The Manager's Handbook

12Delegating

The really expert riders of horses let the horse know immediately who is in control, but then guide the horse with loose reins and seldom use the spurs.

—Sandra Day O'Connor, former Supreme Court justice

In the developing world, dirt floors are a major source of disease. Pathogens survive in the soil, and dust is a principal cause of respiratory disease. Gayatri Datar was determined to change this. By experimenting with the mud from a dried‐out lake near Stanford, she and a team of classmates discovered a coating process that seals an earthen floor for a fraction of the price of concrete. She was on her way to changing the lives of a billion people.

Gayatri moved to Rwanda and started EarthEnable, a social enterprise that installs healthy and affordable floors. For two years she made progress by working as many hours as she could. Mistaking delegation for lightening her own workload, she passed along some of her work to others, but when something was not done to her satisfaction, she'd often take it back and do it herself.

Unsurprisingly, EarthEnable's growth stalled. They missed their targets because her management methods were not scalable. There was only one Gayatri, and if EarthEnable had any hope of reaching millions of vulnerable families, she needed to fundamentally change her leadership style. Calling me from her home in Rwanda, she said:

At first, I was the driver. I was the mason scheduler. I was the varnish maker and installer. I built all aspects ...