Category Archives: Responsibility

Deadlines

We live in a deadline-oriented world. There can be little question about that as we are hit with that fact since well before we are born. While it may be your “birth-day”, prior to that it was your mother’s “due-date”. When we have talked in the past about the three basic resources, Time, Money and People, it is only Time that we can not get more of. Throughout our lives and careers, we are given targets and times that we are challenged to hit. We are then measured, reviewed, graded, etc. on how we did and then progress accordingly. Or at least that used to be the case. Has it really changed?

As is typically the case, I read an article that got me thinking. This one was by Jessica Hartogs, an Editor at LinkedIn, titled: “Workforce Less Forgiving than School” (https://www.linkedin.com/feed/news/workforce-less-forgiving-than-school-4509203/). It was a very short blurb where she cited a Wall Street Journal article titled: “Young Workers Seek Mental Health Accommodations, Employers Try to Keep Up” (https://www.wsj.com/articles/managing-mental-health-at-work-is-a-juggle-of-rights-and-realities-11581523201?mod=business_lead_pos5).

As you might guess the gist of the topic is that we as a society are making progress with coming to grips with mental heath issues associated with our members. We all understand and try to make accommodations for mental and emotional disabilities, just as we do for physical ones. This is obviously done with varying levels of focus, and success. We have seen this with the evolutions and accommodations that have occurred in our institutions of learning.

Students with these types of disabilities and disadvantages are given the accommodations of extra support, extra time, etc., when it comes to delivering their assignments or taking their exams. I don’t think there is anyone who could or would argue with these accommodations for these students to assist them in their studies.

Now let’s shift to business and organizational environment. Here again we will find a situation where deadlines and demands will be placed on all participants. However, most of these deadlines and demands are usually created as a result of an interaction or demand by a customer, or some other external entity. I think we all understand and agree that when dealing with a customer, we will usually find ourselves in a “competitive” situation. When we are dealing with a customer-imposed deadline, there is usually little that can be done in the way of addressing accommodations.

This is just one example. Marketing programs have launch dates where everything must be in place before they can go live. Finance and accounting have rules, some of which may be mandated by regulation, where books must be closed, and reports issued by certain dates or time intervals. The list can go on and on.

The point here is, are we putting businesses into a no-win situation when it comes to providing accommodations for these disabled / disadvantaged individuals?

I am by no means qualified to make any judgements as to what or how any such accommodations should be put in place. I will say however that in the global competitive environment there are many competitors that are not even contemplating making any such accommodations. They are in the competitive environment and are subscribing to the adage “the early bird gets the worm”.

They have recognized that rightly or wrongly, customers will accord some advantage to those that are first on the scene and able to deliver on their requirements. This is part of the “Fast, Good, Cheap” trio of criteria in the customer decision making process. The usual addendum to this trio of criteria is that you can only “Choose Two”.

I have written in the past of how the importance of “Good” has fallen over the past while. We are in a disposable environment for both consumer and business purchases. “Good” now no longer seems to carry the weight that it once did. All quality levels are viewed as somewhat the same and are viewed more in the context of what is paid for them. We seem to now expect Superior / Good / Quality as table stakes for even playing, and will only pay more for it for our “luxury” purchases, and even then only when we are truly looking for and willing to pay for it.

This leaves fast and cheap as the primary customer decision criteria. How cheap is it, and how fast can the customer get it? No business wants to ask for extensions or miss any deadlines when it comes to dealing with customers. What’s more most customers do not well tolerate vendors who either cannot or do not meet their desired deadlines. I think that we all can agree that businesses that are slower to meet customer deadlines and demands will be at a competitive disadvantage.

It is against this backdrop that we seem to be requesting some businesses to make accommodations for those with disabilities and disadvantages, for the one item that up to now customers seem to have been unwilling to grant them, more time.

While it may be reasonable to make special accommodations for those with these types of disabilities and disadvantages in the university environment, where all members will be equally governed by the same accommodation rules (by the university representatives and professors), it may be entirely something else when the same accommodations are expected to be implemented in the open market environment where all do not have to play by the same rules, and the ultimate arbiter, the customer, gets to make their decisions based on the criteria of their choosing, which are usually price and speed.

This is a topic that I really don’t have an answer for. I believe we all wish to be socially conscious, but at what price? It is also obvious that we also live in a global, ever more competitive business environment. I have only touched on the competitive issues and disadvantages that could arise in certain situations. Many companies find themselves on the global stage competing against other organizations that may not have as strong a sense of social responsibility.

And all are dealing with customers who for the most part do not bring social consciousness or social responsibility into their decision-making criteria. They are dealing with customers who again, for the most part are concerned about their financial bottom lines, either corporate or personal.

It seems that adapting the rules of competition to accommodate those with disabilities and disadvantages can only work well, when everybody abides by the same accommodation rules and criteria. When it is attempted to be implemented unilaterally in an uncontrolled competitive environment, it would seem that it only passes the disadvantages along to those that make the accommodations.

While the article that got me started on this may have been titled “Workforce less forgiving than School”, it may be better stated that when it comes to deadlines and demands, customers are the least forgiving of all.

Pressure is a Privilege

Most roles in business come with a certain amount of pressure. This is normally in the form of pressure to perform. This is the implied nature of the employment contract. They will give you money, and in return you will perform certain duties, jobs and tasks. Keep in mind that there are usually time constraints applied to these functions such as “it needs to be done by…”. Get used to it. In this instance, pressure is the requirement to perform or deliver on those functions associated with your professional position.

Stress however is a different story. No job comes with stress. It is not inherent to the employment contract. It is something else.

Let’s start (as usual) with a definition:

“Stress is the body’s reaction to any change that requires an adjustment or response. The body reacts to these changes with physical, mental, and emotional responses. Stress is a normal part of life. You can experience stress from your environment, your body, and your thoughts. Even positive life changes such as a promotion, a mortgage, or the birth of a child produce stress.”

(https://my.clevelandclinic.org/health/articles/11874-stress)

This is a crucial distinction between Pressure and Stress. As I said, pressure is the requirement placed upon you to perform those requirements and functions associated with your job. Stress is how you (and your body) respond to those pressures. As you might guess different people react to different situations and pressures differently.

I’ll illustrate with a typical sports analogy. I watch professional golfers and I am usually in awe of them. Their job is to hit the golf ball, as few times as possible while putting it into the specific hole. It is not just their abilities, but also the level of their performance, and the stage on which they perform this job. It is not uncommon to see them standing on the green, alone with the entire tournament riding on their ability to make a single putt. Make it and they win, miss it and perhaps someone else wins. Hundreds of thousands and possibly millions of dollars ride on a single swing of any club.

Talk about pressure.

But that is what their job description entails. It is what they signed up for. Every stroke counts. At the end of the tournament you total them all up. Three hundred-yard drives and three-inch tap-in putts. They all count the same. The one with the lowest number wins. It is the most quantifiable of any job performance review. And they all want to be in the position where they control their own destiny with that one last swing of the putter and take home the trophy.

As a side note, there are no “participation trophies”. It’s quantitative as I said, in the extreme. You get what you earn.

Lee Trevino was a competitive professional golfer with his hey-day back in the 1970’s. He won twenty-nine professional tournaments during his career. He is famously quoted as saying “Putts get real difficult the day they hand out the money.” He also tells the story of how he personally learned to deal with that pressure.

He tells the story of standing over a putt and realizing that if he made it, he would win half a million dollars. And his hands started to shake. He stepped back and realized that if he missed the putt, he would still win a quarter of a million dollars. He then realized where he had come from and the heights that he had risen to, were a blessing. He had worked his way into the position where he got the opportunity to make a putt like this.

He also famously remarked that even if he missed the putt, winning a quarter of a million dollars was still pretty good, all things considered. I guess he made the putt since he never said in the story.

He put voice to what most golfers and people who work in general should feel. He was fortunate to be in the position to be under that type of pressure. He had worked hard for that opportunity.

However, this is not always the case in golf, or in business. There are many instances where professional golfers lose that innate ability to deal with the pressure. They begin to dread having to make “that putt”. In many of these instances this pressure manifests itself in the form of something called “the yips”.

“”Yips” is a term most often applied to a putting problem that afflicts some golfers. The term describes a nervous affliction in which the golfer putting cannot make short putts due to the inability to create a smooth putting stroke.”

(https://www.liveabout.com/what-are-yips-1561044)

It is symptomatic of a golfer who cannot, for whatever reason deal with the pressure of that situation. The pressure to perform has now become a stress.

It is when one begins to question their ability to perform and deal with the pressure associated with a situation that stress can occur. Just like some golfers who seem to thrive on the pressure of the big stage and the destiny defining putt, there are business people who also thrive under the pressure of the business opportunity. We all know them. The sales person trying to make the big sale before the end of the year, or the executive making the difficult decision on what to do next.

And there are those that for whatever reason, the job, the position, the situation, the boss, etc., who can struggle in those situations. Many times, it is not the job level or the responsibility. It is something else. The internal mechanism that handles the pressure of the role isn’t working.

The privilege of pressure in the role, the opportunity to get paid to do something they want to do, has become the curse of stress. It is usually associated with the fear of no longer being up to the task. All the training, preparation, and experience are sometimes not enough.

Pressure is something we all must live with, to one level or another. It can be as large as life altering events such as marriage, the birth of a child, or finding a new job, or as seemingly small as just staying in the appropriate lane on the road. Expectations and the pressure to perform and react accordingly accompany all of them.

I remember my parents telling me that driving was a privilege when I first got my driver’s license (a long, long time ago…). I also remember them telling me that if I didn’t perform appropriately on the road, I would not get to enjoy the privilege of driving for a while. After a while they realized that the loss of the driving privilege was a pressure they could apply to other activities and behaviors as well.

Like many other things in life, and on the job, it might not have seemed fair at the time, but it was the reality that had to be dealt with. Needless to say, I tried to modify my behavior (within reason of course, I still had to try and get away with some things) but by and large I did not find myself overly stressed associated with the added pressure associated with the privilege of driving. It was not an entitlement. It was indeed a privilege.

Pressure is always present. The pressure to perform. The pressure to get to work on time. The pressure to achieve. I have seen some managers who have elevated the application of pressure to their teams to a high art form.

I don’t think highly of this technique. And I really haven’t met any team member that has functioned in such an environment who thought highly of it either.

I think the key is to understand that pressure can be used as an internal motivator, as opposed to a stress generator. The new phrase to define this type of approach is “Lean Into It”, and it is defined:

“The act of embracing something, or a situation, by using it to empower yourself. To “lean into” something is to own it, to cast off disparagement. You move forward and deal with it with unhindered confidence, casting off concerns and cares.

Instead of letting a shortcoming hold you back, you find acceptance in the situation, perhaps even going as far as to pride yourself on it. “Leaning into it” may even imply doing more of the “thing” in question, or highlighting it, as a means to overpower it and have it no longer be deemed a weakness or unfortunate hangup.” https://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=Lean%20into%20it

I understand that it is far easier to say than do, but I keep coming back to what Lee Trevino said about missing the big putt. He had worked hard to get to where he was, and that despite missing, he still did pretty good. The best hitters in baseball still miss twice as often as they hit. Out of the one hundred plus golfers competing, only one wins on any given week, and half don’t even get to play on the weekend (they miss the “cut”).

Almost everyone has worked and performed under some sort of pressure to get to where they currently are. Because of that they get to continue to have the privilege of continuing to feel that pressure. I guess the key to it is to not allow it to stress you, but rather use it to drive you. You have to learn how to embrace it, because it is probably never going to go away.

When to Say When

Blog 395 – When to Say When

Nobody likes to admit defeat. Nobody enters into a deal expecting to lose. Nobody starts a project that they don’t expect to complete. But sometimes, unexpected stuff happens. Partners don’t live up to commitments. Suppliers can’t supply. Developers forget how to develop or run into unexpected issues. It happens. The question that is now faced is, when do you say “enough” and cut the loss?

First and foremost, this is a time for a “business” decision. Pride and emotion should not come into play. Multiple issues and disciplines need to be reviewed. Prioritizations need to be made and weighted values need to be assigned. There will always be multiple stakeholders in the decision that will believe that their specific issue should take precedence and be the basis for the decision. There will also be those who are probably best ignored in the greater scheme of things. I’ll try to sort through some of the various topics and inputs that should go into this decision.

The first input is one of the most critical inputs of all: Time. No one immediately finds themselves in a failure situation. It is usually the compounding of many items over time that causes the “Ah Hah” moment where the issue manifests. It must be understood that “All errors are Additive”. Two wrongs do in fact not make a right. It is usually a series of small errors or issues that add and multiply to create the failure state.

If you are interested, there is a Harvard University paper on error propagation that can provide you the mathematical foundations of this idea at http://ipl.physics.harvard.edu/wp-uploads/2013/03/PS3_Error_Propagation_sp13.pdf.

The business equivalent here is that there are usually many disassociated errors across time that add up to what can be viewed as a non-recoverable situation. Always correlate all error or issue reports, then review how long the failure condition really existed before it was noticed.

The second is based on the business nature of the issue: Is it an External – Customer Related Issue, or is it Internal to the Business itself? If it is a customer related issue, then the loss of business, both current and future should be the deciding factor. If the customer is committed and dependent on the product, good or service at question, then there probably is no alternative than to continue to commit resources (money, people, components) until either a resolution or work-around is achieved. Here the pain of the customer must outweigh the pain to the business. Effectively, the plug cannot be pulled.

If the customer has recognized the issue and has taken steps to mitigate their exposure, or made other plans based on expected non-compliance, move quickly to achieve an appropriate solution (give them their money back, substitute other products or solutions, etc.,) and move on quickly. The same would apply if the effect on the customer’s business can likewise be minimized.

Understand that engineers will always say that with a little more time and budget they should be able to find a solution. Developers will always say with a little more time and budget they should be able to get the solution working as desired. All will point to the amount that has already been spent and how with just a little more it should be possible to recoup it.

Personally, I have yet to see this work. This argument usually results in an incrementalistic approach that ends up costing more people, time, money, with little more in the way of deliverable results to show for it. One thing to remember here is that if you have hit the point where you have to examine the business case for continuing on along a certain path, then you have probably already passed the point when it was appropriate to stop doing whatever you were doing.

Internal programs, projects and developments are far easier to analyze. The question will always be: Is it strategic to the future of the business? And of course, the answer to this question from those responsible for the topic in question will always be “yes”. Just remember that strategic topics and programs usually encompass years on the timescale and similarly large values on the funding scale. A good rule of thumb is: If multiple years have not already passed by the time you are examining the “Stop / Continue” decision, then it is probably not a strategic topic that is being discussed.

There will always be those that want to continue whatever program, project or development that is being reviewed. These will be the people and groups that have budget and resources stemming from the program. There will always be those that will want the program to be stopped. They will be the people and groups with competing programs that want the budget and resources. These groups can also almost always be immediately discounted as input into the decision.

The internal stop / continue decision must be taken out of the hands of the technical groups (engineering, research and development, etc.,) and put in the hands of the financial and business management teams. How much more will it realistically take to complete? How much revenue or cost reduction will be foregone if not completed? How much longer will it take? What is the project’s trajectory? Will it take a restart / rewrite, or is it truly a defensible incremental piece of work (be very careful here)? It is here that the money should talk, not the desires or beliefs.

Occasionally a business may find itself at the mercy of another business group or supplier as the cause of the program, project or product delay. Instead of a stop / continue decision, you will be faced with a “wait / continue” decision. This means instead of stopping permanently and moving all resources to other projects, the decision is now do you stop temporarily, move resources to other projects and await the outcome of the delaying party, or do you continue with your piece of the project and just hope the offending party will be able to catch up?

Almost every time when presented with this decision, those associated with the project in question will want to continue on and hope the other group or supplier catches up. From their own budgeting and staff assignment point of view, this is the best and simplest solution for them. They will always try to justify this decision by stating that it will be more expensive to stop, reassign the resources, then reassemble them and restart the project at a later date.

Most of the time, since they are the technical resources associated with generating the costs associated with this decision, their assertion is not questioned.

This is a mistake.

Always question, quantify and justify costs to both stop and restart a project. Stopping should usually be nothing more than the cessation of charging to the project. Starting may require some re-familiarization with the project but should not entail significant time. What this means is that from a business and financial point of view, it will almost always be less expensive, and better for the business, to pause all efforts on a third party delayed program or development than it is to continue to work while the third party is delayed.

It may add complexity to those groups whose budgets are now in somewhat of disarray due to the pause and inability to keep charging, but it is better for the business overall.

The only potential mitigating circumstance is how long the third-party delay is forecasted to be. If it is on the order of days to a few weeks (less than four as an arbitrary limit) than continuing may be the right solution based on future resource availability. If it is on the level of a month or more, the decision starting point should be biased toward stopping the costs and investments until such time as the third party has caught up.

So, summarizing the decision tree associated with when to say when on failing or delayed programs, projects and developments:

If the customer business is dependent on the commitment, then whatever it takes to complete is required. Not only current customer business, but potentially all future customer business is dependent on competing the deliverable.

If the customer business is not dependent on the commitment, then the business case for stopping, substituting or finding a work around should be examined. Only the current customer business is dependent on completing the deliverable.

For internal programs and developments, the question of how strategic the program or development is will be key. We all know that nothing ever fully goes according to plan. For those strategic topics, requiring large budgets and long time-lines this is even more evident. Those that are truly strategic it may be best to continue to push on through, but with significant monitoring to make sure further issues and delays do not continue to show up, causing incremental failure.

For those non-strategic programs and developments, it should be a financial / business case decision based on the cost to complete versus the foregone revenues or cost reductions associated with a successful completion. Question all inputs and let the numbers fall where they may.

Finally, when the decision to wait or continue when a contributing entity is the cause of a delay, it is almost always a financially better decision to reassign resources and wait for the third party to complete their work than it is to continue to work in the expectation that they will catch up. It may be more complex and disruptive to those entities assigned to the program, but it will be better for the business.

Finally, understand that any time you ask for the inputs on the decision from the groups that are directly involved with the program in question, they will almost always declare that the program should continue at current funding and spending levels. While this may be beneficial and easier for them, it is the least financially viable approach to the decision in question. Always question inputs and justifications from all parties. Remember, when it comes to money, either internally to the business, or externally from the customer, there will be those that want it, and those that want to spend it.

Getting Angry

I was recently asked why I was such an angry person. This question caught me off guard and surprised me greatly as I had never thought of myself as an angry person. Others may have, but not me. Before answering, I asked why it is that they thought I was so angry. They responded by saying that they thought I had become angry during the last project review we were in. I said they were incorrect, I did not get angry during the last project review. I had quickly and directly responded to what was unacceptable performance as reported in the review. I explained that I am not generally an angry person, but that I can get very direct, both with myself and with others, and will challenge unacceptable behaviors when commitments are not honored, and responsibilities are avoided.

I also said that one should not confuse the immediate and direct challenge to unacceptable performance, with anger.

I have mentioned before that my preferred method of leading is to focus on, and address the achievement aspect of performance. I tend to look at what has been done well and what has gone right, far more so than what has gone wrong or needs to be improved. But that doesn’t mean that failure to deliver on commitments, or objectives can be excused or ignored. And depending on the reasons for that failure to deliver, occasionally they must be dealt with directly.

I have found this to be the case more and more often in the matrix structured, process driven organizations of today. This is the structure where members of the “virtual” team actually report up through separate organizations, and where authority and accountability lines can have a tendency to blur. In this type of structure, it is not uncommon to find that it is felt that the process is the responsible entity for the project’s performance, and not the people that operate within it.

It is true that sometimes events occur that can make it exceedingly difficult if not impossible to honor our commitments. It happens. However, that does not remove the responsibility. Even with mitigating circumstances, the responsibility to try and deliver on agreed commitments, to the then best of an individual’s capabilities continues to exist. And most of the time I think everyone tries to operate in this manner.

However, occasionally, such as the afore mentioned project review, that was not the case.

When you are told that someone did not honor their agreed upon commitment because “they were busy”, that is an excuse, not an acceptable reason.

We are all busy.

I mentioned this this to the person who thought I was angry.

I also mentioned that I did a little further exploration during the project review before truly engaging on the failure to deliver on such a direct level. Were there unexpected issues or circumstances that arose? Were there other activities that got reprioritized, and if so why were this project’s commitments the ones that were deprioritized? In short, why did this happen?

If there had been reasonable responses to those questions, it would have resulted in the creation of a mitigation and response plan to try and recover from the missed commitment. There wasn’t. They just said they were busy.

Sometimes a direct and focused response to unacceptable performance can be perceived as anger, since it seems to occur less and less these days. The idea of individual deliverable ownership can have a tendency to fade in a large process driven project. If the process is the preferred methodology, and something is not achieved, how do you directly address the process? You don’t. You address those that are responsible for executing the process.

Anger in general has no place in the professional environment. When commitments are not honored and there are no acceptable or mitigating reasons, an immediate and direct response to that level of performance can be called for, not anger on a personal level. It is in short one of the best methods to communicate that the performance and the excuse are not acceptable.

The fact that it was so memorable by the participants in this case was because it has become such a rare approach to performance. As I said leading from an achievement focus usually provides the required drive to achieve the desired goals. The fact that the response in question was such a departure from the norm is what made it so memorable.

My litmus test for if the reason presented for missing a deliverable acceptable is very simple: Would it be acceptable to senior management?

It has been my experience that some of the best leaders are also some of the busiest people. The demands on their time and the breadth of the decision responsibilities require a continued focus on the objective and the components and deliverables that will be required to achieve them. Will telling them that you were too busy to get something done be acceptable?

The short answer to that question is “No”.

There is a fine line that should not be crossed in instances such as this. The focus needs to be on the performance, deliverable or objective, and not directly on the individual. Direct responses to performance issues cannot and should not become personal attacks.

In our now process driven, performance interdependent business world, any individual failure to deliver has a far broader affect that on just the specific individual in question. Knock-on delays and other dependent deliverables will also suffer. Everyone’s performance can and will suffer to some extent.

As we become more “PC” (which in this instance means “Process Correct”) in the business world, we tend to attribute both the successes and failures in business to the process and not the people. Performance issues become obfuscated as process issues. And as a result, we have a tendency to try and address the process instead of the performance within the process.

In the past direct and immediate feedback, both positive and negative was viewed as a cornerstone of a strong performing team. It is now difficult to single out an individual’s performance, either positively or negatively without the interaction being construed as either lavish praise, or anger. Neither of which are particularly conducive to positive team alignment or performance.

We all can be and should be sensitive to a certain extent about the feedback we receive. It should help and serve to drive us forward. We also need to understand that it is our own individual behaviors and performance that serve as the baseline for whatever feedback we receive. We also need to understand that while the feedback may be specific to an individual, it must be focused on specific performance items and cannot be construed as being personal in the way it is delivered.

Anger is a personal thing. It doesn’t belong in the professional environment. We are all human and sometimes it is hard not to get angry. Still we must try to maintain our focus. The focus must always be on the performance of the individual, and not the individual themselves. When dealing with performance we must stay at the professional level and not the personal one.

Shorter Meetings

I’ve been trying something new lately when it comes to meetings. I started by looking at the number of meetings I attend. I don’t think I am too far outside the norm by saying, I seem to attend a significant number of meetings. I think I have said this before. We may have hit the point where we seem to establish our credibility and measure our value contribution by the number of meeting we attend. We have now associated attending meetings with making progress.

I then started looking at what actual portion of the meeting was I actually engaged in or contributing to. I am sure there are those that would question my engagement or contribution to any meeting I attend or participate in.

The point here however, is that I found that there were specific portions or times during meetings where the topic being discussed was germane to me and I needed to be fully engaged and participative. The rest of the time, maybe not quite so much.

When I looked further at this relative “down” time I would experience in a meeting, I found that a significant portion of it was associated with what I will call “related” meeting topics, not the specific meeting topics. I’ll give an example.

I was in a project review meeting where the objective was to detail the status of the project. An issue was identified. This is a good thing. But it quickly caused the meeting to go off the rails. Instead of identifying the issue, and assigning those responsible to work out a resolution, those responsible for working out a resolution proceeded to try and work out their solution – during the review, with everyone else waiting to contribute their portions of the review.

The issue was important. But more so specifically to a subset of all those in attendance. The rest of the meeting attendees (myself included) time was less than efficiently spent listening to the attempted resolution of a topic that may not have been completely defined, or fully germane to their areas of focus.

In other words. We sat there on the call.

The meeting dragged on. Another issue was identified which created another attempt at an on-line resolution.

The meeting ran out of time so that those at the end of the agenda had to curtail their reports.

The meeting ran over the allotted time.

Parkinson’s Law was reaffirmed.

For those of you that are not familiar with Parkinson’s Law, according to Google, it is as follows:

“Work expands to fill the time available for its completion. A proverb coined by the twentieth-century British scholar C. Northcote Parkinson, known as Parkinson’s Law. It points out that people usually take all the time allotted (and frequently more) to accomplish any task.”
https://www.google.com/search?source=hp&ei=BhmlW5GQIsvzzgLem5qABg&q=work+expands+to+fill+time&oq=work+expands+&gs_l=psy-ab.1.0.0l2.1768.4291..6750…0.0..0.86.947.13……0….1..gws-wiz…….0i131j0i10.QQZmraKUhpQ

It seems that it may have its roots in science (Physics actually, and as we all know I am extremely fond of Physics).

”This law is likely derived from ideal gas law, whereby a gas expands to fit the volume allotted.”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parkinson%27s_law

And as we all know, if it is science, it must be true.

As with any scientific theory, several corollaries have been created as a result.

“The first-referenced meaning of the law has dominated, and sprouted several corollaries, the best known being the Stock–Sanford corollary to Parkinson’s law:

“If you wait until the last minute, it only takes a minute to do.”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parkinson%27s_law

Other corollaries include Horstman’s corollary to Parkinson’s law:

“Work contracts to fit in the time we give it.”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parkinson%27s_law

All of this got me to thinking. And, as we also all know, this can be a dangerous situation for not only me, but all those involved or effected. It seems to me that meetings have taken on a status where it’s okay to ramble and take extra time, because invariably we make excuses for, or accept this kind of meeting behavior. The end result is that the meeting does achieve is goal, but it takes far more time than anyone is comfortable spending, and no one feels a sense of accomplishment when it is done.

My answer to this issue was pretty simple.
I made my meetings shorter.

Instead of having a one-hour review, once a week on Wednesdays, I scheduled two – one half hour reviews on Tuesday and Friday. I didn’t reduce the agendas or topics either. We covered everything in each meeting.

You might ask how this is possible? The answer is really very simple.

I became ruthless in cutting non-specific meeting discussions off.

If the meeting is a review, then it was a read-out, or reporting delivery only. If an issue was identified, it was immediately taken off-line, with an action item and an owner identified and would be resolved so that it could be read out and reported during the next half-hour call.

No exceptions.

It took a couple of meetings for the team to understand and get the rhythm of the approach, but the results have been very apparent. The project is moving faster. Ownership of issues and their resolution is much clearer. Progress is accelerated.

Just to review: we are spending the same total amount of time in meetings on the project reviews, but we are making more, and faster progress toward our objectives.

Looking back at Horstman’s Corollary to Parkinson’s Law, meaning if work expands to fill available time, that it should also contract to fit available time. Parkinson’s Law would mean if we schedule a one hour review we will conduct the meeting in such a way as to fill the full hour (and then some). Horstman’s Corollary would say that if we reduce the available time from one hour to a half-hour, we should be able to get the work done in that interval as well.

They both seem to be correct.

The issue is changing what were full hour meeting behaviors to the now necessary half-hour meeting behaviors. That means:

Ruthlessly staying on topic.
If it is a read-out meeting, read out only. Issues need to be taken off line, resolved and then read out at the next read-out meeting. If it is an issue resolution meeting, resolve the identified issue only. Don’t read out. Don’t work on other, related issues.

Cutting them off.
Many times, presenters do not know how to end their presentations. Sideline discussions, anecdotes, stories and all other manner of communications needs to be curtailed. Then move on.

Action Items.
Just because non-germane topics come up does not mean that they are not important topics. Clearly note them. Assign an owner and a time for resolution – and move on. Do not allow the group to lose focus on the topic at hand. This will keep everyone engaged.

Own it.
If it is your meeting, then it is your responsibility not to waste everyone else’s time. Stay on topic. Cut them off if necessary. Assign the action items. Publish the meeting minutes.

I didn’t set out to prove what are widely regarded as accurate, if not tongue-in-cheek axioms regarding how time is spent in business. I actually set out to see if I could start to reduce the amount of “down” time I was spending in meetings in general.

I am reasonably well convinced that the reason we have so much multi-tasking during meetings is due to the length and engagement requirements we now seem to expect in our meetings. We know the meeting will be longer than we want. We know that we will really only need to be fully engaged and aware for a relatively small percentage of the time that the meeting is conducted.

We know we will be bored the rest of the time.

The alternatives are to either multi-task, or to reduce the total time of the meeting in order to reduce the down time. Multi-tasking is the meeting attendee approach to solving their individual wasted meeting time issue. Reducing the actual meeting time is the meeting owner approach to solving everyone’s wasted meeting time issue.

Conducting shorter meetings will take significantly more effort on behalf of the meeting owner, and by extension some of the attendees, but I have found that you can actually get more done in the meeting by taking this approach. And I think that everyone in the meeting appreciates that, since that is supposed to be the objective of the meeting in the first place.

Responsibility and Execution

As we move up through management it is our expectation that our responsibilities will increase. We have demonstrated that we can not only handle the responsibilities of our current assignments, but that we can actually handle more. There is also a second axis that is applied along with the responsibility axis when it comes time for personal analysis: the execution axis. Being able to handle increased responsibility, but not being able to execute those responsibilities at an equally high level, or being able to execute at a high level, but not being able to handle the increased responsibilities, will provide you the opportunity to remain where you are and address those aspects of your performance that need work. It is only when both Responsibility and Execution are present at high levels that you get to move on.

I talked last time about Adversity and how my son has dealt with and overcame his Type 1 Diabetes diagnosis a year ago. Now I’m going to look at how he has done it, and what I have learned from watching him.

Most of us get to grow into our responsibilities and learn how to properly execute on them. Admittedly, some are faster learners than others. My son didn’t get the benefit of a learning curve. He didn’t get to grow into his Diabetic responsibilities. One day he is a normal eighteen year old, finishing his last year in high school. The next he is a Type 1 Diabetic, with a daily set of responsibilities, the execution of which affect both his quality of life, as well as his life expectancy.

Talk about having to grow into your responsibilities and learning to execute fast.

Prior to his diagnosis, Diabetes was sort of an abstract concept to me. I knew about it. I even knew a few people that lived with it. When it became real in a personal way, I too had to learn about it.

In business, few of us get to start at the top, with all the responsibilities and the requirement for continuous high quality execution. I suppose there are a few, particularly in privately held organizations, but I think even these have a sort of apprenticeship that comes from being “in the family” and growing up with the transition to be expected.

For most of us we start at relatively junior levels, learn, grow and prove ourselves over time. Situations, environments and even a certain amount of luck come into play. You may be highly skilled but in a mature to stagnant organization or industry that provides a relatively limited number of advancement opportunities. On the other hand, you may be in a growing industry where the opportunities are plentiful.

Good performance and learning the desired behaviors and execution can provide the opportunity for increased responsibility. This increased responsibility is usually built on, or an expansion of the previous role’s responsibilities. This means that you at least usually have a pretty good idea of how to execute on a portion of your new responsibilities.

This is the usual progression. In a new role, build on what you know and have already learned, and leverage it for the new responsibilities and execution of them. If you show the desire, willingness and ability to do this within reasonable time frames and expectations, then future expanded responsibility roles can be available.

Jesse Owens, the four-time Olympic Gold Medalist in the 1936 Olympic Games in Berlin Germany, said:

“We all have dreams. But in order to make dreams come into reality, it takes an awful lot of determination, dedication, self-discipline, and effort.”

I think it is safe to say that those games were not his first competition. He trained for a long time. There is no question that he worked hard. He learned and worked his way up through many smaller, and then increasing larger competitions, before achieving his most notable success.

I don’t think there are any smaller competitions, or learning opportunities for my son, or other Diabetics for that matter. One day you are fine. The next you have Diabetes and now are responsible for potentially life altering decisions, usually multiple times a day. There is no previous assignment to lean on or utilize as a jumping off point for your new role in life. It truly is a sink or swim moment.

If you provide your body too much insulin, it can result in Hypoglycemia (low blood sugar).

“Low blood sugar levels can cause a variety of problems within your central nervous system. Early symptoms include weakness, lightheadedness, and dizziness. … Severe low blood sugar is sometimes called insulin shock. Untreated, it can be very dangerous, resulting in seizures, loss of consciousness, or death” https://www.healthline.com/health/low-blood-sugar-effects-on-body

If you don’t provide your body with enough insulin, it can result in Hyperglycemia (high blood sugar).

“Hyperglycemia is a defining characteristic of diabetes—when the blood glucose level is too high because the body isn’t properly using or doesn’t make the hormone insulin….You get glucose from the foods you eat. Carbohydrates, such as fruit, milk, potatoes, bread, and rice, are the biggest source of glucose in a typical diet….If you have type 1 diabetes, it is important to recognize and treat hyperglycemia because if left untreated it can lead to ketoacidosis. This happens because without glucose, the body’s cells must use ketones (toxic acids) as a source of energy. Ketoacidosis develops when ketones build up in the blood. It can become serious and lead to diabetic coma or even death.”

In business if we do not live up to and execute on our responsibilities, we may end up having some of them taken away from us. If my son provided too much or too little insulin as part of his responsibilities, he could die.

Talk about a negatively reinforced incentive plan.

Normally incentive plans are structured to inspire better performance. To strive. To achieve. We focus on the upside and the opportunity.

His incentive plan has no upside. He will always have Diabetes, regardless of how well he manages it. Or at least he will have it if and until ever a cure is found. On the downside, as I just noted, failure to either execute or accept this responsibility, has a significantly more impactful, and detrimental result.

I have commented on the fact that matrix organizations can have a separation of responsibility, accountability and authority. Accountability and authority reside with the person that is answerable to the task in question. Responsibility resides with the person that must actually accomplish the task. A very simple example of this structure would be when Captain Kirk on Star Trek decides on a course for the Enterprise to take (the accountable authority), and then assigns plotting, navigation and implementation of the course to the navigator (usually Mr. Zulu – the responsible party).

I am not sure of who the appropriate parties would be in this example with Star Trek: The Next Generation, or Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, or any of the other spin-offs. I don’t think I ever really watched them.

In dealing with his Diabetes, my son is responsible, accountable and the authority. He decides what he eats. He tests his blood glucose levels. He decides on and administers the appropriate amount of insulin.

There is no question. He has the responsibility, and must execute at a high level, for the rest of his life. He started in the role, and will remain with it.

Fortunately, he has accepted the responsibility. He doesn’t complain about others with less, or different responsibilities. He knows what he has to do, and isn’t shying away from it. It comes with his new role in life.

He is also executing, continuously at a very high level. His blood tests and doctor’s visits all indicate he has his disease well under control. He is healthy and continues to thrive, much like any other nineteen year old without diabetes. He doesn’t use it as an excuse, or ask for any special treatment (although he is entitled to under the American Disabilities Act).

He just works hard at the tasks he has in front of him and adds the responsibility and execution of his diabetic requirements to his daily agenda.

He has accepted these new responsibilities (even though he definitely did not ask for them), and he is executing on them to the best of his ability. I think his best has far exceeded our hopes and expectations. I am confident that he has learned how to cope with this and any potential future increases in responsibility, and that he will execute on them with the same focus and high levels that he has handled these.

I am immensely proud of the way he has handled it. I don’t know if I could do as well at his age, or any age for that matter.

I continue to watch and learn from him.

The RACI Matrix

As the Project oriented view of the business world continues to flourish in the business organization, we have seen the rise in importance of something called the “RACI Matrix”. Sometimes it is pronounced “RAY-see”, and sometimes it is pronounced “RACK-ee”, depending on whether or not the hard or soft pronunciation of the letter “C” is chosen. I think that I have heard the second, hard “C” pronunciation more lately, as it appears that no one wants to be associated with anything that could potentially be considered racy in the working environment.

In the apparently now outdated but venerable “General Manager” model, there was no question of where the responsibility and accountability for getting things done resided. Leaders led their teams and the buck stopped there. They were responsible and held their teams accountable. However, as this management structure appears to continue to wither away, the matrixed and project based organization model with the RACI Matrix have proportionately grown in both their application and need, as a way to keep track of these new project oriented and structured roles and responsibilities.

As usual, first a little definition work:

RACI is an acronym that stands for Responsible, Accountable, Consulted and Informed. A RACI chart is a matrix of all the activities or decision making authorities undertaken in an organization set against all the people or roles. (https://www.google.com/search?source=hp&ei=91SdWu7FI8Kz5gKHsoTYDQ&q=raci+chart&oq=raci+&gs_l=psy-ab.1.0.0l10.1435.3243.0.8245.5.5.0.0.0.0.198.609.0j4.4.0….0…1c.1.64.psy-ab..1.4.606…0i131k1.0.-TcIxdozKYA)

The most important aspect (I believe) here is the potential organizational division of Responsibility and Accountability. When a Matrix organizational structure is employed, there is the potential for people to be held responsible for a deliverable, but they may not have anyone who directly reports to them that is assigned to the deliverable. In situations such as this, there is the need for some sort of tracking and governing document. Hence the RACI Matrix.

Now a little more definition work:

responsible
re·spon·si·ble
adjective

  • having an obligation to do something, or having control over or care for someone, as part of one’s job or role.

synonyms: in charge of, in control of, at the helm of, accountable for, liable for

  • being the primary cause of something and so able to be blamed or credited for it.

synonyms: accountable, answerable, to blame, guilty, culpable, blameworthy, at fault, in the wrong

  • (of a job or position) involving important duties, independent decision-making, or control over others.

synonyms: important, powerful, executive
(https://www.google.com/search?source=hp&ei=8ZudWur9G4_n_Qbj55eQBg&q=responsible&oq=responsi&gs_l=psy-ab.1.1.0l10.2660.8341.0.11364.12.10.1.0.0.0.241.1165.0j4j2.6.0….0…1c.1.64.psy-ab..5.7.1177…0i131k1j0i10k1.0.Er0EPShawI0)

Okay….but I’m not so sure I am comfortable with having the word Accountable used in the definition of Responsible. After all, according the RACI Matrix these two items, Responsible and Accountable are supposed to be separate.

accountable
ac·count·a·ble
adjective

  • (of a person, organization, or institution) required or expected to justify actions or decisions; responsible.

“government must be accountable to its citizens”
synonyms: responsible, liable, answerable; to blame

  • explicable; understandable.

“the delayed introduction of characters’ names is accountable, if we consider that names have a low priority”
synonyms: explicable, explainable; understandable, comprehensible
(https://www.google.com/search?ei=_ZudWvG1MsGO5wLIm7GACA&q=accountable&oq=account&gs_l=psy-ab.1.0.0i67k1l4j0i131k1j0i67k1j0j0i131k1j0l2.122902.124228.0.127937.7.5.0.2.2.0.209.523.0j2j1.3.0….0…1c.1.64.psy-ab..2.5.558…0i131i46k1j46i131k1.0.wz1wZ7U8_QE)

Alright. I’m still not entirely comfortable with the difference between Responsible and Accountable. I guess a little more research is still required.

The accountable person is the individual who is ultimately answerable for the activity or decision. This includes “yes” or “no” authority and veto power. Only one accountable person can be assigned to an action.

The responsible person is the individual(s) who actually complete the task. The responsible person is responsible for action/implementation. Responsibility can be shared. The degree of responsibility is determined by the individual with the “accountability.” (https://resources.workfront.com/project-management-blog/accountability-vs-responsibility-in-project-management)

Now I think we are getting somewhere.

The Accountable person is the one who must see to it that something gets done.
The Responsible person is the one who must actually do it.

The basic difference between responsibility and accountability is that the former is assumed whereas the latter is imposed. While responsibility is understood as an obligation to perform a particular task, accountability denotes answerability, for the completion of the task assigned by the senior. (https://keydifferences.com/difference-between-responsibility-and-accountability.html)

That seemed like an awful lot of work just to determine what the definitions are for a couple of the columns in the project work and responsibility matrix.

I don’t think I am going to bother going through the Consulted and Informed portion of the RACI Matrix. I think those terms are a little bit more self-explanatory and have less direct effect on the outcome of any discussion or project.

What I am getting at here is that as business moves to more of a matrix oriented business structure where the lines of responsibility, accountability and authority no longer remain within a single business organizational structure, a set of rules was needed to be put in place to define and govern these new cross organizational roles and relationships.

All this incremental work, definition and process was put in place in the interest of increasing speed and efficiency, reducing costs and assuring improved project implementation.

To be fair, what has really occurred is the codification of the inherent rules associated with the general management model so that they can be applied in the matrix structure.  In the GM model the leader was accountable and assigned responsibility to the various members of his team in order to get things done. It is when the solid reporting lines become dotted, that the rule book had to be created so that all can now operate appropriately.

This again assumes that an organizational discipline driven structure is more efficient than an organizational interest driven one.

When an organization is aligned along business disciplines (Project Management, Marketing, Operations, etc.) instead of aligning along business interests (specific products, specific global regions, etc.) companies are relying on the hopefully increased specific disciplinary economies of scale to outweigh the lost economies of scale associated with the specific business product or region interests.

In short many companies now believe that having a shared cadre of say, Project Managers, that every business unit within the organization can access and use, is more efficient than each business unit having their own dedicated group of Project Managers. For smaller organizations this might be the case as having a shared group would obviously reduce the opportunity for “down” time where a PM may not have a project to manage or be fully utilized.

However, for larger organizations, it would seem that having dedicated PMs, with their increased specific product, or region specific, etc. knowledge within the specific business interest might be a more efficient model, with less documentation and process overhead needed to govern the inter-group relationships. It would almost seem to be a foregone conclusion that any time you must create a process, with a rule book and a division of responsibilities matrix, just to conduct existing business within a new business structure, there might be an opportunity for confusion and a reduction in speed.

There can be real benefits derived for the organization from the matrix model. I think it requires a real understanding of what capabilities can be centralized and homogenized, and which might ought to remain within the specific business interest’s organization. I think this is a decision pendulum that will continue to swing one way and then the other as market, and management conditions continue to change.

Either way, it’s always a good idea to understand who is responsible, and who is accountable, as well as the other items in a RACI Matrix, because now a days it’s quite possible that the people who are identified with these responsibilities (and accountabilities) are no longer in the same organization.

Hard Work

Perhaps I am getting a little too retrospective, or was it introspective. I forget which.

I think it is interesting how my concept of “Hard Work” has changed over time. I used to think of it as moving rocks and landscaping timbers around our yard for my mother when I was younger. Hours in the heat with all that physical exertion. Then I remember that I was also a competitive tennis player back then, and that also entailed hours in the heat with significant physical exertion. That didn’t seem to be as hard work, at least back then.

Now both yard work and tennis in the heat of a Texas summer seem somewhat equally uninviting. Right now, both seem like pretty hard work.
I think I would like to look at what hard work was, what it is today, and possibly more importantly, what it may become in the future.

I seem to recall that I also had a distinct dislike for reading text books and studying (on my own time, after school, when I wanted to do other stuff, of all things). It was hard work to both get myself to do it, and to maintain the focus on topic so I could learn and master the required topics. Now I find myself reading recreationally on those same topics, as well as many others related to my professional disciplines, and actually enjoying it. Now it doesn’t seem like hard work at all.

Using these examples, it seems that hard work is the work that we don’t want to do, but are somehow compelled to do. It may be best described as doing something which you have not fully bought into doing. Something you have to do, instead of something you want to do. I think I’ll go with that definition for now.

I had bought into the idea of spending hours in the heat practicing the various aspects of my tennis game. Initially not so much on the yard work for the then family home. Later with my own home and family, I enjoyed both the tennis and the yard work. Now, in the triple digit heat of a Texas summer, I do my best to refrain from both.

As an aside, I didn’t require my kids to join me working in the yard, as I was compelled to do. I don’t know at this point if I did them a disservice.

So far, neither of them has complained about not being required to do yard work in the heat. Go figure.

For some reason, I find myself quoting Mark Twain, a lot. I don’t know if it is just happenstance, or if there is some other type of connection. Either way, he seemed to say many things that can still be considered truisms today. He said:

“Find a job you enjoy doing, and you will never have to work a day in your life.”

But I am actually not so sure that is the case. I think it may be more along the lines of: If you do something that you buy into doing, it means that you will not consider it “hard work”.

You may be fully engaged. You may get to the office early. You may stay late. If you are bought in, and are committed to the deliverable, none of what you are doing is going to feel like hard work. You are getting satisfaction and fulfillment from the effort, and probably feel you are providing value in what you are doing.

I have found when I am engaged and committed I have internalized the assignment or objective, and I want to deliver and excel. I suspect that I am not too different from the majority of people out there. Given the opportunity, I think most everyone wants to be engaged, and to have internalized their work goals. What I have learned over time is that people probably cannot be trained or managed into this type of commitment. They need to be led to it.

I think the ability to do this is probably a learned capability.

I think back to the periods in time when my views about what was and wasn’t hard work changed. When the drudge work of studying for an exam was supplanted by the desire to walk into the exam confident in the knowledge and command of the material. Some kids seem to get this early in their educational career. Let’s just say that it was quite a way into my educational journey before I learned it. Much the same feeling as when the drudge work of the preparing for the customer (or even internal) presentation changed to ownership and the confidence that went with it, although that one came much quicker in my professional career.

People buy into ownership and leadership. If they are given a responsibility and are shown how their role plays into the greater good, the process of getting them to buy in has started. But that is normally not enough. People want to contribute. This is where the pride of ownership comes in.

Communicating the “what” part of what needs to be accomplished is only part of the process. It is the “how” part of the objective, as in how is the goal to be achieved that will either get internalization and buy-in, or probably get the function labeled as “hard work”.

If people are told what they must do, and how they must do it, there is very little for them to contribute to the function, other than being the vessel that performs the assigned tasks in the prescribed manner. They may have no pride of ownership. Without it, almost everything, regardless of how simple or easily achieved has the potential to be considered hard work.

As I said, we all have goals that we need to achieve for the greater good of the business, but I can’t help feeling that being told what to do and how to do it sounds like a definition of hard work.

Even with all of that preamble, I believe that the working environment, and for that matter all work, not just hard work is going to change. I have talked about the application of process as a substitute for judgement in business before. Good judgement is a necessary leadership characteristic. There are those that seem to innately have good judgement, and there are those that have acquired it as a result of their experiences.

Randy Pausch in his book “The Last Lecture” said:

“Experience is what you get when you didn’t get what you wanted.”

This is a pretty well known, and surprisingly accurate assessment of the world. What may not be as well known, is the second line from this quote. It goes:

“And experience is often the most valuable thing you have to offer.”

But as business continues its journey from process to automation and beyond (Artificial Intelligence?), getting experience, that most valuable thing, the basis for good judgement (at least for most of us) is going to be a more and more difficult thing to obtain.

Career progressions that were once based on the recognition of an underlying business issue, and the creation and implementation of solutions to rectify them, will no longer be the norm. It will become more along the lines of being compelled to follow the steps in the existing process. As experience is gained in one step, there may then be the potential opportunity to manage multiple steps, or entire processes, or potentially multiple processes. Work will change from the creation of a solution to a problem, to the management of the existing process.

One of the issues that we seem to be facing today is that we no longer appear to be accepting, let alone rewarding the individual who does what we used to call “Thinking Outside the Box”.

That does sound pretty trite to me, but unfortunately also pretty applicable.

Process minimizes the risk of poor judgment and the variability of results. But as business appears to be creating more processes, as a substitute for judgement, that compel people to remain in the process box, it also makes the opportunity for business (or process) improvement that much more difficult to achieve.

I guess this can be an acceptable situation if you are confident that the process in place is optimal. But again, we have all seen and have grown accustomed to the idea that the rate of change in business is continuing to accelerate. The progression of work from on shore, to off shore, to automation, to the potential of Artificial Intelligence (AI) should underscore this. So even if a process was optimal at one time, it does not appear that it can remain optimal in the face of accelerating change.

I think the future of hard work will lie in compelling people to continue to use more or less fixed processes in the face of ongoing, rapid change. The process structure by its nature is resistant to change with its multiple parties, stakeholders and check points and desire for predictability, and that does not bode well for it going forward in a continually more unpredictable environment.

Perhaps the new business leaders of the future will be the ones that instead of just recognizing and solving an issue, also master the means of rapidly modifying and adapting existing processes to the changing environment. That will probably require a fundamental change in how processes are created and managed. The proverb states that “Necessity is the mother of invention”. I think that is the case here. Otherwise I think there is going to be an awful lot of hard work for everyone in the future.

The Illusion of Choice

I find it rather interesting that I read a many different articles and books from many different sources, that become the genesis of many of my own articles. This fact isn’t really that interesting, unless you consider it interesting that I read things that consist of more than one hundred and forty characters, require a certain amount grammar and literacy capability, and don’t use emojis to convey how the author feels about the topic they are covering. What is probably a little more interesting is that I like to write about business, sales and leadership, and that I rarely find the inspiration for my articles in literary sources that are purporting to be specifically about business, sales and leadership. I seem to find my thought applications from other sources that resonate at a little more elemental and hopefully timeless level.

Such is the case today.

By and large I have found most business articles to be somewhat bland and derivative of other previously written sources. They are also somewhat ephemeral and short lived. There was “The One Minute Manager” and then “The Fifty-Nine Second Employee”. Really. They all seem to be related to the idea of “get rich” or “get successful” quick sort of scheme. After all, if someone actually wrote the definitive text for how to successfully run a business or organization and get rich and successful quick, what would all the other authors have to write about?

Some of my preferred sources can go back hundreds or even thousands of years. I think I have mentioned “The Art of War” by Sun Tzu, “The Prince” by Machiavelli, “The Book of Five Rings” by Musashi and the “The Art of Worldly Wisdom” by Gracion on multiple occasions. Fortunately, my inspiration today was not from these sources, although, come to think of it some of what Sun Tzu said could apply…. I’ll leave it to those that have read both sources to comment.

Today my ideas sprung from a few words by the man who was the coach of the team that lost, yes lost, the last national collegiate championship game for American football this year. For those of you that missed it, it was on TV. I bet you can find it on YouTube. Clemson scored on the last play of the game to defeat Alabama. (I make sure to define it as American football, as I do have friends in the rest of the world where “football” is something entirely different. It is what we in the states would call “soccer”. I don’t know why.)

You would think that there would be far more to learn from the Clemson coach, the winner of the championship, than from the Alabama coach, the man whose team lost it. After all, it was an upset. Alabama was favored and was supposed to win, and it fact, almost did. There may be much to learn from the Clemson coach, but those lessons may not apply to business, sales and leadership as well as what the leader of the Alabama team had to say. At least for me in this instance.

Coach Nick Saban, of the University of Alabama has enjoyed sustained success in his field, the likes of which has probably not been seen in decades. He is successful. He has already won a total of five national championships (across 2 different schools) and is annually expected to be a contender for the next championship playoff. He is the example and standard of what every other coach, school and leader wants to be and do.

But he still lost, last year.

When he was asked what he is going to change, and how much he was going to do different next year in order to win the championship, he responded with what can best be described as an old school response.

He said that he understood all the new offenses, defenses, systems and processes that are out there, but that he was not going to overhaul a system just because he had lost in this year’s championship game. He came in second out of three hundred and seventy-five schools, which when thought of in that way, wasn’t really too bad. Yes, the loss hurt, but there are literally hundreds of other schools and coaches that would have wanted to be there in his place. He understood what it took to get there, and he also understood what it would take to get back next year.

It was at this point that he made the comments that resonated so strongly with me. He discussed that having learned what it took to be successful, he learned that there are no short cuts. He referred to it as “the illusion of choice”. He said that so many people want to make the easy decision, or take the supposed easier road to success. A new process, or a new system were the quick cure. He said this was an illusion. If you wanted to be successful (in his profession) there really were no choices.

It required the recruiting of the best talent available. Alabama’s recruiting classes of new freshmen out of high school are routinely viewed as some of the best in the country. Think about the fact that every three to four years, he (like every other college football coach) has close to one hundred percent turnover of his team. But every year he contends for a championship.

It requires a work ethic that is second to none on his part, and it has to be transferred and translated to the rest of his staff and the players on the team. There can be no illusion that talent is enough. It takes hard work and dedication. There is a base line process and preparation that needs to be adhered to.

Many have heard me discuss my aversion to the perceived over-utilization of process that seems to be plaguing businesses today. Yet here I am praising it. Here process is used to prepare the team. They have practiced and been trained on how each individual need to prepare, perform and act as part of the greater team. A process is not used during the game or against the competition. If so the competition would quickly adapt and defeat it. There is a game-plan, but not a game process.

He assembled the best staff possible, that he vested with the authority to get things done and that he held accountable for those various aspects of the team (Offense, Defense, Special Teams, etc.) he had assigned. However he only held himself responsible for the outcome. He never blamed anyone else. It was his responsibility.

It was this litany of decidedly unglamorous basics that he pointed out were responsible for getting him and his teams (multiple, different teams) to arguably the acme of his profession. He pointed out and reiterated that there really was not choice if you wanted to be successful. It took talent, it took outworking the competition, it took everybody’s commitment and buy-in for the team succeed. There were no “get rich” or “get successful” quick schemes.

That didn’t mean that he wouldn’t change and adapt. He is also recognized as one of the best leaders at innovating and modifying his game plans when his team’s talent, or the competition called for it. He has noted that the basics of the game have not changed, but how you apply them can vary greatly in each situation.

As I noted, by design his team membership turns over every four years. He also turns over his leadership (coaching) staff with significant regularity. His assistant coaches are in high demand to become the leaders at competing college programs because of their success and what they have learned. No less than seventeen of his assistants have gone on to lead their own programs.

It looks like the players are not the only ones that are mentored, taught and become leaders.

Sun Tzu, from almost twenty-five hundred years ago, also talks about talent selection, training and preparation as immutable keys to an organization’s success. He is also quick to point out that flexibility and the ability to adapt to new and different situations, and to be able to take advantage of them while either in or on the field are also the keys to success.

It looks like the idea of putting well trained teams in the field and letting their leaders lead them is in fact an idea that has been around for over two millennia. It sounds to me like Nick Saban may be right when he says that if you want to be successful, and enjoy a sustained success, it really is an illusion of choice. While a new process or system may come into vogue, success is really built on the basics of talent, hard work, and planning, and then letting your leaders lead, and not relying on the illusion that some other process or system can be a substitute for one of those basic building blocks of success.

Micromanagement

Before I dive head first into the metaphorically shallow waters associated with this topic, I guess it would be best to find an acceptable definition of exactly what micromanagement is. We are all pretty comfortable with what a microprocessor is. I am particularly well versed in what a microbrewery is and the delicious products that they produce. I am even familiar with the show “Tiny House Nation” on the FYI channel. (I couldn’t think of another micro-something, so I had to settle for a tiny-something. It’s the same thing really.) But I think everyone has a different view or definition of micromanagement.

Webster’s dictionary defines micromanagement as:
verb (used with object), micromanaged, micromanaging.
1. to manage or control with excessive attention to minor details.

That’s a pretty good start, but I don’t feel that it entirely captures the full annoyance factor that can be associated with this management practice. I have found that attention to detail is sometimes a necessity and not a particularly negative connotation item the way micromanagement is. I think we can all reminisce back to past assignments, lives and times in our respective business careers when we each may have been members of teams that were led by individuals that might possibly have been defined as micromanagers.

A cold chill just ran down my spine. I think I will go and get one of those previously mentioned microbrews to try and soften that specific micromanager memory.

The definition of a micromanager that I will start with is someone who not only tells you what to do (which is the role of just about any standard run of the mill manager) but also tells you how to do it.

Remember, a leader is someone who tells you what has to get done and then supports you when you work out the part that you need to do, and how you plan to go about doing it. Leaders inspire and groom future leaders by challenging them to perform the radical business process commonly known as thinking.

Micromanagers seem to believe that they should do all the thinking. If something needs to get done, they will tell you what you need to do, how you need to do it and when you need to do it. Your responsibility will simply be to follow the instructions. That is unless you have been told to do the wrong thing. Then it will most likely be your fault for not recognizing it was the wrong thing that you were told to do, and instead doing the right thing.

I have heard of many micromanagers being described as “control freaks”. Again I think this description has a little bit too much of a negative connotation that I don’t wish to be fully associated with. I think I would prefer to refer to them as “control enthusiasts”. Some of them can be so enthusiastic about it that at times they can become difficult to tolerate.

So now that we have hopefully adequately defined what a micromanager is, the question that is engendered is: Why do people become micromanagers?

The simple answer to this one is: I have no idea.

If I were going to guess, I would guess that during their formative years in business they were once given an assignment and for whatever reason they created and implemented an ultra-detailed plan, and it worked. This possibly reinforced what here to fore might have been a latent behavior and voila, and a future micromanager was born. Perhaps during the same formative period the future micromanager reported to a current micromanager and the micromanagement DNA was passed down to the future management generation through some sort of micromanagement osmosis.

It might be as simple as a personality defect.

Whatever the cause micromanagement is in and of itself a self limiting management style. As a manager matriculates up the management structure they take on more responsibilities. This means that there are more and more items for the micromanager to try and keep track of and manage. There are only so many hours in a day. Sooner or later the micromanager is going to run out of time to micromanage all that they have on their plate.

One of two things will then happen. The pace of the business will either slow down to accommodate the micromanager’s business technique, or the micromanager will learn to let go of some of the control that they are so enthusiastic about in order to keep pace with the demands of the business. If the business is slowed by the management process, it will fall behind the market, which will not slow down in order to accommodate the micromanager’s technique and it will soon find itself in a recovery mode.

Either way the level of micromanagement will have reached its limit.

During a discussion some time ago I was asked if there was ever a time where micromanagement was called for.

I had to sit quietly and think about that one for a moment. With the entire myriad of business structures and environments there probably was at least one that called for this approach. After careful consideration I had my settled on my response.

I said “no”.

I have mentioned many times that people and teams want a leader not a manager, and certainly not a micromanager. A leader does not tell all members of the team what they are to do. Team members have their respective responsibilities. It is up to the leader to define and communicate the goal and then enable the team to achieve it.

If a team truly requires micromanagement attention in order for them to achieve their goals again one of two things has happened. They have either been so conditioned that their individual input is not appreciated or utilized and have adapted their behavior to that desired by the micromanager, or they truly cannot or do not know what to do.

In the first instance, a management or management style change may be able to return that micromanagement conditioned employee to a business condition where they can contribute more fully to the success of the business. Instead of being an “order follower” they can become a solution creator in their own right.

In the second instance the team either needs to be better trained or replaced. If the team is incapable of performing except under constant management supervision they may be trying to do work that they are not qualified or capable of completing. If the team members are in fact capable and qualified to do the work, yet still require micromanagement in order for them to achieve their goals then they may be candidates for roles in other organizations where micromanagement is the preferred form of management.

Offhand, I can’t think of many of those types of organizations.

Micromanagement is a centralized decision making management structure. One person, the micromanager tries to make the decisions for everyone else in the organization. As organizations become more culturally diverse and geographically dispersed this structure rapidly becomes a limiting factor instead of a performance enabler. The speed and flexibility of response that an organization needs to be successful in today’s business environment is lost when micromanagement is in play.

People will respond to the guidance provided by leaders by making good business decisions and will be fully vested and committed to the outcome. The only response people will have to micromanagement direction will be to make no decision, only to comply rather than commit to the desired outcome, and just follow orders.

As leaders we need to focus on what needs to get done, and rely on the talents of our team members to help us come up with the best ways to get it done. By definition they are closer to the issues than we are. It only goes that they should have some good ideas on what needs to be done and how they can best do it. It is up to the leader to best utilize all the ideas that are available, not just their own.