How to delegate while maintaining high standards

Delegating well isn't about a binary choice between doing everything yourself and handing it off. The core insight is that you must adjust your involvement based on the specific task and the maturity of the person doing it. Wes draws on Andy Grove's "task relevant maturity" concept to show how a manager can start hands-on, then gradually reduce monitoring as competence grows, keeping standards high without constant correction.

The newsletter walks through concrete habits: give a brief but thorough context before assigning work, avoid the temptation to hide behind tasks you're already good at, and deliberately avoid owning individual contributor work while still reviewing in batches. By treating delegation as a spectrum, managers can build trust, keep their own craft sharp, and prevent quality drop-offs that happen when they either over-control or completely disengage.

Examples include a program manager trusted with existing programs but not yet with creating new ones, and the practice of batch-reviewing multiple items to give high-level feedback efficiently. The piece also warns against the "I'm the only one who can do this" mindset and encourages intellectual honesty about where you add value. The result is a team that gradually takes on more responsibility while maintaining the standards you care about.