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Delegation - empowerment or abdication of responsibility


Delegation is something that is often talked about in the workplace. It features highly in management training and personal management/time management.

Seemingly some people do it naturally and well and some struggle with it most of their career.

I am an HR professional and one who seeks to model good leadership and management behaviour (as much and as often as I can). I therefore have from the point that I had a team delegated. For me it is like an unused muscle - the more you do it the easier you find it. Nevertheless for me there are some absolute givens.
  • If you delegate you delegate the work and you delegate the credit but you do not delegate the blame.
  • It will never be done the same way as you would do it. Sometimes better, sometimes worse, sometimes of equal quality but never the same. Therefore if you delegate you cannot try to make it the same. You can, and should, give feedback and support to raise quality - but not to have it done the way you would have done it (if only you had not delegated it).
  • The sooner you delegate a task or project the better
  • The more complete the delegation the better - where possible delegate the accountability and the relationship as well as the work. The standard work study theory of 'whole tasks' applies to delegation - if you delegate bits you get bits back.
  • You must delegate the credit (else you are just demonstrating a profound concern about your personal value to the organisation.
Therefore done properly there is risk - a risk that it might not be done well; a risk that you will lose control; and even the risk that it is done better. As someone with high standards and strong opinions for me delegating is like closing your eyes and taking a big leap - a leap of faith. When coaching people who have worked with me over the years the best advice I have come up with is - take a deep breath and just do it. Keep your eyes closed until the end. After all you can always help sort it out if it goes wrong - few things cannot be fixed.

Many years ago I was given accountability for a new work area (in addition to my own) and with it a fairly reluctant team leader - circa 25 years older than me, and fundamentally different. He did not, of course, know me at all and was quite worried about losing his freedom to act. At our introductory meeting one of the things he demonstrated a concern about was being given credit for his work (I guess the natural fear that a younger manager's ambition meant taking credit). My response was to say that I always gave credit to the people who worked with me. I went on to say that in my opinion I could not lose - that whatever happened my boss would be giving me the credit in any case. Either I would be recognised by my boss as having enabled the work through my coaching and development skills, or for my excellent delegation skills, or my selection skills, or something else. So since I could not lose I could afford to credit my team members with the actual work. I think he was pretty shocked at the time (and I was young so more prone to the outrageous) but actually for me this does underpin a real aspect of good delegation - namely confidence that it will be done well and confidence that you can give away the credit and responsibility (which in a virtuous circle contributes to it being done well).

Another aspect of good delegation is balancing keeping informed with interfering. This requires explicit contracting between you and the team member/colleague to whom you are delegating. And the detail will depend on your personal style and preferences but more importantly theirs. You need to agree how much detail you will be given, and how often and when in the cycle (before or after implementation). As people become more skilled and you become more confident you can vary this.

An example: with a very new HR team member who's technical knowledge is limited I would start them off checking before they give advice (with a team member or their manager); once they settle in and start to get a feel for how things are done we move to checking after the fact (this results in a much smoother delivery, an increased feeling of accountability and contribution, and is still pretty low risk - incorrect advice and information if identified soon after the fact can always be corrected). After this it become, check only if you feel you need to.

The final comment here is that delegation has two fundamental goals/benefits. First to get work done in the most efficient way and second to develop capability. It is not about getting out of a fix (this is asking for a favour) and it is not without the need for time, attention, planning and coaching. It is not about abdicating responsibility as the leader - it is about embracing the real responsibility which is for the work of the unit and not just your own.

Published by: Lisette on 25/02/2009 - Add a comment

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