On Tuesday I told you about the dryer. Jordan offered to grab the cord. I was already mid-flight, stomach down across the machine, feet braced on the door frame, because I wanted the chore done so I could move on.
I also told you about the version of that reach I catch at work. With our new upper leadership, my delegation sometimes sounds like this: do this, in this way.
Today is about what to do with that.
Two versions of the same reach
The reflex shows up in two forms. In the first, you keep the task. You’re good at it, you’re faster at it, and you’re already halfway onto the dryer before anyone else moves.
In the second, you hand the task off with the method attached. It looks like delegation. It has a name on it and a due date. But the person on the other end is carrying out your plan, and the thinking never left your desk.
Both forms end in done. That’s why they’re so hard to see as a problem. The task gets finished, often well, and you move to the next one.
There’s a third option. You work it with the person. You stay in the problem together long enough to hear how they’d approach it. It’s slower, it takes more talking, and when you’re in a hurry to be done, it tends to disappear from the list entirely.
Why capable leaders skip the third option
If you’re good at something, doing it yourself is almost always faster in the moment. That speed pays you back right away. Whatever the other person would have learned, or shown you about how they think, pays back later and in ways you won’t trace to that one moment.
So the reflex keeps winning. It wins in the laundry room, and it wins in the leadership meeting.
The fix is a pause, short enough to fit in the time it takes to climb onto a dryer. Four questions.
