Steps for a Successful Delegation Pipeline

Delegation takes planning. Delegation is the key ingredient to time management and allows the manager to concentrate on the important tasks, not just the urgent tasks. The use of a planning and administration system that allows you to track delegated assignments can improve performance and communication.
Below are 5 Steps to a Successful Delegation Pipeline

Delegate More Effectively

Value

Delegation is one of the most valuable training tools available to the manager. A manager must make it a valuable experience for all parties involved.

Motivation

Delegation can be one of the best motivational tools available to a manager. Providing a developmental plan for an employee is one of the best methods for retaining good employees.

Time Management

Delegation is the key ingredient to time management and allows the manager to concentrate on the important tasks, not just the urgent tasks. The use of a planning and administration system that allows you to track delegated assignments can improve performance and communication.

Maximize

Delegation can help maximize the interests, strengths, and contribution of both the employee and the team. Stretching the employee can be essential to their growth and development.

Multiplier of Productivity

Delegation can be a multiplier of productivity. Productivity and performance improvement are key components to a results-oriented culture.

Planning

Delegation takes planning. Make a special plan for delegation by listing all of your tasks and then creating categories such as the things only I can do, things that can be simplified, things that can be eliminated, and things that can be delegated (Simplify, Eliminate, or Delegate).

Monitor Progress

Delegation must be monitored by providing appropriate feedback with measurable results.

Set Levels

Set levels of delegation and formulate goals to move as many people as possible to the highest level.

Challenge the Potential

Consider delegation to be the greatest challenge for you to develop their potential and to use more of their abilities. Succeeding with these challenges will move the entire organization forward.

Feedback

Provide feedback on performance and make it a continuous process. Feedback must be given daily, weekly, or monthly. Communication is the key to organizational success in a results oriented culture.

The Art of Delegation

According to most management publications, the primary responsibility of the manager is to get work done through other people. Too many times, the art of delegation is not looked upon as a most positive experience. It is considered “dumping” by many, and the reason for this attitude by the employee is the method in which the delegated assignment is presented. As a good chef would say, “it is all in the presentation”. In other words, the key to delegation is communication and training.

Practicing effective delegation is what makes delegation an art as opposed to a science. It is the most important if not the most effective technique for getting work done through other people. Hence the definition of effective delegation is the act of giving someone else the responsibility and authority to carry out an assignment or to represent you or your organization in a specific role. Some people expand the definition to include the sharing of responsibilities with others in the company where it is appropriate and logical.

It is important that you, the manager, has the right attitude in delegating. You must be willing to spend the time training people. You must remove the fear that often presents itself when you train someone to do exactly what you do. The fear that you will be replaced.

The truth is that effective delegation leads to opportunities for you, as well as your people. Most managers fail to monitor delegation because they don’t realize the importance of delegation in terms of the development of their people. The employee is anxiously awaiting direction, and if needed, additional training. People want to feel empowered and delegating brings you an excellent opportunity to do just that! It is important that you make feedback specific to behavior. You must make sure that the person to whom you are delegating takes ownership in terms of accountability and responsibility. Effective leadership generates productivity. The development of your staff can bring pain as well as joy. Delegation is one of the most valuable instruments to help initiate change.

Delegation is a skill that needs to be learned and developed. Most inexperienced managers have the most difficulty in mastering delegation skills. Be patient and as Vince Lombardi says, “Practice. . .Practice. . .Practice!” Success runs on empowerment of people, and empowerment runs on delegation. Looks like it's time to start delegating!

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Mark Corey, Atlantic County Utilities Authority
Carolyn Conover, Atlantic County Dept of Intergenerational Service
Cindy Smith, Atlantic County Dept of Family Community Development
Terry Petruzzi, Atlantic County Animal Shelter
Karla Guy, Atlantic County Dept of Family Community Development
Audrey Alpheaus, Atlantic County Dept of Family Community Development

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"I just completed my last class tonight and I want to thank the ACUA for allowing me to attend this class. This class was spread out over sometime and I feel that this made it more of a learning experience over the time and I highly recommend this class for all the group leaders." - Mark Corey, Group Leader, ACUA

HR Needs to Step Up to the Plate!

It is well documented that most companies have a formal strategic-planning process but don’t use it to make many of their most important decisions. Less than half of the respondents of a recent survey demonstrated that they are satisfied with their company’s approach to making strategic decisions. It has also been demonstrated that greater satisfaction could come from improving the company’s ability to align their people with their strategic plan and from monitoring progress against the plan.

So what are we doing wrong? Are we not looking at our current methodology for both the creation of the plan and the implementation of the needed actions? The missing link is usually found within the implementation or monitoring component. It is projected that 65% of the components of most plans never even get implemented. Is it because we aren’t willing to put the time and energy into the implementation process or we don’t consider it a high priority?

Strategic Planning is critical to the continued success of any organization yet most employees feel that critical decision-making is left to a select few. The two top suggestions for improving the company’s approach to strategic development are: improve the alignment with the strategic plan and develop better methods to monitor progress against the plan.

Surveys have also demonstrated that executive concerns about executing and aligning strategy are likely exacerbated by a perceived lack of integration between the company’s strategic-planning group and its human resource group. When asked to consider strategic planning’s integration with several corporate functions, respondents in a nationwide survey ranked HR as second-to-last in terms of degree of integration. Respondents who were dissatisfied with their company’s strategic planning see the least integration.

Isn’t it time that HR steps up to the plate and take the integration of strategy and people seriously? What does your Strategic Development Process look like? Who is willing to hold people accountable for the success of the plan? It sure sounds like HR or anyone else for that matter is not willing to focus on the outcome. It seems to me that we should all take time off and read the “Five Dysfunctions of a Team” by Patrick Lencioni. It talks about trust, conflict, commitment, accountability, and results……five things that we just seem like we don’t want to address. It sounds like no one is willing to stick around to see the outcome.

The Call from the Family

Several years ago, I attended a certification program for coaches titled, “Coaching the Small Business Owner”. The course was designed to provide how to coach a small business owner through the “rough waters” of small business ownership. The course demonstrated how superior coaching competencies could compliment the achievement of the small business owner. It was apparent that from the start, the small business owner wanted both a sounding board and a resource that would he or she could now call, “Coach”. Coaching is different than consulting and most consultants claim that there is no difference but that is an argument for a different day. Coaching skills coupled with strong business acumen are certainly the competencies needed to work with any business owner. The majority of small business owners are about to transition their business to other family members within the next ten years and most have not designed an “exit” plan or succession plan. It is really discouraging that most financially successful business owners don’t have a plan for transitioning themselves out and the family members into the decision – making roles.

The following facts are presented in The Pricewaterhouse Coopers Family Business Survey for 2007/08:

• One –quarter of the family firms in the survey are due to change hands within the next five years


• Half of those companies are expected to remain in the family
  Yet almost half of all responding companies have no succession plan, and the percentage is even higher in small firms or those that have been in business for fewer than twenty years.


• Eighty – four percent of the respondents aim to pass their companies on to their descendants compared to less than half of that in Europe and other areas of the world.


• Two –thirds of family businesses have no defined criteria for choosing which family members who want to take an active role in the company should be allowed to do.


• More than half also employ relatives without requiring them to compete for their jobs on the open market.


• More than two –thirds of companies in the survey had no procedures in place for dealing with disputes between family members
  
  
  Remember, an effective succession plan assesses the company’s leadership needs, determines the positions needed to continue the achievement, and identifies the core competencies needed for those positions. In other words, who is going to assume the roles of the family members starting to leave through the back door?
  
  The fact of the matter is that the small business owner is not a good planner. Most owners are great tacticians and manage the business on a day-to-day basis very, very well. After all, this is why most started the business. They were the best technician, and no one asked them if they were a good manager, or visionary. Now suddenly, they are asking their family members to be much more than they were. Many business owners have commented that they don’t have a high confidence level that the next generation can make it as successful as they did. The younger family member wants to know why their ideas and recommendations are not being readily accepted. Most wonder why the other is not listening to the other and why communication is becoming more difficult than ever. My listening skills have never been more tested. Both sides claim that they are not being listened to by the other nor do they feel that either is exhibiting any compassion, so communication has come to a standstill.
  
  It’s seems to me that it is now time to call the “Coach”. Most businesses have their professional advisors like their lawyer, accountant and possibly a business consultant. Most family members have their own financial advisor, stock broker, counselor or whatever. The coach is now being asked to be the conduit between all of the above focusing on the new members of the family and the exiting family members. It becomes the role of the coach to assume the following responsibilities:
  
  · Provide a communication channel for all parties
  · Make sure effective and open communication is present
  · Provide a fair assessment of the talent at the table
  · Make sure everyone listens to “what” is being said and not “how” it is being said
  · Confirm understanding and expectations
  · Encourage participation
  · Hold people accountable
  · Monitor the implementation of ideas, policies, procedures, etc.
  · Measure the results
  · Celebrate successes
  
  
  The above certainly looks like a Results-oriented model that I like to use in the coaching environment. I know that Business Coaching can provide an integral component to the transition or transformation of any small business between family members. Most family disputes are focused on the skills, competencies, behaviors, and knowledge demonstrated by the younger family members while the younger members are wondering when the elders will finally let go. The experienced ones are questioning their fortitude, knowledge, ambition, and energy while the younger ones are wondering if the experienced ones will ever let go of ways they have been doing business. It certainly appears to reflect the Definition of Business Insanity, “doing the same thing over an over, yet expecting different results”.
  
  Sounds like we have to let the experienced owners transfer the positional authority to the younger generation and be willing to accept mistakes and just file them as a learning experience. It might also behoove the younger generation to ask questions and include the experienced ones in the problem-solving process. In reality, maybe the coach should focus the family more on how to better understand generational diversity and make the workplace an environment satisfactory to all. Good luck….and good coaching.
  
  Richard Hohmann
  
  For more information of succession planning (Exit Strategies) and Business Coaching, please call us for a complimentary Coaching Session or contact us