10 Habits of a Micromanager

In a previous blog, we explained the importance of developing your employees to reach their potential. One of the biggest activities that could negatively affect the progress of your employees is micromanagement.

It’s important to know the signs and to follow the below steps to avoid becoming a tyrant over your employees.

Signs You’re a Micromanager

If you’re a micromanager, you tend to:

  1. Resist Delegation
  2. Immerse Yourself in Your Employee’s Assigned Work
  3. Focus on Minor Details Rather than the Big Picture
  4. Limit Your Employees’ Decision Making
  5. Involve Yourself in Your Employee’s Projects
  6. Monitor and Request Regular Reports on Less Important Tasks
  7. Disregard the Knowledge and Experience of Employees
  8. Focus on Wrong Priorities for your Team
  9. Lose Sight of Your Own Tasks
  10. De-motivate Your Team

If you relate to two or more of these signs, you have a problem that will affect your team and eventually your business.

How to Stop Right Now

Just like getting through addiction or breaking a habit, there are various steps that you need to go through to stop.

Step 1: Identify the Why

Most instances of micromanagement stem from insecurity. Whether you’re insecure about managing a team or worried that relinquishing control only leads to disaster, take a hard look at why you feel the need to micromanage.

Step 2: Let It Go

Start practicing your restraint. You don’t need to be a part of every single project or task for your company to be successful. Let go of your need for perfection. You need to decide what’s more important: Having the work completed to “perfection” by you or having it completed successfully and efficiently by your employees.

Step 3: Are You Hiring the Right People?

Maybe you micromanage because you feel like you can’t trust your employees to effectively complete the task. If this is right, then you really must address this issue. If it comes down to it, you may have to replace those untrustworthy employees. Before bringing on new members to your team, analyze their background and what’s really needed within your company to determine if they are a good fit and avoid this situation in the future.

Step 4: Delegate Effectively

There’s nothing wrong with doing everything yourself, but to grow your business, you need to delegate. Assign your employees projects based on an analysis of their skills, backgrounds, and experiences.

Step 5: Continue to Develop a Strong Team

Just like cogs in a machine, everyone should work together and trust that everyone will maintain their part in the big picture. Take steps to empower your employees, let them run with their ideas, and trust that you made a good decision to hire them in the first place.

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