Transparent Briefs

Ok, the title is deliberately attention-grabbing. So what’s the point here? What I’m really thinking about is delegation and learning. But allow me to drag your attention back south for an example: I suspect I’m not the only writer who winds up sharing a joke with colleagues about ‘loose briefs’: our way of referring to that slightly worrying sensation that someone is expecting an article that’s sort-of-about-you-know-that-kind-of-thing-and-stuff. Ish.

Actually, this is an experience that many of us will have shared – a requirement to fulfil our own role in support of a manager or leader where we have initial doubts about what exactly is required or wanted. In the delegation of any task, particularly one intended to deliver a stretching challenge, there is an onus of the delegator to ensure that the objectives for the task fall within the parameters defined in the familiar SMART model – specific, measurable, achievable, realistic and timebound. You can’t always get what you want, but the clearer you are about whatever ‘what’ is the better your chances. As Salon’s commentary on Bill Clinton and the meaning of ‘is’ points out, hairsplitting on this kind of scale can slide into existentialism:

It depends on what the meaning of the word ‘is’ is. If the–if he–if ‘is’ means is and never has been, that is not–that is one thing. If it means there is none, that was a completely true statement…”

If that particular moment of history has passed you by, you may perhaps be grateful. The lesson is, I suspect, to avoid situations that require you to resort to the intricacies of semantics.

There are two layers of intention involved in task-setting: clarity (see above and below) and purpose. You can think of ‘specific’ as the first of a sequence of hurdles rather than one of five boxes to check. If there is no clear understanding of the task, the other criteria cannot hope to be met. Indeed, they become unanswerable questions. In his book Attitude is Everything, Paul J Myer defined ‘Specific’ as requiring the answer to six questions. Here are the first five:

  • Who: Who is involved?
  • What: What do I want to accomplish?
  • Where: Identify a location.
  • When: Establish a time frame.
  • Which: Identify requirements and constraints.

If you chose to see these as another set of hurdles, nestling like a Russian doll inside the first, then the first of them is probably ‘What?’ And if not the first, it can be the highest. The one someone is most likely to rasp a shin on or rattle firmly as they only just clear it. But each of them needs to be cleared.

While the bright, resourceful delegatee (ie the person to whom something has been delegated) will want to work to support the broader mission by asking these questions where they don’t receive the answers, delegation is not abnegation or abdication. As HR Bartender points out:

Being a leader and manager isn’t about doing everything yourself. It’s also not about just “letting it be.” When an employee has demonstrated the skills and willingness to assume responsibility for a task, we absolutely let them handle it. Even then, it doesn’t mean we abdicate our leadership responsibilities. We provide guidance and support. In fact, it’s only when we do our role effectively that we can delegate (i.e. “let it happen”) and know with confidence our employees will be successful.”

Peter Drucker made a similar point more concisely, and considerably more bluntly:

Management by objectives works if you first think through your objectives. Ninety percent of the time you haven’t.”

Re-reading that Drucker quote not only reminded me of another that I can’t currently source (but which effectively argues that failed empowerment and delegation are examples of failed leadership), but also explained why I baulked a little when I read another piece about the topic at The Engineer Leader. While the list of questions for a manager or leader to ask themself in the wake of a ‘dropped-ball’ delegation includes many highly appropriate ones (“Why did the delegation fail?” “Was I unclear in my direction?” “Did I delegate to the wrong person?” “How can I better frame my future delegations for clarity?”), the logic of the piece’s argument is that the failure belongs to the person to whom the task was delegated. The assumption is that the manager will rescue the situation and then decide whether to punish someone.

The assumption is also implicitly that ‘someone’ means ‘someone else’ but delegating is not about retaining power and passing on responsibility: it’s about sharing both.

Which brings us back to the briefs. Addressing how, what, where, when and which can address unnecessary looseness, but – if the mental image is not too distressing – I think there’s another issue that relates to Paul Myer’s sixth question that ‘Specific’ must address: transparency. That missing sixth question is:

  • Why: Specific reasons, purpose or benefits of accomplishing the goal.

Three years ago, there was a post here that staked a claim for ‘Why’ being the best question – or at least the one to which it’s most appropriate to know the answer. It used the following example to illustrate the human primacy of wanting to understand why:

“Why?” is what gives context and purpose – if we only know what, where and how (and even who), we might know what to do, but we’d be no closer to having a reason for doing it. Knowing why is how we come to understand. Young children notoriously ask ‘why?’ on a seemingly incessant basis: I remember the mother of my god-daughter almost in tears in the middle of a supermarket on the receiving end of the umpteenth question of the day and saying despairingly “It just is, sweetheart, it just is.” She must have made a better job of answering the other thousands of repetitions, as her daughter is now an almost scarily bright and perceptive teenager.”

It’s an example drawn from life, rather than from work, but the daughter (no longer a teenager) will not stop asking ‘Why?’ as she goes through life. She’ll know and understand more and she’ll ask less often, but her question will remain an important and valid one. To benefit most from a delegated task – particularly where the purpose is to empower and to provide opportunities for learning and development – we need to understand the bigger picture of the task as well as the details.

The type of delegation that is most effective in both developing and engaging is not the delegation of task, but the delegation of authority and of ‘voice’ – the opportunity to make their own contribution. There can, of course, be reasons for withholding true reasons and purposes. At the extreme, these can border on the malicious: I’m thinking of a quango I once worked for, where the entire organisation was effectively on the receiving end of what certainly felt like malicious delegation, saddled as it was with a mission statement it could never hope to achieve. It was evident to us that our purpose was to fail so that the quango could be replaced with another body whose remit and purpose fitted the more honest agenda of the particular government department – a purpose it would have been impolitic to admit or voice at the time of our establishment.

Being set up to be proved wrong, however, does very little for the sense of trust on which engagement and commitment rest. On a smaller and less extreme scale, it might be better to be honest that the true purpose cannot – for whatever reason – currently be revealed.

A delegated objective is one that, provided trust has not been hobbled from the outset, most of us will pursue with good intent. That intent and its accompanying commitment will be intensified where the ability to achieve a sense of contribution is instilled. Yes, that requires on-going support and encouragement, but it also requires delivering a real sense of purpose. If we are to feel empowered to act and to contribute to decision-making, we need to understand the purpose that we are being given the opportunity to pursue and achieve. Otherwise we are little more than dogs being invited to chase our own tails – and more likely than our canine friends to recognise that we might be being made fools of.

We’ve made remarks here before about the Emperor’s New Clothes, partly in the belief that a soupcon of wit helps to make a point more vividly. This point is effectively the opposite, and argues that transparency has a time and place. But remember, not over the trousers. And please, no capes.

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