Providing coaching and support

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If the person you’ve delegated to wants support, a way you can help them accelerate their learning and complete the tasks faster is by initially increasing the level of interaction between you and them at the start of the task, when they are setting an approach for completing it. By inputting early and often on their approach, it should mean less potential for missing objectives and less re-work required later on.

If they approach you for assistance then it’s important to avoid "upward delegation”. If there’s a problem that needs fixing, or a challenge they can’t yet overcome, don't permit them to shift responsibility for completing the task back to you. Guide them on how they can do it instead of simply taking it back off of them.

An effective way of guiding them is by indirect coaching through the use of open questions such as:

However, if they seem able to complete the task but appear to be lacking drive then you need to help build their motivation and commitment:

Your activity for today is to reach out to the person you’ve delegated to and offer them support if they need it.

Checking in

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Even though you have now delegated your task to someone else, it’s important to recognise that since it originated with you, that you retain overall accountability for its successful completion.

When it comes to taking accountability, you’ll want to take a balanced approach. On one end of the scale, you don’t want to totally abandon the task or the person you’ve delegated it to. Equally, you want to avoid micro-managing the person.

If you regularly check-in with the person that you’ve delegated to, you can ask them for feedback not only on how things are going with the task and whether they require support but also, you can ask them for feedback on how they feel about your interactions and this can help guide you.

Your activity for today is to spend a few minutes preparing a proposed schedule for checking-in with the person you’ve delegated to, then finding a time to meet with them:

Handing it over

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Delegating a task tends to be a bit of a balancing act. If you offer too little guidance or clarity, it makes it harder for them to successfully complete the task. Telling someone to do something and then just walking away, leaving them to get on with it is delegating… it just often tends to be ineffective because of the lack of oversight and support.

However, too much guidance and instruction can come across as painful micromanaging - one of the least wanted traits in a leader. So you want to try and strike a balance between the two; asserting the right information and asking the right questions.

Try to arrange the handover as early as you can - that way, the other person has as much time as possible to prepare for and complete the task, reducing the pressure on them.

Your activity for today is to spend a few minutes preparing for your handover meeting and then meet up to delegate the task:

By using questions instead of directing what you think they should do, you can create a dialogue and build a stronger rapport, as well as their confidence and sense of ownership.

Defining the task

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Before you can fully handover ownership of this task, it’s crucial to properly define it first. That way, you can properly align with the person you’re delegating to and ensure you both understand it the same way.

Your activity for today is to spend no more than 5-10 minutes forming a perspective on your task definition. Try and outline its:

Choosing whom you should delegate to

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When you delegate, you’re transferring responsibility for completing the task to someone else, as well as the authority to get it done.

To ensure this person fully takes on that responsibility though, they’ll need to feel that they have ownership of the task, which is a problem if you try delegating the task to more than one person. So always task to an individual and not a group.

Your activity for today is to spend 5-10 minutes reviewing who you should delegate the chosen task to. Consider:

There isn’t normally a perfect answer for who you should delegate to but you want to strike enough of a balance across all of these considerations to make you and them feel comfortable that delegating this task to them makes sense.

Identifying what you should delegate

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Delegating can be hard because we want to hold onto control, ensuring things stay at their best. Try and shift your mindset to one where you’re ready to let go. If you can’t release control and be prepared to accept some uncertainty, then it will be hard to delegate effectively.

As such, you might want to start small for now, selecting a task that you’re more ready to let go off.

Your activity for today is to spend 5 minutes reviewing your list in order to choose a task to delegate for the next 2 weeks. Prioritise tasks for delegation when:

Why you should delegate more

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Over this series we’ll run through some steps you can take to make delegating easier and more successful, such as; how to identify what to delegate, how to choose the right person to delegate to, how to set them up for success, and how to manage them throughout the task.

Your activity for today is to spend 5 minutes considering what tasks you have to delegate that:

Write down your options in a list.

Preparing for your delivery

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The best deliveries are prepared deliveries and that means practising - you should always build in sufficient time to practice before doing it for real.

You can practice by yourself, which can uncover opportunities for further refinements, increase your confidence and smoothen your delivery but practising by yourself is of limited value compared with presenting to somebody else.

If you can find someone to practice with, ideally someone of similar experience and knowledge as the audience on the relevant matters, then you can extract even more value from the practice.

If they can highlight the most impactful and least impactful aspects of your presentation, whether that be the messages or how they are delivered, it can help you decide what changes, if any, you want to make before going into the real thing.

The added stress of practising in front of other people will help better prepare you for the real thing too.

Your activity for today is to find someone to practice your presentation on and receive feedback.

Which brings us to the end of our series on storylining. It will become easier and you’ll get better at it the more you practice and always remember to GAME it out. Best of luck.

Expressing your storyline

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Stories can be communicated in a variety of forms, such as:

It’s crucial to determine not only the best way to express your entire story but also how to express each individual message - some messages may be better said out loud whereas others may be better communicated with a visual.

And when you’re determining the medium you wish to use to express your story, you need to consider not only the messages but also your own style and most importantly, the audience - you need to determine what your audience requires and express your story accordingly.

Your task for today is to spend 5 minutes considering how to express your story and then start putting it into place, writing up your report or speaker notes, creating your visuals or props, whatever it may be.

Refining your Messages

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The best storylines tend to have more than one person crafting them.

It’s best not to spend too long working on a storyline by yourself before you take it to someone else - someone who knows the situation and the topic - and ask them to review it and give you feedback. They can offer you a new perspective.

You want to take their feedback, ensure you understand it fully, consider it openly, and only then iterate your storyline as you see fit.

Spend 10 minutes identifying someone who can review your storyline for you and offer you feedback. Then tomorrow, or once they have provided you with the feedback, take some time to consider it and iterate your storyline.