Ultimately, micromanagement destroys creativity, innovation and team morale.

Managers must tread a very delicate balance between attention to detail and micromanagement otherwise employees will feel disheartened, resulting in disengagement, a lack of motivation and a decline in productivity.

However, it can be extremely difficult to recognise our own micro managerial tendencies.

The Micromanagerial Checklist

There are certain traits that micromanagers commonly portray and being able to identify these can be a great indicator as to whether you just have an eye for detail or you are, in fact, potentially a micromanager.

• You need constant updates – Micromanagers ask their team for updates too frequently and don’t trust their team to make even the smallest decisions without their input.
  
  
• You want to know every detail – Micromanagers expect their teams to report every minor, unnecessary detail to them.
  
  
• You expect things to be done your way – Micromanagers want their team to do everything their way, even if it’s not necessarily the best way.
  
  
• You work crazy hours – Micromanagers tend to find themselves working a lot of overtime as they feel the need to do everyone else’s work as well as their own because they want to be in control.
  
  
• You overcomplicate instructions – Micromanagers often add unnecessary detail to the simplest of instructions, therefore overcomplicating them

Overcoming Your Micromanagerial Tendencies

Once you have recognised your micromanagerial tendencies, it’s essential that you act on them to prevent further damage to relationships with employees.

• Focus on outcomes, not processes – more often than not, there are multiple ways to do a task; as long as the outcome is what you expected, the process isn’t important.
  
  
• Delegate more – begin delegating small tasks to your employees to show your team that you trust them; this will greatly motivate and inspire them.
  
  
• Let go of unnecessary details –look at the bigger picture instead of focusing on minor, unnecessary details.
  
  
• Trust employees to make decisions – start allowing your team to make decisions without your intervention to allow them to feel more in control.
  
  
• Hold employees accountable – while you need to allow your employees more freedom, you still need to hold them accountable as this will ensure work still gets done.

Why You Need to Let Go of Your Micromanagerial Habits

Letting go of your micromanagerial habits will bring an abundance of benefits to:

• Yourself - Letting go of your micromanagerial habits will likely decrease your stress levels in the long run and allow you more time to spend on larger, more important tasks.
  
  
• Your team – Your team will start to see that you have trust and confidence in them, which will inspire them to perform even better

Try taking some time this week to reflect on your leadership style and create an action plan to improve your approach to leadership, decrease your micromanagerial tendencies and help start next week with a refreshed mindset.

(Click here for an easy guide to developing an effective action plan)

“A boss who micromanages is like a coach who wants to get in the game. Leaders guide and support then sit back to cheer from the sidelines” – Simon Sinek