DELEGATION: PHENOMENON FOR EFFICIENT ORGANIZATION
BY OLUWANISOLA SEUN EMMANUEL
EZINE ARTICLE EXPERT AUTHOR
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED (C) 2009


No single man can do everything. An attempt to do such would mean living one’s life in stress, pain, frustration because their will much more to do and the pending files will be filled to the brim. In an organization, whether simple or complex, there is always need to give some responsibilities or duties to lower staff, but the accountability for the job or responsibilities so assigned remains with the superior officer. Delegation, thus, is a means to avoid wear and tear on the job and is also seen as a teaching and learning method for the new or lower staff in question.

Delegation in modern organization is highly necessary as most organizations are going global and expanding aggressive beyond the national boundary. This makes the job description or duties being performed wider and more demanding. Thus, delegation could simply mean the act of assigning or sharing part of one’s job or task to a lower officer, worker or subordinate who in turn report to the assignor on what he/she has done. For inexperience subordinate, he/she can be guided on and along the line as he/she proceeded in doing the job (i.e. assisting or telling him/her on how to do the job). However, for experience worker or professional, you only tell him what to do and the expected result, but the ‘how’ of the task, that is, the manner at which the job should be done, is a left for the assignee.

In fact, looking at modern day organization, delegation is seen as one of the tools for effectiveness and efficient of both the ‘delegator’ and ‘assignor’ and of course, of the total organization. There are lots of benefits to be derived from the concept and likewise lots of factors to be considered when delegating a task.

Some of the benefits of delegation include: the job is done faster; it ease the job of the superior officer as he concentrate on major jobs; it makes the assignor more efficient; it makes the organization more efficient and it saves the assignor the rigour of having to do all the job alone resulting to stress, nervous breakdown, failures, missing deadlines, etc.

In assigning task to subordinate, a number of factors need to be put into consideration. These include: (1) the span of control of the subordinate (2) his/her schedule (3) his/her level of experience as regards the task to be assigned (4) the distance between the assignor and the assignee (5) the communication means, if there is a gap or communication problem, it is not advisable to assign job (6) the nature of the task in question (7) the technicality of the job, etc.

Lastly, delegation is a management principle that must be given credence, especially in this dispensation, if the organization must be efficient and effective in its internal workings and with its external relationship with the global business world.