How to empower employees

Empowerment means letting go of the authority to make certain decisions. This is partly a good management practice and partly about facing reality - the reality that modern employees won't accept jobs where they have no say in their day to day operational decisions. Still, old habits die hard and some managers will struggle for awhile to change their roles from prime decision maker to facilitator.

Several factors contribute to effective empowement. Your organizational culture must support empowerment. It won't work if managers feel threatened by a loss of authority, for example. There is also the question of what to empower and when. In addition, self-awareness is essential to be sure that you are not actually disempowering employees.

Read on to learn how to empower employees and how to overcome barriers to empowerment.

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Culture and Empowerment

Does your culture support empowerment?

Empowerment often fails because the employee is the only focus.
But the organization's culture may prevent managers from letting go.
Empowerment means LESS decision making for managers.
Managers may not be helped to clarify their changed roles.
If managers are insecure they hang on even harder to their "rights".
Risk taking may be encouraged while mistakes are still punished.
Empowerment entails a total culture change...from top to bottom.
Role models and success stories should be celebrated.
Initiative which leads to reasonable mistakes should be rewarded.
Empowerment is an excellent tool for motivating employees and for talent retention.

Empower people to do what?

How to do their job OR what their job should be about?
Discretion in how to do the job is easiest but provides less latitude.
"What the job should be about" can also be decided by the employee, when their options are acceptable and add value.
Creativity will be more likely if employees have some say in WHAT they might contribute.
Handling customers and urgent problems are two commonly empowered tasks - but people have much more to offer.
If employees are your partners, they should be empowered to make more strategic contributions.
Empowering means giving power - not just to DO things but to participate in major decisions - to be listened to with respect.
Empowerment is also the natural shift of power - to knowledge, away from position.

When is it best to empower?

Empower when...

* employees are close to customers
* innovation is critical
* technology is complex
* processes are changing rapidly
* the environment is uncertain
* employees want growth, responsibility and development
* initiative has a high payoff value
* employees need motivating
* the individuals concerned are ready
* close supervision is impossible
* the boss can genuinely let go
* the boss is supportive and a good coach

Consider not empowering when...

* consistency and uniformity are essential
* costs need to be minimized and tightly controlled
* operations are too routine and need to be standardize
* errors are too costly
* employees are untrained or otherwise unready
* employees are too dependent and lack confidence
* individual initiative may be too costly
* motivation is already strong the way things are
* close supervision is essential
* the organization's culture is not supportive
* the managers are not ready to let go

Barriers to empowerment

Empowerment can fail for any one of several reasons:

* The manager's fear of losing power.
* Pressure from the manager's boss to be on top of all details.
* Rationalization that employees are not ready.
* Fear of losing control reduces empowerment.
* The feeling that "Only I can make the right decisions".
* Fear of having nothing to do...being redundant or having no purpose.
* Fear of losing face or status.
* Not accepting that subordinates are more knowledgeable or better placed to make some decisions.
* Lack of support from the organization's culture - demands for more centralized decision making.
* Preaching the value of making mistakes while still punishing them.
* Not providing clear authority or boundaries.
* Not enabling those empowered - not developing them or giving them sufficient confidence to make decisions independently.
* How can you minimize these barriers to empowerment?
* Empowerment normally means letting others make decisions that you would normally make.
* You can also empower leadership in the sense of encouraging employees to think for themselves and to challenge upwards.

How to empower employees

* Empowerment entails a more fundamental change than mere delegation.
* First your culture has to adjust, then people have to be developed to overcome their fear of acting without your approval.
* Many employees are already able to take all the responsibility you can give them.
* Get people to realize how much power they have already - through their specialist skills and knowledge.
* The hardest part of empowerment is changing old habits - your willingness to let go and fearful employees to abandon their fears.
* Best to start small for those most unused to this new way of working.
* Trust takes time to build - regular feedback - both to the manager and to the empowered employee will build their confidence.
* When reluctant subordinates continue to look to you for decisions, ask them what they think they should do.
* Supportively praise good ideas before questioning aspects that are unworkable.
* Give them space to do things differently from how you would do them.
* Ensure that the employee leaves your office feeling good about something and more confident to decide in future.

How do you disempower people? Do you...

Make sure YOU handle the important issues?
Insist on approving actions they could take on their own?
Criticize them for not consulting you on decisions they could make?
Offer your answers instead of drawing solutions out of them?
Occupy most of the spotlight most of the time?
Lead all your meetings and cross functional exchanges?
See your role as making decisions and having the answers?
Feel you need to look after or protect your subordinates?
Show discomfort or disapproval when they disagree with you?
Jump on them for mistakes but forget to praise their successes?
Ridicule their ideas as unworkable?
Generally like to see things done your way?

The reality of empowerment

Empowerment is viewed as authority that managers grant employees
The reality is that many front line employees already have a lot of power.
Recognize their power and motivate them to channel it productively.
Employees who serve customers have the power to make or break a business.
Empowering them means acknowledging how powerful they already are.
The same applies to knowledge workers whose innovations can build your business.
In the old days when most employees did only routine jobs, they had no power other than what managers condescended to grant them - this was called job enrichment!
Now, employees are doing the critical jobs and managers are increasingly facilitators or coaches who need to get out of the way and let powerful employees do the business.
This is a profound shift in organizational power.
Nevertheless, it is hard for employees to fully utilize their power because the other reality is that managers still have the power to promote or fire them.
So, both sides have their own sort of power and today the balance is more even than it used to be.
An even balance of power implies partnership, not empowerment.
The catch is that partners expect an even balance of reward distribution as well
The key is not so much to empower employees who are already powerful but to motivate them to channel their power to maximize business results.