Leadership: How to cede control and not go crazy

Teams do better when managers and supervisors allow them to make decisions and solve problems with the least amount of supervision.

Leaders who give their employees more control over their work and decisions about how work should be done, do so because they realize that the workforce is smarter than the systems in which the team is working. Many enlightened organizations also find that when they have more power, the workforce can react more quickly to situations.

This is because the workers know that they have been responsible for managing the situation.

When problems get worse, empowerment can be further expanded on an "act then inform" basis. Acting first and reporting second retains the advantage of a quick response. Report to the supervisor or manager what was done shortly after the action was taken informs the boss of what happened, but also provides the worker with "top coverage" (support from supervisor or manager ). Of course, the bigger the problem, the more empowered it must be.

What is required of the organization to empower teams? Several things must be present:

•     There must be a commitment on the part of senior management.
•     There must be mutual trust between management and work.
•     The organization must maintain a commitment to training and education.
•     The organization must select the appropriate activities to delegate.

When you empower the team members, you give up a little control. Your tolerance for the amount of control you leave has a lot to do with the people you consider empowering. The better the relationship between management and work, the greater the likelihood that empowerment will work.

Senior managers must commit to providing sufficient time and resources to prepare people for power. In addition, they must have the strength to make decisions that may not be the same as those of the team leaders. Of course, we want to avoid incidents that are unsafe or that do not meet regulatory requirements and those that could significantly degrade operations or result in high overhead costs.

Trust is essential. Managers and supervisors who are closest to the workforce will be those who empower specific individuals or teams. Each person or team member is responsible for performing all of their duties in a manner that increases their confidence in their knowledge, skills and willingness to assume their power. As team members gain more authority, they have the opportunity to learn new things, develop new skills, expand their network, and improve job security and earning potential.

Team members should be trained in the technical skills and / or management aspects of the role they will be asked to assume. They may need access to budget information or production planning to complete the tasks.

Empowering workers also means giving them the knowledge they need to take responsibility for decision-making. That's why I believe tremendously in the staff who participate in multifunctional training and team activities focused on issues such as fault elimination, reliability-based maintenance (RCM); failure modes, effects and criticality analysis (FMEA); and root cause analysis (RCA). When team members have the opportunity to collaborate, they learn much more about the entire system.

Always remember that not all tasks or activities are good candidates for this process of worker empowerment. Good empowerment tasks are those that can be done by people who are closer to work and who know more about how a particular system works.

My advice to managers and supervisors is to create an atmosphere that fosters collaboration and trust. Lower-level team members and their managers and supervisors should feel comfortable with the transfer of authority, and employees need all the tools and skills needed to operate reliably.

Once a team member or team has been authorized, the manager or supervisor must maintain responsibility for the task. Think of it this way: the chief retains responsibility, but the empowered person is responsible