what is delegation? according to wikipedia:
“Delegation (or deputation) is the assignment of authority and responsibility to another person (normally from a manager to a subordinate) to carry out specific activities.”
Andy Robinson at careerealism shared “the 8 Myths of Delegation”. He suggested that managers have several reasons why they don’t want to delegate projects to their team members.
Among those reasons I think that few more ‘popular’ than others:
- “I don’t delegate because they don’t do it right” — I think that managers (often) are afraid to trust their team enough to delegate the project. Why? maybe because managers are responsible for the project.
- managers are afraid of loosing control, which might lead to ‘ they don’t need me anymore” — nowadays it’s tricky because unemployment rate is high and that’s only cause more stress.
- some managers might think “that project is MINE” and they don’t want to share it with anyone else.
At mindtools I found some tips when to delegate:
“Delegation is a win-win when done appropriately, however that does not mean that you can delegate just anything.”
I agree, not always is good to delegate the project. Some projects are too important, or it’s one-person-work (when manager needs to concentrate on that project and work on it by themselves). Other projects are perfect to delegate them. Manager doesn’t have only one project so some of their projects should be delegated so manager can focus on other projects.
Manager need to learn how to delegate, how to prepare his/her team to take over the project, and how to control whether everything is going according to the plan. And step in if necessary.
If process of delegating is done in the right way – at the end manager and his/hers team will find success.
