Delegating To The Floor - For Directs

Summary

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Career Tools: "Delegating to the Floor – For Directs" (Part 1 of 2)

Podcast: Career Tools
Hosts: Sarah and Mark (Manager Tools)
Date: July 16, 2026

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Episode Overview

Main Theme:
This episode focuses on a strategy called "delegating to the floor"—a practical approach for individual contributors (non-managers) to analyze their workload, identify lower-priority tasks, and work with their managers to remove or deprioritize less essential duties. The goal is to help professionals find more time for valuable, growth-oriented work, sharpen their focus, and contribute more effectively, all while mitigating the risks of deprioritizing tasks.

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Key Discussion Points and Insights

1. The Purpose and Problem: Why Delegation (and Delegating to the Floor) Matters

• Organizations constantly push work down to the lowest functional level, seeking efficiency and growth.
• Managers often resist delegation due to beliefs that their directs can’t do tasks as well or as quickly, or that teaching takes too long ([01:50-02:41]).
  • Quote:
    “It's just easier if I do it myself. My direct doesn't know it as well as me. I can do it faster, I can do it better. Which of course is technically true, but doesn't lead to growth.” — Mark [01:50]
• The consequence is overload at every level, until work “falls out the bottom” for individual contributors with no one else to delegate to ([03:30-03:41]).

2. What Is “Delegating to the Floor?”

• “Delegating to the floor” refers to individual contributors analyzing their full list of tasks and, with manager approval, officially deprioritizing (or ceasing) lower-value work that can no longer be sustained due to capacity constraints ([04:33-05:06]).
• The process requires transparency with management for cover—directs aren’t secretly dropping tasks ([03:41-04:33]).

3. The Delegation Cascade Explained

• Delegation happens throughout the hierarchy, pushing tasks downward—CEO to directs, directs to their reports, and so on, eventually reaching individual contributors ([09:20-10:40]).
  • Quote:
    “The beauty of her delegating to you before you're in the role is she can provide air cover to you when you mess it up a little bit, which her boss didn't do… She got promoted, she's expected to be a manager, and now suddenly she has no air cover for this new stuff she's learning. And that's a very, very risky thing.” — Mark [08:45]
• Organizations are built on the assumption that demand grows ("the work can never stop coming in at the top"), and so work must also be removed at the bottom ([10:40-11:26]).

4. The Risks and Benefits for Individual Contributors

• Risks: There is some risk in not doing assigned tasks, but there's also risk in refusing to prioritize and remaining “undevelopable” ([16:41-18:55]).
  • Refusal or lack of skill in prioritizing can trap individuals into working unsustainable hours (overflowing into evenings/weekends) as they move up when they have no practice in this skill ([18:55-19:43]).
  • Quote:
    “Be really careful about thinking. The answer is more hours, folks. It's not sustainable.” — Mark [19:43]
• Benefits: Delegating to the floor frees up time for higher-value, more engaging projects that drive both personal and organizational growth ([14:05-15:20]).
  • Quote:
    “Delegating to the floor is a tool that you can get to the fun stuff to reinvigorate you and go, this is fun. I like working so hard today. I work so hard today. I got my normal work done by two. And I give myself 90 minutes that I could work on this thing that I've been thinking about for a while…” — Mark [15:14]

5. How to Delegate to the Floor: The 4-Step Process ([05:06-06:18])

1. Analyze Your Work: Capture EVERYTHING you do at work in granular detail over 1–2 weeks. (Emails, meetings, reports, calls, decisions, ad hoc tasks, etc.)
2. Choose What to Delegate to the Floor: Identify tasks that are lowest in organizational value—not just things you dislike, but those that your manager will also see as lower priority ([05:06-06:18]).
3. Review with Your Boss: You CANNOT just stop doing tasks. This step mitigates risk by gaining air cover and ensuring organizational alignment ([06:18]).
   • Quote:
     “You have to be able to deal with pushback and we'll tell you exactly how to handle that. When you delegate to the floor in concert with your manager, you have a defensible position. You are not at risk.” — Mark [06:07]
4. Handle Pushback: If your manager pushes back, it typically means you’ve misjudged organizational importance or they’ve under-communicated expectations ([16:41-17:14]).

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Detailed Segment Timestamps

• 01:13–02:26: Why managers struggle with delegation; common (but incorrect) reasons.
• 03:41–04:33: Introducing “delegating to the floor” and the need for managerial air cover.
• 04:33–05:06: Individual contributors don’t have to wait for “Manager Tools managers” to benefit—they can reverse-engineer the process.
• 06:37–09:17: The organizational logic behind pushing work down; Managerial Economics 101; the need for matching decision-making with work level.
• 14:05–16:41: Practical motivation—why most employees never have enough time and how delegation to the floor helps address this.
• 19:43–20:49: The dangers of simply “doing more hours” and instructions for starting a time log (Drucker Time Log method).

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Example in Practice: PMO Manager Task List ([21:36–22:48])

To illustrate, the hosts detail a real-world list from a “PMO manager” (with no direct reports):

• Emails on Project X (quality requirements)
• Team meetings, one-on-ones with manager
• Reporting: project status, project X weekly, sending notes, mailing confirmations, compiling and hand-delivering materials
• Handling payment issues, ordering refreshments, resolving ad hoc problems, compiling cost reports, shelving materials
• Completing status reports for project managers

Takeaway: This exhaustive inventory is the first step—later, you’ll learn how to categorize and decide what can be recommended for deprioritization (“delegating to the floor”) with your boss.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Organizational Efficiency:
  “If Sarah is my boss and she can do a thing... but she knows I can do a thing... I should be doing that thing because... I'm cheaper labor.” — Mark [07:20]
• On Delegation—A System, Not a Shortcut:
  “We're not saying just don't do parts of your job, okay? ...There's a legitimate, systemic process that is happening here and you need to play your role.” — Mark [15:22]
• On Sustainability:
  “You can't say family first and then do work first. You can't say one thing and then do another.” — Mark [19:43]

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Guidance for Next Steps

For Individual Contributors:

• Start a detailed time log for 1–2 weeks (reference: Drucker’s Time Log [19:43–20:46]).
• Prepare to categorize tasks by value to the organization, not just personal preference.
• Stay tuned for Part 2, where the process of choosing, discussing, and handling pushback is covered in detail.

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Summary Table: 4-Step Process for Delegating to the Floor

| Step | Action | Key Point | |------------------|------------------------------------------------|-------------------------------------------| | Analyze Work | Track ALL tasks for 1–2 weeks | Use granular detail (emails, meetings, etc.) | | Choose to Delegate | Identify lowest-value tasks | Avoid just choosing things you dislike | | Review with Boss | Present findings and request permission | Secure air cover, clarify what can go | | Handle Pushback | Address concerns, adjust recommendations | Learn from feedback and manager priorities|

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Episode continues in Part 2

• Expect next episode to focus on the detailed steps of prioritization, presenting to your boss, and handling typical scenarios and objections.

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For links to referenced podcasts, methodology details, and sample task lists, see the episode show notes at manager-tools.com.

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Transcript

[A]

Welcome to Career Tools. This is Sarah and I'm Mark. Today's podcast Delegating to the Floor for Directs, Part one of two.

[B]

As always, our content has been crafted by humans and is now certified by Proudly Human. The questions this cast answers are how do I find more time to do valuable work? What task should I stop doing at work? And the answer is not everything, folks. And how do I get my boss to agree to me dropping some tasks to focus on the right ones?

[A]

If you want answers to these questions and more, keep listening.

[C]

Your communication style is costing your relationship at work right now and you don't have to travel to fix it. The Effective Communicator conference is available virtually so you can get the same behavioral frameworks, the practice opportunities and the same result from wherever you work. One focus day online. Real skills you'll use Monday. Register for our upcoming Virtual Effective Communicator Conference on August 24th at manager-tools.com ecc

[A]

so Mark, today we're talking about for our Career Tools listeners, how and when to delegate to the floor. Right? And folks, we tell manager tools managers, not that you necessarily work for one, although I really hope you do, to delegate as much as they can to their directs so that those managers can do only the things that they can do. Because there's plenty of things, I mean that your manager must do and can't delegate to you. But many managers, many people above you are aren't delegating all of those things that you could very well do.

[B]

I think it's fair at this point to say, Sarah, we tell the managers, you've got to delegate more, you got to delegate more, you got to delegate more. And almost across the board they resist because it's just easier if I do it myself. My direct doesn't know it as well as me. I can do it faster, I can do it better. Which of course is technically true, but doesn't lead to growth either for the manager in terms of doing higher level tasks and the direct learning higher level tasks. Anytime the organization can push a task from one level to the lower level in the structure, that's a net good for the organization in terms of costs.

[A]

Yep. Oh, and development and succession planning. Yeah, I mean all that. There's a list of things that hold managers back cause them not to delegate. And I would say they're all good reasons. They're wrong thinking but managers have.

[C]

There's.

[B]

I misunderstood when you said good reasons.

[A]

Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. And I mean folks, to be clear also, I mean we. I talk to managers I train managers almost every single week. And it doesn't matter where you work, who you work for, what you do for a living. I would suggest that the three most common reasons for not delegating are the same everywhere we go there my directs can't do it as well as I can. It takes longer to teach someone to do it than do it myself. And it is. They don't have time either. And yet we keep telling them, telling them and telling them to delegate down to you individual contributors. And then, then we tell them to allow the individual contributors to do what we call and what we're talking about today. Delegate to the floor so that the

[B]

least important things in your organization are getting. Are not getting done. Because we all know we have too much work to do and that's the way organizations are built. But that means some stuff is not going to get done.

[A]

Yes, that's exactly it. And also individual contributors, no fear here. When we're talking to managers about this idea that they delegate to you and allow you to delegate to the floor, we also tell them that they need to provide air cover for the things that don't get done that they've permitted you not to do any longer, essentially.

[B]

Yeah. And I think it's important we say that now because if they're thinking we're about to teach them a way that you can choose what part of your job not to do, even if we had the slickest way in the world for them not to do it, they, the vast majority of you listening, go. I'm sorry I've never met you. I know this is a good show. I like the guidance. I've used it, it works. But no, I'm not doing that. Rest assured, folks, we're going to solve that problem for you in this cast, okay? You don't have to decide. You don't.

[A]

Yeah. And to go a step further, folks, you don't have to have a manager tools manager to get the benefits of this activity either. I mean, we may not be in your manager's ear telling them all of these things, but essentially what we're talking about today is, is reverse engineering of what we would train managers on. Typically, you can engage in the delegation to the floor activity. You just have to be smart about what you do and don't delegate to the floor and get a little air cover from your boss. And that's what we're going to talk about today.

[B]

Yeah, exactly. So here's our outline. First of all, you're going to have to analyze your work. Okay. And again, by the way, your boss, if your boss is a manager, tools manager, they should know how to work with you on this delegating to the floor technique. But if not, this still works as well. Your boss might raise some eyebrows, but your boss also will probably be very impressed that you've thought through your value to the organization as long as you don't fall prey of just delegating this stuff you don't like or don't want to do. So we're going to talk about analysis and how to do that analysis. Then we're going to talk about how to choose what to delegate to the floor. Then we're going to talk about reviewing your list with your boss. You can't just not do work. I'll never forget when one of my directs said, oh yeah, I don't do the important things, I do the interesting things. And I thought, wow, wow, because I only want to talk to you about the important things. Interesting. No pun intended. And then last, there's four step. You have to be able to deal with pushback and we'll tell you exactly how to handle that. When you delegate to the floor in concert with your manager, you have a defensible position. You are not at risk. Promise?

[A]

Yeah. Okay, so we're going to start by going over how to analyze your work. And actually before we do that market, it occurs to me, it strikes me that maybe before we dive into this analysis, a little explanation for our career tools listeners about the organization, the why behind it might be helpful.

[B]

Yeah. So folks, if you don't know, if you haven't listened to manager tools, there are four managerial behaviors that are by far the most useful in terms of creating results and retention, which are managers core responsibilities everywhere in the world. Those four things are know your people. In other words, build trust, talk about performance. That's feedback, ask for more. That's the coaching model, right? And then pushing work down. And the reason why there is an organizational, there's a human response to organizational responsibility that causes people to want to avoid when they can, not always, but when they can to defer to their boss to make a decision. So their the phrase I like to use is their fingerprints are not on the murder weapon. In other words, that my boss made that decision and I'm just enacting it. And if you've ever felt that way, you want your boss to make the decision, you're normal. Now in really great organizations there is a defense against that by bosses being assertive about pushing work down. This also goes to something known as Managerial Economics 1 on 1 101, which says something very simple. If Sarah is my boss and she can do a thing, run a meeting, for instance, but she knows I can do a thing, or relatively quickly I could learn to do that thing, then I should be doing that thing because, and this sounds terrible to think of it this way, but I'm going to treat you like adults and say, because I'm cheaper labor, okay? If a job can be done by a boss and a subordinate, the boss should be being done by the subordinate. Despite the fact that managers say no, the quality is higher. With me, the fact is that manager is comparing her ability today after a year or two in the job where she's had 100 reps or 300 reps, or even just 20 reps to your first time doing it. If she were going to delegate to you, and what she should be comparing your first rep with this new delegation she's going to give to you, she should be comparing it to the first rep she had, which she wasn't very good at it either. And what's more, she probably, if her boss hadn't delegated her in advance, is doing it in the role. Okay? The beauty of her delegating to you before you're in the role is she can provide air cover to you when you mess it up a little bit, which her boss didn't do, didn't give it to her, she got promoted, she's expected to be a manager, and now suddenly she has no air cover for this new stuff she's learning. And that's a very, very risky thing.

[A]

What I call lovingly do the job with training wheels.

[B]

Exactly. Yeah. So. So what happens is what you probably don't realize if you're relatively new to your professional career and it's okay not to know it. I didn't know this Till I was 30 years old, that the organization wants to try to push, push work down to the lowest possible level. And all you have to do is ask yourself, do I like decisions being made three levels above where the work is actually done? No, Nobody does. They think if you're doing the work, you should make the decisions around the work, right? Well, that's exactly what the delegation cascade does. The CEO lands a new billion dollar client, he can't handle all of his job, he delegates something to one of his directs, they're already busy, and they delegate down and so on. Which by the way, should teach you a lesson when your subordinates are busy. When you become a manager and you have subordinates, or maybe you're a manager now and you're just still listening to career tools. Welcome back. When you're a manager and you get delegated something from your boss, that's a clue that you should delegate. Now you say, wait, wait, wait, my boss can't delegate to me. I'm fully busy already. Well, if everybody's fully Busiest. Busyness. Sorry. If everybody's fully busy all the time, then that basically says the organization can't grow, we can't do new things. But because busy.

[A]

Yeah. And that, I mean, that takes us back to. And I'm sure we have a podcast for this, Mark. I'm sure it's like a executive tools podcast. I'll make sure I link to it takes you all the way back to the purpose of the organization. Right. Which, if you're unfamiliar with it, folks, is to serve society. And I don't know if you've noticed, society always wants newer and faster and shinier and better. The work will never, can never stop coming in at the top of your organization. Which also means tying it back to today's topic. The work can never stop falling out of the bottom either, because at some point this continuation of work coming in at the top, which again will not stop happening, will have to stop happening if we don't continue to remove it at the bottom as well.

[B]

Absolutely. Plus, and to your point about why the organization exists, what is the first responsibility of every executive? It's a generic responsibility for every executive, even including the CEO, to grow organizational results. So if you're going to grow and you have roughly the same number of people, those people are going to have to learn to do more. Well, over time, you are always learning how to do your job more. But we want the jobs to be pushed down to the lowest possible level. We actually want to push harder than we probably should because there's no way to prove balance, perfect balance in between job responsibilities. And so that's why the safety valve in the delegation cascade is delegating to the floor where people at the bottom of the organization also have too much to do, but they are given some relief from that and not held accountable because they don't have anybody to delegate to. So that kind of hopefully did that.

[A]

I think that's helpful. I think that's helpful. Yeah. And there's a few podcasts, folks, that'll give you some of the background. Managerial Economics 101. I want to say the other one, Mark, that I'm thinking about is Juggling Cohen. Already busy juggling Cohon.

[B]

Yeah. Yeah.

[A]

So I will make sure that all of those are linked at the bottom of this one, folks, if you're listening, if you need a little bit more depth on the background piece, there'll be plenty of links at the bottom of this one.

[C]

Today, sitting on an interview panel without a structured process means your team is making guesses and calling it evaluations. Different questions, different impressions, no shared standard. The effective hiring manager teaches every person involved in the hiring how to ask behavioral questions, take useful notes, and make consistent decisions that hold up available for individuals and [e-mail] ehmc okay, so that

[A]

takes us then to analyzing your work. And folks, before we cover exactly what to delegate, we need to cover first why you would want to delegate. Although we kind of started down that path, most of us say we're too busy at work. Very few of us go home at the end of the day with all of our work done.

[B]

No one does.

[A]

No one does. Exactly. Exactly.

[B]

I mean, they might say it's done if they can't take it home. There are some jobs where you literally cannot take your work home, even with laptops and everything else. So you could say I'm done work pohana, as the Hawaiians say, but that's not actually so if you haven't met all your deadlines. Right, right. You did all the work that you could, but it's not enough.

[A]

Yeah, yeah. And folks, most of us also have some projects we'd love to do or things we'd like to get organized or additional responsibilities that we'd love to take, but we just can't work out how to find the time to do those extra things. So those next level things, those helping me grow kind of things, they tend to get relegated to the back of your desk to collect dust. And delegating to the floor is a way to help professionals find that get to those things.

[B]

Also, I would argue some people won't necessarily agree with me. I would argue that if you want to get to those fun, interesting projects, the ones that you think will make you stand out, delegating the floor is a tool for you. Now, there's some risk here. Unless you're. If your boss is not an ethical person, there may be some risk. But I would argue the vast majority of your. Listen here, your boss is. Is ethical enough that you can do this, but delegating to the floor is a tool that you can get to the fun stuff to reinvigorate you and go, this is fun. I like working so hard today. I work so hard today. I got my normal work done by two. And I give myself 90 minutes that I could work on this thing that I've been thinking about for a while and it's been gathering dust on the back of the.

[A]

Gathering dust. Exactly.

[B]

Now, look, folks, we're not saying just don't do parts of your job, okay? We're so more sophisticated than that. And this is an organizational system that you play a part in. So it's not like you're going to be a rebel without a cause. There's a legitimate systemic process that is happening here and you need to play your role. And nobody's going to tell you this role because the 99.9% of managers in the world, including frontline managers, actually it's 99 point, you know, it's six sigma 99. They don't know about these systems. Now, you could argue, why don't they? I'm sorry, you know, we should make every manager take organizational systems, organizational theory. But then you would argue, well, why don't they teach management in MBA programs? And MBA programs would say they do. And by management they mean how to run a big company with strategy, operations and people. But no MBA program that I'm aware of does anything but pay lip service to the actual management of people and how work flows through the organization. So we're not saying just do nothing. And we're not saying if you want to clear out your time so you can have a lunch and relax and catch your breath and so on. That's not what we're talking about here. We're talking about contributing to your organization at a higher level by being aware of your role in the delegation cascade when you are an individual contributor.

[A]

That's exactly it. Trying to find time to do value add activities. And again, folks, even though these are value add activities, there's still risk in taking this approach. But we're going to talk about in today's cast the fact that we'll mitigate that by being as smart as possible. And I mean, I got to tell you, sometimes you might recommend to your manager that you stop doing a thing and they push back because they think to themselves, well, I've clearly poorly communicated to this person how important that thing is. That happens too. Lack of communication in organizations.

[B]

Oh, there are a lot of managers say you have to do everything and you have to do everything to a super, super high standard. But you know, it's interesting. We, we're candid here. We're ethical and we say, hey, there's a little bit of risk here, but we'll explain it in a way to reduce your risk down to marginally zero. But there's also a risk in what you're doing now. If you don't know about this, you're defending yourself from more work from your boss. Because I'm too busy. I, you know I'm busy, right? It's all the busyness defense, okay? But your boss is delegating to you because he got something given to him by his boss. And your boss was already fully busy, too. Busyness is not a defense in organizations. It isn't anywhere. So you better develop some system for dealing with the new stuff that comes in when you're busy, one of which is, by the way, every day you should be getting slightly better at your job and becoming a little bit more efficient. And so what, three months ago might have taken you eight hours a day, will now take you seven and a half hours a day, and you have a new half hour to focus on something new. But don't kid yourself. You might hear this as a little bit of risk because you don't want to get in trouble for not doing something, and that's fair. But there's also a hidden risk in what you're not doing, which is you're not developable. You don't, you don't want to do more, you're not a volunteer, you're not willing to step up. And your boss has already been through her transition to being a manager. She knows she wasn't ready. She knows she didn't get any training, any help, any development. I know that sounds selfish here, but unless she listened to manager tools and she's going to want help. And if she delegates to you and you push back, you're saying, yeah, I want to stay right here for the rest of my career.

[A]

Yeah, I agree. And I think there's also that risk inherently in this lack of accepting delegation, lack of delegating to the floor mark. That looks and sounds like, I don't have practice. I haven't developed this muscle, my job gets bigger, I become a manager, and the only way I know to overcome this massive workload increase looks like, sounds like work more hours, which is a recipe for disaster. And so many people find themselves in that position, right? They don't know how to handle it, and it just spreads into their evenings and weekends. And they don't know how to do this, this activity, this prioritization, this removal of less useful work because they've never had to do it. And now they're leading other people and then those people obviously won't know how to do it. And it's just, it's.

[B]

Yeah, be really careful about thinking. The answer is more hours, folks. It's not sustainable. We've been talking for 21 years here at Manager Tools about family first. You can't put family first. You can't say family first and then do work first. You can't say one thing and then do another. So now we're getting into activity for a week or two. I want you to write down everything you do from the reports you create, the statuses you update, the calls you take, the calls you make, the emails you send and receive, maybe by topic, in person, the decisions you make, and the meetings you go to. There's a thing called Drucker Time Log, which we actually have a podcast about. There's also other ways to do a time log where you can actually get a random number generator that dings every once in a while and you just write it down. And after enough randomness, it's an accurate portrayal of your work after a couple of weeks. Drucker Time Log, I think is like every 10 minutes.

[A]

Yes, it is.

[B]

You're supposed to write down what you're doing.

[A]

Yeah, okay, so.

[B]

So you write it all down.

[A]

Yeah, you write it all down. And folks, in order to to help you with this exercise, as we go through the podcast, we're going to lay out an example so that you can visualize the delegation to the floor activity. Now, our licensees can print off the list. It's written in the show notes. Those of you who are not yet licensees, we would encourage you become a licensee. And fun fact, the first 30 days of any license type are free. So if you want this show notes to this one, you can become a licensee and download them and print them off in the first 30 days. So let's imagine in our example that you work in a project management office. Your title is PMO manager, but actually there's only you. So you're really not a manager so much as a person that does the work. So your list might look like this.

[B]

And by the way, this list came from a PMO manager who was who had no directs. So this is a direct from an actual time study done by a manager, tools manager, PMO manager anyway, with no directs.

[A]

So the first thing on the list is emails on Project X regarding quality requirements.

[B]

Then the next thing on the list

[A]

is team meeting, going to one on ones with your manager. Right, because this is an individual contributor, right?

[B]

Reporting on project status, the Project X weekly meeting, sending notes to your manager about Project X Weekly meeting Mailing the

[A]

hard copy confirmations on citing quality requirements

[B]

Compiling Project Kickoff materials for Project Y

[A]

Hand delivering Project Kickoff materials help resolve

[B]

issues with payments for Project Z Ordering

[A]

the refreshments for the Project Kickoff meeting

[B]

Resolve the issue for Project Manager X with library materials for previous project, Compile

[A]

cost reports for Project X from purchase

[B]

orders, shelve project materials for Project A

[A]

and then ultimately complete status report for Project Manager. Why so? That's a list of some some duties that are associated with this PMO Manager role so that we can continue to think those through in today's podcast in our example. Thanks for joining us folks. We hope you join us again next week as we continue today's topic. Now help us help others and tell your friends. And of course, follow rate and review our podcast. And remember, five stars only please.

[B]

Sam.