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The Cardoso file

Because Cardoso learned at a young age the value of delegation, he didn’t have to go through those growing pains at Kennametal.

But there are young leaders out there right now who live under the idea that they can do it all. Save yourself some pain and just start the process of delegation.

“Your chance of succeeding is much higher if you delegate more,” he says. “A leader is only as good as the people that they have working for them.”

But don’t just begin to pass off everything that comes across your desk. You have to evaluate what is necessary for you to do and what you can delegate to others.

“It comes with prioritization and where your strengths are versus the strengths of your team,” he says. “One of things I encourage people as leaders to do is surround themselves with people that have different skills than they have.

“When you are a young leader, you know what you know and you don’t know what you don’t know. So, getting more people involved helps you be successful because it helps you with your blind sides and brings different core competencies that you may not have that you learn.”

You can also use delegation as a learning process for the people below you.

“You’ve got to be opportunistic and understand when is the right time,” he says. “By the way, you have to have the right courage and the confidence that sometimes you delegate to a person who is probably not going to get the job done. It’s part of teaching. You’ve got to make sure the risk ... is very low when you do that. Sometimes you have to let your people fail and you’ve got to be ready to come pick them up.”

Picking them up means using the moment to teach and not to criticize.

“When they fail, you can’t clobber them,” he says.

However, he has been surprised by employees who actually succeed and reach the goal.

“Sometimes I say, ‘I didn’t think you would be able to pull it off, but you did it so kudos to you.’ So you have to reward that,” he says. “You have to reward creativity in the company, as well.”

And you aren’t just delegating to help in the present but for the future, as well.

“Every leader has an obligation to grow their people,” he says. “It’s part of the leadership position. If you don’t delegate, the people underneath you are not going to grow, they’re not going to get better. Ultimately, your department is not going to be any better because everything relies on you.

“If you don’t delegate, you’re not going to be able to be promoted because there’s not going to be a successor to you and the company is going to look at you and say, ‘Your position is critical and we need you there because we don’t have anybody else to take your job.’”