How to decide what to delegate and what to keep
This is for you if you're stepping into a bigger job. You delegate by feel, handing off what you dislike and keeping what you're good at, while the week fills with work anyone could do. The role only you can run has no hours left.
Dislike and good-at are the wrong sorting question. Both bury you: you're good at plenty that doesn't need you. The better question: which work runs on the ability only you bring?
That ability is in your Superpower profile. Open your Systems, each a compound ability. Read your top two and their How to Power notes to spot the work that draws on them.
- Write your top two Systems at the top of a page, in shorthand.
- List this week's real work: every recurring block, even what never hits the calendar.
- Tag each block: System 1, System 2, or neither, by the ability it draws on, not whether you like it or you're fast. Good-and-quick is the trap.
- Draw two columns and drop each block into one.
``` Top Systems: 1) ______________ 2) ______________
KEEP (runs on a top System) | HAND OFF (runs on neither) ---------------------------------|--------------------------------- | | ```
- Keep is where your compound ability shows up and no one else can easily replace you. Protect it.
- Hand off is your delegation list, even the blocks you secretly enjoy. Someone else can run them, and you can't win the bigger job back while you hold them.
- Take the biggest block on your hand-off list, name who runs it next and what "done" looks like, and move it this week. One real handoff, not a loan you take back on Friday.
You walk away holding two lists, one block already off your plate. The keep list is the shape of the bigger job; each block you moved off is a seat to grow someone in.
