Empowerment: Are you a micro manager?

By Rick Johnson -- Industrial Distribution, 8/7/2008 8:18:00 AM

I deal with a lot of leaders that confuse delegation with empowerment. I am often told, “I don’t micro manage, I empower my employees.”

However, when we start digging into specific situations, we often uncover the difference between delegation and empowerment. It is really not that difficult to ascertain the difference.

Delegation is simply getting someone else to perform a specific task for you: “Tom, can you move these four pallets for me to make some room for a new shipment coming in tomorrow?”

Empowerment sets a little higher expectation that encourages the employee to use their own creativity and innovation: “Tom, our warehouse is getting pretty full and we have a new shipment coming in. Can you figure a way to solve this problem for me?”

In other words, just telling an employee what to do is not empowerment because it doesn’t allow him to use his own creativity. In fact, many times delegation can be construed as micro managing simply because the employee feels offended that he is given directions that are too specific.

If you even have the slightest thought that your employees may consider you a micro manager, try the following tips and see if your empowerment skills improve.

Analyze your leadership model. Do you hold things close to the vest? Are you reluctant to share information? Are you afraid of giving up control? If you answered yes to any of these questions, you have a challenge on your hands. Your answers may be very telling with regard to your skills as a leader.

Create a skills assessment inventory for every key employee. Supplement that exercise by creating a training and development matrix to improve the overall competency of the organization. Include yourself in the assessment. Communicate the purpose in a positive fashion to the employees.

Utilize your skills assessment. Make sure you have the right people in the right seats and identify future potential leadership.

Stop answering questions and start asking them. When an employee asks you what they should do, ask them what they think they should do.

Let your employees fail. The hardest thing to do is watch an employee make a mistake. But unless the mistake is life-threatening or is going to cost the company thousands of dollars, it is a better learning process if the employee learns from his own mistake.

Provide more than just skill training and product training. Create an employee development program for those employees that show potential for future stardom. This development program must be based on empowering these employees to make tough decisions.

Results happen in various ways. Remember, you may have a specific way of doing things but it may not be the only way. As long as the employee is getting the results expected, give him praise. Your way may not be the best or only way.

Don’t limit innovation
Micro managing may make you feel in control but in reality you are only hurting yourself and the company. It only limits an employee’s ability to be innovative and creative. This can cost the company thousands of dollars because it is the creativity and innovation of your employees that maximizes the profitability of your company.

Leadership is about trust. The easiest way to suppress energy is a style of micro management that scrutinizes every decision an employee makes. It can kill their spirit. If any of your employees even joke about you being a micro manager—back off. Where there is smoke there is usually fire.

Micro management is often just a symptom of ineffective planning, too much compassion and the inability to judge performance and develop bench strength. Developing a strategic plan for your company is a very effective way to address any or all of these challenges.

I often tell my clients that the most valuable part of a strategic plan is the development process itself. Running a company with a shoot-from-the-hip mentality often encourages micro management and does not allow employees to develop their skills and maximize their potential.

One of the many warning signs is a high turnover rate. The reason is simple: Good employees just won’t tolerate micro management and they will leave to find employment that will challenge them and help them grow.

Simply put, effective leaders don’t micro manage. In fact, they cringe at the thought of it. Why? Because they recognize that one of their primary responsibilities is the development of future leaders for the organization. You can’t develop future leaders by micro managing.

Micro managing can be an indication of the following: 

• Lack of trust in your employees. This is not good because it often leads to a lack of trust in you as a leader. 
• Fear of lost control. This is often demonstrated by a parochial attitude about turf or position in the organization. This may also indicate a lack of self-confidence and low self-esteem. 
• Panic response to emergency and crisis. The micro manager often feels alone on an island, and when a crisis hits they may panic and respond reactively without much thought, planning or discussion.

Employee development is a key principle for success. You can have the best sales plan, an excellent service and operational plan, but if you ignore employee development through effective leadership, your success will be limited.

Rick Johnson is the founder of CEO Strategist LLC. Contact him at rick@ceostrategist.com or visit www.ceostrategist.com.