Delegation In Supervision

Delegation in Supervision

There are many responsibilities to being a supervisor. Delegation happens to be one big responsibility and obligation that needs to be handled appropriately in order for the supervisor and the company to be successful. The proper delegation of duties is a work of art and can be done either in the aspect of soft or hard delegation. Two issues that should be delegated by a supervisor are recording and stocking incoming shipments and handling small issues such as malfunctioning facilities.

For a manager, the moment to delegate is when another individual or an outside organization can do a job cheaper, quicker, or in an enhanced manner than the manager can do it him or her self. Keeping the principle of delegating jobs to the right people always leads towards effective delegation. Successful managers are very vigilant about the subordinates they choose to perform a given assignment. Reverse delegation is when a manager delegates an assignment or job to a subordinate and in the end the manager winds up completing it oneself. According to Conger and Pearce (2003) reverse delegation is suitable if a subordinate is deficient in the time or capability to appropriately perform the task.

Being the manager usually means that more expertise is involved and a greater level of knowledge than subordinates. Delegating tasks is important not as an offload of those that are undesirable but those that will allow for a more effective use of time. There are a number of assignments that can be easily delegated such as those that are repetitive, routine, require certain skills, and/or more suitable for another team member. Delegation also helps to improve the performance of subordinates while at the same time freeing up time for managerial tasks that are unable to be passed down the chain of command. By leading and controlling the assignment of new tasks or those of which the employee is inexperienced at performing through supervision and appraisals as well as training programs a level of comfort develops within the team as well as a large amount of growth. Giving subordinates the freedom and authority to complete tasks in their own way, of course with some set guidelines, confidence in the employee is demonstrated by the manager.

It truly takes a well-developed, skillful manager and a "leap of faith" to realize that other individuals may also have similar or even superior abilities while also maintaining a sense of pride and commitment to ensuring that required contributions are made for the betterment of the organization. For this reason, it is important that employees are given authority to act along with the duties and responsibilities that have been handed down. The leader must trust that things will work out. Whenever a manager is only paying lip service to delegation, however, people are quick to see that the deeds don't match the words. In these cases, subordinates without an appropriate amount of faith on behalf of their manager will in a sense give up and wait for a call to act rather than take initiative to perform in the future.

This primarily means that tasks like customer relations