October 16th, 2020
The key to managing people is giving them ownership.
- Instead of you planning the project, give it to the newbie.
- Instead of you writing the code, let them write it.
- Instead of you running the meeting, let them run it.
Let them get all of the credit. All of the stakes. Let them own it.
Ideally, these tasks are things you know you can do, but are out of their comfort zone.
Once they realize this ownership, they’ll do a fantastic job.
They won’t feel like they’re being told what to do, which is what all employees hate. They will feel like they have power, and volition, and freedom.
They’ll also feel challenged and fulfilled. That is what people want out of a job. If they don’t feel challenged, they will slack off or leave your company to go be challenged somewhere else.
If they do a bad job, that’s your fault. There’s a glitch in your teaching, or the systems you built.
In the event that something does goes wrong, you should never say “I’ll just do this myself”. Fix the problem with them, and learn together, along the way, so it never happens again.
By giving ownership, not only will you have a happy, productive team, but you will have less work on your own hands.
Ever met someone that’s on back to back meetings every day and must respond to hundreds of emails? They are actually bad managers! They put everything on themselves, and cannot delegate and give ownership to their team.
A manager’s job is to build more managers. “Teach a man to fish”.
If I look back on the best bosses I had, that’s how they treated me. They trusted me and let me lead. They gave me ownership, and I always ran with it.
I just went on LinkedIn and looked up these old bosses to see where they are at now. They are all now VPs, high-level execs, or started very successful companies.