Successful Delegation: Jethro’s Advice to Moses

^“But select capable men from all the people—men who fear God, trustworthy men who hate dishonest gain—and appoint them as officials over thousands, hundreds, fifties and tens” Exodus 18:21 (N.I.V)

People everywhere have a lot of needs: food, health, justice, security, spiritual nourishment and so on. The people you serve deserve all these things. However every leader needs to face up to his limitations in terms of his time, skills, training and the priorities of his job. He needs to determine what tasks can be successfully delegated without shirking his responsibilities.

As the leader of the people of Israel to the Promised Land, Moses had taken upon himself too many tasks which left him worn out. As advised by his father in law Jethro, Moses charged the task of judging the multitude of cases to others and had them bring only difficult cases to him. That made his load lighter, leaving him enough time to do the most important tasks he had been assigned to do by God;  to be “… the people’s representative before God and bring their disputes to him.” Exodus 18:19, and to “Teach them his decrees and instructions, and show them the way they are to live and how they are to behave.” Exodus 18:20. This further ensured that he trained and provided guidance to the people he had selected so that they could perform their tasks efficiently.

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No person will make a great business who wants to do it all himself or get all the credit.
-- Andrew Carnegie

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