Focus on Leading to Avoid Micro-Managing

One of my biggest pet peeves is micromanagement.

When I see someone being micro-managed, it’s always for the same reasons: there wasn’t a clear understanding of what was required, there weren’t clear instructions, there weren’t the necessary resources, there wasn’t enough motivation, or the person completing the task lacked the necessary skills.

All of these reasons for failure are due to the leader, who should have provided all of these things in the first place, or if the person doesn’t have the required skills, then we should have assigned the task to someone who does.

When we end up micro-managing, it’s due to a failure on the part of the leadership, but we never see it that way, we see it as a failure in the person carrying out the task.

Our response is not to investigate what’s missing and provide that, but to take close control and look to manage the task ourselves.

When we start to micro-manage, are we looking to allocate blame?

How do you feel when you’re micro-managed?

Most people don’t like it; it’s hard to work with someone perpetually looking over your shoulder, constantly asking “Are we done yet?”.

So why do it yourself?

I have had to do it myself, but it was never a pleasant experience, it usually leads to a lot of frustration, and it never enhances the reputation of anyone involved.

Not the one being micro-managed, and certainly not the leader; no one wants to work for a micro-manager.

If I find myself thinking about micro-managing someone, then I try to look and see what I have missed, what have I forgotten to provide, and then look to provide that.

People are much more successful when given the resources they need and then left to complete the task on their own.

That’s certainly how I prefer to work, so why wouldn’t I extend that courtesy to my team?

As I said right at the start, micro-management is a failure of leadership, not usually of the individual performing the task.

Focus on leading, then you won’t need to micro-manage.

If you want to learn more about creating highly engaged teams or being a better leader click the link to make an appointment to talk about how I can help.