Delegation

Good managers delegate effectively. In doing so they negotiate some sort of compromise between the extreme of “abdication”—letting subordinates decide everything—and “autocratic management”—doing everything themselves. We have found the leadership model useful for managers as they delegate work to their subordinates. After exposure to the model, managers are often likely to be more explicit about the informational and decision authority requirements of a delegated task. For example, the project manager might say to his subordinate: “Get the information that you need from my files and also check with Marketing (information). You make the decision yourself (decision authority), but notify me in writing as soon as you have made it so that I am kept informed.”

Thus the subordinate understands both the information and decision authority aspects of the delegated tasks. Delegation often fails when the communication is unclear on either or both of these dimensions.