Let’s face it, when you delegate, the buck still stops with you. You’re still accountable for any screw-ups. When the stakes are high, no wonder you think you need to be front and center, to direct things and over-manage.
Even when the stakes aren’t high, sometimes it’s just easier to do it yourself than take the time to explain it, especially when it’s difficult for them to understand what you want.
And to be honest, it can be more fun and interesting to roll up your sleeves and run the show than to deal with strategy, capacity building, and other big picture issues where it’s not so easy to see the results of your efforts.
But watching everyone so closely can wear you out. It’s simply not possible to consistently be involved in everything that’s happening. There are other demands on your time, and there aren’t enough hours in the day. There are times they simply have do their jobs without you.
So you back off. But inevitably something goes wrong. And you are forced to step back in.
You are trapped on a see-saw. You over-manage, under-manage, and sometimes do both.
The problem is… you’re driving your team nuts.
– They’re frustrated because they never know when you’re going to swoop in and change things.
– They are waiting for you to provide information or make a decision and projects get stalled.
– They’re afraid to make a decision because you might not approve.
– They’ve lost confidence in their own judgment.
– They’ve stopped thinking because they’ve grown dependent on you to think for them.
– They’re dreaming of working somewhere else.
They might like you, but they don’t like working for you.
Break out of the trap by getting off the seesaw.
Stop thinking like a parent, and treat your team like the adults they are. They’ve been passengers in your car. Stop thinking of it as your car, let them drive, and don’t be a backseat driver.
Find out what they need from you to complete the job. Ask and listen. Share your own thoughts, and then decide together where you’ll be involved and how.
Your job is to make sure they have the resources they need, to provide the information they need, and to be available when they need your help or advice. Often they simply need you to be a sounding board. When you ask questions instead of giving answers, you help them develop their ability to solve problems without being dependent on you.
What if they make a mistake? Well, you can count on that. Mistakes will be made.
So instead of blaming them and using it as an excuse to step back in, consider it an investment in their education. If you debrief mistakes without judgment, they won’t become defensive and will be able to learn. If you act as a sounding board, they can figure out how to address the problem themselves.
Are the stakes high? That’s when you need your team more than ever to be able to lock arms and figure out how to deliver. They can never learn to do that when you stay in the middle orchestrating their moves.
So what do you do with your time if you’re not involved in all the details of your team? You might feel uncomfortable at first, but if you hang in there, you will discover there’s much more important stuff for you to do than spending your time doing your team’s jobs.
“What if they make a mistake? Well, you can count on that. Mistakes will be made.”
Easy enough to say. I guess in some industries, you can screw up and it’s hey ho, have another go, but if your mistake kills something, contaminates the environment or loses the company its regulatory compliance, you don’t get a second go. That mistake will follow you for ever: in effect you’ll find your career will be over.
It’s easy to think every mistake is a learning process. Sometimes, what you learn is that you only have one chance.
Good point, Mitch. Delegation does not mean abdication. Projects with huge implications need regular check points for steps in the process. During the discussion on the manager’s role, they need to discuss how monitoring and quality control will occur. Often these kinds of projects involve other people and there are regular check points.
I don’t like admitting it, but I’m one of these managers. I know I get too involved at times. Good suggestions on how to get out of the trap. Thanks.
The first step is to discuss this with your team. Get their input on where you are jumping in when not needed and make some agreements on how you will be involved. Good luck, Dave!
Great story about Thomas Watson, founder of IBM who upon receiving an employee resignation because of a $1M mistake said to the employee that he could not accept it because to him he had just invested $1M in the employees education. That’s how you empower others by creating a culture in which it’s OK to make mistakes. That behavior generates initiatives and reduces fear of action.
Great story, Stewart. Thanks for sharing!
Thanks Jesse. One of the more eye-opening conversations I have with managers is about how well correlated is the employee job description/ job advert when hiring (you know… “are you a conscientious, creative self-starter?”)and the actual way they manage their team.
It’s amazing how often employees are punished (emotionally, not physically)for doing what they are supposed to be doing, or for why they were hired in the first place.
Great question, Mark! It’s quite confusing and frustrating to be hired because you’re a self-starter and to be discouraged for taking initiative. These are usually the first to leave. If there’s a lot of turnover on your team, it’s worth finding out why.
As always, good advice, Jesse. When I am brought into management teams, inevitably, there will be at least one person on the senior team who makes everybody CRAZY. Micromanaging. In one group, the senior manager kept wanting to check everything:telling a team to change the color background on a slide deck, re-writing copy, insisting on a different visual.
So my suggestion, was to figure out the hourly wage of the senior managers who were micro-managing. It’s not just knowing the salary but also factoring benefits, health insurance etc. Trust me, you can come up with a close hourly rate. Turned out, that the hourly rate for this exec was close to $350 per hour. The simple question: is this worth your time? Speaking with financial data made a big difference!
What a great way to drive the point home! Thanks for sharing here so others can benefit.
Spot on! Sounds like you’ve met my boss. Unfortunately, if he read this, he wouldn’t recognize it’s about him. He doesn’t see himself that way, but the rest of us sure do!
Unfortunately that’s not uncommon. It’s impossible to have a good sense of reality without feedback. A 360 assessment (anonymous feedback from your boss, peers and direct reports compiled by a neutral consultant) would provide the reality check he needs. Otherwise, self-perception is really self-deception.
The key to starting down this path is to let your team own their work product. Don’t edit their work once you defined the purpose with them. Discuss it, let them defend it, offer thoughts, but keep your fingerprints off. This is not very different from teaching moments when raising your kids. Let them pick their own clothes, tie their shoes, and for goodness sake don’t grab the steering wheel!
Great tips, Paul. Thanks for further illuminating these important points.
A follow up article to this could be about how to ask questions of your team. No employee wants to face the ‘your doing it wrong’ boss suddenly asking, “Why did you did it this way?” so really digging into how a under/over/swoop manager can modify to become a feedback driven, supportive manager would be GREAT!
Good suggestion, and I will do that. This post simply primes the pump. It’s not so easy to change a habit, even when you want to change. As you point out, simply asking questions with the same old tone is not going to be experienced as supportive.
Mistakes will happen. If you are not making mistakes, you are not stretching yourself enough. Regulators have a problem with consistent action, doing what is wrong. I can’t see any country having the sort of regulator where one strike you are out. I get the point that some mistakes are bigger than others, but there is no way of learning and developing if we don’t stumble upon the occasional mistake. Thank you Jesse, for the tall ask in letting go…
Well said, Thabo. Appreciate your point about one strike and you’re out. It is a tall ask, but the reality is, there is no way to prevent mistakes.