I am the boss - but I have a deegation questio...

I have one manager who has two, soon to be three people beneath him. The manager is technically fantastic but the admin/1st line support girl(maybe the girl part is a clue) below him is way more organised.

My question is: Is it wrong of me to bypass my manager and ask the admin person to do something directly? Should i give everything to the manager to delegate or if she is more organised should I give it to her?

I am refering to more organisational procedural tasks here as apposed to techincal requests.

One part of me thinks I am rght but the other part thinks I must be pissing the manager off for bypassing him.....Suggestions welcome please :)

Play each of them to their own strengths

Does the guy know / acknowledge that that part of his 'work' isn't as it should / could be? If he knows this quick chat to run past you idea / suggestion with him and then give it to the more organised member of staff with the guy 'supervising' as he should.

my tactic Jamie would be to talk to both parties and just be honest - people often realise their strenghts and weaknesses - and you may find manager actually agrees with you - if they don't then reassure why they are managing in the first place - its because they are best for the job

if everyone leaves you then i will need to be more careful next time i walk down borehamwood high street

I would talk to your manager and ask him to delegate it to the girl. keep him in the loop and don't bypass him.

If you tell him to he will resent it, if you bypass him he will resent it, if you help him make the right decision you both win.

But, hey I havent worked in an office for 40 years.

Office politics rocks! treading on toes is where it's at.

Hi Jamie

I think you are right to be questioning it! your manager could feel undermined if there is no commiunication at all through them esecially if it is tasks/requirements they are responsible for and is in their job description.

That said it is balancing act in so far as you want efficiency and you know the other staff member can provide it.

Like Steve said see if there co-op solution that everyone can live with

Tell the manager what you want doing,

ask him who he thinks would be the best person for the job,

when he doubtless says that girls name (if he doesnt you can lead him to say it eventually by closing the other options off one by one) ,

offer to give her the work directly to save explaining it to him only for him to have to then pass it on

say i guess then its OK if I have other such work to pass it directly to her ,

he'll say yes unless he's in the wrong position. .

Job done

Give her the work; tell him; ask him to keep an eye on it;

Next time give it to him to pass on to her.

Delegation training.

I am with Mike and Les on this.

I have seen this situation before- absolutely completely the wrong thing to do on 99% of occasions is to bypass the manager. It sends horrible subliminal signals to the subordinate that in the worst cases can lead to major management issues. If you go down this route, you are in effect opening up a communication gateway between yourself and the subordinate, bypassing the manager, which is not good.

In the worst cases, the subordinate could read into a situation which may or not be already there, the manager feels a problem which may or not be already there and a management issue has been created.

Thanks very much for the suggestions- they do echo what I have been thinking. I shall ask my manager to get the admin to post a thank you response....

Jaime,

Hopefully you have a direct enough relationship with the manager. If he leans toward technical excellence then (unless he has a serious ego) he probably recognises he's not 'that' organised anyway.

Approach:

I'd meet with him as part of week planning. Mention that you've noted how well organised HE'S managed to get the admin girl...and state she's clearly ready for a heavier organisational workload...and that of course, frees 'tech genius' to carry on being tech genuis!

Benefit to company:

Tech genius 1) Feels recognised as the one responsible for Admin girl's skills development. 2) Tech genius given more time to concentrate in his area of expertise (and interest). 3) Admin girl feels more trusted/responsible and sees a 'development path' ahead.

Benefit to Jaime:

Jamie has two staff working at near optimum levels in their 'strength areas' and the pay -off? Improved inter- dept operation, harmony and productivity levels.

Result! :D

Brian