Delegating Work by Harvard Business Review

Author:Harvard Business Review
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Harvard Business Review Press
Published: 2014-03-05T16:00:00+00:00

Decide on the level of authority to grant

The level of authority you choose to grant should depend on the requirements of the assignment, the employee’s capabilities, and your level of confidence in the person you’ve selected. To determine the kind of authority you’ll grant to your employee:

• Assess the employee’s past performance in making decisions.

• Consider the consequences of wrong decisions, and decide what degree of risk you’re willing to take.

• Determine the minimum amount of authority your employee will need to complete the assignment successfully and efficiently. (You wouldn’t want the employee to have to come to you for approvals every step of the way.)

Several options exist along the broad spectrum of authority. You can decide that your employee may:

• Make and implement decisions as needed without prior consultation with you.

• Make decisions as needed, but notify you before implementing them.

• Make recommendations for a final decision, which you must then approve.

• Provide you with several alternatives, from which you’ll make a final decision.

• Provide you with relevant information, from which you’ll develop alternatives and then consult with your employee to reach a decision.

What might granting a specific level of authority look like in real life? Say you place Cy in charge of approving purchase orders for your unit. You specify a dollar limit within which he has free rein and a range of expenses that he can approve but must report to you. For all other purchase orders, he must research alternative products or services and review the requests with you.

In addition to granting a specific level of authority, you can eliminate confusion and encourage initiative and problem solving by delegating responsibility to one person rather than dividing it among a number of people—even if you are delegating the work to a number of people. Make sure every person involved clearly understands who is ultimately responsible for the outcome. For example, you might assign the responsibility for reviewing, approving, and submitting expense reports to one of your employees, who, in turn, asks a colleague to follow up with finance to ensure that reimbursements are made on time. Regardless of how follow-up is delegated, your direct report remains responsible.

Now that you’ve determined what to delegate to whom, and at what level of authority, you can proceed to the next step: actually assigning the work.

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