The hardest skill, I believe, for a new manager, is the skill NOT to micromanage.
Congratulations, you’ve been promoted, typically because you have been great at what you did. And now you probably have several people working for you, that you know are worse than you in your previous role. The temptation- I was tempted- was to actively take over what they are all doing and to ensure their performance meets your previous standards by micro-managing.
Micro-managing is really easy- find people who are loyal and will do exactly as you tell them. Get them into your office every morning to ask them what they’ve done and for you to instruct them what they should do that day. You have a potentially great result, but you are doing all the work.
The other extreme is over-delegation. OK, you were great in your previous role, you probably felt that all the Boss needed to do was leave you to it and all would be well. For skilled self-motivated people who become managers there is an opposite temptation from micro-managing and that’s over-delegation, where you let the team manage themselves without guidance or oversight.
Micromanaging, though, tends to be the bigger problem.
So, how to avoid micromanaging?
Here’s how Ray Dalio of Bridgewater Partners looks at micromanaging as distinct from effective leadership.
- Micromanaging is telling the people who work for you exactly what tasks to do and/or doing their tasks for them.
- Not managing is having them do their jobs without your oversight and involvement.
- Managing means: 1) understanding how well your people and designs are operating to achieve your goals, and 2) constantly improving them. To be successful, you need to manage.
The implication of this is to ensure you hire people who share your and the companies values and vision so that you can work alongside them rather than domineering over them.
To develop your team members you need to have close contact with them in a work environment so that you can assess their strengths and weaknesses as they are doing their jobs. They need to be given some leeway so that they are able to learn through some trial and error. With time, you will be able to decide what they can and can’t effectively handle on their own, before you delegate bigger, more important tasks and projects to them.
Dalio also highlights that another symptom of micromanagement is treating problems that arise in your team on a “task-by-task” basis. That is, if your employee’s output doesn’t meet your expectation instead of just focusing on the problem associated with the poorly performed task, then you should consider from a holistic learning perspective, not just the task performance but step back and assess the thinking and action process they went through. Discuss with your team member what the problem is caused by, whether it’s a bad work habit or a misunderstanding of team goals; their lack of know-how or lack of motivation. There’s less of a chance a similar problem will arise in a similar form if you can get your employees to recognize how they need to change their work style or work behaviour.
Ultimately, the key to avoiding micromanaging is choosing to engage in communication rather than just issue an order. And by ensuring people are coached on their performance and as a result are able to improve.
