President Dwight Eisenhower created the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), an audacious decision that launched a new, more ambitious chapter in space exploration. Over 65 years ago, he had the wisdom to see that “space exploration holds promise of adding to our knowledge of the earth and the universe…moving [the nation] forward in the fields of science and technology. ”1
The impact of this decision has been far reaching, both in terms of inspiration and innovation.2
While this decision elevated humanity to the moon and beyond, many of Eisenhower’s management tools inadvertently weigh down executives from taking flight.
Perhaps the most egregious example is what’s called the Eisenhower matrix - a tool that many leaders rely on as a guide for what to delegate (see figure below).
Leadership Principle: Delegation is not just about “getting leverage” or time management. It is a must-have leadership skill to broaden your impact and accelerate the growth of your teams.
Unless you are a U.S. President who wants to play more golf or you are an individual contributor, the Eisenhower matrix is a terrible tool for deciding what to delegate.
Here’s why:
First, you will never develop high potential team members if the only tasks that you give them are “urgent and not important.” That’s like hoping an athlete reaches their highest level of performance without ever competing in big games.
Second, one of the biggest mistakes that leaders, and particularly CEOs, fall victim to is the “tyranny of the urgent.” If you as the leader are only focused on “urgent and important tasks” as the Eisenhower matrix suggests, then you risk not focusing enough mindshare on long-term thinking and new sources of growth.
Instead, consider Claire Hughes Johnson’s model (an adaptation of Jeff Bezos’s decision making framework). It also has two axes but they are quite different. She considers impact and reversibility (i.e., how easy it is to adjust or un-do)3 as the two most important factors (see below):
Importantly, she has two explicit exceptions to this model. First “sometimes you should delegate high impact, one-way door decisions to help a trusted high performer grow.” Second, sometimes you should take on adjustable, high impact work if there are resource constraints or something needs to be done quickly and your team lacks the capability.
By using this matrix and keeping in mind these two exceptions, you can quickly determine “what” you need to delegate. From there, you need to consider five key questions on “how” to delegate4:
Who: To whom will you hand off the work?5
Expectations: What expectations will you set (timing, quality, priority level)? What context will you provide?
Motivations: How will you connect it to their motivations and career aspirations?
Oversight: How will you monitor progress and provide feedback? How frequently?
Readiness: What questions will you ask them to understand their readiness in order to understand where you’ll need to support them?
Lastly, keep in mind that one of the biggest obstacles to being an effective delegator is your own mindset (vs. lacking the “what” and “how” skill). One that I often see, even in senior leaders, is “If I don’t add value by directly checking stuff of the list in the guts of the business, I won’t have any self-worth.”
In closing, I implore you…if you manage a team, please stop using the Eisenhower matrix. Instead, take a more modern approach to the “what” and “how” of delegating, which will increase your odds of having NASA-like impact over the course of your career.
Take Action: Practical and Proven Steps
Skill gap or limiting mindset? Determine if you have a skill gap or a limiting mindset. If you try deploying some of the tactics above, and you are still getting feedback that you need to delegate more, then the obstacle is probably more of a limiting mindset. If that’s the case, Robert Kegan and Lisa Lahey’s Immunity to Change model is an excellent place to start exploring how your mindset can get in the way. In fact, in their book, they have a whole chapter called “David doesn’t Delegate.”
Practice, Practice, Practice…and Reflect. Practice using the tools I suggest above in a systematic way. Over time, this will become second nature and you won’t even need to reference them. Notice when delegation goes well and importantly, when it does not go well. Reflect on whether it was a “what” or a “how”” issue that made your attempt at delegation less effective.
Pay it forward. When you delegate a new initiative to a high performer, help them think through how they can get more leverage from their team, so they have the capacity to take it on. One of the most pernicious habits of working with high performers is rewarding their great work with even more work. If they want that, great. If they don’t, then help them think through how to free up capacity through delegating to their teams.
Reflect: Some Questions to Consider
On a scale of 1-5, how effectively do you delegate today? (5= world-class delegator in terms of both the what and the how. I never under- or over-delegate.)
What’s an example of delegation that didn’t go well? Did you miss on the “what” or “how”?
Who is a high performer on your team that would benefit from leading an upcoming initiative that falls in the “one way door, high impact” quadrant? How can you de-risk delegating this initiative through clear expectations and oversight?
If this week’s Friday Reflection was practical or enjoyable (or maybe even both!), please share it with your colleagues and friends.
He also was responding to competitive pressure as the Soviet Union had been the first to successfully launch at satellite into orbit (Sputnik). You can read more about the creation of NASA and Eisenhower’s vision here. His insight was spot on as so many innovations emerged from NASA or NASA funding. Here are some cool examples.
Space and the planets capture the imagination of young children and this obsession also can help remind adults of their impermanence. My son is absolutely obsessed with the universe and the planets…and specifically with Saturn. He knows more about that one planet than I ever knew about the entire solar system. Thank God for Chat-GPT in helping me to answer all of his questions. For example, you could fit ~766 Earths inside of Saturn. When I think about that and how I am just a speck of dust on Earth, it is pretty awe-inspiring.
You can read a more detailed explanation of this model in Claire Hughes Johnson’s book Scaling People: Tactics for Management and Company Building on p.284-289. In the book, she gives great examples of each type of task. For example, signing an exclusive multi-year partnership with a single provider is an example of a “high impact-one way door” outcome. It is incredibly hard to undo and will have a huge impact on your organization (positively or negatively).
I’ve adapted these questions from Ali Schulz, a well-known startup coach at Reboot. You can read her article on delegation here.
Sometimes the answer to this first question is obvious. Other times, you need to be thoughtful based on the person’s skill/readiness, development needs and current bandwidth. And one major watchout…if you have addressed any limiting mindsets that you have and you find yourself frequently hesitating to delegate to someone on your team, you likely have a “Who” problem and need to determine how to upgrade that person.