Instead Of Micro Managing, Leverage A Visibility System That Includes Communication And Action Management

As a business owner, you want to control what happens, how it happens, and when it happens. And, justifiably so. Your lively hood and the success of so many individuals is dependent on a business reliably producing value for its customers. 

But, many small business owners take this too far when they remove their team’s agency and dictate to employees exactly how to do their job. While they may feel and be justified in their doing so, micro-managing this way removes the mind of the team members and turns them into robots. 

These team members become less effective at their jobs and don’t develop into the leaders required to grow the organization. Founders end up disappointed, and this frustration leads to micro-managing even more, perpetuating the problem.

Great workers know how to work with micro-managers to alleviate their lack of trust, reassure them about what’s going on, and generating results. But for them, it isn’t easy, and it is still stressful. 

When working with clients using the batch action management (BAM) system, I’m constantly communicating about what I’m working on past, present, and future. As results validate my activities, the engagement continues. It’s this accountability system that’s empowered me to teach many small business owners how to trust and slowly let go. 

While I help in this regard, what I want most for them is to create a visibility and accountability system (VAS, as my friend, calls it) for fostering trust and results as they grow their business. At a minimum, I model for them while freelancing under their authority. I've succeeded when this has inspired action to follow my example.

So if micromanaging is your go-to method, I encourage you to dig into the root of why you operate this way and discover a better method for how you could more effectively grow your team (and resolve your insecurities).

Two Ways To Effectively Lead People Without Micro Managing

Proactive scheduled communication and organized mutually visible actions are how you’ll build a system that provides what’s needed to grow the business while also empowering your team. Let's quickly explore both.

Create communication checkpoints with your staff or contractors. Whether it’s a quick morning chat, weekly meeting, or a monthly email digest, establish a minimum level communication cadence. When a checkpoint is missed, you have a trigger to follow up with them. This will actively bring you along on what’s happening and alleviate your anxiety from the unknown.

It also provides an opportunity to capture ideas, and share direction. Usually, this cadence will start often and dwindle in frequency as you effectively teach, direct and empower your team.

Established an organized and visible action management system (living blueprint) for your organization and the people in it. What are the priorities of the organization, department, project? Who is responsible for them? And what are the activities happening in those areas by those people day-to-day and week-to-week?

This place allows you to rest assured ideas, actions, and projects are being captured and given attention. It also allows you to check-in discreetly on activity to ensure things are going as expected while not hovering over your team. 

Wrapping Up

These two small steps of time and organization make a big difference and are powerful ways to empower your team. They very well could be the system you need to stop micromanaging your team, and rebuilding the trust you need to grow the business to the highest level.