More with less

Sometimes we can be amazed with what we actually achieve. We undergo cuts, take on multiple roles, work longer hours, and have been doing so for years. And we are still asked to do more with less.

Its mainly stock market driven of course. The advantage (or disadvantage) with our capital investment markets is that they are free to invest, so money goes where returns are likely. Hence a perpetual ongoing pressure to do better.  The local plumber or family shop doesn’t have those types of pressure because once they are earning a living they can perhaps relax a little. Maybe that’s why the Germans do so well they have a significantly higher proportion of private family owned businesses (as opposed to public companies with shares on the stock market) than we do or the Americans do.

So our system dictates that if we work for a corporate, it ain’t ever gonna change.

Or is it? It certainly isn’t going to change from the top. But maybe it could change with you and me at the bottom.

I have noticed in a number of companies I visit a new syndrome is emerging.  People are so used to each other being phenomenally busy and unavailable, that it is becoming more acceptable to say ‘I am too busy to do that for you’.  People didn’t used to believe that. Now they do. It has even led to some people I have observed doing less work than say 2 years back, they are learning that people accept their reasons for not being able to do the work asked, and are using this situation to make themselves an easier working life. This is especially possible when people report to multiple bosses and can play one boss off against another. The survival instinct is returning ‘I made huge sacrifices for you over the years, so now I am going to use the system to look after myself’.

Industry is thus getting itself into a cleft stick. Senior managers are likely to become more frustrated that savings cannot be found, and staff are going to find that as they become more assertive about being overloaded people believe them and they can actually develop a more reasonable workload in the interests of self preservation.

I must say, without naming names, I have met an increasing number of people who appear hugely busy and resist tasking on any further workload. However what they are doing with their time is not necessarily productive. If you are a manager, you have probably seen the same and become frustrated. You have also asked for ‘more with less’, and have been perplexed that the results aren’t coming through. Wise managers are beginning to realise that this well-worn request has really had its time, and it is now producing a self-defensive behaviour.

So how should the modern manager get more productivity?
 

Firstly drop the request for ‘more with less’. No-one believes it anymore, and people are devising tactics to bypass the pressures. Perhaps instead we should ask for ‘Focus’.

Focus brings results in, and eliminates wasteful activity. Asking for 'focus' is likely to produce better results than asking for 'more with less'. More on this in the next newsletter.