Empowerment: what it is and how to practise it in your team

The word "empowerment“ frequently appears in articles about leadership. It has no direct equivalent in Czech but could be glossed as "giving more power" or "giving more authority". It refers to a process in which management offers individual employees growing levels of trust, allowing them increasing authority and room for their own initiative and decision-making. How can you introduce empowerment into your team?

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Why give employees more power?

According to Entrepreneur.com, there are many reasons for empowering employees more. Primarily this applies to regular employees who are on the front line, which means they know best how clients behave, the everyday problems they have to deal with and what consumes most of their time. By giving them the opportunity to decide for themselves, they will be more able to determine what to do differently so as to work better. Empowering employees also increases the diversity, capacity, and flexibility of the team, so you may delegate some decision-making power to team members and leave yourself more time for other work.

How to empower employees?

The process of empowering employees and providing them with more authority must always be individual, long-term and gradual. Here are a few tips on how to do this:

  • Create a healthy working environment in which employees are motivated to try out new procedures and not reprimanded for minor mistakes.

  • Give employees feedback and maintain an active dialogue with each of them about their work, rights, obligations and business.

  • Consult your decisions with individual employees and gradually involve them more in the decision-making processes in your team.

  • Set up a transparent system of gradual expansion of the rights of employees based on the time they have spent with the company, their expertise and seniority.

 

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Article source Entrepreneur.com - website of a leading U.S. magazine for entrepreneurs
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