Scenario – Managing workload
John is a manager of a local sports store. He didn’t like it when his boss told him recently that he needs to pay more attention to work in his outlet. He was told that he needs to concentrate on the important things and leave the rest to others. “I don’t know what he expects,” John thought. “I am not slack, and I always work overtime. I have more work to do than one person can get done.” He got on with his work for the day.
At 8.50am, John realised that Sarah and Joe had not arrived for their shift, which had an 8.30am start. He noticed that there was no one attending to the queue at the counter. “Better get out there myself,” he thought. His assistant manager, Paula, was out back. Paula came out to the counter after John had served three customers. He didn’t want to make a big deal of it in front of customers and figured that she was there now.
John was starting to feel quite stressed and had a headache coming on, so he went into the lunch room for a water. He realised that he had a report due that he needed to submit by close of business that day. Paula could do it, but he didn’t think that she should see the revenue figures. If everyone knew what was going on, he may lose his sense of control over things.
After John got the report done, he started on the work he loves, which is reorganising stock and catching up with some of the suppliers for coffee. He realised that he hadn’t checked up on Sarah and Joe, so he tried to find out what had happened. Sarah was there at work now, but Joe was not. He needed to find someone to takes Joe’s place. An hour later after several phone calls, he decided to ring head office to see whether they had a solution for staff. He never had time to train staff and often ended up doing things himself because it was faster. The staff were always referring customer concerns to him to deal with, especially if the customers were not happy about something. He found it easier just to stay on the counter all day and work there. It was a really busy day with the start of the sales season.
Just after lunch, with another report to work on for head office, John had to attend another meeting. He knew that Paula had attended these meetings when she covered for him when he was on leave and that she liked doing it, but he was afraid that if he didn’t go himself, he would be out of the loop.
That day, four customers had missed out on items that they wanted because the store had run out of stock. An urgent stock report was required so that the store didn’t lose revenue over the upcoming weekend because the stock wasn’t in store. They had lost revenue to their competitor in the next street on several occasions in the last two months. John’s last assistant manager is now managing the store over there, and he keeps John updated on their business when they occasionally catch up. Paula has had a lot of experience using this stock database. John hates using the system because he doesn’t understand it very well. John thought it best to do it himself though as it is part of his job. He then had to phone the report into head office as part of his weekly requirements. This normally took about half an hour to get phoned in.
After the meeting, John systematically signed a stack of routine forms that have been piling up on his desk.
Two members of the team are due to go on leave in a week for two weeks, so he is starting to get worried about how things are going to get done.
John’s boss is putting pressure on him to provide the results of the annual staff appraisal forms to him. He has conducted half of the meetings. He just wishes that the staff could be more proactive in monitoring their own performance.
John has realised that things need to change at work, but he is unsure what to do. He has been thinking about asking his boss for some advice because he constantly feels like he is chasing his tail and not getting things done that he needs to.
What are the key issues for John in terms of his time management practices?
What could John do to be more effective with his time?
Consider the following:
How could John better assess and prioritise his workload to ensure that tasks are completed within identified timeframes?
How could John better plan and organise work commitments to ensure that deadlines and objectives are met?
What systems and tools could John be using to better manage the store?
How could John communicate with his manager to ensure that work goals and objectives are understood and agreed in accordance with organisational requirements?
How could john ensure that feedback on performance is actively sought and evaluated from colleagues and clients in the context of individual and group requirements?
How could john ensure that feedback on performance is actively provided to staff in the context of individual and group requirements?
How could John identify sources of stress and access appropriate supports and resolution strategies?
How could John identify personal learning and professional development needs and skill gaps using self-assessment and advice from colleagues and clients in relation to role and organisational requirements?
Scenario – Managing stress
1. Imagine that a colleague is experiencing stress due to an increased workload since a co-worker left the organisation recently. They have been working long hours, they are not sleeping well, and they have become difficult to work with as they can be abrupt and snappy at times. What support and resolution strategies might help this person?
2. Imagine that a colleague is experiencing severe stress at work. They are working on a number of challenging projects and have had to deal with some tricky problems lately. They spend a great deal of time in meetings and they take a lot of work home with them most nights. They have told you that their family life is starting to suffer. Some of their projects still have at least another six months to go until they are completed. What support and resolution strategies might help this person?
3. Imagine that a colleague is experiencing problems in their family life and has separated from their partner. They are spending more time at work, working long hours, and you know that they are spending little time with their family. They seem very unhappy and have become forgetful. They have also been making quite serious mistakes at work. What support and resolution strategies might help this person?
Scenario – Managing development needs
Beau is an administrator working in the office of a small family-run construction company. He has a wide range of duties from ordering supplies and maintaining personnel records to preparing documents for customers and for meetings, etc. He has been in the role for almost one year. He uses a wide range of software in his job, including databases, spreadsheets, and word processing packages. He has been asked to help with some accounts administration, e.g. processing invoices and payments. This will become a regular part of his job, but he is feeling anxious about it as the accounting software looks complicated, and he is very aware that any mistakes could cost the company a lot of money. He has been complimented for his flexible attitude to his work and his good attention to detail, but his boss has told him that he sometimes leaves important tasks unfinished at the end of the day, and this can sometimes cause problems if the papers for a meeting taking place in the evening have not been prepared before Beau goes home after work. He is not confident in using presentation software, and so when he produces documents, they are not always formatted in the most appealing and reader-friendly way.
1. What personal learning and professional development needs and skill gaps does Beau appear to have?
2. What possible opportunities might there be for Beau to develop his skills and knowledge in all the areas that you identified?