DEV Community

Sean Massa for Latticeworks

Posted on

Delegating when only you can do the work

by Trek and Sean


Leaders often end up in the situation where they accumulated more responsibilities then they can execute alone. Delegation is the answer, but you can't just had someone a new task and expect them to succeed.

How do you delegate when only you can do the work?

There are three steps to this no longer being your problem.

Drive Collaboration: The first step of delegation is collaboration. Identify a team member who you want to be able to do this task. Ask them to help you complete the task. The goal here is to get them comfortable understanding what you are doing and how you do it.

Navigate Collaboration: After the team member has a handle on the task, have them do the task while you assist. You are still there to make sure it's done properly, but make sure they are the one actually doing the work.

Delegate Execution: After the team member can handle the task without your help, delegate it!

You are still (probably) responsible for this task being completed, but not for executing it.


If you want to hear more about this and related topics, sign up for our newsletter! We will never sell your information. We send ~1 email per week.

Top comments (0)