If you are a manager or supervisor and want to exercise greater influence with other people, get your ideas across effectively, resolve conflicts positively, and to promote yourself a bit in the meantime, you’ll need to follow these simple ideas for Delegating with Influence.
There are many reasons managers fail to delegate: from fear of failure, an overwhelming desire to be needed, a wish to control everything. One of the most common reasons for failing to delegate work, authority, and responsibility is the lack of confidence.
Many managers feel that employees will be annoyed or feel put upon, and consequently will resent being asked to do work. Of course, these managers are forgetting that is their job to get work done through others.
Guidelines for Influential Delegation
1. Accept delegation as a Technique for Managing and Influencing
Delegation is not just desirable but necessary to a successful department. Even if employees do not do things the way you would do them, you should be prepared to accept and live with the results.
2. Specify goals and objectives.
The clearer you are, the more Influence you’ll have. Employees must know not only what is to be done, but why, how well, when, with what resources, by whom, and according to what priority.
3. Know employees’ capabilities and individual strengths and weaknesses.
If you don’t know what your people can do, you may ask them to perform tasks they aren’t qualified or trained to do or have little liking for. And your influence will be more lasting.
4. Agree on performance standards.
It’s important for you and your subordinates to agree on the standards against which their performance will be measured. These include such information as the quality of work, the time of completion, and other criteria.
5. Include training.
Delegating doesn’t mean simply handing employees something they’ve never done before and saying, “Let me have this by next Monday.” You must provide the necessary training that will enable employees to do the new task and empower them to use their own influence
6. Take an interest, but don’t hover.
Managerial snooping will not be welcomed by employees. But the boss who really cares about the delegated assignment and takes the trouble to find out how it’s going won’t be resented. On the contrary, employees will be pleased that their efforts are being noticed and appreciated, and they’ll be greatly influenced by these efforts.
7. Delegate, Don’t Abdicate
You’ll have maximum influence when you make specifically clear what is expected, then follow up to make sure goals and targets are being met.
8. Assess results
Carefully appraise employee’s performance of a delegated task. Only then will you know what’s needed to improve that performance, such as further training or motivation.
9. Give appropriate rewards.
An employee who successfully completes a delegated assignment deserves recognition and praise. The manager should recommend pay increases and promotions for employees who effectively handle greater responsibilities.
10. Don’t snatch back the delegated task.
An employee may not be doing as well as you’d hoped with an assignment, but think twice before you take it back-unless, of course, the problem is serious. Making mistakes, finding out about them, and correcting them is a valuable learning experience. And if you take back the task you delegate, your employees will wonder how sincere you are in your talk about delegating.
When to Delegate
- When someone else can do it is well as you or better.
- When you might do it poorly because of lack of time.
- When subordinates can do it as well enough for the cost or time involved.
- When the subordinates can’t do it as well but your doing it interferes with something more important. Delegate, coach the subordinate on how to do it, and expect less satisfactory results than you would have achieve. If this can’t be done, subordinates may be unqualified to do this job. You need controls on this situation.
- When a project will be useful for developing a subordinate, if cost or time permits, and if you can afford the risk.
- When it actually costs too much for you to do it.
- When you are spending too much of your time on operations.
