Empower > Delegate

I need to delegate more. This phrase gets mentioned by almost all of my executive clients. I know what they are thinking and understand their intention. These are busy people who often bite off more than they can chew. Delegation is needed so that they can keep the main thing the main thing. However, I often challenge them to think beyond delegating and instead focus on empowerment.
Here’s why:

Empowerment is about finding people who can do a task better than you can. We all have weaknesses. Ideally, we surround ourselves with people who are actually better at certain tasks than we are. Even if people aren’t necessarily better at certain tasks than us, empowerment can birth autonomy. When humans have autonomy, they gain more fulfillment out of their job, and will in turn be more likely to produce. Empowerment is essential to developing people. However, delegation often stifles growth. Delegations is telling someone they have to do something because you don’t want to. It’s not done with the other person in mind and is simply an attempt to get things off our plate.

I am not suggesting that delegation isn’t needed at times. It is. And all of us need to be intentional about what we spend time on and what we outsource. But if you are leading a team and want the team to function as highly as possible, then focusing more on empowerment than delegation will create a competitive advantage for you and your team.

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