Can your team keep going without you?

What if you vanished?

Alien abduction, probably. The method isn’t the matter here; it’s the impact. What if your team wakes up one day to find that their beloved manager is just not there? Does the thought of this happening scare you?

One possibility is that you may be anxious about who will manage those gazillion tasks and balance meetings. Another is that you may be relaxed, knowing that your team knows their stuff.

While it’s an uncomfortable thought, exploring this scenario can provide valuable insights into your team’s resilience and your effectiveness as a leader.

I spoke earlier about becoming redundant as a manager in a conversation with one of my team members, which you can watch here. In this case, I went away for a trek in a no-contact zone! A few years back, this would have been the stuff of nightmares.

What if someone needs me? What if everything somehow manages to fail?

And the spiral goes on. But we can break this.

There are a few pivotal questions that you should think of:

• How would your team react in the first 24-48 hours?
• Are there any urgent tasks or decisions only you can handle?
• Who would step up to fill the leadership void?

How can you make your team self-managing?

A few key elements help us ensure resilience in the face of planned or unplanned absences of

people leaders.

There are two elements central to building an independent team. The first is the culture and values.

Let’s explore a few of them in detail here.

#1 Communication and information sharing

If you want your team members to handle things in your absence, you need to empower them to do so. This means trusting them with information like login details for key accounts and communication channels to reach important people and building an attitude of ownership in them on a daily basis.

Think of everything your team might need to keep going, even in the case of incidents, and ensure they have access and abilities.

#2 Getting the attitude right

Let’s discuss the ownership factor more here because no matter how much access you grant, it won’t matter until and unless your team sees it as a problem they can solve. You have hit a dead end if it remains a problem for you in their heads.

For this, you need to do the work when you are present and actively working with the team, like letting them handle parts of a process independently and building clear decision-making processes. The more you describe and document, the easier it gets.

If you provide a set of expected behaviors to individuals, they start to learn in terms of “When I am in doubt, how do I make a decision?”

What we do at Risely is more abstract. We have defined five core values that apply to many work-related scenarios. They are guiding principles to look at when you are stuck and alone. As I discussed with Aastha above, if you have “honesty” marked as a value, you will know which direction to take without having anyone nudge you.

#3 Keeping the team afloat

Of course, a manager is not just getting things done but also building a team. You are ensuring effective relationships and healthy team dynamics to keep up work. Do those efforts sustain in your absence? It’s like a test. Here’s how you can pass with shining colors – by building interpersonal relationships in your team.

Think of your absence’s impact on the team’s morale and motivation. Does it seem dangerous? If yes, then there’s work left to do. Start by focusing on the long-term vision that has brought each one of you there, and dive deeper into the impact that each individual brings. They need to see the value in their own efforts and those of their team members.

Visualizing your absence is a powerful tool for identifying gaps in your leadership and areas for improvement. Take some time this week to reflect on these points.

Identify areas where your team might struggle in your absence and develop strategies to address them. Remember, the true measure of a leader is not just what they achieve while present but how well their team functions when they’re gone!