5 Steps To Delegate As A Perfectionist And Prevent Burnout
If you’ve ever found yourself overwhelmed with work and stuck in a cycle of go-go-go and burnout, you need to learn how to delegate as a perfectionist.
It is non-negotiable at this point if you want to be successful in your professional and personal life as a perfectionist.
It is an especially big problem in the corporate world as evidenced by a Harvard Business Review study that showed that up to 50% of companies were ‘concerned’ about their delegation skills but only 28% offered any training.
This is why it is important for me to empower you to take responsibility for your life and learn how to delegate effectively without having to rely on your employer because despite their concerns the training is not forthcoming.
As a Mindset and Productivity Coach for perfectionists, I’ve helped countless high-achievers step out of victim mode and start living their best productive lives without succumbing to burnout and overwhelm.
In this article, I’m going to explain the common pitfalls perfectionists fall into when it comes to delegating their workload, 7 practical steps to overcome them and 10 journal prompts to help you start your journey.
What is delegation and why is it important?
So you may be wondering: what is delegation? Simply put, delegation is the act of assigning tasks to someone (in your personal and/or professional life) or something (E.g. AI, digital assistant, automation software) so that you can focus on more important work.
Even simpler is the Cambridge Dictionary definition: ‘to give a particular job, duty, right, etc. to someone else so that they do it for you’.
Contrary to popular belief, it is not about avoiding responsibility and offloading your difficult work onto an unsuspecting victim. It’s about working smarter.
If you’re a perfectionist, you might struggle with the idea of letting go of control of your tasks but it is essential in helping you stay sane during busy times and it actually helps improve your productivity levels.
You get time back to focus on tasks that align with your strengths and values and as an added bonus you get to empower others in the process, making you a better leader in the long run if done effectively.
A study showed CEOs who were good at delegating generated 33% greater revenue than CEOs who were not because it enabled them to focus on strategic tasks rather than fire-fighting day-to-day problems.
Moreover, it’s a key skill to help you prevent burnout so you can achieve your high-level goals without sacrificing your wellbeing.
Related Post: 13 Subtle Signs You’re A Perfectionist And Don’t Even Know It
“If you really want to grow as an entrepreneur, you’ve got to learn to delegate” – Richard Branson
Why do perfectionists struggle with delegation?
Delegation is often one of those things that sound better than the reality of actually doing it. You might be feeling overwhelmed at work but when the opportunity to pass on your workload to a colleague comes up, feelings of unease and anxiety may crop up.
This is because perfectionists set high standards for themselves and trusting another person to meet those standards is a risky venture. This is especially true for other-oriented perfectionists whose perfectionism is mainly focused on the belief that other people will never be able to meet their standards.
You might be thinking:
- “No one else can do it as well as I can”
- “If I don’t do it, it won’t get done right”
- “I shouldn’t need help”
- “It’s faster if I just do it myself”
- “Management might think I’m not capable of handling my workload”
- “I’m going to end up fixing their mistakes anyway”
- “My reputation is going to be ruined if they mess up”
- “I don’t have the time to train them up”
- “People are going to think I’m lazy”
These are limiting beliefs and they are going to keep you stuck repeating the same cycles of overworking yourself to burnout. Recognising these thought patterns is the first step to letting go of control and trusting others to step up for a shared vision/goal.
Related Post: 3 Types of Perfectionism – Which One Are You?
Signs you NEED to delegate something
If you’re constantly feeling overwhelmed or stressed, it’s probably time to delegate your workload.
Here are some signs:
- You’re always doing overtime and skipping your breaks
- You feel resentful or frustrated because you’re doing everything and no one is helping you
- You feel like the creative side of your brain switched off
- Small tasks are taking over your day so the big tasks end up being pushed back
- You’re making more mistakes because you don’t have the mental capacity/energy
- You constantly feel like there aren’t enough hours in the day
- You can’t remember the last time you felt fully caught up on all your tasks
- You feel like you’re always ‘fire-fighting’ and never ‘fire-proofing’
I have found that too often my clients leave it to the absolute last minute to tell their manager that they are struggling with their workload and ask to delegate some of it. By that time, they are burnt out and overwhelmed, unable to train the delegatee effectively and inevitably setting up everyone for failure.
Not great.
Related Post: Perfectionism vs High Standards — Are You Pushing Yourself Too Far?
How to delegate fairly and effectively
1. Shift Your Mindset
The first step towards delegating effectively is a change in your mindset. Let’s honestly think about it, your current mindset got you in this position: stressed out, overworked and overwhelmed. So, if you continue doing things the same way you have been doing it you will continue getting the same results.
The only way to delegate effectively is to shift your mindset towards something different. You need to see developing delegation skills as a strength, something that will not only enhance your skills and lighten your workload but also greatly improve the lives of others.
It’s the ultimate act of a true leader. Steve Jobs said it best “Delegation is not a sign of weakness, but of strength.”
So really, you’re making the world a better place by empowering your colleagues and giving them an opportunity to step up and learn a new skill. A great bonus talking point for their quarterly review, if I do say so myself.
Top tips
- Question your limiting beliefs around delegating your workload. What thoughts come up and why? What are you scared of?
- Use the journal prompts at the end of this article to help you
- Think about the cost of NOT delegating and how it disrupts your ability to achieve your goals
2. Start Small and Prioritise
Now that you understand the importance of letting go, the next step is learning how to do it without losing your mind. That’s why I recommend you start small. No, I’m not going to recommend you offload the biggest task onto your colleague with immediate effect because I have doubts that you’d actually do it.
Instead, I suggest you use the Eisenhower Matrix to help you decide what small activities you can let go of right now.
The Eisenhower Matix is a handy tool that helps you decide what tasks to do now, do later, delegate and delete.
Here’s what you should do:
- List out all of your tasks in a big brain dump
- Draw out the matrix box in the diagram above
- Go through your list and put each task in the relevant box
- Urgent and important
- Not urgent and important
- Urgent but not important
- Not urgent and not important
You have to be honest with yourself when making these decisions. Urgent tasks are activities that need to be done immediately whereas important tasks are highly relevant to your long-term goals.
“The most effective way to change your habits is to focus not on what you want to achieve, but on who you wish to become. Small habits compound over time, and starting small leads to long-term transformation.” – James Clear
You shouldn’t have too many tasks in your urgent and important section but if you do, I recommend you go through it again and be really honest with yourself because it’s unlikely everything is THAT urgent and important.
If it doesn’t align with your values or long-term goals, get rid of it. It might be urgent and important for someone else but not you and that’s okay.
Tasks that are:
- Urgent and important – do now
- Not urgent but important – schedule
- Urgent but not important – delegate
- Not urgent and not important – delete it
So, your challenge is to identify an urgent but not important task you can delegate to someone else in your personal or professional life.
“If you set your bar at “amazing,” it’s awfully difficult to start” —Seth Godin
Top tip: use ChatGPT to help you sort out your tasks into the Eisenhower Matrix. Tell it your long-term goals, values, strategic vision (etc…) and then list out every single task you need to do and ask it to filter them for you. It will save you so much time and mental energy.
3. Communicate Clearly
There is nothing worse than assumptions and poor communication when delegating tasks. It erodes trust between all parties involved and can make the workplace feel like hell on earth where no one feels seen, heard or understood.
The key to avoiding all of that is to communicate clearly and effectively.
While working as a project manager, I had to learn the art of communication and make sure everyone knew what they were doing, where they were doing it, why it was important and who they needed to report to.
Delegation isn’t about dropping off your tasks and moving on with your life (no matter how tempting it feels). You need to make sure there are clear role descriptions and reporting structures to ensure the tasks run smoothly without you having to micromanage.
I know. More work and you’re already busy. I know and I’m truly sorry.
“Delegation requires the willingness to pay for short-term failures in order to gain long-term competency.” – Dave Ramsey
BUT, it’s a short-term sacrifice for a long-term gain. Do not skip this activity.
- Describe the task and explain the purpose
- List out all of the activities
- Note key milestones and deadlines
- Any dependencies?
- Any templates?
- Key contacts: RACI
- Who is responsible? Who is accountable? Who needs to be consulted? Who needs to be informed?
It doesn’t have to be a long-ass comprehensive report if it is a small task but providing the information in the list above will ensure that the person you’re delegating to feels empowered to take ownership of the responsibilities without you feeling the need to micromanage.
Top tip: make sure you have a clear definition of what ‘done’ actually looks like. No vague definitions, please!
4. Empower Through Training
Since you’re probably very busy already, you might not have the time to fully train someone up properly which is why I recommend you do 2 things:
- Have the delegatee watch you doing the activity in person or on teams/zoom
- Get the delegatee to do the activity with you next to them and answer their questions
Do it in that order.
This will save you so much time and empower the delegatee in the process. For the first step, you’re just going to run through the task like you normally do but this time have the person you’re going to delegate to on the call so they can witness the process and make notes. I also highly recommend you record this session for additional impact.
The second step is all about handing over responsibility to the delegatee. Be patient and encouraging and guide them through each step making sure to answer their questions as you go along.
When training your coworker, try to think about the benefits of the task from their perspective. Remember, everyone is going through life with a ‘what’s in it for me?’ mindset so you need to make sure you explain the process to your team with that in mind.
5. Regularly Review and Offer Feedback
It is incredibly important that you embed regular reviews and provide feedback where necessary. You want to encourage the person you have delegated the work to feel like they have ownership of the project while also feeling supported by you.
Remember, just because you’ve always done something a certain way, it doesn’t mean that it is the only way to do things. If you notice your colleague doing the task a different way, don’t jump in all guns blazing and scold them for it. Take on an inquisitive approach to find out the reason behind it because their way of doing things might actually make more sense – you never know, you might learn something from them.
If, however, you find yourself having to have a difficult conversation with the person you delegated the task to because they’re not doing it correctly then I recommend you use nonviolent communication techniques to help you.
This is a technique I end up having to teach all of my clients at some point in our coaching journey because it is that important! Too many of us are poor communicators and it shows. You don’t ‘tell it like it is’, you’re just mean and lack communication skills.
Nonviolent communication is all about empathy, mutual respect and shared understanding developed by Marshall Rosenberg in the 1960’s.
This works not only in your personal relationships but also in the working environment as evidenced by Adriani et al. They found that using NVC in the workplace improved collaboration and created a culture of empathy, especially in complex environments.
In order to have difficult conversations you must break down the conversation into 4 parts:
- Observation: “I noticed that in the report you submitted, there were several numbers that didn’t match the data in our main system.”
- Feelings: “I felt concerned when I saw this because accurate data is crucial for our decisions.”
- Needs: “I need the reports to be as accurate as possible so the team can make well-informed choices.”
- Request: “Could you double-check the numbers against the main system next time? If you have any doubts, let me know, and we can review them together.”
Explaining things in this way addresses the issue without blaming or shaming the delegatee. You’re simply explaining that there was a problem, why it’s important and what needs to happen in the future.
“In all aspects of business, there are these little short reward loops that we can identify” – Alex Hormozi
10 Journal prompts to help you start delegating effectively:
- What’s one task I could let go of right now?
- Why do I feel nervous about asking for help?
- What’s the worst that could happen if I delegate and what’s the best that could happen?
- Who on my team (or my life) can I trust with more responsibility?
- How would my day feel if I had less on my plate?
- What’s one thing I can delegate this week to free up my time?
- How can I make asking for help feel easier?
- How do I feel after I delegate a task?
- What small task can I delegate today to practice?
- What would my ideal work-life balance look like if I delegated more effectively?
So, what are you going to delegate?
You should be well-informed on the key steps to delegating effectively and efficiently now so it is up to you to choose to let go of some of your tasks. I know it can be tricky, trusting others especially when you feel like your job is on the line but knowing when and how to delegate will help you level up in your career because it frees you up for more meaningful tasks. And you also get to contribute to creating a community of collaboration in the workplace when you learn how to delegate effectively.
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Related Posts:
- How To Handle Criticism As A Perfectionist – 9 Simple Ways
- How To Deal With Mistakes as a Perfectionist – 9 Simple Ways!
- Perfectionism vs High Standards — Are You Pushing Yourself Too Far?
- 13 Subtle Signs You’re A Perfectionist And Don’t Even Know It
- How To Make Decisions as a Perfectionist – 10 EASY steps
- 7 Important Boundaries Perfectionists NEED To Set Without Guilt!
- STOP Saying These 7 Toxic Perfectionist Phrases To Be Successful
- Work-life flow is better than work-life balance for perfectionists
