“If you want to do a few small things right, do them yourself. If you want to do great things and make a big impact, learn to delegate.”-John C. Maxwell
Most people are not able to delegate task properly to the people working under them due to several reasons. They think that the task would not be executed in similar manner as they carry out themselves. I have observed in the large organisation that generally supervisors do not trust their employees to do as good of a job as they would. But a good manager trusts the skills of his or her employees.
We learn the theories for the delegation of duties and responsibilities but as far as the practical aspects are concerned, it is very much gruelling to master the process of delegation. A good delegation practice can be obtained in following manner
1. Define the tasks
It is primary need to recognise the tasks or responsibilities you want to assign to team currently working under you. Identify the work you have in your plate, introspect whether work is totally necessary for you to do yourself or it can be assigned to someone else. It is managerial principal, “ Do not do, get it done.” You have many important tasks in hand and if you carry out all trivial task by yourself you might miss the very intelligent efforts of your quality work of your expertise.
2. Time constraints
Sometimes the deadlines of the task are alarming and you may not be able to finish in time. A crucial deal line may induce stress due to work load and smooth work flow is not maintained. I have seen people carrying away the tasks at home and finish miserably by curtailing the time that has to be enjoyed with family.
Every drop of your overwork is deadly for your physical and mental health.
3. Decide the right person
Assigning right task to wrong person may result not in mockery of delegation and whole purpose of assigning the task may be defeated. I want to explain this with an example.
There was a group of thieves. For breaking the safe full of ornaments and currency during night robbery they required additional hand. While passing by a cross road they happened to see a road side show in which a young man jumped and climb over the rope and started walking smoothly with a long bamboo in hand. When show finished one of the gangsters asked to the young man, “How much do you earn from this show?” He replied, “10 dollars.” “Do you want to work with us if we give you 20 dollars?” He said yes and agreed to work with them. On explaining the job to him, he understood the task properly that during night time he would climb and walk over the rope from one building to another and reach to the safe to take out valuables from it. In the night he was ready after tightening the rope at both the end fastened. When gangsters told to move he was unable to do so and told them to beat the drum. He was habitual of drum beat for walking on the rope. You know what I meant to say? if the drums are beat everybody may wake up and purpose becomes pointless.
On other end, sometimes we under estimate the skill sets of the person to whom we have to assign the task. In a personality development classes I was explaining to my students not to prefer the English book for reading and stick to other easy language because my English was poor and thought in the same way that they may also have the same problem. But I never knew that there were some students who have English as their native language. There are people who may carry out the task better than you.
Like an expert event manager, you have to delegate the task to different expert hands. Although Henry Ford fancied himself an engineering genius, he had little formal training in mechanical engineering and could not even read a blueprint. A talented team of engineers performed most of the actual work of designing the Model A (and later the flathead V8) with Ford supervising them closely and giving them overall direction.
In delegation task one has to be powerful about communication skills and learn how to deal with the behaviour and attitude of the people. Nobody like orders including children at home. You have to motivate the worker in such a way that they love the piece of work they undergo and take pride. Every piece of their finished task should be appreciated so that whenever a new task is assigned to them, they will be in an exited mood to receive task. If you assign the task forcefully, the work will try to defy the authority and the desired result is obtained.
In most of the corporate organisations, the tasks are out sourced to agencies or franchisees so that the time bound goals are achieved in time and useful talents of the employees are preserved for the important tasks.
Key Takeaways
1. Status of your organization is weakest individual in your working team
2. While dealing with the people, love strongly hate wisely
