We can think of different approaches to delegation as sitting on a continuum between delegating tasks and delegating responsibility.

Being stuck at the delegating task end of the continuum we become a bottleneck, slowing down process as people wait for us to give them instructions. 

We haven’t empowered our team, instead we have taught them to wait for instructions. This is often described as ‘gopher’ delegation because you tell people to ‘go for’ this or that. 

Delegating responsibility for a task hands it over to a trusted team member to achieve the desired outcome. If you have confidence that your team member will undertake the task successfully you don’t need to worry about it anymore. You remove it from your cognitive bandwidth allowing you to increase your focus on other things. There are three steps to the process:

• Identifying the right people for the right task

• Briefing effectively

• Governance, or closing the circle.

There is an important principle to mention here. When you delegate, you are always accountable. A failure in a delegated task will be because you may have not identified the right person for the task or you haven’t briefed them effectively. If they go outside their level of authority, you may not have set effective boundaries for them or you don’t have a good governance process that identifies this.