Thought for the Week - 6/9/08

Conformity is the jailer of freedom and the enemy of growth. -- John F. Kennedy

If you’ve hired someone for a particular job, you must have believed they were capable of doing that job. So why not get out of the way and let them do it? You hired them because you believed they were going to do the job, and you need to maintain that belief and treat them as such. The day that you believe that they can't do the job, is the day that you need to start doing something different, possibly even saying this is not the right place for them.

Empowerment has been defined as the process of enabling employees to reach their own potential in ways that help the team or organization. This definition focuses less on control and power and more on the effective use of autonomy and delegation. This allows employees both controls over and responsibility for the work they have been assigned.

Unfortunately, many managers and supervisors struggle with the act of delegation. Effective delegation requires being very specific about what you want, setting clear parameters and timelines, making sure the resources are available to accomplish the task, setting up regular “touch base” meetings to check on progress (if necessary), and being available for support if requested.

One of the most critical rules of delegation is making sure you set appropriate limits, establish necessary ground rules, and clearly stating your expectations. If you can only spend a certain amount of money and you have a limited timeline, share that up front.

As long as those you delegate responsibility to meet the criteria that you gave them, you need to accept whatever they come back with. The worst thing you can do as a supervisor is send them off, let them work for two months, and when they come back and have met your criteria, you say that it's not what you wanted. You will kill morale.

We have all probably been in that boat where we asked “why didn't you just do it yourself the first time then, and save me the two months of work if you already knew what you wanted?” Your job is not to do the work for your employees. If that were the case, why would you need them in the first place?

Effective delegation not only instills independence in your employees, it also frees you up to do the job you were hired for. As suggested earlier, your role as a servant leader shifts from “managing” the productivity and progress of employees to coaching and mentoring their continued growth and development.

Have you ever been micromanaged?

How did it feel?

Did you like it?

Did you feel respected?

Did you respect the person who micromanaged you? I

t is always interesting to us that no matter how many people we ask, almost all have been micromanaged, but no one likes it!

So who is doing all the micromanaging and why?