Jory MacKay on November 12, 2024 How to delegate the right way: 6 tips for managers
No one can do everything themselves — but that doesn’t stop us from trying. While most managers know the value of delegating work, they still try to tackle as much as possible on their own.
A Microsoft survey of over 20,000 leaders and workers around the globe found that more than half of all managers feel like they have too much on their plate.
There’s no denying that delegation is a hard skill to master. Not only does it require careful team management, but also handing over control of important tasks — something that’s not always easy, especially when your project’s success is on the line.
But delegation is a superpower. When you learn to properly delegate, not only does it empower and motivate your team to do more work, but it also frees up more mental space for high-value work, such as working on strategy or big picture thinking.
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If you’ve been struggling to delegate tasks and are looking for a way to move forward, this article is for you.
What is delegation? What are the benefits of becoming a better delegator?
Delegation is the process of reassigning work to other team members because it’s more relevant to their skills, priorities, or workload. Delegation is a key management skill, helping ensure work gets completed on time and to expectations, all while managing everyone’s workload effectively.
That being said, failure to delegate can lead to serious negative consequences.
As a manager, many tasks will come your way, but if you fail to delegate the right ones you’re at risk of missing deadlines, delivering poor results, and personal burnout.
While most managers know the value of delegating work, they still try to tackle as much as possible on their own.
As a team member, if your manager delegates you the wrong things, you may become overwhelmed, leading to poor productivity and a breakdown in trust and psychological safety.
On the other hand, if you learn to delegate effectively, and you can unlock a range of great benefits for you and your team, including:
- Improving team efficiency. When team’s work together, they can achieve more by combining their collective skills and capacity. If tasks are distributed to the right people, overall team effectiveness and productivity increases.
- Providing new opportunities. As a manager, there’s no better way to help your team members develop and grow than by delegating them tasks. This gives them the chance to work on new things, leading to the development of new skills and competencies for the future.
- Building trust across your team. There’s no greater sign of respect than trusting a team member to complete an important task on your behalf. While you must communicate this in the right way, when done right, delegation shows you have trust in your team.
- Helping uncover strengths and weaknesses. Delegating a task is also a great opportunity to learn more about your team. When team members are exposed to new experiences, you learn more about their strengths and weaknesses, helping you to identify further opportunities for development or coaching.
- Allowing you to focus on the bigger picture. As a leader or manager, when you’re able to delegate some of your day-to-day tasks, it frees up time to step back and focus on the bigger picture. Balancing short and long-term priorities is incredibly important, and delegation is a valuable tool to help you free up time for future roadmap planning.
- Preventing burnout. Taking on too much work without delegating tasks is a surefire way to hit burnout. While you might think you’re doing the team a favor by holding on to work, but once you hit burnout, your entire team suffers.
6 reasons why you’re probably avoiding delegating tasks
For many people, it takes time to get comfortable with the idea of delegating. Passing on tasks to others can require overcoming psychological hurdles. This is especially true of new managers who may not have confidence in their management skills.
But the good news is that a simple change in mindset is all it takes to get started with delegating.
Let’s look at the most common false beliefs surrounding delegation and uncover the truth behind how you may be feeling.
| What you believe: | The truth: |
|---|---|
| “It will take longer to explain the work than to do it myself.” | Yes — at first. But once you’ve trained an employee on a specific task, they can repeat that task over and over, freeing up your time and energy in the long run. |
| “No one else can do the task as well as I can.” | There’s no reason someone else in your team can’t do just as good of a job, especially with your guidance. They may even find a better or more productive way to complete the task. |
| “My team will think I’m shirking work by giving it to them.” | Your team wants interesting work to do. Even if you think the task is “boring”, assigning it to a team member gives them autonomy, new responsibility, and a sense of purpose. |
| “My team doesn’t have the time to do the work.” | Let them tell you that, rather than just assuming that’s the case. Your team may even decide to re-prioritise other work to complete the delegated task. |
| “I don’t want the task to go wrong, so it’s best if I do it myself.” | Giving over control to others can feel uncomfortable. Delegating isn’t just assigning and forgetting, though. Instead, you will be there to oversee the task to ensure it goes to plan. |
| “I don’t want to get fired.” | You may worry that if others are seen doing your work, you’ll be considered disposable. In fact, delegating boosts everyone’s productivity and frees you up to complete more value-adding tasks. |
In reality, you should look to delegate tasks wherever possible, overcoming your false, limiting beliefs in the process. Not only will you free up time and energy to focus on the bigger picture, but your team will be happier and more motivated as they have the opportunity to work on new and interesting tasks.
When should you delegate? 5 questions to help you decide
The key to delegation is knowing which tasks to re-assign and which to keep hold of.
After all, there will always be some tasks you simply can’t delegate, as they’ll require your specific skills, knowledge, or authority to complete.
When a new task lands on your to-do list, ask yourself these five questions to determine whether you should delegate it or not:
- Does the task require my specific skills, knowledge, or authority? If the answer is yes, you should find a way to manage it yourself. If it’s a no, you should strongly consider delegating it.
- Who in my team has the skills (or the ability to learn the skills) to complete the task? Think about who would be best to complete the task on your behalf. Remember, delegating is also an opportunity for others to learn, so consider those who could benefit from a new opportunity.
- Does that person have time and capacity to complete the task? You must be comfortable that your team member has the capacity to complete the task. If they don’t, you might create unnecessary stress and risk the task being completed poorly.
- What tools or information does that person need to complete the task? You should only delegate a task if you can enable someone else to complete it. If they require specific resources to complete the task (e.g. access to software) you have to provide it before delegating.
- What support, guidance, or mentorship does that person need from me? Especially if it’s their first time completing the task, you need to be there to support your team members. As with question four, if you can’t find time to support them properly, you shouldn’t delegate.
If you’re comfortable with your answer to all five questions, you’re ready to start delegating the task — let’s go on to see how you do that in a way that enables success.
The key to delegation is knowing which tasks to re-assign and which to keep hold of.
How to delegate the right way
Line many things in business, delegating takes time to master, but is much easier when you follow a set process.
1. Get to know your workload
To master delegating, start by establishing a good understanding of your current workload. Sure, you might think you’re always busy, but in reality, everyone’s workload moves and changes over time, and understanding this will help you plan for the future.
Specifically, take the time to understand:
- The types of tasks on your to-do list
- The peaks or troughs in your workload on a daily, weekly, or monthly basis
- The tasks you’re stronger or weaker at completing
- The tasks you enjoy the most and the least
One easy way to do this is to look through your current and recently completed tasks in your project management tool. For example, in Planio, you can filter all issues by assignee to see which tasks are assigned to you or other team members.
This will help you understand when and where you might need to delegate. After all, you can’t delegate all of your tasks all the time, so it’s about choosing the right tasks to delegate to improve your personal workload and the overall productivity of the team.
2. Set the team’s expectations
Before you start re-assigning tasks to your team, take the time to get everyone comfortable with the concept of delegating. You need to set everyone’s expectations, explaining why you’re going to be delegating and what it means for them.
Whilst your business context, communication style, and team etiquette will be unique, here’s an example of how you could explain to the team that you’ll begin delegating some new work:
“As we’re a successful team, we’re always being asked to take on new and exciting work. So, in the coming weeks, I’m going to be asking for your support on some different tasks. This will be a great opportunity for everyone to grow and develop. I’ll be here to support you throughout the process, and we’ll re-prioritise other work if required.”
Clear communication helps to set the foundation with your team, meaning they won’t be surprised or stressed when new tasks start landing in their inbox.
3. Identify tasks that you can delegate
With a solid understanding of your own workload, you can identify the tasks that would be better completed by others. This is either because you don’t have capacity, or someone else would be well-placed to do an equally good or better job.
This is also the time to mentally prepare yourself to let go. The limiting beliefs we reviewed earlier on will be swimming through your mind, but take the time to work through them and reassure yourself with the benefits of delegating.
Once you’ve identified a task, validate that it’s appropriate to delegate it using our five delegation questions, and if it is, move on to the next step.
4. Clearly communicate delegated tasks and expectations
Where many managers fall down with delegating, is not taking the time to clearly explain what’s required. Instead, they just say ‘hey, can you please do XX for me?’ and walk away. This leaves team members stranded without all the information they need to meet your expectations.
To overcome this, when delegating, make sure to clearly communicate:
- What the task is (e.g. the monthly project report)
- The purpose of the tasks (e.g. to track team performance)
- When it needs completing (e.g. next Friday)
- Any specification/quality requirements (e.g. use the project report template)
- Anyone else that may need to be involved (e.g. the project data team)
- How you’d like to receive the output (e.g. submit to me via email).
It’s best that this information is stored somewhere it can be referenced and updated — such as in your project management tool.
Here’s what a properly delegated tasks looks like in Planio:
Planio also lets you add custom fields to keep tasks organized and on track, on top of the standard fields like status, priority, category, and start and end dates.
While it’s important not to micromanage the situation, providing these details sets the team member up to succeed. As a manager, digging into the details will also give you the confidence to let go of the task, as you’re safe in the knowledge that you’ve set the expectations and provided clear instructions.
5. Provide support, tools, and mentorship
Once tasks have been delegated, create an opportunity for team members to ask questions or request support. This could come in many forms, including specific software tools or training, or even additional time with you to validate thinking or align on progress.
This is especially true if it’s a recurring task that you’re delegated for the first time. While you may need to invest additional time upfront, once team members are comfortable with the delegated tasks, they’ll need less support moving forwards.
Again, keeping everything in your project management tool allows you to quickly respond to questions or supply information.
Not providing this kind of support is another common area where delegation fails. Delegation isn’t “handing over” because you still have accountability for the task being completed. Make sure you provide the support and guidance your team needs to complete the task to the highest standard.
6. Get feedback, iterate, and improve
Delegation takes time to master. There will be times when delegated tasks go well, and others when they go badly — so be prepared for both scenarios.
No matter the outcome, take time to gain two-way feedback with your team to help you make improvements for the future.
Specifically, look for occasions where team members have struggled or not enjoyed completing a delegated task. As a manager, you want to maintain trust between you and your team, so when it isn’t working, don’t be afraid to re-assign the task or take it back on yourself.
Over time, you and your team will find the right balance between managing your own workload and boosting the overall morale and productivity of the team.
Final tip: Avoid these common mistakes when delegating tasks
Delegating is an essential skill all managers need to succeed. Fail to delegate, and it won’t be long until your to-do list becomes unmanageable, risking burnout and poor outputs as a consequence.
Proper delegating helps share the load while providing your team with opportunities to learn and grow.
But delegation can actually cause more harm if it’s done in the wrong way. Make sure you avoid these common delegation mistakes:
- Don’t mistake delegation for micromanagement. Focus on supporting the right results, rather than managing how a task gets done. Allow your team to experiment and find their footing, without standing over their shoulders.
- Provide clear and concise instruction. When delegating a task, make sure to provide all the information your team members need. A wishy-washy delegation will only lead to bad results, reflecting poorly on you in the process.
- Don’t delegate everything. You’ve been given the team manager role because you have the skills, knowledge, and authority required. There will be tasks that you simply can’t delegate, so make sure you pick and choose the right ones to pass on.
If you’re new to delegating and require some support, remember Planio is here to make the process easier. With tasks, issues, workflows, and reports, you have everything you need to assign, monitor, and sign-off delegated tasks, while working from one central location that fosters continuous team collaboration.
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