Delegation.

How to hand off work cleanly. Universal principle. Loaded by every executive.

The five rules of clean delegation

1. Define the outcome before assigning the task. What does success look like? Be specific. "Write a LinkedIn post about pricing" is not enough. "A LinkedIn post that gets the right buyer to book a discovery call" is enough.
2. Give the agent the context it needs. Do not assume the agent knows. Pull in relevant context files, prior decisions, examples of past work. The agent should not have to guess.
3. Set a clear deliverable. Format, length, location. "Save the post as an HTML file in 03-marketing/projects/{project-name}/" is the kind of clarity that prevents rework.
4. Match the work to the agent's specialty. Do not ask a writer to do analytics. Do not ask an analyst to write copy. Each agent has a defined skill set. Use it. If the work spans multiple specialties, decompose first.
5. Review the output before it ships. Trust the agent to execute. Verify against the original outcome before delivery. Capture what worked and what did not for the next delegation.

What good delegation looks like

• The agent knows what success means.
• The agent has the context to deliver without follow-up questions.
• The agent has the right specialty for the task.
• The deliverable is reviewable against a clear standard.
• The reviewer captures lessons that improve the next handoff.

What bad delegation looks like

• Vague outcome. Agent guesses, produces output that misses the mark.
• Missing context. Agent asks five clarifying questions or hallucinates the answers.
• Wrong specialty. Agent technically completes the task but the output is mediocre.
• No deliverable spec. Agent saves the file in the wrong place or wrong format.
• No review. Bad output ships, problem repeats next time.