Disorganized Supervisor: What to Do? Try this!

Q. I am not an organized person. I forget things, lose things, and keep a sloppy desk. I admit it, already! However, I am good at what I do. I have climbed the organization’s ladder rapidly. Now I need to hire an assistant. How do I hire someone whom I won’t drive crazy? I need someone organized, but let's put it this way, I won't be a good model of OCD illness to put it lightly.

A. It sounds like you are a creative spirit but could use some skills and coaching in how to organize yourself and delegate properly. After hiring an assistant, you are at risk for leaping between the extremes of refusing to delegate tasks to delegating wildly, sloppily, and hastily. Plan now to talk to consider a coach who specializes in organizational skills. There are such people. In fact, there are OCD-inclined individuals who actually have adapted to this dysfunction and created businesses ouf of it. (I am certain, someday, that some television program will be produced about this topic.) Go to Craigslist.com. You will certainly find such a person there. They are awesome. Then you will be prepared to hire someone and perhaps will have more organizational skills when they arrive. Try taking a look at 14 Vital Skills for Supervisors at the web site EAPtools.com to see if may contain helpful information for you. The employee you hire will be the most important person in your business life. Assuming you don’t make dramatic changes, he or she will have to be very good at running behind, scooping up the pieces, and making sure initiatives get implemented. This key person has to cheerfully accept all this responsibility and, often, may have to practically read your mind. This is okay if the employee you hire loves this role. Some do. Others love it but become controlling and manipulative because the supervisor has ceded too much authority without accountability. Making some key changes now will set the stage for a gratifying relationship with your new hire.