Supervising a group of individuals is usually not a smooth process. In an ideal situation, a manager would assign various tasks to the team, and would receive completed work on time.
Most managers know that is not always the case.
Therefore, supervisors start micromanaging, and spending too much of their own time and effort on running every part of their employees’ day.
Micromanaging interferes with the supervisors’ own tasks, and often makes employees feel as if management doesn’t trust them to perform their job duties. Setting up a good process that empowers employees to be responsible for their own tasks promotes better office morale and frees up supervisors to focus on their own jobs.
Tips to Avoid Micromanaging Employees
Set Up a Good Team – If you want to stop micromanaging, you need to trust your employees. That starts with creating a solid team of competent and driven individuals. Assess your current group and determine who are the most efficient employees, and who can improve.
Communicate with those employees that need to increase their accountability and productivity, and explain that you are expecting them to take more ownership over their work.
After some time, if you do not see any results, replace them with better candidates. Supervising a team of capable staff members that are self-driven will allow you to stop micromanaging.
Establishing Teams – Create multiple teams within your department and set up hierarchies in each team.
If several people work on one project, they will internally encourage each other to get their work done properly and on time. If one person works inefficiently, it will affect all the others in the group.
Furthermore, instead of dividing assignments and having to check up on everyone’s progress, have a few senior employees do that for you. This way, you will have to meet and communicate with just those senior employees, instead of managing everyone else’s work.
Give Employees A Voice – To stop micromanaging, you need to encourage employees to have accountability over their own work.
In order to promote that, give your employees a voice and listen to them. Meet with your team and discuss upcoming work and how they feel would be the best way to get it done.
Some employees may have great ideas that you have not considered yourself. Plus, it will make group members feel like they have contributed to the decision-making in the office.
Many supervisors find that they cannot relax and hand off work to their employees. Instead, they hover and check up on their staff constantly, making employees feel uncomfortable and undervalued.
Instead, managers need to learn to create a good team of competent and accountable employees that will allow the supervisor to focus on other parts of the job.
