Give Up Power to Lead the Team - Part 2
From the Voices on Project Management Blog
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Voices on Project Management offers insights, tips, advice and personal stories from project managers in different regions and industries. The goal is to get you thinking, and spark a discussion. So, if you read something that you agree with--or even disagree with--leave a comment.
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Date
In my last post, I discussed how powers of position—legitimate power, the power to penalize and the power to reward—don’t create a productive environment. To continue the discussion, I’d like to look at how to turn over powers to team members to create more productive environments.
1. Delegate work: This is the first step toward releasing power. Delegating creates opportunities for us to entrust powers to team members. However, be cautious of downloading—searching for candidates to do work simply because we’re overloaded. Delegating is more strategic. It involves identifying the right work to delegate, finding potential in the team, assessing skills gaps, preparing a plan, providing training and then sparing time to support.
2. Take risks: Even if we delegate, the accountability for work still lies with us and we are answerable to their faults. In fact, giving work and power to team members is filled with risks. However it has its own rewards. Taking risks is essential to provide opportunities to team members, grow their capabilities and create a productive environment. We can mitigate the risks with better planning, by assessing skills gaps and by preparing a response plan. Reviewing and supporting the team members during execution is an important part of risk mitigation.
3. Be an enabler: Acting as enabler is the most powerful practice to entrust our power to the team. It means we are no longer only an actor, doing the work, but also a resource to our team members. An enabler provides direction to team members, coaches them to take new steps, enhances team members’ skills and lets them face challenges. He or she helps teams find the solutions rather than providing a readymade one.
Enabling also means providing praise and constructive feedback regularly—or even sometimes in the moment.
4. Empower: When we become a resource for our team we stop executing our formal powers because it was the manager who had these powers. One of those powers we are giving up is the power of making decisions. Empowering team members to make decisions requires patience. We shouldn’t panic and start acting like a manager to see quicker results. These moments are tests of our trust in our people. Instead, go back to the enabler mindset—explain the circumstances, suggest options and describe the benefits of finding a final or intermediate decision within a given timeframe.
By turning over these powers to our team members, we not only show our trust in their capabilities, but give them opportunities to enhance their career. This will surpass all the benefits of reward power. It will also generate a positive energy of ownership, collaboration and cooperation, leading to a productive environment that can never be achieved via the negative energy of legitimate or coercive powers.
I look forward to hearing your experience.
Posted
by
Vivek Prakash
on: October 14, 2016 09:41 PM |
Permalink
Comments (10)
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Karthik T
Senior Engineering Manager| Nike
Bangalore, Karnataka, India
Daniel Krompholz
Principal Maintenance Systems Specialist, Asset Management| The Port Authority of New York & New Jersey
Jamaica, Ny, United States
In addition to be an enabler, I'd also add that fostering a "flat" organization is a good thing here since they encourage collaboration and cross-pollination.
Daniel Krompholz
Principal Maintenance Systems Specialist, Asset Management| The Port Authority of New York & New Jersey
Jamaica, Ny, United States
In addition to be an enabler, I'd also add that fostering a "flat" organization is a good thing here since they encourage collaboration and cross-pollination.
Prasanna Arkadi
Mr. Prasanna Suhas Arkadi| Volkswagen India Private Limited
Pune, Maharashtra, India
Really a nice explanation for a leader to become a good leader.
Thank you for sharing this information. I could not agree more since delegating workload will make better balance in all aspects. Simple explanation and easy to understand. Once again thank you
Vivek Prakash
Founder and Chief Consultant| pmwares - Project Management Consultancy & Training
Pune, Mah., Maharashtra, India
Thank you friends for your comments.
Daniel, absolutely agree with you. Flat organization provides more ownership to team members and more opportunities for collaboration.
Mudassar Khan
Program (Project )Manager| Woodward Canada Inc
Peterborough, ON, Canada
Very Well Written and Worth Sharing :)
Good Interpertation. Articles as yours, enhavnce the knowledge of any budding project managers.
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