Speaker 0 00:00:00 From Roman Leadership. I'm Oscar Romano. This is learn, reflect Lead Leadership, and DIA Development for mission driven individuals and organizations. This is what my mom's spa messages can teach you about delegation. This episode is for you if you are struggling with delegation. If you don't know why you should delegate or if you are looking for tips on how to delegate. Today, we're going to focus on what you can do before delegating to increase your odds of success. A few months ago, I was on a fly with my mom when she brought up these messages. She's been getting from random numbers via WhatsApp messages like, trust me, I can make you big money with crypto. Or Did you lose your purse? I think I found it. She said she didn't wanna open them because she's heard so much in the news about hackers who tried to get your information through messages Now that that was a good move.
Speaker 0 00:01:05 So I appreciated that she did that, but it's left her inbox full of these random messages. This made it harder for her to keep track of messages she actually needs and actually cares about. So I proceeded to go through them to block the numbers and delete the chats. I figured I could do it much faster than she could. You know, my mom's not the most tech savvy person out there. You see, my brother and I have to keep track of all her devices and their respective usernames and passwords. You know, she, she doesn't really enter that world a lot at all. Do you have anybody in your life like that? Have you ever had a moment when you thought it might be easier to do the work yourself? How did that go? Cause for me, as I look through the dozens of spam messages she received, I realized I didn't have time to go through every single one by myself.
Speaker 0 00:01:57 Then I thought about all the spam messages she might receive in the future. There was no way I could always be there to delete her spam messages. No way, nor did I want to. It was time to teach my mom. I showed her how to do it a few times and then turned it over to her. Initially, she was hesitant, but I kept an eye on her progress and gave her feedback as she was working through it. Then she was off. It was great. She was deleting spam messages all on her own, and all I had to do was check in on her. Every once in a while, it was a win-win scenario. My mom got to clean her phone and learn how to keep it clean, and I got some time back to work on a few block posts. Here are a few delegation reflection questions that you can ask yourself.
Speaker 0 00:02:44 How often are you erasing your staffs spam messages? Instead of teaching them how to do it themselves, what else could you have done with that time? How much time are you losing in the future by not teaching them? What can you do before delegating to somebody? What type of preparation can help? So here's what you can do next time before you delegate to support your staff. Number one, visualize success for the task you're delegating. You need to know what you're delegating to somebody else. This means having a clear picture in your mind of what needs to be done and how it needs to be done. For example, I knew what success looked like when deleting spam messages because I did it myself first. If I hadn't gone through it myself, I wouldn't have been able to give my mom the right instructions on how to delete her spam messages.
Speaker 0 00:03:35 Now in practice, what you can do is create a rubric that clearly defines necessary components for your delegating task. A rubric could be as simple as a checklist that you use to keep track of everything that needs to happen for the task to be completed correctly. Number two, be clear on your staff's knowledge and skill level with the task. It is essential to know how familiar your staff is with the task. Somebody who has completed the task, you know beforehand may need much less guidance than somebody who hasn't done it at all. For example, I knew my mom's comfort with technology was very looked so I needed to give her a simple process to follow. If it was too complicated, there's no way she would've picked it up that easily and no way she'd remember for next time. In practice, what this looks like is writing it down a list of the similar tasks the individuals already completed and how well they did.
Speaker 0 00:04:28 It's also a good sign to do more observations if you can't recall many tasks that you saw or experienced firsthand. Number three, align on the vision of success. Your staff needs to be clear in your expectations for the task. It doesn't matter that you have a solid understanding of what needs to be done if your staff isn't aligned with that understanding. For example, I walk my mom through the process and then how her do it herself. While I watched this helped me make sure that my mom knew exactly how to correctly execute the task. In practice, you know, for you with your staff, what you can do is ask the individual to walk you through how they'll complete the task. You would be surprised at how many times somebody made mistakes when repeating back what they were supposed to be doing when they were, you know, talking to me.
Speaker 0 00:05:15 Number four, plan ahead for observation. In an ideal world, you delegate. The task gets done and everyone's happy. In the real world, you delegate and then observe for feedback opportunities. Planning is essential though, since leaders often have countless priorities that compete for their time. For example, I planned to check in with my mom a few times during the hour long flight to ensure she was still on the right track. She had a lot of spa messages, so it took her a while to go through them all. In practice, what you can do is schedule time on your calendar for the observation, determine whether it's gonna be announced or unannounced, so you know whether to invite your staff member via calendar invite, I saved an hour by delegating to my mom on that plane ride. You will save much more time if you start delegating at work today. Now it's time to commit. Which one of these pre delegation steps do you need to improve on? Are there any other steps that you found helpful to complete before delegating to somebody? And if you have any other tips, hey, please let me know. Thanks.
Speaker 1 00:06:24 That's it for this episode of Learn, reflect Lead. Thank you for watching on YouTube or listening via podcast. If you're interested in more, you can find
[email protected] or connect with me on LinkedIn, a Romano leadership. If you like this episode, please share it with your friends. Subscribe and leave a review. I'm Oscar Romano. Until next time.
