Fresh Focus On Productivity!™

Welcome back!

As a former manager in the retail industry (check my “About” page for more on this), I can attest to the fact that this is a VERY (almost the “most” important”) step in being productive. There can be a few things that you can do to finesse the delegation, so let’s go through those now.

When I was in management, I assessed people that I delegated to a bit more unusual than your average person. When you think about delegating to someone, you automatically think to delegate to the person that has the best skill set for the job,don’t you? I know that I did for a few years, until I found a better way.

I assessed people by their dedication to both me and the business in which I was.

It did not matter to me if people did not have the strongest skill set, because you know what? Skills can be LEARNED – dedication cannot. I can teach anyone anything – but I cannot teach them to be dedicated and true to me and the business. That’s either something that you have or something that you don’t. More times than not, when you take a chance on a person that has been very dedicated and loyal to you, they will realize and know that they may not have been the best person for the position based on their skills, so they will work that much harder to get the job done, and learn quickly.

I can remember one person on which I took this approach. I promoted her to a shift leader. She was an older woman (I don’t think that she graduated high school) and gave excellent customer service to the customers. She was also liked by the crew. When I approached her about taking the position, to voiced her concerns to me several times: she had difficulty in counting money. I told her repeatedly that I could teach her hw to count money, and that I would be very patient with her and make sure that she fully understood things. She did eventually get the hang of the duties that were required in the position and made an excellent shift leader.

So when you delegate, whether you work for a business or work for yourself, remember that delegating is viewed by most as a show of your trust and respect.

If the person to which you delegate to throws a fit and complains about how much other work that they have to do, how well do you think that the task you’ve delegated will get done? It will be done quickly and thrown together and most likely the outcome will be crap.

When choosing a person who’s skill set is not strong, remember that there will be some training time involved by you to get them up to speed with how you’d like things done. While there is always a learning curve with a person, your choice will vary with how much is needed. But I can tell you this: there is no replacement for dedication. Dedication: look for it first. You can teach the skills along the way.

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