Delegation: The Master Manager of Time

In the previous Habit, we approached delegation from the perspective of developing people. The art of delegation, however, has multiple payoffs. Beyond growing and empowering people, delegation is a profoundly important tool for personal productivity. 

One of America's most popular seminar topics is time management. Affiliates of Leadership Management, Inc. offer one of many time management programs. It is authored by founder Paul J. Meyer. 

In his Effective Time Management course, Meyer devotes one of six weekly lessons to the time management benefits of delegating. Calling delegation the "one master strategy" for managing time effectively, he credits delegation with freeing leaders at all levels to make decisions, plan, dream, or visualize new opportunities. He also suggests that delegation requires the leader to plan the amount of freedom each subordinate should have. He breaks delegation into five levels. 

Level 1. Wait until told. This lowest level of delegation involves the worker who performs only routine activities and only when told. Assembly line workers are examples. 

Level 2. Seek direction, then approval. Workers at this level bring all matters to you for instruction excepting the routine. Work completed at this level is immediately returned to the supervisor for approval. 

Level 3. Seek approval, then act. One at this level of delegation brings problems to the supervisor with suggested solutions. The supervisor approves or disapproves the suggestions and the worker acts within this framework. 

Level 4. Act and report immediately. The employee makes the decision but informs the supervisor immediately of any action taken outside established guidelines. Any mistake can be corrected quickly before damage is done. 

Level 5. Act and report routinely. This level of delegation is reserved for competent, trained, and highly dependable people. This level requires only routine interval reporting. While initially taking the most time to set up parameters, it produces the biggest payoff in time saved by the supervisor or leader.