10 ways to know you're micromanaging

10. When you realize you're doing all the talking.

9. When your team stops having any initiative because they know you're going to do it your way anyway.

8. When you hear yourself say, "why do I always have to think of everything?"

7. You have to be involved in every meeting, even though your team members are capable.

6. When you do attend that same meeting and finish your team member's sentences for them.

5. All decisions have to come through you no matter how trivial.

4. You regularly say to yourself, "if I want it done right, I'm gonna have to do it myself."

3. If you're too busy to plan because you're so involved in putting out all the fires from today.

2. You never take a vacation because the place will fall apart if you're not around.

1. If you tell your people what you want them to do and then turn around and tell them how to do it, too.

I think most bosses micromanage at one time or another, but the point is to not do it constantly.

Ways to avoid being a micromanager (e.g. you get to feel comfortable about letting your people do their jobs without your constant involvement):

1. Hire the right people and put them in the right positions (Jim Collins: right people on the bus in the right seats)

2. Acknowledge there's more than one way to get things done.

3. Develop your people, give them goals and objectives, and then hold them accountable to the goals and objectives.

4. Focus on your own job because that doesn't go away when you're busy micromanaging your people's work.

Are there any signs of micromanagement not on the 10 above that you want to share and/or do you know of other ways to avoid being a micromanager?