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clearly by the delegatee and the task has been
understood, send a follow-up email or set up a second
face-to-face discussion. Give scope to the employee to
voice his/her ideas and concerns about the task.
Measuring outputs
How do you know that work is progressing well and not
going in a direction that will not bring the result that you
are expecting?
Regular updates from the delegatee and patient and clear
feedback from you will help you.
Set the timeline for receiving updates:
Regular
updates on the task will help to keep it on track,
prevent unpleasant surprises and guide the employee
to complete the task well. However, a timeline needs
to be set for the updates, which will demonstrate your
confidence in the employee and will also keep you free
from micromanaging the task.
Analyze and give feedback:
Analyze the updates, and
provide quality feedback to the employee so that
he/she can learn and complete the task as per
standards.
Document:
Document the outputs and incentivize
good work.
Developing/Training second liners
A valuable result of delegation is that a pool of second-in-
line leadership can be created for the company. How do
you do that?
Select wisely:
Pick your person with care.The famous
delegation story quoted by experts is about the wolf
and shepherd. The shepherd trusts the wolf to look
after his sheep while he goes to the village to get food
and returns to find many of his sheep missing.
Be patient and give a realistic timeframe:
Often
managers judge capacities of people based on their
own capabilities and have higher than realistic
expectations. Remember, delegation is about freeing
your time to enable you to invest in more strategic
work. This can only happen if the person learns the
task well enough and develops his/her ability to
manage with minimum interference from you.
Discuss with seniors:
Companies have their visions,
missions and priorities. As you embark on the path to
delegate effectively, discuss with your seniors and map
out the deliverables for you and your team with your
seniors.
In Lewis Carroll’s famous book ‘Through the Looking
Glass’, a conversation between Alice and the queen goes
like this:
“I can’t believe that!” said Alice.
“Can’t you?” the queen said in a pitying tone. “Try again, draw
a long breath, and shut your eyes.”
Alice laughed. “There’s no use trying,” she said. “One can’t
believe impossible things.”
“I dare say you haven’t had much practice,” said the queen.
“When I was your age, I always did it for half an hour a day.
Why, sometimes I’ve believed as many as six impossible things
before breakfast.”
July 2016 43
Celebra ng 30 years’ service
KISHALAYA DEB FAISAL P. ANSARI
VIVEK SETH SIVAJI DUTT KENAL SHEKHAWAT
❁ ❁❁