Management delegation empowers employees by granting them the authority and accountability necessary to achieve desired results, fostering ownership and enabling business growth.
Primary Implication
It’s impossible to hold people accountable for results if you fail to delegate to them the necessary authority to accomplish what you are holding them accountable to achieve.
If you are making all the decisions on what and how to do things, then accountability for the result of the actions you delegate remains with you. All you can do is hold them accountable for doing what you told them to do.
Overview
One of the most common obstacles to people being accountable for results involves the failure to have delegated to them the necessary authority to accomplish what they are being held accountable to achieve. Those businesses who find themselves in the survival, stuck, or unable to get out of the stretch business profit progression stage are there because their owners aren’t good at empowering those in management and supervision roles to own their role.
Management delegation is the sharing or transfer of authority and the associated accountability. The delegation of authority originates the delegator who has the right to delegate a part of their authority to a subordinate (the delegatee) to carry out the purpose of the delegation.
The primary reason for owners not to delegate the required authority to others in their employ is because of their fear of that employee failing. It is you, the owner, not your employee that has everything at risk. Mistakes cost money, and when money is tight, it’s hard to let go of authority and responsibility for decisions and actions that can put you out of business, so don’t.
Before delegating authority to another, ask yourself: “Am I willing to delegate the accountability for the result as well, or am I going to hold onto that?” Holding onto accountability for the results means you are delegating responsibility for actions you identify but not the result. Actions with only responsibility but no authority means that all you can do is hold those without authority for doing the action or not. You can’t hold them accountable for the results if you don’t give them the authority to shape the actions required to produce the plan result.
