Industry Confidential

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In this issue, our guest writer discusses the subject of 2022 management trends.

Efficient leadership is complicated. Sinking into bad habits and developing a toxic work environment can be hard to prevent. Adapting to delegate and trust a team are the cornerstones of attaining efficient leadership. Without these foundational pieces, managers can trap themselves in scenarios of micromanagement. More and more, we continue to see micromanagement exist and burnout employees. We as an industry need to continue developing our management skills around empowerment and delegation.

Managers that do not delegate efficiently inadvertently tend to micromanage. Those that delegate with skill allows their employees to sharpen their skillset. You can take baby steps to accomplish this. Over time, trusting your more ambitious employees will motivate them to perform well and help build a more cooperative daily work environment.

Setting clear expectations from the beginning can position your employees for success. The more direct you are about the vision, the easier it will be for your team to grasp and execute. We can fall into the micromanaging trap as we sometimes believe we are the best to accomplish the end game. The manager often performs the tasks because they have delegated your desired outcome, not how to achieve it.

Dive into the company culture. Successful, followed leaders focus their attention on managing corporate culture more than managing their employees. Micromanagement can be eliminated if an organization dives into its culture. If you are genuinely emphasizing your organization’s values, you will possess little time to micromanage your team’s actions. When employees witness the actions taken by upper management to build influential company culture, they are more optimistic about their work and profession and motivated to accomplish their various assignments.

Transfer responsibility. Winning the micromanagement battle is hard, especially reassigning the typical duties and tasks you would perform. Placing trust in a specific employee or department with additional responsibilities and tasks will lead to more cooperation and creativity as they rise to the occasion. Once providing the overall outline, project lifecycle, strategies, and pitfalls from the get-go, step back and allow your team to perform. Be available for questions, provide context, and give insight and feedback when sought out, but remember to aim for leadership rather than managing.

Showcase trust. Lack of trust is the leading cause of a leader who micromanages. We can all speculate on where a manager’s lack of confidence originates. Creating an atmosphere of trust at your organization will energize your employees to become self-sufficient and enhance growth. Try new methods of placing trust on your team, as this is a great, ongoing way to challenge yourself as a leader to delegate effectively. You likely hired them and did so for a reason, so allow them to perform in a way you were confident they could at the time you hired them.