How to decide your level of engagement in delegated tasks?

Before we engage our team members and hand over some tasks to them it is important to figure out what kind of guidance or support they need and how much we need to engage with them. You get involved too much with them, they might feel that you are micromanaging, you get involved too little and they might feel disconnected with the task or may complain that there is no one to guide them. Both these situations are not good for long term performance for our delegation abilities.

Our involvement might be dictated by how much time we have and the nature of the task to be delegated. Not only that, the level of engagement might be different for different people even if the tasks are the same. Additionally, if tasks are the same and the subordinate’s skills to execute the task are the same, subordinate’s commitment to the tasks can also affect the outcome. Let’s consider these factors in upcoming sections.

Task and subordinate Readiness

You can decide your level of engagement with the help of the following table which describes the engagement level based on team member’s competence and confidence.

Subordinate Skill Level	Appropriate Engagement Level
Low Competence/Skills and High Commitment/Confidence	Directing (Structure, Organize, Teach, Supervise)
Some Competence/Skills and Low Commitment/Confidence	Influencing & Coaching (Be more directive and offer support)
High Competence/Skills and Low Commitment/Confidence	Supporting (Listen, facilitate, praise, participate, lead by example)
Low Competence/Skills and High Commitment/Confidence	Delegation (Turn over day to day responsibilities for decision making)

Low competence and high commitment

This is generally seen with people who are just starting their career. These teammates have almost zero experience or low competence to do a task but they are highly motivated or committed to do their job. This can also happen when people are promoted to higher positions (or they are put into a new environment) where they have high commitment but since they do not have much experience in managing the new role, hence they have low competence in that context. In this scenario we need to take the role of a coach or teacher. We need to help our teammates in organising, structuring and prioritising their tasks and supervise them to make sure they are making progress and are on the right path.

Some competence and low commitment

This situation happens when your teammates are neither skilled enough nor do they have motivation to do the task. These people generally have average or less than average performance scores when compared to other teammates. Surprisingly, there will be a large number of people falling into this category. Also, one kind of solution does not work for everyone to get them to deliver their work. Sometimes you need to invoke authority, sometimes we need to be more direct with them. Some people just need support while some will still fail to deliver even after all your earnest efforts to motivate them.

Most of the time these people require coaching to build up their competence. With proper influence and support these people can be moulded into high competence and high commitment people. On the other hand, when your efforts to teach them are not working, you might want to change the strategy and start using your official authority. You can make it clear that you want them to honour the deadlines, schedule regular checkpoints meetings with them to make them realise they are being monitored. You can listen to their excuses and nip it in the bud so they do not have anything but themselves to blame if deadlines are not delivered. Sometimes, this direct approach does have negative consequences where people feel they are being micromanaged and they tend to leave the team, which is OK, why would you like to keep a poorly performing, demotivated team member in your team anyways; especially when all your efforts to help them have failed?

High competence and low commitment

This situation generally happens when your people are skilled enough but do not feel motivated enough to do the task. Maybe they find tasks monotonous which have no challenges or maybe they are going through some hard time in personal life and are not able to focus in the office. In this situation, we need to lead by example and keep people motivated. We need to listen to their issues, help and facilitate them. We also need to do our fair share of boring tasks as well to make them realise that we are not just delegating boring, monotonous tasks to them. A little praise, a word of encouragement and recognition goes a long way.

Sometimes all your effort might go in vain and you might feel like nothing is working. Additionally, you might come across scenarios when a person who was performing well previously is now showing signs of low commitment. People with high competence and high commitment can turn into high competence and low commitment quite often. When this happens, we might have to dig deeper to find out the root cause, otherwise all your efforts to turn around this situation will bear no fruit and trying to motivate them without identifying the root cause is like treat the decease without knowing it.

High competence and high commitment

This situation generally happens with senior resources in your team. These people are highly experienced and highly motivated. They have integrity, discipline and proven track record of delivering their work in the past. These people are the leaders everyone wants in their team. Most of the time these people are either leading bigger teams or managing some departments. In this scenario we can give them sufficient authority and turn over day to day responsibilities for decision making. Although do not abandon them, schedule regular meetings with them, listen to them and work with them as a teammate.