Making Yourself Redundant

Some thoughts on succession planning to reduce bottlenecks. Pointers on how to grow team members to eventually replace you by giving them stretch tasks to challenge them.

Transcript

1. Making Yourself Redundant Or, How To Stop Being The Bottleneck On Every Little Thing
3. I can't do it all
4. We need more of me (No loud disagreement please)
5. Picking the right thing to delegate
6. Keep tabs on where you actually spend your time
7. Identify stretch tasks and normal delegate tasks
8. Pick something you'd normally feel like you have to do
9. Something that's not on fire right now
10. Something where there's still slack to work with if it fails
11. Picking the right person
12. Pick someone who could probably do it if you helped them
13. Someone who would learn something from it
14. Someone who could one day be doing your job
15. Someone who wants to develop themselves
16. Letting them grow into the challenge
17. Set goals for what you want achieved
18. Give a 'starter for ten' [Training wheels option]
19. Don't help them - yet - but let them know they can have help
20. Check in to see if they're progressing or drowning
21. If they succeed, give thanks and feedback
22. If they fail, give feedback
23. Don't give out something that can't fail
24. Pick more than one person
25. Talk to them about how you're doing this
26. Reiterate that they will be supported
27. Know when you're growing your replacements and when you're just delegating
28. Regular delegation is fine too
29. Making better use of your time is good, but they're not going to learn as much from it
30. Setting an example
31. "You're empowered, just change everything already"
32. People don't believe this until they see examples they can follow - that's where it rests on us
33. Bring people into things they'd not normally see or do and next time they may step up and ask