personnel perspectives
Delegation:
Responsibility and Authority
I was approached by a
very small company that was trying to
reorganize itself into a more efficient
organization. The request for help came
from the office manager, John, who was
promoted to his position in order to
reshape the company. The company
consisted of 25 people, and John was
in charge of them all. After months of
conducting business the same old way,
John was overwhelmed. He didn’t know
how to break the cycle of incompetence
evident in the organization.
Neither John nor his staff had definitive
and reachable goals. People in the
company did the best they could under
chaotic conditions. Lines of authority and
responsibility were blurred; morale was
low and turnover high.
During an average day, John filled in for
staff who didn’t show up for work, served
as the contact point for vendors, and ran
the numbers because the accounting was
outsourced. He settled staff difficulties
and dealt with customers. His health was
jeopardized by the chaotic state of this
business, which had him wearing as
many hats as there were jobs.
John began to see that he would have
to learn to delegate authority and respon-
sibility if he and the business were to
survive. To do this, he had to reorganize
the staff into departments with people in
charge. People had to be given responsibil-
ity and accompanying authority. It was
impossible for him to supervise 25 people
directly, and he could not make all the
decisions.
John was inventive, eager to learn, and
had the ability to talk with people in a
non-threatening manner. He knew how to
6 Industrial Management
enlist them in this enterprise and rally them
to change. Everyone joined in the effort to
straighten things out. The payoff for them
would be clearer lines of authority, more
individual responsibility, and a calmer
structure. If all this could be accomplished,
morale would be given a big boost.
But this would not come easily. The
owner proved to be a formidable barrier
to change. He mirrored what was wrong
with the company: The power was in
one person’s hands, preventing delegation.
While he ostensibly gave John the respon-
sibility to shape up the organization, the
owner was reluctant to give up power.
He constantly interfered with the decision-
making process. With this realization,
however, and after several months of
stalemates, John decided to confront the
owner about how he was weakening
John’s authority and preventing change.
John approached the owner with the
same non-threatening style he used with
employees. After their discussion, John
decided to keep the owner in the loop
only when necessary.
After a few months, things began to
move. The owner, seeing how much more
efficiently things were being done and
realizing how much time he had to devote
to things other than the day-to-day opera-
tions, proved to be less of a barrier in the
change process.
As things progressed, John discovered
he was not needed all the time, that peo-
ple knew how to run things without him
and were taking appropriate responsibility
to do so. The business was finally running
smoothly; people were becoming more
effective in their new roles.
John was satisfied with what he had
BY EILEEN L. BERMAN
accomplished, but a new kind of stress
arose: He was struggling with being
displaced.
As power and control shifted, John real-
ized that giving up power left him feeling
empty. “You get everything organized so
that no one person is in control and you
miss being the focal point of attention,”
John said. “I never thought I would feel
this way. On the one hand I’m thrilled
that I’m not being run ragged with all the
demands of this place, and on the other
I miss the attention and the power. I kind
of feel extraneous.”
This pretty well sums up why delegation
of responsibility and authority is one of the
most difficult feats to accomplish. No one
wants to feel redundant. Yet, in order
to manage effectively, you need to
delegate responsibly. No one person
should be irreplaceable. That’s how
an organization flows. No matter the
size or kind of company, it must be
run by responsible employees who
understand what their jobs entail and
Delegation of what their goals are. They need to report
responsibility to supervisors whether they are accom-
and authority is plishing their goals, and they need to be
one of the most directed in their efforts by those supervi-
difficult feats to sors. In this way, companies flourish as the
accomplish employees feel a sense of significance and
because no one meaning in their roles. In other words, they
wants to feel become the company.
redundant.
Eileen Berman, Ed.D., is a practicing
psychologist and consultant in Rhode
Island. She is also the author of two
books, Dealing Effectively with Job Loss
and Building Productivity. E-mail her at
eileen22@juno.com with comments
or suggestions.