Gone are the days of time-in and time-out when the pandemic hit us. Employee timekeeping and KPI management have been disrupted when people work from home. Yes, it was a significant change but an effective team management and delegation principle stays the same.
Imagine being on a Nascar team that has several positions. Engine specialist, tire specialist, pit crew, truck driver, etc. a race car needs every role to be efficient. A Nascar driver can never drive and race by himself. It is a team with different functions but they key here is the understanding of each functional area and its KPIs.
It is never effective to delegate tasks withour a proper understanding of the team member’s roles, scope of work and the vision of the leader on where the team is being led to.
The leader must acquire the skill and the art of delegating tasks.
Being the head of a team doesn’t mean that all the work falls on you. The goal of the leader is focus on strategies while the team work with autonomy .
The team should feel empowered, take initiative, and be motivated to work on the goal.
According to Dr. Scott Williams, professor of management at Wright State University, ” “Delegation can also be a clear sign that you respect your subordinates’ abilities and that you trust their discretion,” Williams writes. “Employees who feel that they are trusted and respected tend to have a higher level of commitment to their work, their organization, and, especially, their managers.”
Once your employee feels the trust you’re giving them, they’ll be more committed because they also get to fix their focus on what you’ve assigned to them to do which will make them more productive and efficient.
Here are a few tips on how to delegate effectively.
- Choose the right people. This is why recruitment is a crucial part of HR management. The key here is to assess employees’ strengths and weaknesses, their motivation to work and their emotional intelligence.
- Clearly state their job description. Be clear about their scope of work, their KPIs, work instructions and how important are their roles and contribution to the businses.
- Establish a project or performance review system. Software developers have been practicing a system called Sprints. It is an agile-methodology that promotes flexibility in project management. A sprint can be a weekly, can be every two or three weeks depending on project milestones.
- Ask people to commit. Every start of sprint, it is ideal that the tasks given to each one are well documented. Let the members estimate each task and their commitment date to deliver. A daily huddle or what we call stand-up meetings can be implemented to talk about roadblocks if there’s any but never micromanage. It’s a common notion that if you are busy and taking time to do a particular task then you should charge more. On the other hand, if you are efficient and you are doing quality work in less time, then you should charge less. I believe people should value things based on output and not based on time.
- Establish a feedback system. Every end of sprints, review the work and discuss the challenges and mistakes encountered to make sure that the team avoids the same issues. Record actual performance vs. the commitments. These documents will then be used on the quarterly employee performance review/appraisal.
Last but not the least, don’t forget to commend your team and express gratitude on every successful milestones. Establish a good incentive scheme to stimulate team satisfaction.
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