What's Mine Is Yours: The Art Of Delegating

The biggest myth about delegation is that it's essentially "getting someone else to do your job". Not so. In fact, it's an essential skill that helps YOU do your job. Unfortunately, some people misunderstand what delegation is and act accordingly. Use it the right way, however, and you'll make your working life a lot easier.

People often mistakenly think that delegation is for managers. Although probably used more frequently by senior staff, this shouldn't always be the case. Colleagues at the same job level can share a workload to help themselves and their own respective managers by delegating. Everyone should be doing it from time to time. So what is it?

Delegation should be viewed as a positive action. At its core, it is the process of identifying a task that could be done by another person, resulting in the end result being more efficient than you doing it yourself. Confused? Here's an example. If you're a doctor with a busy surgery, it may be part of your job to audit what kind of ailments you had to deal with in a given month. If you're having a particularly busy month, it might be best to ask an intern to do your paperwork that month. This, by the way, is one of the unspoken rules of delegating - it's usually a one-off task. Don't pass your work over every single month because that would come across as shirking your own responsibility and would probably not endear you to junior staff.

You should always identify tasks suitable for delegation and only if the need to do so arises in order for you to work better. In the above example: you'd spend that time treating more patients, therefore doing a better job. However an extreme example of the wrong kind of delegation would be asking the intern to treat someone!

Remember that if you have delegated a task that is, essentially, your responsibility, you also have to accept responsibility if it goes wrong. If a contractor asks a work experience candidate to build him a wall, and it falls, you can't blame the candidate: he was being asked to do something he perhaps wasn't qualified to do. This is another aspect to delegation: make sure it's a task that someone can do independently of you, and with basic, clear instruction. If you delegate something, then have to spend your time and effort actually showing someone how to do what you've asked, it's hardly saving you any time! It's also a consideration to make sure that the person you're delegating to has the authority to do what you've asked, (remember the doctor and the intern: one is qualified, the other certainly isn't!)

Provide feedback when you've delegated something and it's been done properly. People are more likely to help you again and feel appreciated. If you are constantly shuffling around your tasks and delegating some, (whether it's through no fault of your own or not), you need to have people on your side. Nobody wants to do a thankless task for little or no recognition - and remember, one day these people may have to delegate something to you, too.

Another etiquette point when delegating is that you should really ask someone to do a major task in person, if you can. There's nothing worse than someone receiving an email asking them to do a difficult or demanding job for you when you haven't had the courtesy to walk over and ask if they'd mind. It's not rude to set a deadline because, after all, people can always put off your task if they don't know when you want it completed, but you shouldn't have to demand or pester - make sure the person you are asking has the time to allot to your work; another reason to have a conversation with them beforehand.

Remember to monitor the progress of the work you've delegated because, as mentioned, you still hold the responsibility for it. It's also a lot more polite to periodically "check in" on how your colleague is doing, so you know that you haven't overwhelmed them or that you're going to miss your own deadline.

Finally: don't misuse delegation. If you genuinely pressed for time and cannot do a task to the detriment of higher-priority work, that's the time to delegate. It isn't acceptable (although people do it), to dump your more unsavoury or boring jobs on other people when you could be doing them yourself. If you're a manager, abusing delegation is a good way to have your subordinates dislike you. A good delegator will always earn respect and will show willing in return. Is that you?