Employees are constantly reminded to be a team player. Whenever an organization has a last minute deadline or a mission-critical project, everyone is expected to pitch in.
The reality is not everyone is able to contribute. And I’m not talking about having the skills and abilities (we’ll save that for another post). In today’s working world, employees have full plates and full lives. At some point, organizations can’t just heap more work on someone’s plate and declare, in their best Tim Gunn impersonation, “Make it work.” Today’s workplaces are not reality television shows.
I’m hearing from more employees the pressure and guilt they’re feeling about the need to get their work done, still have a life plus jump in and help when those “all hands on deck” moments occur. When I ask people why they just don’t say “no”, they explain the company’s philosophy of “If you’re not with us, you’re against us.”
Seriously, this isn’t a management philosophy. Just like “no news is good news” isn’t a performance evaluation. Managers need to stay in touch with employee workloads and know when they’ve hit the max. In addition, employees need to inform managers what they are working on and the deadlines they’ve been given.
Good resource management involves more than heaping work on employees and guilting them into doing it.
I’ve seen many times where employees are frustrated about their workload along with their manager for not helping alleviate the pain. Come to find out, the manager didn’t know the employee was doing a pet project for a vice president. Or the employee was working on an assignment because it’s fun and they like doing it…even though it’s not part of their job.
One way to increase productivity is to properly manage work assignments and deadlines. I’ve worked places where we used to have quick meetings that allow everyone to share what’s on their plate. This way if work needs to be redistributed, it can happen quickly. It also allows senior management to share projects coming down the pike and possibly rearrange schedules in advance of the “must do” project. And because none of us want another long boring meeting added to our calendars – especially when there’s work to be done – here are a couple of tips to keep the meeting short:
- Make it a standing meeting. This kind of meeting should take minutes, not hours. Once people sit down and get comfy, the meeting gets longer.
- Have it at an unusual time. Like 8:50 a.m. We found people would be habitually late for meetings starting on the quarter hour.
Good resource management involves more than heaping work on employees and guilting them into doing it. Employees should always feel they are part of the team. Even when they are working on a project alone.
Image courtesy of Donna C Green
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Gil Pizano says
Thanks Sharlyn for writing about such a good point that everyone who works in an organization needs to keep in mind. In today’s world, people are able to accomplish so much more than people in the past. With that said, the load of the work can feel much more overwhelming at times and supervisors/managers are able to help their people out by helping to ensure the avenues of communication are kept open and that people feel comfortable speaking up whenever they have an issue with the amount of work they are experiencing. From the manager’s perspective, the need to be imaginative in how to keep the “means of communication” open. Everyone does not always see or agree with the means of communication that may be available, but that is where a manager may be able to help people see other ways of communicating any issues such as feeling overworked.
From the employee’s perspective (which all managers are really part of as well of course), the sense of ownership is very important to the overall feeling of being overworked or not. The reason for me saying that is because I’ve often seen where a person, who may not appear to have much work to do, when compared to their peers, is feeling so overworked that they can’t understand why they have so much work. This same person when understanding that they “own” the process or work that they are in charge of getting done, often feel a rush of energy that allows them to move forward and finish their work without the feeling of being “overworked”. Not saying that this is the silver bullet for the overworked employee dilemma, but a changed mindset may help many people get through their work and have a more enjoyable work experience. Guilt to get something done is probably one of the worse things that a company (in the longer run) can do because it can create so much resentment later on that the cost to the organization will unnecessarily grow.
Thank you for the good information and the tips to helping with regards to this all too common of an issue in today’s workplace.
Gil
Sharlyn Lauby says
Thanks for the comment Gil. You bring up a good point about pride in ownership and how hard it can be to let go. Good message.