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Nine Steps To Successful Delegation
By Irene Rivka Becker, Chief Success Officer, Just Coach It , www.justcoachit.com
Delegation will always be one of the most important management skills - and one of the easiest to get wrong. Good delegation saves you time, develops you people, grooms a successor, and motivates. Bad delegation will cause you frustration, demotivates and confuses the other person, and often fails to achieve the task itself.
A simple delegation rule is the acronym SMART. Delegated tasks must be Specific, Measurable, Agreed Upon, Realistic, and Timebound. If you can't check these points don't delegate it .
1. Define the goal and the task.
Focus on the goal you want to achieve and confirm in your own mind that the task is suitable to be delegated.
2. Select the individual.
What are your reasons for delegating to this person? What are they going to get out of it? What are you going to get out of it?
3. Assess-ability, i.e. training or coaching needs.
Is the other person capable of doing the task? Do they understand what needs to be done? If not, you should not delegate this task to them.
4. Explain the reasons.
You must explain why the job or responsibility is being delegated to them. What is the importance and relevance of the job/responsibility? Where does it fit in the overall scheme of things?
5. State required results.
What must be achieved? Clarify understanding by getting feedback from the other person. How will the task be measured? Make sure they know how you intend to decide that the job is being successfully done.
6. Consider resources required.
Discuss and agree what is required to get the job done. Consider people, location, premises, equipment, money, materials, other related activities and services.
7. Agree on Deadlines.
When must the job be finished? Or if an ongoing duty, when are the review dates? When are the reports due? And if the task is complex and has parts or stages, what are the priorities?
At this point you may need to confirm understanding with the other person of the previous points, getting ideas and interpretation. As well as showing you that the job can be done, this helps to reinforce commitment.
Methods of checking and controlling must be agreed with the other person. Failing to agree this in advance will cause this monitoring to seem like interference or lack of trust.
8. Support and communicate.
Think about who else needs to know what's going on, and inform them. Involve the other person in considering this so they can see beyond the issue at hand. Do not leave the person to inform your own peers of their new responsibility.
9. Feedback on results.
It is essential to let the person know how they are doing, and whether they have achieved their aims. If not, you must review with them why things did not go to plan, and deal with the problems. You as a team leader must absorb the consequences of failure, and pass on the credit for success.
Irene Rivka Becker |Just Coach It |The 3Q Edge ™
Exceptional coaching, exceptional programs and services, exceptional results
(1) 905-889-0940 info@justcoachit.com
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