So you're clear on ‘why’, have decided on ‘what’ and recruited the right ‘who’. The process on moving from ‘I do’ to ‘You do’ is clear and ‘how’ comes next. It is process led, time consuming but vitally important. Its importance is such that it explains why there is so much documentation out there on ‘how’ to delegate. My belief is that delegation is broader than that and advice which dives straight into how is missing out on the vital pre-process which starts with clarity on ‘why’, ‘what’ and ‘who’ but most importantly the ‘why’, which is usually centred around value and benefits which in turn are broken down into value and benefits to the individual, to the team, to the business/organization/family. A firm understanding of why delegation would be good leads to having a far better chance of going well and achieving its aims.

So, down to the ‘how’, which very deliberately sits towards the back of this book. If a manager or business owner also understands what their barriers are or may be to delegation and how that sits within their management personality, they can ensure that the ‘how’ part accommodates those concerns or areas of weakness experienced during past delegation or, indeed, when they have been delegated to themselves. In my approach, I assume that in starting with ‘why’, deciding ‘what’ and selecting or finding ‘who’, the delegator has driven the process rather than reacted to a current level of workload. I assume that the motivation to delegate is a longer-term gain. I do so because successful delegation takes time, planning and thought and if it is an urgent requirement for help, though the same principles of course apply, the motivation may come from a different point in the process.

Delegate with confidence and get guilt out of the way

At this point, therefore, it is important for me to reiterate a need for confident delegation: you have every right to delegate because you and the recipient are clear ‘why’ it is important, you are clear on ‘what’ needs to be delegated and therefore the ‘who’ sitting in front of you has been chosen for their skills and strengths. This, therefore, negates the need for any guilt in handing over work. You are not begging a favour here: you are paying an appropriate person a fair fee for work they are capable of doing. If you're handing over work by way of an apology, you are devaluing their work before they've even begun. ‘I'm sorry to do this to you’ says that they are the wrong person, they're not going to love it or you're not otherwise playing to their strengths or rightful position in the organization. Naturally, there are times when the delegation may be unexpected or something new to them, but again if they are right, and given all they need to do the best job, as detailed in this chapter, there should be nothing to worry about.

Tools required for effective delegation

Google ‘delegation’ and you're bound to come up with the SMART acronym somewhere along the line. It's not a bad way to go but to me it feels a bit forced, as if the word comes first and the content later, but the principles do hold so if it's easier to remember it as Specific, Measurable, Achievable (or Agreed), Realistic (or Reported/Recorded) and Time-bound, then go for your life.

‘How to delegate’ is the bit that takes the most time, though it still incorporates much of the work that has been done prior to arrival at this point. It means thinking through and documenting the requirements and processes, systems and instructions, expectations and standards needed to do the job or task well. Team members or others willing to help need to be clear on what they are required to do. It's as simple as that. Table 12.1 has a breakdown.

It's been said and reiterated that time is the biggest barrier to delegation and the ‘how’ is one of the reasons why, especially if much of the ‘how’ is carried around in heads rather than down on paper or documented somehow or is otherwise easily transferrable. It takes effort to devise appropriate training, instruction or briefing and even more time to support that with appropriate, accurate and comprehensive documentation or procedures. It ends up being ‘easier’ or ‘quicker’ to do it oneself.

Be prepared for cock-ups

And by that I mean think through the worst-case scenarios as much as, and as soon as, possible, and plan accordingly. This is where past mistakes and poor experiences with regard to delegation suddenly become your friends as they help you to plan for the future with the benefit of hindsight.

Preparing in this way is not just good for business; it is also good for the delegation process. Almost the worst thing that can happen is that the work is taken back by the manager, who adds it back into their own workload and pulls the equivalent of an all-nighter to get the job done. Yes, the job is done, but where does that leave the stakeholders involved? The employee could be left feeling like a failure, the manager certainly tired, probably stressed and possibly reluctant to delegate again.

If the errors, mishaps or even disasters are thought about in advance (more time, I know) and a plan of action already documented and made clear, it has multiple benefits. First and vitally for the business, there is a clear way to remedy this situation and get back on track. Second, there is a way that the employee can understand the ramifications of what went wrong, why it went wrong and how to avoid this in the future. They also know what to do potentially or at least in part if the same thing happens again, either to them or when they delegate in the future. And finally, which is always a bonus, they may think of a way to improve the process as a whole or avoid the error going forward.

The Figure 12.1 shows that more or less all delegation issues are resolved through communication (of why, what, who, when, how) and/or process (how).

Without labouring the point, however, it is useful to note that wherever you sit or your business sits on the ‘pew’ (Process/Empower/Why) scale, time will be a major factor in your course correction. If the use of successful delegation can be analogized to being akin to a muscle, you have to exercise it evenly in a number of directions to achieve optimum use.

In conclusion, I would like to touch again on the psychological contract because it reflects the touchy-feely difference between the de rigueur terminologies that are ‘responsibility’ and ‘accountability’. In Oxford dictionary terms, I can find no discernible difference between the two definitions, unless there is something there too subtle for my brash interpretation. In business terms, however, if you google it you'll no doubt find the same articles and references as I did. I think one is meant to assume that to be accountable is to somehow be more responsible for something that happens. That is to suggest that if the person responsible for the task or job messes it up, there is a person ‘above’ or ‘behind’ them who is therefore accountable, and in some cases of public office required to lose their job as a result. It would appear safe to assume, then, that the person accountable is the person with whom the buck stops. If that's right, I've no problem with it as an interpretation of the definition as it helps to illustrate the relative strength of the psychological contract.

Where communication and mutual understanding, aims, goals and values are clear and universally shared within the team (i.e. everyone is of the same mind), the psychological contract is naturally strong and every team member feels supported and equally responsible for the output of the group. This is especially the case for the leader of the team, who does (or very much should) accept and understand whose head is ultimately on the block, but who feels the huge support of a team, single supplier or employee when a strong psychological contract exists. Moving forward in this scenario is easy and smooth. In simple terms, someone has your back – and that's always a nice feeling.

The mirror of this, which we'll address more deeply in the next chapter but is important to touch on here, is the issue of giving credit where credit is due. Delegation truly backfires when the manager takes all the credit. While it may suggest that true accountability entitles a manager to do this, the smartest managers know that they look so much like a great leader when they're big enough to stand aside and let those they managed, developed and trusted to be delegated to do a great job for them.

Check, check, report

Delegation is a management tool or skill. In my opinion, it is an essential one. The keyword in the first sentence is ‘management’. In order to achieve successful delegation, one has to manage it. That isn't to say one has to micro-manage it. Indeed, as I've said before, we all recognize that making mistakes is a great way to learn and delegation means allowing, in certain cases, that to happen in order to reinforce the message, but it all, nonetheless, has to be managed. To do anything less is to abdicate responsibility, and that is rarely a good context in which to operate.

The key is to plan, which, as I keep saying, takes time. Plan for the worst to happen and plan how to mitigate it if it does. Check, check, report is a highly summarized version of the ‘situation confirmation’ process (Figure 12.2).

The first ‘check’ in this process is the one that the delegator controls and ensures takes place. This may be deliberately liberal (allow a freer rein) or conservative (wary of errors or problems), that is to say, a more relaxed and casual update versus a more defined or detailed report or meeting feedback.

Regardless, what is essential here is some form of anticipation or ‘what if’ scenario (and probably more than one scenario will be required) and a plan to recover from any wayward situation. If the worst or something less severe does happen, and it probably will, maybe not immediately, as a level of confidence or security (but hopefully not complacency) kicks in, it is essential to have pre-empted this, for a number of reasons. The first is that a drop in the operational standard or customer service level norm is a disadvantage to the business, which needs to be addressed immediately and the damage limited. The second is so that you as a manager are able to handle the situation, and not panic as a result, or worse, in my opinion, lose your faith in delegation as a means to success. The third, but arguably most important, is a plan, and a sense of reassurance that things can quickly get back on track means that you can be supportive to the person or team who you have delegated to.

Remember to remember that they could quite likely be distressed or stressed or certainly unsettled by the situation, too, and it is important to involve them in the solution and handling of the situation as the team proceeds to correct it. Naturally, there will be an element of proving that actions (or inactions/omissions or errors) have consequences, but this also has to be balanced with damage limitation.

Deliberately, I have played here to the worried and the concerned, so let this be said because it is as important, if not more important, than all the pre-emptive, preventative planning that one, as a delegating leader, can come up with. It's simple, oft forgotten and it goes like this:

Always remember to say thank you for the things that went well or even just as planned. Take time to add why you are so pleased. Hopefully, you would always thank a driver who let you out of the junction or a person who held the door open for you or the waiter who served you dinner etc. They are just doing their job (not open to a discussion about tipping protocols here), but there is no reason why you wouldn't say thank you, and actually it is right that you do. Same applies in the office and in business. Yes, you're doing what you are paid to do, but a thank you, or at least an acknowledgement, goes an extremely long way.¹

As things progress or get more comfortable, one could hopefully move to the next type of ‘check’ in the feedback process, the one where the delegated to are responsible for initiating the agreed and regular feedback, be it meeting or report. It is not the manager who has to fret about ensuring it is in the diary. The team member recognizes that he or she needs to give the reassurance rather than the manager take it. The meeting may be much the same, in truth – the agenda largely unchanged – but the psychological contract is developing and the employee is keen and confident to give all the positive feedback necessary to the manager to know that delegation was the right thing and all is met: work is being done as per the expectation, within budget and timescales and to the expected standards. Naturally, on occasion this may not be the case, but if the employee is the initiator then they would reasonably be expected to have their own plan B or potential solution to the problem or, if not, be a comfort with seeking advice as appropriate.

At the ‘report’ stage, things have progressed to an ideal scenario. Things are reported to the delegator by exception (i.e. when they have fallen outside of agreed parameters). Let's see this as the equivalent of a patient arranging to see a GP because something is not quite right. This is utopia in a delegation sense: you have made it. At this point feel free to visualize a holiday with no interruptions because everything is going well back at base. Congratulations.

Here is the cautionary note: you are still accountable, as a human, and you have in all probability delegated responsibility to a or some humans. So my advice is still to have a structured form of check for yourself to make sure all is well. It is well worth creating an audit process of sorts, just to be sure that no news really does mean good news and not a hidden collection of minor disasters waiting to explode. For me, I have an operational checklist that will forever form the structure of even the most casual updates:

• People: Do we have the right ones doing the right things well? If some are being carried, the carriers will eventually look to leave and the carried will be all that remain.
• Systems: Sadly, our dependence on technology means it has to be as good as possible in an otherwise uncertain world. Make sure the team has excellent support and training and a budget to accommodate.
• Processes: As we work through this checklist, the importance grows. You can only be certain of the resilience of the business if you know the team are doing what you expect; otherwise, even the managers you delegate to are trying to manage shifting sands. Process, adherence to it or agreed and documented movement away from it are vital.
• Performance: Performance measurement comes under three banners: standards (quality assurance, or QA), management information (key performance indicators, or KPIs) and financial (namely cash). Have ways to know all three are in great shape and being achieved.

My message here is that delegation is deep and it should be when done well, but it is not absolute (that would equate to ‘dumping’). To further the medical analogy, having one's finger on the pulse does not mean hanging onto the patient's wrist at all times. One can take a pulse periodically and gain the results for oneself, in addition to listening to the testimony of the patient.

In short, don't assume all is well; be sure to ask the question one way or another. And when things are good, say so, loud and clear. It helps to ensure that teams know what good looks like. When things are less good, ask lots of questions. Find out why. Have they been left alone too long? Has there been a move away from procedure or protocol? If the answer to all is no then count your blessings: you're in an iterative stage of learning, briefing and delegation, and things can only get better as long as there is focus on continually deepening and improving the understanding of the process.

The Gift of Time is accompanied by an online programme that offers practical help, activities and accountability for action.²