This article is part of a series for busy leaders. The very best leaders are fantastic at giving away leadership. Some people call that delegation. This article provides a practical framework.  

I practice Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu (BJJ). BJJ is a martial art created by Hélio Gracie, who wasn’t very big or strong. He adapted traditional Japanese Jiu-Jitsu and Judo to be more practically useful. Specifically, to help a smaller, weaker person defend themselves against a larger, stronger opponent.

It’s a difficult martial art and takes a notoriously long time to master. It’s not that the concepts are that difficult to understand. They make sense when explained. But they are hard to execute. However, when you do learn them, they are almost magically effective.

Your first opponent is the one you usually will have the most difficult time learning to overcome. That opponent is yourself. At the beginning, you don’t know even know that’s where the fight is. You have to learn to stop trying to use your effort or strength. Instead, use leverage, movement, and balance. Which kind of sounds wise and powerful.

Until a sweaty 280lb guy is sitting on top of you, choking you. Then spazzing out suddenly makes more sense. But spazzing doesn’t help. It just wears you out. It causes you to make mistakes.

You have to learn to control your own emotions while paying attention to your opponent’s. You have to learn to calmly be able to recognize your current position, which is fluid, and be able to think multiple moves or options ahead.

For most practitioners, that doesn’t even make sense, real sense, for years.

Stop Spazzing Out

I’ve coached hundreds of leaders. Maybe more. Because they are typically smart, able, and successful people – their tendency is to lean into their own strength. But they learn they aren’t strong enough on their own. Regardless of how confidently they enter the room, or even how successful their organizations appear from the outside, many feel like they are slowly being smothered.

At least that’s what they tell me, in so many words.

They are spazzing out and struggling to get a breath. They can’t afford to think one move ahead. They are putting all their effort into just trying to catch up.

Start Using Jiu-Jitsu

When I first started learning BJJ, I would get this “helpful” advice from more experienced partners.

“Stop fighting so hard! Use Jiu-Jitsu!”

One of the key principles of BJJ is to use the strength and motion of others to your advantage. One of the key principles of organizational growth is exactly the same. The principle is simple:

Stop fighting so hard. Stop trying to do it yourself. Learn to use the strength and motion of your team.

The greatest success doesn’t come from your own herculean efforts. It comes from a leader’s ability to gracefully lead a team and an organization. This will force you to face your issues of trust and fear of failure. It will confront your sense of identity and worth.

If you want to lead beyond where you are at now – stop fighting so hard.

One of the key “moves” in leadership is to be able to delegate effectively. If you struggle with delegation, you probably feel like it creates more work than anything else. You probably also tend to delegate tasks as opposed to responsibilities.

A Delegation Guide:  So You Can Stop Fighting So Hard

One of the biggest challenges for leaders learning how to delegate is that they aren’t clear about what they really want. They usually think too small and delegate specific steps instead of just telling people where they need to end up.

Effective delegation spends more time describing the endpoint – and empowers people to figure out how to get there, on their own, as much as possible. That’s leverage. That’s fighting with their strength. Not yours.

Here’s how to do it. Answer these questions (15 minutes invested here could save you exponentially more time later):

• Identify one goal or priority you want to be accomplished.

• What do I want? Describe the outcome/result/goal/purpose of what you want done

• What is the minimum amount of guidance that I need to give regarding the method used to accomplish this? Is there anything that absolutely must or must not happen?
• How will I recognize or measure success? “I’ll just know,” may be true. But it’s a difficult target for others.
• When do I need this accomplished?
• What is their scope of decision-making authority? Define their “sandbox.” Can they make spending decisions? Can they use organizational resources? Can they direct the actions of others? What are the limits of their authority? When do they need to ask for permission?
• What skills are needed to be successful with this responsibility? Be realistic in your expectations. Give people work they are able to succeed at. If they don’t have the skills, can they be learned in time? How will you support that learning?
• What knowledge is needed to be successful? Don’t hoard knowledge. Account for necessary learning curves. Let people know what they need to know. Give them permission to learn what they need to learn. Introduce them to the relationships they’ll need.
• How do you want them to communicate or report back to you? What frequency? What do you want to know? How do you prefer they communicate?

Now…Practice

If you’ve answered these questions, you’ve created a framework for effective delegation. As you practice this and get better at it, you will be able to larger and more complex organizations with less effort.

It’s like magic.

But it isn’t magic. You just put the time into learning to lead. And the best leaders are incredibly effective at giving leadership away.

Take good care,

Christian

Read more about how to stop running around putting out fires all the time.

Read more about how to manage your team to outcomes. The key to effective delegation.

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