Episode 239 Transcript:

0:00:00 Ramona Shaw: Delegating well is a lot more about managing yourself than it is about managing others. This is what we’re going to cover in this week’s episode of The Manager Track podcast. Here are the two questions this podcast answers. One, how do you successfully transition into your first official leadership role? And two, how do you keep climbing that leadership ladder and continuously get promoted? Although the competition and the expectations get bigger, this show, The Manager Track podcast will provide the answers.

0:00:30 Ramona Shaw: I’m your host, Ramona Shaw. I’m on on a mission to create workplaces where work is seen as a source of contribution, connection, and personal fulfillment. And this transition starts with developing a new generation of leaders who know how to lead so everyone wins and grows. In the show, you’ll learn how to think, communicate, and act as a confident and competent leader you know you can be welcome to The Manager Track podcast. I am excited that you’re here.

0:00:58 Ramona Shaw: This week. We’re going to talk about delegating. This is work that we do in many of our leadership programs that are Covid. This is something that a lot of our clients ask us about. Or how do I not just delegate, but I delegate creating a sense of accountability and making sure that work is getting done, that I have high standards for my team. They’re sort of in the pursuit of achieving or even exceeding those standards, and they feel like they have the clarity and the support that they need in order to be successful with the tasks that I assign them.

0:01:34 Ramona Shaw: That’s typically sort of the, you know, the ideal solution or outcome they’re going for, or sometimes it’s a problem statement that goes into that direction. And because so many managers and leaders are asking themselves these questions, I wanted to record this episode for you. So effective delegation is a crucial skill for managers that involves really the assigning of tasks and responsibilities to team members in a way that maximizes productivity, fosters their engagement, and helps us ultimately to achieve our organizational goals.

0:02:11 Ramona Shaw: So we’re going to go through some key aspects of effective delegation, but let’s start off by talking about why this is so important. First of all, it allows managers to focus on higher priority tasks in strategic planning. If you notice you’re too much in the weeds and all those important projects that your boss assigned to you are not getting done and you have to sort of delay them or go back and ask them to extend the deadline, then, you know, you might have a problem delegating well, and it could be, by the way, that your team is just not ready yet to delegate. But then that leads us down a different Rabbit hole where we have to look at, okay, what is the gap and how do you quickly bridge the gap?

0:02:54 Ramona Shaw: Okay, so that’s number one. Number two, it promotes employee development and skill building. So not only is your ability to delegate well gonna serve you and allow you to actually spend your time where you should, it also is a critical tool to promote employee development and help them learn new skills. If employees, especially those high performing employees that you want to retain, if they feel like they got nothing to learn and they’ve reached a ceiling where everything interesting now just lands on your desk and they’re not getting exposure to it, they will ultimately leave.

0:03:31 Ramona Shaw: So that’s number two. Number three, it just generally increases overall team productivity and efficiency. So you can only win, but it means that you need to manage yourself, which is why I call this episode. Delegating is a lot more about managing yourself than it is about managing others. When we see leaders who don’t delegate well, 90% of the times it has to do with them not able to manage their ego and manage themselves, their need for control or need for a certain standard or perfectionism or sort of the fear of losing relevance or passing on work that they actually enjoy. So again, we’re going to get to all of that choosy stuff.

0:04:16 Ramona Shaw: But after reviewing why delegating matters, let’s quickly talk about how to actually identify work to delegate. So you as a leader need to carefully consider the tasks that you do. And the framework that we use at Archiva is to separate your tasks and responsibilities into LVAs and MVAs. The LVAs are your least valuable activities. Those are the things that people on your team could be doing. Your skill and your strength and your expertise isn’t adding value here.

0:04:55 Ramona Shaw: Someone needs to get it done. Anyone else could get it done. And it’s not for some strategic reason, not for some visibility reason, because it’s going to give you some kind of exposure, or it’s helping you learn a new skill, or because your unique expertise or knowledge or authority is required. If all that isn’t the case, then it’s likely an LVA. That’s where we want to start. So the LVAs we want to consider, and regularly consider, which ones can we either eliminate, we should no longer do them, automate, and maybe through new technologies, a lot of them could be automated or we need to delegate them. So if they can’t be eliminated, can’t be automated, then let’s consider delegating them.

0:05:43 Ramona Shaw: And for me, for example, I have a running list of LVAs, things that I keep doing. And some of them I’ve been doing for six months and I regularly look at them and I see that they’re LVAs that I still do. The reason why I haven’t delegated them yet is because I don’t know yet if I should continue doing them. So they’re sort of in my. Not sure if you’re going to keep that going. I am trying to automate them, but I’m still waiting for some technology to further advance or I just haven’t spent the time on that yet.

0:06:14 Ramona Shaw: My mistake. I should probably prioritize that or because I’m developing someone on my team either in terms of skill or in capacity so that then I can offload it and pass it on. But I’m. I have to wait for them to be ready. So that’s why they’re still on my list. But that list is something I continuously monitor. Those are the LVAs. The MVAs, on the other hand, are your most valuable activities. Likely your strategic projects, your cross functional work, the things that your boss wants you to do, things that give you visibility in your organization and you can’t and shouldn’t pass them on, or where your specific expertise or again authority is required.

0:06:57 Ramona Shaw: Those are your MVAs. You’re going to have some tasks that fall in between, but we really want to focus on the LVAs and the MVAs. A lot more time should be shifted towards the MVAs, a lot less time towards the LVAs. So what we suggest, the leaders that we work with to do, and what I suggest you do is to go back the last two weeks, think about all the things that you’ve been doing, the reports you’ve created, the teams that you respond to and answer questions for the slide decks you create, the meetings that you attend, the updates that you provide or presentations you share, and so on.

0:07:34 Ramona Shaw: Capture all that and then assess on that paper your LVAs and MBAs and decide what to do. So that’s just about what you should delegate. Now the second step is to decide whom to delegate to. So you want to look at work that aligns with team members, interest and strength, as well as their growth or career goals. So you look at the task and you think based on this task, what kind of skill profile would allow a person to do this task really well?

0:08:07 Ramona Shaw: That’s one question. Another one is, well, but who has the interest or who has a development goal where this particular task would actually help them? Now another consideration that you have to make is who actually has the capacity. You might have the perfect person based on the skill profile, but they’re totally wrapped up in an intense project and you can’t distract them, pull them away. Well, you’re going to go to second option, but really consider things that you delegate as opportunities for skill development or to help them do more work that is of interest to them.

0:08:42 Ramona Shaw: And if you’re not sure what they’re interested in, what they want to develop in, what they’d like to do more of, or what kind of growth goals that they have, you know, then you’ll have to go back and actually find out. Have those conversations with your team member so that when you delegate, you are considering this. One of the issues that I often hear from people that we talk to is, for example, they may say that they feel slighted by their boss or they feel they don’t have growth opportunities. May say my boss either hoards all the work so they don’t delegate, or they may delegate work to someone else on the team when you would be the one who actually wants to have that exposure.

0:09:23 Ramona Shaw: And my question is always, does your manager know? If the manager doesn’t know, they’re not mind readers, you’ll have to tell them and say, hey, I’d like to do more of this or that. But also now you in the position of being a manager, you want to make sure that you proactively initiate these conversations to prevent your team members from saying to others and colleagues that you’re not fairly distributing tasks or you’re not giving them the exposure that they’re looking for.

0:09:51 Ramona Shaw: So now that we’ve looked into what tasks to delegate, we looked at whom to delegate it to. Let’s talk about how to delegate first. Clearly define the desired outcome and expectations. It seems so obvious and common sense. It is not common practice. Too often I see people say like, hey, can you complete this report? Or can you consolidate a list of services from our competitors? Seems maybe pretty straightforward to you because you’ve done that in the past or you have organizational context, but to the person you delegate to, they don’t know what to include and how, in what format do you want a PowerPoint presentation about competitor products?

0:10:33 Ramona Shaw: Do you want a spreadsheet? And in that spreadsheet, are you looking for the SKUs? Are you looking for the sort of launch date of those products, the materials? Are you looking for, you know, estimated transacted volume? What is it exactly that you need? So set them up for success by being really clear on outcomes and expectations. Provide context on the purpose and on the bigger picture as much as possible.

0:11:00 Ramona Shaw: More and more we’re getting these questions around how to work across different generations. And one thing that you’ve probably heard before is that younger generations need and want to understand the big picture and the purpose of the work that they do. So whenever there is something to connect to, volunteer that information. Make sure that you’re being very clear on why they’re doing what they’re doing.

0:11:22 Ramona Shaw: And then of course, provide necessary resources and clarify the authority that they have to complete the task. What is it that they can decide and when and for what should they come back and ask you or ask other people for input or for approval? So necessary resources, clarify authority. These are sort of the initial steps to delegate. And then there’s one more thing that I want to mention here, which is to agree on touch points.

0:11:52 Ramona Shaw: Many people will delegate work and then, you know, say, can you get that done within a week? And then maybe four days later they check in and say, hey, how is it going now? If I got this work delegated when you were my boss, I might think, well, don’t they trust me that I’m going to get it done? We said in a week. Why are you checking in now? This feels a little micromanagey. I got it. Like, back off.

0:12:17 Ramona Shaw: You might feel like, no, this is my responsibility. I’m being a supportive, caring manager who wants to offer help if they need help. And also since we haven’t talked about it in four days, I don’t know, did they drop the ball? Do they forget? Are they aware? Especially if they’re not in the same office, I might not know what they’re working on at all times. So I feel like it’s the right thing to do to risk mitigate.

0:12:42 Ramona Shaw: The issue with this is neither of them is wrong. Like, it feels weird for the employee, especially if they’re really on top of things, to receive that kind of unsolicited check in or unsolicited offer for support. It also is totally reasonable for the manager to say, this is an important task. We haven’t talked about it. I want to offer some help or check in. The problem is that it wasn’t agreed upon ahead of time.

0:13:08 Ramona Shaw: So when you delegate, agree on those touch points, talk about, hey, let’s check in. Give me an update where you stand by Friday or in three days or when you reach this point. I’d like to be aware, and I assume this will be in the next week or two, address this early on. Or you can also say, I’m going to check back in with you in our next One on one. So it’s not about micromanaging, it’s not about offering unsolicited support.

0:13:37 Ramona Shaw: It is you saying, this is what I’m delegating. And here is how I’d like us to communicate while you do this work. So setting up regular check ins to monitor progress, make sure that you confirm the expected level of your involvement. For example, I expect you to problem solve and then to reach out if you’re stuck, that sets a very clear expectation of what their job is. And then when you want to get involved, and then of course, we also want to make sure that we monitor their work and we provide feedback and recognition when it comes to monitoring progress.

0:14:15 Ramona Shaw: It again is about letting them know what kind of check ins and touch points you anticipate. You don’t want to interfere unnecessarily because that can come across as like overbearing or micromanaging. But you do want to know what is it that you agreed upon? Accountability cannot happen if you delegate work to them and you say, please have this done by Friday. And then you move on and you totally forget what it was you delegated to them and what the deadline was because you have a million other things to do.

0:14:47 Ramona Shaw: Friday passes and you don’t know, it’s not top of mind for you. Monday comes along, it’s still not top of mind. Tuesday, suddenly at 2:00 you think, huh, wait a second, wasn’t I supposed to receive this email from Mike about, you know, this presentation? I should be working on this this afternoon or tomorrow and I think we said Friday. But let me go through my emails, I don’t think I heard back from them on Friday. And so Tuesday afternoon at 2:00 you say like, hey Mike, where is this slide deck that you said you’ll get done?

0:15:19 Ramona Shaw: I wanted to work on it this afternoon. That’s not helping. If that is no problem for you and you don’t have an accountability issue or concerns over reliability and all that, you do you and that’s totally okay. But if you realize people aren’t doing what they said they’re going to do and it puts me into a reactive mode and I constantly feel like I need to check in with people, I need to be on top of it.

0:15:44 Ramona Shaw: I constantly pull information and hold all the strings and it feels exhausting, then you not tracking the commitments that they make is one of the root causes. So when they say I’m going to do it by Friday, you have to note down somewhere called, we call this the commitment tracker. You have to write down what they’re going to do by when. And then Friday comes along, and if you don’t get it, then Friday night or Monday morning, you say, hey, Mike, you said you’re going to send this to me by Friday.

0:16:14 Ramona Shaw: What happened? And it’s not saying like, I can’t believe you didn’t send it. No, you just say, what happened? It does two things. One, it tells Mike that you’re on top of it. You’re not wishy washy with the commitments that you expect. When he says something, that you’re expecting it to be done. And that instills accountability. And you’re encouraging that sense of accountability because now you’re demonstrating this is serious.

0:16:38 Ramona Shaw: And two, it also then puts Mike into the position to provide you an update and for you not to be reactive on Tuesday when you want to work on it. So that starts to change the dynamic on the team. Okay, so that was a little side note on accountability. You want to monitor that progress. And then of course, uh, all along the way or towards the end, you want to provide constructive feedback on the work. And you want to make sure you recognize and appreciate good performance.

0:17:07 Ramona Shaw: Not by saying good job, but by really calling out, you know, where did they go the extra mile? What specific skill did they demonstrate? What kind of unique ways that they think about the problem or solve it? What do you really like and what kind of strength they leverage in order to produce what you asked them to. So that helps them get feedback and learn, but it also makes sure that they understand you see, and you value their effort.

0:17:32 Ramona Shaw: Okay, but let’s now get to the cheesy stuff. The real crux is really in managing yourself. Effective delegation requires managers like you to resist the urge to micromanage, resist the urge to want to have it done your way. And instead, you allow the employees to develop their own processes for completing tasks or outcomes and do it differently. It also means for you and managers in general to resist the urge to problem solve for them.

0:18:10 Ramona Shaw: We call this being more like Yoda. Like you’re in the back and you’re not fighting the fight, you’re supporting behind the scenes. You’re not being the superhero is out there saving others and problem solving for them. This happens too often and it’s very sneaky. It takes a lot of discipline and awareness for the leader to recognize, oh, I know the answer. I know I’m going to be good at it. I know they’re going to feel like I was helping them and going to feel this kind of satisfaction or recognition of my work if I just did it.

0:18:44 Ramona Shaw: And it’s so tempting, especially when you’re under pressure or something really needs to be done right in, you know, quotation marks, right in your perception to then jump in and do it. So resisting the urge to problem solve another one where self management comes in is to acknowledge the fear of losing importance or recognition. We often get that sense that if I delegate this work that either I like doing or people really appreciate about me, then what am I going to do?

0:19:19 Ramona Shaw: So acknowledging also that comfort of letting go of something that we wanted to do ourselves and we are good at and we got recognized for it because you can tell delegating, the actual process of delegating and what to delegate, it’s pretty straightforward. It’s like we all kind of know, for example, how improve our cardiovascular strength. Yeah, we got to go run more, we got to do sprints or interval trainings.

0:19:45 Ramona Shaw: You know, it’s not the rocket science. But then actually doing it is all about the discipline that we develop and understanding. Like, oh, we’re going to find excuses, we’re going to find reasons why we can’t do xyz. And it’s the same thing here. You might understand how to delegate. And then you watch yourself at work not doing what you know you should be doing. And the reason for that is all those underlying things that you need to manage yourself.

0:20:13 Ramona Shaw: Another one is to be aware of the bias that you trust yourself more than you trust others, which is totally normal because you understand all your ways of thinking. You know exactly what, you know exactly what you’re looking for, what’s expected. But now to lead well, you have to grow others. You don’t have to be the one who’s excelling all the time. And that means you have to allow them to learn through the process, sometimes through the struggle, sometimes from making mistakes, and you’re there with them as they learn.

0:20:46 Ramona Shaw: And sometimes it means we have to let other people make errors on the team. And if we have a problem and we worry about our reputation being at stake, and we can’t really accept the fact that when we start to delegate, it’s not all going to look the same way that we would do it. In fact, it might be at 70% of what we wanted to do and we are seeing other people struggle. If that is challenging for us, we are compromising the quality of the output for the actual development and the productivity and the efficiency of the team.

0:21:20 Ramona Shaw: That means you’re a good individual contributor because you’re sort of in charge of that output that’s not good leadership or even good management. So to wrap this up to learn how to effectively delegate is a really important management skill that requires you to have clear communication, trust and focus on employee development. So when you understand these techniques, you understand the approach, but more so you understand the mindset it takes to prioritize the team productivity and the employee development overall and you understand how you have to manage yourself, the discipline required.

0:22:00 Ramona Shaw: That’s when you truly become effective at delegating and you are able to enhance team performance again, foster positive work environment and overall achieve the objectives for the organization. Now if this resonated with you and you realize like, ah, I see exactly what she’s talking about. I see how this shows up in me and there’s something that I am holding onto and haven’t been able to let go, which is why I feel burnt out. I feel I have too many things to do or it feels really difficult to manage the team and it always feels like pulling all the strings and having to remind everyone all the time to do their work.

0:22:37 Ramona Shaw: Check out the show notes to schedule a strategy Call with us to talk about what kind of programs or coaching might help you solve that problem. Because your team only grows to the extent that you grow, your career only grows to the extent that you grow. And if you noticing there’s a cap in your ability to deliver and increase the impact that you produce for the organization and for your team to elevate and grow and you feel stuck in this doer mentality, you’ll just notice that ceiling that you’re seemed to hit then executive coaching or leadership development programs might be exactly what you need in order to change the way that you go about your work, the way you think about it, and the way that you show up. Now of course, as always, if this was a helpful episode, please give it a five star review on the podcast app that you’re listening to and share it with the friends and colleagues that you think would benefit from hearing this as well.

0:23:29 Ramona Shaw: Thanks so much for tuning in. We’ll be back with another episode of The Manager Track podcast next week. Bye for now. If you enjoyed this episode, then check out two other awesome resources to help you become a leader people love to work with. This includes a free masterclass on how to to successfully lead as a new manager. Check it out@archova.org/Masterclass the second resource is my best selling book the Confident and competent New Manager.

0:23:55 Ramona Shaw: How to quickly rise to success in your first leadership role. Check it out at archova.org/books or head on over to Amazon and grab your copy there. You can find all those links in the show notes down below.