You’ve seen it before—the overworked, stressed out, eyes-glazed-over manager with patches of hair missing…because she’s pulled it out. Just ask her to do something and you get the same response every time: “Sure!” Or the employee who stays late without being paid for his time, because he has so much to do. If you can’t spot them with the naked eye, you can recognize them by their constant sighs of fatigue—loud enough for everyone to hear.
Sure, sometimes you can chalk it up to personality differences, but all psychoanalysis aside, it might just be the result of a lack of education.
Learning to Delegate the Hard Way
Take Emily, for example. She learned to delegate the hard way when she found herself accidentally in a leadership role she didn’t want (and which, truth be told, she wasn’t qualified to occupy). But there were events to be planned, funds to be raised and expectations to be met. What better way to accomplish what she had no intentions or desire to do…than to delegate?
Emily knew her team members existed solely to accomplish certain goals and objectives—and they did exactly that. Why? Because Emily helped them by holding them accountable to what they volunteered for as well as the tasks they were assigned. In other words, she delegated.
It was an enlightening and liberating experience for Emily when she finally understood through this ‘life lesson’ that a leader (manager) is not the one doing the work; he or she is simply the one leading the way. Like they say, “If you want to know if you’re a leader, turn around and see if anyone is following.”
Empower Your People
Delegating is the technique that allows you to empower others with the gift of accomplishment. If you think others can’t do a job as well as you, you are right. That’s because by not delegating you have robbed them of the opportunity to learn to do it as well as you. So…what’s the lesson? Empower your people, lighten your load. DELEGATE, DELEGATE, DELEGATE.
Check out our Smart Management Course, The Art & Science of Delegation, as well as other courses to help you improve your Leadership and Management skills at www.smartteam.com.
Got a few tips of your own?
Post a comment and tell us about your experiences with delegating. We might just highlight it in our next post!
