“Learn to Delegate”
Skips Asking Whether Each Person Wants the Work.

Earlier in my career, I took over a team as its new leader. I could see what each person was capable of. I could not see how much each of them wanted the work, or how sure they felt about it.

The managers who had led them knew how each person felt about the work. That knowledge did not come with the team, so I assumed the best. I handed out the work as if every one of them wanted it and felt ready for it. That team taught me never to assume how much someone wants the work.

Leaders are told to learn to delegate, and it is good advice. You stop being the bottleneck every decision waits on, and your people grow by taking on real work.

Most leaders hear “learn to delegate” as “hand off tasks.” When you hand off a task, you keep the decisions that are part of the work. When you hand off a responsibility, the person makes those decisions.

Often a leader hands off work without saying whether it is a task or a responsibility. The person then has to work out alone which decisions they can make. Working that out is cognitive load: mental effort they spend before they can start the work itself. I built my Decision Charter so that an organization says who makes each decision, at multiple levels.

As people grow, what I hand them moves from tasks to responsibilities. To choose between the two, I judge the person’s skill and will for the work in front of them. In The Tao of Coaching (1996), Max Landsberg asks leaders to judge both, one piece of work at a time.

Skill shows in a person’s work. Will does not, so a leader has to identify it. Many leaders identify will by feel. I call that emotional intuition, and leaders often take it for emotional intelligence.

When I say emotional intelligence, I mean asking the person how they feel and listening to the answer. Emotional intuition works when someone’s feelings show the way you expect. When someone’s feelings do not show that way, you can misread them and never find out. That is why I keep the two apart.

I am autistic, and my own feelings often do not show the way people expect. So before I hand someone a piece of work, I ask them how they feel about it.

Here is the handoff in three lines you can write down or say:

What they can already do on this piece of work.

How they feel about taking it on. Ask before you share your own view of the work: “How do you feel about taking this on?”

The handoff, said one of two ways. If they cannot do it yet, make it a task in small pieces they can finish well, and say: “This is a task. Here is what done looks like, and when I will check in.” If they can do it and want the decisions, say: “This is yours. These decisions are yours to make, and here is what to bring back.”

Say you are handing next quarter’s customer survey to the most experienced person on your team:

An honest answer about how someone feels takes trust and time. I earn that trust by asking the question and respecting the answer, over and over. On my teams, people can tell me how they feel about a piece of work. Nobody is embarrassed or pushed aside for saying something I did not hope to hear.

In my experience, people who know I care about them want to do the work well. They feel valued, and they come to care about the work.

I am about to hand the piece of work below to someone on my team. List the steps it takes, in order. Mark each step that holds a decision someone has to make, and say what that decision is. Then draft the handoff two ways. As a task, say what done looks like and when I will check in. As a responsibility, say which decisions are the person’s and what they should bring back to me. Next, draft one question I can ask the person about how they feel about taking it on. Word the question so the person cannot tell what answer I hope for. Do not rate or guess at what the person can do or how they feel, and do not choose a version for me. End with any step where you could not tell whether it holds a decision, so I can look at it myself. The work: [paste here]