Monitoring of Performance of an Individual. The act of delegating is not the act of abdicating. Individually and collectively, you are still responsible for the results obtained by the team members.
It depends on the task and the individuals involved to what extent and how you should monitor performance. Inexperienced individuals or teams may need to monitor their performance attentively at first if they are asked to perform a task they are unfamiliar with.
Informally watching progress is better, however, the sooner you can do so,. You should be confident that the individual or team will deliver the results you want without excessive supervision. Exception reports may be requested only periodically in such cases. Set target dates for specific tasks or projects, and keep a note of them in your diary to ensure they are met.
Do not allow people to become careless when it comes to meeting deadlines. Reporting on progress and exceptions and agreeing on any necessary corrective action should be done without becoming oppressive. People should be able to act without reference to you to the extent that you give them authority. In this case, they should expect criticism if they go beyond their brief or do not keep you informed. It’s not okay to keep you in the dark, and you don’t want any surprises. Keep your hands off the work unnecessarily, so as not to interfere. It’s all about the results in the end.
When things are about to go off the rails, it is essential for you to step in. Overspending, rash decisions, and disregarding defined and reasonable constraints must be prevented. In order to have freedom of movement and freedom of expression for people, a delicate balance has to be struck between hedging them with restrictions, which may seem petty, but still allowing them to do what they want. As a result, strict guidelines cannot be used to assess this equilibrium.
People management is more of an art than a science. Based on your understanding of the people involved and the situation, you should at least have some sense of what is appropriate. A judgement call must be made based on facts, but it must be based on an understanding of them. Delegators who know their team members’ strengths and weaknesses, as well as the circumstances in which they operate, are the best. The most important thing is to avoid ‘river banking’.
In this case, the boss assigns a task that is more or less impossible for the subordinate to accomplish. In a remote and safe position on the river bank, the boss observes the subordinate going down for the third time, saying: ‘It’s easy, you just need a bit more effort.’
Originally posted 2022-12-14 08:07:06.