Delegating

Push decision-making to the front lines

November 17, 2014
Many leaders urge employees to take responsibility and make smart decisions. But some leaders interfere by insisting on signing off on those decisions. By delegating well, you can push decision-­making down to the rank-and-file.

Stay on track during your workday

August 7, 2014

Time doesn’t organize itself. That’s your job. To squeeze the most out of every minute, scrutinize your workday. Follow these guidelines.

Donny Deutsch: The disappearing boss

September 12, 2013
Advertising executive and TV personality Donny Deutsch sums up the secret of leadership in 10 words: You need to be comfortable enough not to be needed.

Learn to empower others

April 3, 2013
Top executives often take up hobbies such as golf and sailing. But Mark Hellerstein is probably the only CEO who is also a professional ventriloquist. Hellerstein served as chief executive of St. Mary Land & Exploration Co. from 1995 to 2007. During that time, the oil and gas firm—now known as SM Energy Co.—grew from an $80 million private company to a $2.5 billion public company.

A leadership lesson, set to Mendelssohn

November 14, 2012

When Maestro Wolfgang Heinzel stands before the Merck Orchestra, he may look like an authoritarian leader, commanding musicians from his podium. But Heinzel doesn’t actually know how to play the instruments himself—“in the same way a leader in an organization can’t do everyone’s job,” says Jon Chilingerian. Here is what maestros—and good leaders—understand.

The 5 levels of delegation

November 18, 2010
As a leader, are you making it clear which level of authority you are conferring when you delegate a task? Keep these five very different levels of delegation in mind, says Michael Hyatt, chairman and CEO of Thomas Nelson Publishers:

New leaders: Hire right and delegate

September 13, 2010

Melissa Dyrdahl, a former executive at Adobe, sums up pretty well the essence of taking on a leadership role: You get rewarded in a company by doing your job really well. But when you get promoted into management, you have to stop being the doer and start being the leader. For some people, that is a difficult transition …

Are you missing the ‘Why’?

May 17, 2010

You’re frustrated. You carefully explained what needed to be done, in detail, gave the deadline and even suggested interim deadlines. Yet, the result was underwhelming. What happened? You answered four questions for your team: Who? What? When? and How? But you didn’t say Why.

GM CEO creating a new generation

May 17, 2010
In updating General Motors’ plodding company culture, CEO Edward E. Whitacre Jr. is trying to make the company more nimble—in a makeover akin to converting a family wagon into a Corvette.

Delegating while managing risk

April 12, 2010
In a recent group coaching session, we were talking about the challenge of delegating actions and decisions to your team while still keeping yourself informed of things that could put either your organization or career at risk. Here are some of the ideas we came up with on that front: