Delegation, Responsibilities, Authority And Accountability

As mentioned in this module’s introduction, managers should not attempt to carry out all tasks themselves. One of a manager’s most important tasks is to delegate, or put in other words distribute tasks evenly across his/her area of responsibility. Therefore if each level of management mentioned in the previous section, delegates well, responsibilities would be well distributed across the organisation, put simply, everybody would have a job to do!

If management can be defined as a set of skills for achieving results through people, then all levels of managers should delegate.

Click here to view a video that explains what delegation is.

Delegation can be defined as: ...entrusting another with the appropriate responsibility and authority to accomplish a specific activity. It involves briefing another person to carry out a task for which the delegator holds individual responsibility, but which cannot be carried out by him or her directly. 

Three Elements of Delegation

There are three elements inherent to delegation; if one or more of these elements are missing from the process, the manager might think he/she is delegating but he/he is not. If he is not delegating, he might be:

• Dumping: Delegating without giving direction/responsibility
• Hold on to the job, reluctant to delegate, because he thinks only he can do the job.

Click here to view a video that explains effective delegation.

Responsibility

As manager of a department, you always remain ultimately responsible for what happens in your department. Although you delegate tasks and keep subordinates accountable for their actions, you need to ensure that your department’s goals are met. Although the manager remains responsible for the greater goal attainment of the department, he/she can break bigger goals into smaller chunks, delegate responsibility for the smaller task. The manager will however always remain responsible that departmental goals are achieved.

In order to empower your employees, it is important that you break down the bigger responsibility into smaller responsibilities, that way you prepare them to also become managers one day.

Authority

Authority is the freedom of staff members to decide how the job needs to be done. The manager must state clearly what the success criteria and end result should look like. How the subordinate reaches this goal, is however up to him/her (obviously within organisational and ethical boundaries). It’s no good to give someone the responsibility, but deny him/her the authority to make the decisions to complete the task.

Accountability

Accountability is the manager’s control over the authority you have delegated. If you do not hold subordinates accountable for tasks delegated to them, you are dumping! The personal concern of a manager for results, is a sign to employees that he/she cares. If the manager simply walks away after a task has been delegated, without asking for reports, monitoring progress, employees might start wondering if the task is such high priority.

The good delegator continuously strives to encourage his/her subordinates to develop a fuller sense of their responsibilities, he/she refuses to withdraw their freedom of authority. Except in dire emergencies he supports them to sort out their own problems, take their own decisions and learn from their own mistakes. But equally important he/she insists on being kept informed about what is going on – he/she keeps subordinates accountable all the way.