When I first began as a non-profit executive director, I struggled with what felt like an enormous workload. Short staffed. Underfunded. Overworked. Every solution offered to me appeared to assume I had more resources at my disposal than I did. I became so stressed it actually impacted my physical health.

Moreover, I wasn’t interested in micro-management. I preferred to give high level vision and very broad direction. I thought this would empower and encourage people to set their own goals and find their own way to accomplish them.

Instead, I found people responded in one of two ways:

• Some Froze: They weren’t sure what was expected, how success would be measured, or what the “finish line” would look like. Afraid of failing or disappointing, they wouldn’t start or complete projects.
• Some Ran Wild: In the absence of clear direction or expectations, other kicked up their heels and ran…in any direction that made sense to them. Most often not the direction we needed.

What lessons did I learn?

Begin with a Mindset Shift

In both cases, I was frustrated. Out of my frustration I would dictate orders to those who froze (which encouraged more freezing) or I would try to grab the reins of those running wild (which caused them to either start freezing or to pull away). Either way, I had problems.

Then, I had an epiphany: Managing people is part of my job. (I know, it took my breath away too.)

What a shift in mindset looks like: Here I was, resenting the fact that I had to spend time and energy leveraging people as resources. It dawned on me that people work better when managed well. So, I needed to embrace my role as facilitator of their success. This is key to the role of anyone who supervises or directs others.

What I began to do was set aside regular, focused, meeting and planning times with my staff. We identified priorities and clarified what was needed for them to be successful. I helped them differentiate between what was urgent and what was important. As I gained understanding of their workload, I was able to redistribute it; as well as, change my expectations in terms of pace.

When I finally embraced this reality something “magical” happened: we got a lot more work done. Stress levels went way down. We started to gain traction. And, because I spent tightly focused and intentional time in management, I was able to spend more time on other areas of interest, as well.

Big picture people often feel frustrated or impatient with the details of management. Sometimes, if we’ll admit it, we don’t even understand the details. It’s easier to just wave it all aside and insist that we move forward. This approach doesn’t serve people well; and it doesn’t serve you as a leader.

Detail people often feel frustrated and distrust the abilities of others to get things right. Detail people say things like, “It’s just faster to do it myself.” Or, “I know I’ll get it done right.” The problem is that our job isn’t to do it faster ourselves. And it isn’t to be the one that got it right. Our job is to get the most out of our team. Our job is to ensure their success. When we shoulder it ourselves, we create a bottleneck of productivity and creativity in our organizations. Ironically, we slow things down by trying to be faster.

How To Delegate

1. Communicate the Big Picture People work best when they understand the context (the “why”) of their work. This helps people self-manage, because they understand the context. It also helps tap into their internal motivation because they understand “why”. Some people will get excited about the big picture. Some people will feel overwhelmed by it. The people that get excited will feel reluctant to spend time dealing with planning. The people who feel overwhelmed will feel relieved once they see the plan. The key is to give just enough information to meet the needs of the group and then stop. Once your team has experienced this whole process working well the first time, it will become much easier and moves faster in the future.

2. Break the Big Picture into Small Pictures Many of my clients find it helpful to answer the question: “If we want to accomplish ‘X’ in one year, what needs to be accomplished three months from now?” Adjust this for your needs. Big picture and small picture can be different for every team. I have some clients in oil and gas who think in terms of decades. I have other clients, in the midst of crisis, who are thinking in terms of days and weeks.

3. Identify major steps or goals Many clients have also found it helpful to break the three-month goals down into major steps or tasks and estimate how long each will take. As mentioned above, adjust this for your needs.

4. Assign to individuals Even if a team will work on it, make one person responsible. I will sometimes allow for one supporting partner on a project; however, one person must always be clearly responsible.

5. Assign time frames: Be clear about expectations. Rough out the beginning and ending dates on a calendar. Most people will either try to begin everything now or just get it all done before the deadline. This creates bottlenecks. It also doesn’t help identify which tasks are dependent on others. On a practical level, not everything can be started at once and you probably don’t want everything to end at once. Stage it out. This process usually takes time the first time around. People are learning to differentiate priorities and estimate time frames. This is a skill they may not have developed. Your team will get faster as they gain experience. If you use a tool like a Gantt Chart you can also plan for holidays, vacations or other significant dates. This will help provide a visual sense of workload.

6. Schedule regular follow-up meetings Many clients find that weekly or bi-weekly meetings are helpful. Some need to meet more frequently if the project is fast moving.

This exercise accomplishes several things. It:

• helps your vision become manageable, which, in turn, relieves stress and engages people.
• helps your people self-manage, improving their ability to work towards goals with less support.
• gives you a sense of the actual workload so that you can redistribute responsibility or adjust pacing.
• provides you with an automatic management tool, so your regular meetings are structured around check-ins of progress and goals, relevant to that time frame. You can easily see who’s working well on their own, and who needs additional support.
• frees your time so the bulk of your “managing” is conducted during planning. With regular follow-ups, your team should maintain course fairly well, while you focus on the people and situations that really need support.

What will be your next step toward becoming a better leader? How will you improve your management and delegation?