Management Rules: 50 New Rules for Managers

CHAPTER 9

HOW TO DELEGATE

Some bosses think that they delegate well when they delegate all the routine rubbish and keep all the interesting work to themselves. These bosses also tend to be very good at delegating the blame when things go wrong.

Clearly, there is an art to delegating well. The principles are simple enough.

• Be clear about the objectives. Don’t just ask for a report on the market. That could mean anything of any length. Start by being clear about why you need the report: if it is for the CEO, then that is different from an informal briefing for the team. Then specify the detail. You would not ask a builder to “build a house”: you ...