assignment entails (what, the sequence, who is involved, and the results).
Listen to their explanation and confirm that it matches your image of the assignment. If something needs clarification, thank them for restating the assignment and explain where the correction applies.

Monitor Progress

Don’t expect perfection.
Be available to provide assistance, advice, and encouragement as needed.
Give help if necessary, but allow the employee to take responsibility for the assignment.
Make sure that their time is occupied with useful work.
Follow up with any monitoring on which you have agreed. Check back later in the way you have said you would.
1. Make sure that their abilities and interests are challenged by the work.
2. Give special attention to the good things they have achieved.
3. If necessary, help redirect or renew efforts to complete the assignment.
Let them work by themselves to build their self-confidence. Don’t stand over them. Don’t take over, let them do it.
Don’t accept poor work.
Express appreciation.

Self Assessment for Delegation

Circle the number that is closest to the statement on the right or left that best describes your delegation style. Discuss the results with your supervisor and try to identify areas of personal style on which you can improve.

Table 1. Leader’s Self Assessment for Delegation Effectiveness
I look for tasks in my work that take up my time but could be done by others	5…4… 3…2…1	I try to do everything myself, even things that could be done by others.
I find that I can work at a normal pace because I focus on problems that are important and I delegate small decisions.	5…4… 3…2…1	I am always in a hurry because I try to solve every little problem myself in- stead of delegating small decisions.
I carefully match the jobs I delegate to the abilities of the person who will do the job.	5…4… 3…2…1	I delegate without much consideration of the abilities of the person who will do the job.
I use delegation to give people experiences which will prepare them for new roles.	5…4… 3…2…1	I delegate only the easiest jobs that I know people can do. I seldom give them a challenge.
I give people very specific descriptions of what they are to accomplish and when.	5…4… 3…2…1	I often give only vague goals, such as "Do the best you can," which confuse people.
I give people a chance to ask me questions and get help if they really need it.	5…4… 3…2…1	Once I delegate a job, I do not expect that there will be any more questions about it.
I give people the organizational authority to make decisions as well as making them accountable for the effects of decisions.	5…4… 3…2…1	I often tell a people that they are accountable for a decision but actually keep the authority for the final decision for myself.
I delegate decisions to the people closest to a problem who can solve it quickly.	5…4… 3…2…1	I find myself making many decisions which could have been made more quickly by a follower.
With a new people I delegate when I have time to watch what happens.	5…4… 3…2…1	I delegate under pressure so I seldom have a chance to watch how a people makes decisions.
I allow people to do the job in their own way, as long as they make no big mistakes.	5…4… 3…2…1	I expect people to do a job exactly the way I would do it, so I watch them very closely and correct them often.
In discussing a person’s performance, I focus on how to improve what he or she has done.	5…4… 3…2…1	In discussing a person’s performance, I try to assign blame and make personal attacks.
Once I delegate a job, I do not overrule a person’s decision without discussing it with that person first.	5…4… 3…2…1	I often overrule people decisions without their knowledge.
I take full responsibility for a delegate’s decisions with my leaders.	5…4… 3…2…1	I use delegation to give me someone to blame if something goes wrong.

So what can you improve?

Scoring

35 and above - very good delegation
29 to 34 - fairly good delegation skills
19 to 28 - average delegation skills
13 to 18 - below average delegation skills

Additional Notes

Prepare to underwrite mistakes. Be competent and confident enough to take a risk. There is no better way to stifle creativity or to dampen morale than not tolerating any mistakes. Leadership is risky. Delegating responsibility and trusting people is risky. Effective leaders must take those risks.

In most cases, people will respond in direct proportion to the trust that they feel from their leaders.

Delegating is allowing people to have substantial responsibility and discretion in carrying out work activities, handling problems, and making important decisions. As you cede control you get more, and often better, results and develop your employees.

Encourage initiative in your employees. Hard work and force of personality can sometimes carry the day, but more effective leaders delegate authority and support their employee’s decisions, while holding employees accountable for their actions.

Delegating successfully involves empowering people and ensuring they know that they indeed have the freedom to act independently. Empowered employees have, and know they have, more than the responsibility to get the job done. They have the authority to act in the way they see fit and are limited only by the supervisor’s guidance about their intentions. Employees know that you trust them to make the right things happen; this security motivates them, in turn, do their assignments with determination.

They know you will underwrite honest mistakes, well-intentioned mistakes—not stupid, careless, or repeated ones—so they’re unafraid to fail.

Empowering employees means building the climate that gives employees the rein to do the job within the bounds of acceptable risk. It means setting organizational objectives and delegating tasks to ensure parallel, synchronized progress.

Delegation is a critical task:

Which employees can be trusted with independent action?
Which need a short rein?

In fluid situations—especially in circumstances that change rapidly or where leaders may be out of touch—empowered employees will pursue the leader’s intent as the situation develops and react correctly to changes that previous assignments failed to anticipate.

However, as important as delegation is to the success of organizations, it does not imply in any way a reduction of the leader’s responsibility for the outcome. Only the leader is accountable for the overall outcome.

1. From an HR VP years ago and she got it from somewhere else.

Updated on 10 Nov 2019