Delegation Dilemma—From the Vault Transcript

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Lane Jones (00:02):
Welcome to the Andy Stanley Leadership Podcast, a conversation designed to help leaders go further faster. On today's podcast, we'll explore an easy and effective way to delegate Andy. All leaders eventually come to that point when I guess they have to admit, no matter how hard it is that they can't do everything they know. They'll have to delegate some responsibilities if they want their organization to move ahead.

Andy Stanley (00:25):
And this really goes back to something we talk about a lot on our leadership podcast, and that's that for the leader, the ultimate goal, the bullseye on the target, is to only do what only you can do, which means you've got to quit doing all the things that you shouldn't be doing. Which brings us to our topic today of delegation. And the other thing that, and we'll get into this a little bit later, the other thing about delegation, because it's not a super exciting word, is delegation. Really when it's done right, is really a leadership development strategy. And one of the questions that we get so many times from leaders is how do you develop leaders? How do you develop leaders? And I think they picture a classroom or a setting, or every Tuesday at four 30, we do something. But really, when delegation is done right, it really is a leadership strategy because you find out quickly who are the leaders, who are the responsible leaders, and who can you trust greater responsibility with? So this really is a super important topic.

Lane Jones (01:16):
Yeah, I mean, it is an important topic, and yet again and again, we see leaders struggle with it. Why do you think that is?

Andy Stanley (01:22):
I think it has to do with just the nature of leadership as leaders, three things. We know how we want things done, we know when we want things done. And because we are responsible by nature, the idea of handing off responsibility is not intuitive. I think sometimes to leaders, because we feel responsible and we should feel responsible, but refusing to hand off responsibility actually puts a lid on our leadership. So again, because we know how we want it done, sometimes we're hesitant to hand it off because we want it done when we want it done, and it takes longer. We're going to talk about that later as well. It takes longer to explain to someone how we want it done, and then the whole idea of we're just responsible. Along with that, if a leader, especially an entrepreneurial leader, if a leader isn't careful, they or we can get caught up in what Jim Collins refers to as the genius with a thousand helpers syndrome. Over time, everything starts to hinge on a singular source of brilliance or talent. And great leaders, truly great leaders, especially great organizational leaders, even talented organizational leaders, avoid that by handing off responsibility. And again, that comes down to delegation.

Lane Jones (02:26):
Recently during a leadership conference that we host one of our best leaders, Gavin Adams conducted an enlightening breakout on delegation, and he's joining us on the podcast today. So welcome back. Welcome Gavin.

Gavin Adams (02:38):
Lane, thanks, Andy.

Andy Stanley (02:39):
It is great to have Gavin here. And for those of you who are new to our leadership podcast, let me explain just a little bit about our organizational structure because that will give Gavin some context for what he has to say. Gavin is an extraordinary leader. We are organized around several large church campuses around the Atlanta area. Gavin leads one of those. Gavin came into a very difficult situation. It was a struggling church. We took the church on as part of our network, brought Gavin in as the point leader, and he's done an extraordinary job on any weekend during their weekend services, they'll have around 5,000 people there. So it's a very large church, and he's done an extraordinary job. One of the biggest challenges to Gavin's leadership context is they have been in a rental situation, so they have 5,000 people showing up on the weekend in a school that they rent. So again, it's a challenging leadership environment, but he's done an extraordinary job and now they're in the middle of a construction process. So this is a very complicated time in his life as a leader. And if he did not understand the art of delegation, none of this would be happening. So I feel like if you can be an expert in delegation at your age, Gavin, you've got to be an expert. So I'm thrilled that you're here and I'm thrilled that our audience gets to hear from you today.

Gavin Adams (03:51):
Andy, thanks. That's super nice of you to say. Actually, most of what I've learned has been through trial and error, mostly error, especially in the beginning when I first walked into watermark, as you said, it was a very challenging situation. And because it was a turnaround almost situation, I had to get my hands in every facet of the organization. And that helped in the beginning, but it also quickly became a lid for me, for my family, for the organization because it was hard to understand when to begin delegating and why even I needed to, because it was so necessary for me to be involved in everything upfront.

Andy Stanley (04:23):
And one of the things that you experienced that many of our leaders who are listening experienced is it was your responsibility to establish the culture, which meant as you just said, you had to be a part of everything, but you can't be in everything for very long without destroying the culture at the same time, because it's a culture of leadership.

Gavin Adams (04:42):
In fact, one of the things that for me was so helpful, Andy, is just your teaching on autonomy and pushing leadership as far down the organization as you can, because in the beginning I didn't know I needed to do that. I realized quickly that if I didn't, we were going to all be in trouble, me mostly, and the organization secondly. And so your teaching on it actually really gave me clarity on what to even do to continue to grow the organization.

Lane Jones (05:06):
Gavin, I think the thing that made your breakout at our leadership conference so helpful was that you define leadership delegation at different levels. Before we get into them, specifically, talk about why you thought this is important.

Gavin Adams (05:19):
Well, the levels was so important for me because delegation, while it's so critical to personal health, organizational growth, all those things, we know that it's such a balance between micromanaging on one end and then complete abdication of leadership on the other end. So what I was afraid of is that when I began to realize delegation was going to be a necessity for us and for me and for the organization, I knew that I had to find ways to do it successfully. That random drive by delegations was not going to take us where we needed to go. We also felt the need, or at least I felt the need to create what we would say common language around this. So we were all playing off the same playbook and delegation. We all understood exactly, we meant when we were delegating. And also I just wanted to make sure I was providing clarity. I think one of the most frustrating things for me as a younger leader was when anyone delegated to me without clarity, my expectations weren't clear, their expectations weren't clear. I felt like I was set up to fail so many times, not because I didn't have the ability or the desire to do well, I just didn't know what was expected of me.

(06:18):
So for me, really the clarity that came with creating these levels or investigating these levels was so helpful for us.

Andy Stanley (06:25):
And I think one of the things I appreciate so much about Gavin's leadership is this specifically because this is something I struggle with. I think I succumb to the assumption that if it's clear in my mind, it must be clear when it's coming out of my mouth, which is not the case. And throughout my leadership experience, I've had people coming back to me consistently saying, Andy, I'm not sure exactly what you're asking me to do. And I'm thinking, well, it was clear to me. So again, I think the more a leader something, the more they tend to lean toward not being as clear. And this goes to something we're going to talk about later as it relates to handing off responsibility. But Gavin has done an extraordinary job, and his team always says that they know exactly what Gavin expects, but somehow you have been able to avoid, as you mentioned a few minutes ago, the tendency to micromanage along with the high expectations you set for your team. So anyway, let's continue.

Lane Jones (07:15):
Well, let's talk about the four levels so quickly for our audience. The four are investigation, informed, progress, informed results, and finally ownership. Well, let's start with Investigation.

Gavin Adams (07:25):
Lane, as you said that the first one is the first level is investigation. And really for me as a leader, as I began to feel overwhelmed honestly with where we were at as a church and the growth we were experiencing, I just read everything I could read on delegation. I studied it as much as I could, and came across several different pieces of information from different places and pulled it together to create these four levels of delegation. So the first one is investigation, and really it's almost a pre delegation level in some ways. Investigation is when we ask a leader, not necessarily to make a decision yet, but just to get information so that we can then collectively make a decision. Now that may lead to another delegation, it may lead to a project or lead to a task at some point, or it may not. We may find the information when we get it back, doesn't lead to that. The first level for me is investigation. So basically I'm going to delegate research, delegate the opportunity for someone to go and help us gather information so that either I individually or our leadership team can make a great decision.

Lane Jones (08:21):
Gavin, this sounds like a good way to measure a person's capability really without risking too much.

Gavin Adams (08:26):
Well, absolutely.

Andy Stanley (08:27):
And their interest.

Gavin Adams (08:28):
Yeah. Yeah. Well, we talk a lot about our leadership development process, and you're right, it isn't this systematic, listed on your Tuesday thing. In a lot of ways, this is so helpful for younger leaders to give them an opportunity to contribute to the overall goal, to the bigger larger team. But at the same time, we're not burdening them with a massive task they're not quite ready for. So allowing them to investigate, come back with recommendations and come back with information, really is helpful for them. A great example of this for us was when we launched our Sunday afternoon services, Andy Land, you guys, we talked about that a lot between all of us, but when it got to the local church level, I delegated the task of figuring out what it would look like to start this to some of the people on our staff. It really was a level one delegation for them to find out how much it would cost to start this, how many volunteers would we need to do this? We weren't launching it yet, but we were investigating what it would look like.

Andy Stanley (09:22):
In fact, you hadn't even made the decision to necessarily do it.

Gavin Adams (09:24):
Not yet.

Andy Stanley (09:25):
So before the decision was made, you're involving the people that you're thinking in the back of your mind, I may hand this off to this team. Let's involve them as early as possible in the process of even deciding.

Gavin Adams (09:36):
Exactly,

Andy Stanley (09:36):
Which is really, really smart because in a few minutes when we talk about are we delegating task versus responsibility, this step, this sort of pre-step to delegation actually creates a sense of responsibility with a team before you actually hand off the responsibility. So that's really great.

Gavin Adams (09:53):
I think also, I always assume that delegation had to be specifically tied to an individual task or a project. The reality is that we can back delegation up further and bring more people into the process. At the same time, grow leaders at the same time before we even get necessarily to a decision or a task or a project.

Andy Stanley (10:09):
And I think this explodes one of the myths around delegation, because when we hear the word delegation, what we picture is the boss or the leader calls someone into the office and says, I have an idea. I have a project. I have a task. I want you to go do this project or this task. But what you're saying is that delegation actually begins before that one-on-one where you say, I'm asking you to own this task or own this project. And I think that's great.

Lane Jones (10:33):
Gavin, that leads us to the second level that you call informed progress.

Gavin Adams (10:37):
Yeah. Level two is informed progress where we really ask for someone to own a task, but I ask for them to come back and give regular updates along the path and then to let me know when it's completed. So I'm remaining available obviously the entire time, but I'm not releasing them to go take care of it completely on their own. I am asking 'em to own it, but to also keep me informed along the way. A great example of this for us right now, and Andy you mentioned this earlier, is we're in the process of constructing our first permanent facility, a large facility. How many square feet? Well, it keeps growing. Thanks. So just under 180,000 square feet.

Andy Stanley (11:12):
So not a casual endeavor,

Gavin Adams (11:13):
Right? It's big. But here's what I love about the idea of delegation. I'm not even owning that construction process on my own. In fact, I mean, we would think in every organization, the point leader should be the one making every decision when it comes to something of that size for sure. But I have level two delegated this to a guy named Al Scott on our team, who is a phenomenal leader, great with details, great with leading teams and coordinating all the entities. He's keeping me informed. I'm getting regular updates, I'm contributing to that conversation. But as far as the actual task itself, AL'S owning it because I've level two delegated that to him.

Andy Stanley (11:50):
And this goes back to level one investigation, because was in the process of helping you decide where do we build? When do we build, how big do we build him? He was involved all along the way. So when you finally called him in to say, Al, I want you to own this. This wasn't own. Why are we doing this? A thousand questions That drives you crazy because you had involved him. You got a sense of whether or not he wanted to do this, and whether or not he could do this. He had a sense of whether or not he wanted to do this and whether or not he could do this. So again, you're way down the road by the time you finally hand off that responsibility. And I think for leaders who just were constantly thinking about the future, we're a little bit tight with information, and especially for very entrepreneurial leaders, we skip that first step, which would've made this second step so much more complicated than it needed to be. So that's a great illustration of this.

Lane Jones (12:39):
Gavin, going back to the reporting back, bringing information back to you as they're leading the project. Now to some people that's going to sound like micromanaging. How do you keep it from becoming that?

Gavin Adams (12:50):
That's a good question. I think it can feel like that if we're not careful in how we communicate the delegation, I've always felt like micromanaging, and I've had it done to me, and I've done it way more than I would like to admit. Micromanaging for me has always been about telling people how to do a task. Level two delegation is not about telling them how to do it, it's just asking 'em to keep me informed as they do it. And so the information side doesn't feel like micromanagement. In fact, I feel like it's freeing to them to know that I'm available and I want to help, but I'm not going to tell 'em exactly how to do it.

Andy Stanley (13:22):
One more question I have for you, Gavin, before we leave this topic. You made a statement that Al feels as if you're really there to serve him and help him do what you've asked him to do. So are these regular meetings, are these scheduled meetings or is this, Hey, Al, if you need something, call me. And the reason I ask is because my tendency, when I delegate, I lean more toward abdication. I feel like the micromanaging ask the people who work for me when I'm not in the room, if that's really the case. And because my follow-up is so bad, I think I don't make myself as available as I need to be for fear of micromanaging, but I think you handle this differently. So talk just a little bit about what that follow-up looks like. That again, gives al the freedom to do what he's been asked to do without him feeling like you're looking over his shoulder.

Gavin Adams (14:03):
Yeah, that's great. I feel like I contend to that abdication side too, because for me, it's just more out of sight, out of mind. I'm not as much worried about micromanagement as I used to be. Now there's so much going on, as we all know, right?

Andy Stanley (14:14):
There's so much. We're busy.

Gavin Adams (14:15):
As soon as I delegate it now, I think, well, it's gone. So for me and his task depended, each project is different. With this one specifically, yeah, we have a regular meeting schedules so that we will sit down at least twice a month is what we're scheduled to do, just to review progress, review where we're at, if there's any decisions I need to speak into, I can't at that point, but to know that I have at least twice a month an opportunity to officially do that, that's helpful for Al and for me, and it creates great clarity. I know we keep saying that, but clarity is so important in the delegation process. So yeah, absolutely. Now, not every project is that frequent. I think it depends on the size and the scope and really the leader who's leading it as well.

Andy Stanley (14:53):
As I mentioned earlier, this is something I'm really not good at, and my salvation really has been my admin assistant in the calendar because Diane knows if she doesn't calendar those one-on-ones or those one-on threes for me to follow up with these projects, it won't happen.

(15:09):
So because she knows that about me, I have empowered her. I've said, Diane, this is something the people that I need to meet with frequently. And as you said, depending on the project and the timing of a project, you know how often I need to meet with them. So Diane, I'm trusting you to make sure those people get face time with me based on the project and based on the schedule. Because if it's left up to me, I'm just not good at that. So I think for those of you who tend, as you said, out of sight, out of mind a little bit, use your admin, use your calendar, don't trust your gut on this one. You may need a little bit more structure.

Lane Jones (15:44):
Well, that leads us then to level three, and it's what you call informed results.

Gavin Adams (15:49):
Yeah, informed results is a fantastic opportunity for a leader to not just own and give updates of a project or a task, but just to do it exactly the way they feel. And then to let me know when it's over, what we call level three informed results is we're not going to meet all the time. We're not going to talk throughout necessarily. I just want to know when it's accomplished. I may ask what you did when it's accomplished. I may want to know a little bit more detail along the way. At the end I just want to know that it's done in our organization. A great example of level three delegation, this informed results was our recent volunteer push. We decided as an organization, and we are so volunteer centric, I mean, our organization really rises and falls not just on leadership, but on the number of volunteers that we have because it takes a lot of people to execute what we do.

(16:34):
So we decided to rethink and really shift how we recruit, assimilate, train, integrate volunteers in our church in the organization. And so this was a great level three informed results. Delegation, though I allowed our leadership at the church, the different directors of each department to own how they wanted to do it, they all did it a little differently, but at the end, they just reported back what they did and how successful it was. So it was a brand new approach for us. I didn't feel like I needed to meet with 'em weekly or every other week to find out what they were doing. I just wanted to know at the end of it if it was successful and what we learned.

Andy Stanley (17:09):
This is a great example and is certainly different than the construction project because you build a building once...

(17:15):
What you're talking about this time is something that our organization does at least once or twice a year, and the timeframe is compressed. The timeframe between launching a project and being able to measure the results of the project is weeks as opposed to 18 months or two years. So in this situation, and I think for all of our listeners, as you think about quarterly events or quarterly sales cycles, or even things that happen once or twice a year, to be able to hand it off completely say, we are really not going to follow up until it's over. This is not going to make or break our organization, but because of the scheduling, I'm really handing this off. And then we will look at results and evaluate. So I think this points to the fact that projects should probably determine how things are delegated, because again, there are two year projects we need to check in along the way.

(18:04):
There are projects where you can actually hand it off, and you really learn more about your leaders in those situations where you hand it off and say, let's meet at the end and talk about results. So going back to this whole idea of micromanaging, if in a project that was really a two month project, basically if you'd said, okay, we're going to meet every four. I want to update every four days. I want an update every Friday at two o'clock, that would've felt like micromanaging, I think because of the scope. So I think scheduling and scope, I think leaders have to ask the question, is this something I can hand off? Let's talk about the results. When there's something to measure. This isn't going to sink the ship, make or break, but we've got to evaluate because next year if we do this again, we want to do a better job. So I think making those distinctions for a leader is super important, especially as it relates to on one ditch is abdicating, which is I hand it off and I don't really follow up to find out what happened. The other ditch is let's meet every three days for an hour in turn in a report and make a presentation that drives everybody crazy. Staying out of both of those ditches is important. And I think what you've illustrated for us here, Gavin, is that the nature of the project should probably determine how all of that is managed.

Gavin Adams (19:15):
Yeah. Ownership has become my favorite level of delegation because ownership is literally, I want you to own everything about the project or the task. I don't need regular updates. We don't need to necessarily meet regularly. I'll remain available if you need to ask questions, but we're not going to schedule those times and I don't even really need to know how you did it or even when it's done. I just trust that you are owning every bit of this.

Lane Jones (19:39):
Gavin, give us an example of ownership.

Gavin Adams (19:41):
Sure. A great example for us is our Sunday morning security with children. If you're a parent coming to our church, your primary concern probably is not anything other than the safety of your kids. Now, you hope it's fine. You hope it's helpful, you hope learn something right? But in the end, you don't want to spend an hour worrying about your children. You want to make sure that they are safe. For me, that's a perfect example of a level four delegation. Our family ministry staff, our directors completely own the security systems that we have, including the evacuation procedures. Everything that we do around security, they own it completely, which is a great example of level before delegation.

Andy Stanley (20:20):
Now, this brings up a great leadership dilemma because that is so out of sight, out of mind. I mean, you don't plan it. It doesn't come up in meetings. Now, if it goes wrong, everybody knows. I mean, if something happens to a child in one of our churches, everybody knows if a kid gets lost. So how then circling back around, it's out of sight, out of mind. Nobody's coming in every week to report and say, good news, Gavin, we didn't lose any kids this Sunday in the halls, every parent reconnected with their baby. There's no report structure. It's extremely important. It is more important than getting a building built. It is more important than recruiting volunteers. How do you as a leader, circle back around to make sure your leaders know, number one, that you're grateful? Because that's part of inspiring and motivating. They don't wake up every day thinking, I wonder if Gavin knows how secure the kids are. But at the same time, you are genuinely appreciative. And I think as leaders in the areas where we've delegated and it really is out of sight, out of mind, there's no follow up, there's no evaluation because it's never going to come up unless there's a problem. How do we as leaders make sure that the people who are managing those big, in some cases, enormous, some cases, mission critical pieces, how do we keep them motivated and express appreciation? Do you have a system for that or how do you handle that?

Gavin Adams (21:37):
That's great. The level three delegation has a built in piece for that. Every meeting. Yeah, we're going to meet at the end and I'm going to be able to say thank you directly

Andy Stanley (21:44):
We're going to evaluate,

Gavin Adams (21:45):
Right? This one, for me, as a leader, it certainly can create a dilemma, but for me, it just requires me to be a lot more intentional about paying attention to what's happening. It doesn't mean that I wait for a kid to get lost and go, wow, we had 300 days before without that way to go. But knowing there's, that's not much of a consolation. Exactly, yeah. But we didn't lose the other four 14. Here's what I have discovered is that I don't know that I have to specifically say thank you for an individual action, for people to feel grateful and to keep them motivated.

Andy Stanley (22:16):
That's a great point.

Gavin Adams (22:17):
I think that I can, as much as I possibly can, just encourage them, thank them for everything they're doing. I actually have learned to say, I don't even know everything you're doing to make this place fantastic. Thank you for doing it. Just little verbiage pieces like that have become so helpful for me.

Andy Stanley (22:33):
And I think the takeaway for this, for all of us, even the three of us sitting in this room, is I would imagine within five minutes I could make a list of five or six or seven things that I take for granted because they're out of sight, out of mind, and the leaders are doing such a fantastic job that they stay out of sight, out of mind, but they are as mission critical as anything that we evaluate on a weekly or monthly basis. And those are the areas that short list is where I need to start writing more. Thank you notes to say I thought about it. I noticed you're doing such a great job. I never have to worry about the fact that you're doing such a great job. So I think, again, for this area, as you said, Gavin, the intentionality of gratitude is probably more important than ever.

Lane Jones (23:16):
Gavin, you referenced earlier that you've created a common language around this. So when you delegate, do you use this language,

Gavin Adams (23:22):
Right? Well, at times, yes. But I mean, we don't in every delegation look each other in the eyes and say, now this is a level three delegation, right? I mean, we're not doing that. The common language mostly is for me, it has helped provide me with such clarity on knowing what we're going to delegate and how we're going to do it. Because every task, and actually every person that we're delegating to is unique. And so each process needs a unique delegation. The common language is being used on my end more than anyone,

Andy Stanley (23:52):
And this is an example. You've been able to teach this to your staff and to your leaders to say, as you delegate, don't forget number one, which is involve them early. Don't forget. Number two, there's got to be clarity. And then there's different kinds of projects that require different kinds of follow up. So I think creating the language makes it transferable, which in leadership, again, as we said at the beginning, delegation is leadership development. Taking it to this level I think increases the potential for actually using delegation as leadership development.

Lane Jones (24:22):
Well, Gavin, as we wrap up, tell our audience what has been the biggest win for you in using this system?

Gavin Adams (24:29):
Well, for one, it certainly has created clarity in delegation. And not just clarity for me, but clarity for both of us. On both sides of the delegation, I have an expectation of exactly what I'm hoping to get back, whether it's just investigation or whether it's complete ownership, but it's also so helpful for the person I'm delegating to because they have a clear expectation for what I'm hoping to have happen as well. So clarity is certainly the first one. Leadership development. Andy, you've mentioned that it is so helpful. What a great way to develop leaders. Some things can only be learned through experience, most things. Yeah, most things, really. And so for me, delegation has allowed me not to give away the things that I need to be doing, but to expand other people's influence and expand their ability to lead by giving them things to actually lead. So that has been a super helpful piece of this. And then the third one is it has allowed me to really focus on where I add the most value. We never want to delegate the things that are unique to us, the things in the organization that only we should be doing. But this has allowed me really to create a lens to see what I should be doing, what I should not be doing, and then to delegate those things appropriately.

Andy Stanley (25:37):
So Gavin, if we had a live audience and we stopped now and said, Hey, are there any questions? I can tell you what the first question would be. The first question would be, okay, but what do you do when you've delegated something and you're trying to stay out of it? You don't want to micromanage, and you realize it's not working, it's not happening. I'm hearing from other people that there's a problem. What do you do? Have you ever had to step into a situation like that and take responsibility back or take somebody off of a project? How do you do that?

Gavin Adams (26:05):
Yeah, that is a great question, and I have had to do that. And the problem though, really wasn't with the person I delegated it to. The problem was that I didn't delegate appropriately upfront with that person. If level one is investigation, level two, informed progress. If I leverage those correctly, I'm choosing the right person well before I get to level four of ownership. I'm not going to give a level four delegation to someone who's brand new in the organization who I don't know their capacity or even don't know their passion yet. But through level one, we really dig into that so much more clearly. And level two, I'm able to walk alongside of them as they accomplish a task. So we're not just going to turn something over to someone who we haven't really worked with long enough to know where they're at.

Andy Stanley (26:48):
So if you do number one, and if you do level one and level two, well, it certainly decreases the chances of a disaster later on, and that makes sense. But you have at times and the past had to step in and take responsibility away from someone because it wasn't working.

Gavin Adams (27:03):
Yeah, absolutely. And people have done that with me before when I was a younger leader too. But here's what I hope happens, and I say hope because it's our goal. I never want anyone to feel that they're only as successful as their very last project or their very last task. I don't want people going home every weekend wondering if I'm okay, if I'm okay. So if we fail at something, that doesn't mean that we failed at our entire job, and it doesn't mean we're not going to get another opportunity. And so I think for us, and for me specifically, I've just tried to, when I have to step in, even though I said I didn't want to, or even if we have a technically ownership level four delegation, and I do have to step back in at some point, I just want to ensure that the person I'm working with knows that I still believe in them. I still trust them. This doesn't mean they're not going to get another chance. Again, it just means that for this specific project, maybe I fail by giving 'em too much responsibility, or maybe I didn't give them enough information because the reality is that usually does fall back on me when we have that failure.

Andy Stanley (27:59):
I was going to say, in cases where I've had to step back in, generally, I wasn't clear,

Gavin Adams (28:05):
Correct.

Andy Stanley (28:05):
I didn't set up super specific expectations or I didn't. In my case, oftentimes I haven't defined success well enough. And there have been times when I've stepped in and a person was shocked. They were completely shocked because the way they were measuring their success was so different than the way I was measuring their success. Well, that's my fault. Chances are, I mean, that's something you can write on paper and say, here's how we're going to measure success with this project or with this job description. So I do think as leaders, at some point, we'd have to look in the mirror before we step in and take responsibility or take a task away from someone. And the reason I ask one of the reasons is because I think you're exactly right. That level one that we talked about is so important. You learn so much in that investigation process. It definitely decreases the chances of failure later on.

Gavin Adams (28:57):
And if in the delegation process, if we can avoid the drive-by delegations, I mean after we decide on what level we think a project or task is going to be. I mean, if we just decide on the right person and then create great clarity around the expectation, if nothing else, the person we're delegating to has the opportunity to ask great questions before they bump into a situation that may cause a failure or cause me to have to step back in.

Andy Stanley (29:20):
I think stepping back at the macro level, the whole idea of delegation goes back to something we talk about thematically on this leadership podcast. And that is leaders need to practice saying, you decide. You decide. You decide, as Gavin has illustrated in his career with us and in the things that we've talked about, if he had not been willing to hand off, not just task but responsibility, his organization wouldn't be where it is. And so he's developed in his own style a way of saying, you decide. You decide you really do own this. You decide, and if there's a problem, I'll help you take responsibility because I'm giving you permission to decide. And then I guess the last thing, I think every leader listening should take those four ideas that we've talked about, these four levels, and think about how they are currently delegating because we are all doing this well, or we're all doing this unwell, but delegation is a central part of leadership. And the better we do this, the better leaders we are and the stronger our organizations become.

Lane Jones (30:22):
Well, Andy and Gavin, thanks so much for your time today. And those of you who want more information on this topic, you can check out Gavin's blog at gavinadams.com, G-A-V-I-N-A-D-A-M-S.com. Thanks again for listening, and join us next month for the podcast. Until then, you can hear more from Andy on leadership andystanley.com.