You hired good people. You still rewrite their drafts at night. You handed the project over on Monday and took it back on Thursday. Most of your calendar is work that is no longer supposed to be yours. You tell yourself it is only for this one deadline. Taking responsibility for everything is what got me where I am. It worked. Now it's the thing I can't turn off.
Sometimes the team really is new or stretched, and keeping hold of things for a while is the right call.
01
What you do with work you gave away
The handing over may go fine. The trouble may start a day later.
You check in more than the task needs. You find something to fix. You fix it yourself, since explaining would take longer. After a few rounds, people may bring you their work earlier and less finished, and some may expect it to be redone.
You are in every thread. You are the last to leave. You say you want people to take ownership.
People call it micromanaging, or being a control freak.
It may be costing you the job you were promoted into, since the hours go to the job you had before. Your people may be learning to wait for you. And the good ones may leave.
02
What the holding on may be protecting
"Being wrong isn't a mistake. It feels like a verdict."
Their version may be fine and still not correct by your standard. Under Right, a flaw in work that carries your name may count as your flaw. I stay on top of everything so no one has a reason to say I got it wrong.
Read about Right →"If I'm not producing, I don't know who I am."
Managing produces little you can point to at the end of a day. Under Output, doing the work yourself may be the only kind of day that counts.
Read about Output →"If they didn't need me, why would I be here?"
If they can do it without you, a question follows. Under Needed, being the one everything runs through may be the point.
Read about Needed →These are not the full list. Checking because something might go wrong can belong to Ahead, where the fear is that if you stop managing, something goes wrong again. And it may be no rule.
03
What is under the rule
Under Right, the fear may be that if you are wrong about this, what else are you wrong about. What would answer it is being able to remain yourself while someone thinks you are wrong.
Under Output, the fear may be that without achievement you don't matter. What would answer it is worth that doesn't require performance.
Under Needed, the fear may be that without your usefulness there is no reason for you. What would answer it is being wanted rather than required.
04
Three questions, in order
First, for Needed and Right. Which stings more: that they did it without you, or that they did it wrong?
Without you is the Needed answer. Wrong is the Right answer.
Second, for Needed and Output. Who's it for?
If the work only matters because someone needs it, that is the Needed answer. If it would have to be done even if nobody needed it, that is the Output answer.
Third, for Right and Output. Which is worse: finishing something flawed, or not finishing at all?
Flawed is the Right answer. Not finishing is the Output answer.
If none of the three moves anything, there is not enough to tell yet, and that counts.
Not all holding on is a rule. Some decisions are yours and can't be handed off. A new hire does need closer review. In work where precision really matters, checking is part of the job, and for Right the check is whether the reaction is in proportion outside that work.
Each question does one piece of subtraction. It takes an explanation away and leaves the rest to be looked at again.
05
One thing to try this week
Pick one thing you took back in the last month.
Write down the moment you took it back, and what you had just seen: an error, a slower pace than yours, or nothing in particular.
Then write what you expected would happen if you had left it alone.
How doing everything yourself works as a strategy is on Overfunctioning.