The business or organization benefits a lot from employees who are motivated, and work independently with minimum supervision. The management that empowers its workers to utilize their self-reliance and ingenuity to work without supervision will find the organizational goals easy to achieve.

A good leader gives the members a chance to be their own bosses by letting them work with autonomy and self-control so they can develop new skills and increase job satisfaction. In fact, one of the causes of job dissatisfaction among employees is when they feel that they are too controlled and monitored over their roles as working individuals. By giving them a little responsibility, they tend to take more of it and their self-confidence in taking responsibilities would gradually increase.

How to Encourage Self-Supervision in the Workplace

Management has various ways and means to motivate employees to become independent and autonomous in the workplace. Here are some ways to do it:

• Delegate special projects and let them work on it with less supervision.
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• Utilize the skills and competencies of the employees for which they are hired. These skills may be applied through regular tasks and workloads where they can widen their knowledge and develop their abilities.
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• Let them participate in trainings and workshops to enhance their skills and learn more.
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• Allow them to learn from their own mistakes and avoid having to reprimand them for a shortcoming as it will only lower their self-esteem. Give them a chance to straighten out their flaws.
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• Pose challenges and problems that will require them to think out of the box and analyze the situation. This helps develop their problem solving and decision-making abilities.
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• Conduct group activities wherein group leaders will be appointed in order to make them experience the role of a supervisor.
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• Don’t try to control everything. Simply lay out their daily or weekly tasks and let them figure out how they will go about accomplishing them.

Work Autonomy and Independence

Think of home-based employees. They are perfect examples of self-supervised working individuals because there is no boss or supervisor to watch over what they do. Yet, these home-based workers still report to a superior or a client, only that they communicate virtually. In certain situations, some organizations follow this kind of supervision method. The way supervisors would communicate with the employees and check for work progress is through email or chat even if they are in the same office.

In a way, the workers still feel that they are not closely supervised and can work on their tasks comfortably. Sometimes, the presence of a supervisor can frighten the employees and cause them to worry about the possibility that their superiors are looking at their computer monitors or sorting through the paper works on their desks.

Self-Supervised Employees

The term “employee” is not only limited to first-level workers or those who are at the bottom of the organizational chart. People in the management position are also employees. Your managers, supervisors, and team leaders are all working for the same company just like you.

Self-supervision is not only for the typical subordinates of a team or the first-level employees but also to the management. So, if your supervisor or team leader handles a team of workers, they also report to their managers and are supervised by their bosses. This hierarchical approach does not limit the skill of self-supervision.

Employees in the management position do more self-supervision than a regular employee mainly because they have a bigger supervisory role to take toward the employees who are directly under them. The fact that they are leaders gives them more reasons to be effective in self-supervising.

Emphasizing the independence of employees in the workplace helps them to grow in both personal and professional aspects of their lives. This individual career growth can even prepare the workers for a possible promotion. Getting self-supervised employees for a management position is a great advantage for the organization.