This Is Why Leaders Don’t Delegate When They Should

Most of us as leaders “know” that it’s important to delegate. We’ve read it and heard it, maybe multiple times.

However, even though we “know” it, many of us, maybe you, struggle with delegating. Why is that?

Why do leaders have difficulty delegating even though they know they should?

In this article, we will explore the reasons why. As you read through, look to see if you see yourself in any of these.

You think no one cares as much as you do.

This reason can especially be true for small business owners and entrepreneurs.

You start a business, put your heart and soul into it, and work your tail off. You love your company. You care about it.

You think no one cares as much as you do, so you don’t want to delegate work to others because they will do it with less care.

That’s a struggle Dave Ramsey had with his business when he started. He said in his book Delegation, “I told myself, ‘It’s because I care so much, and no one cares as much as I do.’”

However, as he later said, that’s not a good reason. Yes, you may care more than others, but that doesn’t mean they can’t or won’t do as good of a job (or even better) as you do.

And you will hinder your business growth if you don’t delegate. (Check out the article Growth or Control? The Decision Every Business Owner Must Make.)

There’s no time to delegate.

Delegate? You barely have time to do the work itself! How in the world will you find the time to sit down with someone, explain it, and show them how to do it?

It’s like picking up rocks and carrying them in a bag that you keep with you. The further you go, the heavier the bag gets. You could stop and divide the rocks with others around you, but if you stop, that slows down your picking up rocks. But in truth, by continuing, you slow yourself down even more, and the bag gets even heavier.

Yes, delegating takes some upfront time, but it gives you time to do the work you need to do.

If this is a struggle for you, you need to cut out some work that’s not that important (or delay it) and start delegating. The more you delegate, the more time you will have for what’s important.  

It’s easier/faster if you do it.

You may think it’s easier or faster to do the work yourself. “It takes longer to explain it than to just do it,” you may say.

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What this is, however, is short-term thinking.

It’s like your kid needing to tie their shoe. It’s easier and faster for you to do it at the moment. But the problem is, if you never teach them, you will always do it, which will take up more time in the long term.

It may be easier and faster for you to do whatever task it is now, but if it’s repeated, you end up doing more work over time.

David Dodson, in The Manager’s Handbook, suggests taking a long view of the work—6 months. He says to look at how much time it would take you to do the task over 6 months versus the time it would take to teach it.

If it’s a one-and-done task, it may not be worth teaching. But if it’s something that has to be done repeatedly over time, thinking about the six months can help you better see the time you save/use.  

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As Dodson says, “We are notoriously bad at trading hours in the future to save minutes in the present.”

Think long-term, not short-term.

If you want something done right, you’ve got to do it yourself.

Imagine a chef running a busy kitchen.

 Orders are flying in, but instead of trusting his team, the chef insists on cooking every dish personally. Soon, plates are piling up, customers are waiting, and the kitchen is in chaos.

The problem?

It wasn’t the team’s lack of ability — it was the chef’s unwillingness to let go.

Leaders often face the same challenge. They trust in their ability but not in others.

Maybe they’ve tried, and the people didn’t “get it.”

However, what it’s really saying is that they don’t know how to lead, delegate, and teach well.

Leadership isn’t about getting results yourself but getting it through others. If you aren’t doing that, you are failing to lead.

It could also be a perfectionist mentality – it has to be done “just right,” exactly how they see it, and if it’s not, it’s not good enough. No one can meet the standard of that “leader.”

If this is you, realize that perfectionism is different than high standards. Having high standards is okay, but perfectionism will just hurt you.

Also, realize that people’s work may not be “perfect” as they learn, but taking back control isn’t going to help in the long run.

If you find people aren’t “getting it right,” check your teaching and delegation skills and see if you are a bit too much of a perfectionist.

You want to feel indispensable to your team/boss.

Sometimes, leaders don’t delegate because they want to feel indispensable or important to their boss or team. They want things to be where they will fall apart without them.

So they may play “lone wolf” and do everything themselves. They may become a bottleneck because they don’t want to give up that knowledge or that important task.

But here’s the irony: when you hold onto every task to feel essential, you’re not making yourself invaluable. You’re just making sure no one else can step up. You also hurt the organization by creating bottlenecks and slowing things down.

Great leadership is about making yourself replaceable — by building others up to carry the load.

Great leaders build up their teams and organizations to run without them, not to depend on them.

If you struggle with this, you must confront your insecurities or ego. Your aim is to grow others and the organization, not focus on yourself and your image.

You enjoy specific tasks and don’t want to give them up.

Let’s go back to our chef friend.

Let’s say this chef started a restaurant. She loves cutting up the vegetables and mixing things in the bowls – so she does that. She focuses her time on doing those things – that she doesn’t do the things she should be focusing on – like directing the staff, ordering the food, etc.

Your time is limited. Even if you could and wanted to work 24/7, you are still limited by the number of hours you have.

There are only so many tasks you can do.

It can be easy to focus on doing the work that you like, especially for business owners who started a business because they enjoyed certain work.

The problem is that when you focus on the work you like, you may neglect the work that is important for you to do.

If those are tasks you want to do (and you don’t want to do what’s required as a leader), don’t be a leader. Go back to a position that does those tasks. It’s not bad or shameful if you want to do that.

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But as a leader, you must focus on what’s important, not just what you like.

You feel bad about adding to other people’s work.

Imagine you are hosting a family dinner. You do all of the cooking, serving, and cleaning up. The meal goes well, but you’re exhausted by the end of the night.

Your family members ask, “Why didn’t you let us help?” You reply, “I didn’t want to bother anyone.”

But the reality is that your family wanted to contribute, and your refusal to delegate left you overwhelmed and them feeling unneeded.

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The same thing happens in the workplace. When you refuse to delegate because you feel bad adding to others’ workloads, you’re not protecting your team — you’re limiting their growth. People want to contribute, learn, and take ownership of tasks. By holding onto everything, you’re denying them those opportunities.

Delegation isn’t about throwing unwanted tasks at people but strategically assigning tasks, roles, or outcomes to others. When you delegate well, you help others grow, learn, and step up, making your team and organization more effective.

When you delegate, you show trust in your team. When you don’t and do it all yourself, it tells your team you don’t trust them.

Delegation can also help even out the workload instead of one or a few people doing it all.

Delegation is a good thing, not bad. If people are overloaded, though, then help them with that. Help them remove tasks that aren’t important for their job and to manage their time effectively on their tasks.

You’re unsure who to delegate to, what to delegate, or how to delegate.

It could be that you’ve never been taught how to delegate. That’s understandable and happens a lot.

But you can learn – check out these resources here.

You’ve done it before, but it didn’t work out so well.

As leaders, we take ownership. If things don’t work out well, the first people we should look at are ourselves.

Often, assumptions were made, expectations weren’t clear, we didn’t follow up well, or we may have delegated the wrong tasks to the wrong people.

The truth is, we may not do it right often because we never learned how to do it well. But you can learn—check out these resources here.

You fear losing control or authority if you delegate.

Imagine a ship captain who tries to steer the ship, manage the sails, and check navigation all by themselves. They’ll burn out quickly, and the ship won’t sail efficiently.

Delegating tasks to the crew doesn’t diminish the captain’s authority—it makes the ship faster and more reliable. The captain’s authority isn’t in doing everything; it’s in setting the course and ensuring the crew knows how to follow it.

This mentality also shows a lack of trust and a perfectionist mentality. You may not get things exactly how you want them, so you hold on to the task.

If this is your fear, remember that is what leadership is about—pointing a direction and helping others get there. You aren’t meant to do everything.

More results happen, and your influence and “authority” grows when you delegate well.

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You believe delegation isn’t your “style.”

Sometimes delegation is seen as a “style” you can use – the delegative/laissez-faire style. It’s an “optional” style that you choose if it fits you (or however that particular article or video labels it).

And it’s often seen as completely (or close to it) letting go—basically abdicating.

We talk a lot about leadership styles and the misconceptions here, but delegation isn’t a “style” you choose (just like many of those things often considered as tyles) – it’s a function of leadership – it’s something you do.

If you want to be effective, you delegate.

Here are some other reasons:

Here are a few other reasons why leaders (including you) might not delegate  when you should:

  • You fear it will make you look bad
    Sometimes, leaders fear that it would make them look bad by (a) someone else is doing it, not them, so that person will seem as more capable as them, or (b) if the person fails, then it will reflect on them. So because of that, they don’t delegate.
  • You misunderstand leadership and what it means
    There’s a lot of confusion and mixed information about leadership out there. Sometimes, people think leadership is about making all the decisions and solving all the problems. That’s not the case. Yes, leaders need to do that at times, but great leaders teach, empower, and release others to make decisions and solve problems on their own.
  • You feel the staff is not competent enough
    If that’s the case, that’s a you as a leader problem, not them. Either you aren’t training well, you lack trust, or you hired poorly. If you are saying no one is capable but you, that’s a sign there’s an issue in you that you need to work through.
  • If you are good at something, you should do it yourself
    This goes back to doing tasks because you enjoy them. Just because you are good at it doesn’t mean it’s what’s important for you in your current role. It also doesn’t mean others can’t or can’t learn to do it as well or even better than you.
  • You’ve worked hard on it and think others will ruin it (it’s your baby)
    Study after study has shown that you need to delegate if you want to grow your business. You can hold on to everything if you wish to; just don’t expect much growth. Learn to let go and realize that while people may not do it exactly like you would, there’s a big difference between that and “ruining” it.
  • You have an individual performer mindset
    This happens often when people are raised into management positions but aren’t trained in management and leadership. They aren’t told what the new role entails and aren’t supposed to get results solely on their own but through others.
    Remember, as a leader/manager, you aren’t getting the results through yourself anymore (such as, if you were a programmer, you did the programming); you are getting it through others. It’s a shift of mind. (Depending on the role, you may still do some work yourself, but you also have to focus on getting results through others now.)

Whatever the reason, work through it.

You may have seen some points you relate to as you went through the list. Maybe you do it because it’s easier and faster, you enjoy specific tasks, or you fear losing control.

Whatever the reason, take the time to work through it, learn how to delegate well, and do it.

Otherwise, you will limit your growth and effectiveness as a leader and the results you, your team, and your organization get.

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