Creating an IT strategy, driving digital transformation initiatives to success, managing IT teams, negotiating with vendors and presenting the IT value proposition in front of board members to secure the required budget are only some of the responsibilities of IT leaders. Managing all this and much more becomes a daunting task for CIOs.That is why they should delegate certain tasks to others.

Despite heavy workloads, most CIOs are reluctant to delegate tasks.They believe that if they delegate a task, they might make a mess of it. Even when they do delegate tasks, then tend to make delegation mistakes which increases the chances of missteps. Don’t want to make the same IT delegation mistakes by learning from them? This article is for you.

This article will bring to light seven mistakes IT leaders make when delegating IT roles.

7 Mistakes You Should Never Make When Delegating IT Roles

Here are seven IT delegation mistakes you should never make.

Delegating Roles To Unqualified Employees

One of the biggest mistakes IT leaders make when delegating IT roles is that they choose the wrong individual. The individual is not qualified or skilled to fulfill the role properly. Due to this, their worst fears come true. Always delegate roles to team members who specialize in that domain and have some experience in performing similar tasks to minimize the risk of errors.

Even when you are delegating the task to someone who is inexperienced, add a supervisor or a senior to oversee progress.In addition to qualification, skills and experience, you should also look at how well prepared an individual is to fulfill the role before delegating it to them so you won’t have to regret your decision later just like businesses do when buying cheap dedicated servers from a server provider.

Delegating Roles To Someone Who Is Not In Your Supervision

IT leaders sometimes delegate IT roles to employees who are not under their direct supervision.This increases the risk of mistakes as they have no control over them. What’s even worse is that they can not hold them accountable for their actions. Keeping track of such individuals can quickly become a hassle as they report to their direct supervisor who reports to you.This can create a host of problems for the IT leaders, which is why it is better to delegate roles to someone who is under your direct supervision.

Delegating Small Tasks Only

There is nothing wrong in delegating minor tasks in the beginning and delegating critical tasks later.Things start to go wrong when IT leaders keep delegating minor tasks only.This reflects CIOs lack of trust and confidence in the abilities of their team members, two elements which are critical for successful IT delegation.If you want to nurture future leaders and pass on the torch to them, you will have to delegate mission critical tasks to them as well.

Delegating Supervision of Mission Critical Tasks

Delegating important tasks to employees will give them more confidence and prepare for the future leadership role.Things start to go off track when you delegate the supervision of mission critical tasks to employees.You end up losing control and visibility, which can have negative implications for your IT projects.

Since you lack both the visibility and control, you don’t know when you divert from the target. What’s more frustrating is the fact that you can not do much about the situation. Despite being the IT leader, who is leading the initiatives, you feel powerless when you lose sight of your projects by handing supervisory rights to someone else.To save yourself from getting in such situations, IT leaders must avoid making this mistake.

Providing Fuzzy Instructions

Most IT leaders are working on many projects simultaneously.As a result, they tend to delegate tasks hastily.With no clear instructions or experience to work with, team members struggle to perform the delegated tasks efficiently.This forces them to make assumptions and guesses based on their knowledge and expertise.

From misunderstandings to conflicts, from wasted resources to project failure, a lot of things can go wrong. It can also negatively impact your team cohesion and morale of each individual in your team. Provide crystal clear instruction to the person you are delegating the task to and brief them about what you expect from them and what goals they need to achieve.If they have any confusion regarding instruction, you should clarify them before they turn into something more dangerous.

Delegating Tasks and Micromanaging

Some IT leaders are so insecure that they start micromanaging even after delegating the task to a team member.This kills the whole purpose of delegating a task. From the employee standpoint, it limits their authority and autonomy, which negatively impacts their efficiency the same way using a shared hosting would if you don’t migrate to a semi dedicated server.

Employees never develop new skills and grow when you have a heavy oversight on them..Once you have delegated a task, you should stay out of it instead of interfering from time to time.There is nothing wrong in supervising but avoiding micromanaging.

Refusing To Delegate Tasks

IT leaders are already under extreme workloads and failure to delegate tasks can lead them to poor productivity, employee burnout and work related stress.This is the main reason why most IT leaders either quit their jobs early or switch career paths IT leaders need to understand that they can not do everything on their own.They need a team to succeed. When you try to do everything on your own, you don’t get time to focus on tasks that deliver real business value.

Which of these IT delegation mistakes do you still make and why? Share it with us in the comments section below.