What would an effective manager do?
January 9th, 2007So, you’re a manager, and you’ve got a boss and a team. Let’s assume for a moment that all of your responsibilities - your goals and objectives, rolling up all your tasks, can be represented by a bucket of balls (as in, “juggling a lot of balls.”).
For discussion purposes, let’s just say that everybody - you, your boss, and all ten members of your team - has TWENTY balls in their bucket. You have 5 big balls - the ones your boss might well fire you for if you drop them. And, you have 15 more smaller balls as well (5+15=20). These are also “important”, though not critical. Your 20 balls keep you VERY busy - sometimes 80 hours weeks (though not often), and you take less vacation than you’re allowed, and less than your kids would like you to.
Got it?
Now, I’m not saying that this would actually ever HAPPEN 
…but one day your boss comes to you and presents you with another shiny big ball. Your SIXTH BIG BALL.
What would an effective manager do? Would you refuse? Would you ask what balls of the other 5, or other 20, would he have you NOT DO? Would you simply hope she wasn’t going to notice that you’re going to drop 5-6-7 of the small balls later?
To be clear, there IS a right, or most effective answer to this question. It’s like the “does a tree falling in a forest” question you’ve probably heard. That is a zen koan, and there really IS a right answer.
Who’s first?
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January 9th, 2007 at 10:17 am
http://www.manager-tools.com/forums/viewtopic.php?p=4231&highlight=#4231
:-)
January 9th, 2007 at 10:51 am
Ask my boss to prioritize where this new ball fits relative to the other 5 he might fire me for.
January 9th, 2007 at 10:58 am
I have no managing experience, but this sounds the same to me like users requesting too much features for one release (in an IT project). What I learned is to let the users prioritize the features at the beginning of a release, and when halfway the development cycle they want more, show them the original features and the time we need for them, and let them scrap one with the same time as the new feature themselves. Time is calculated using previous development cycles.
So in this case I would say, show all the current balls and their priorities (set before by the manager) to your manager, tell him that’s all you can manage to do, and ask him which ball of the same size as the new one he wants to see dropped. Now the decision lies in his court, not mine.
January 9th, 2007 at 11:09 am
Wendii-
Niice! But not completely on target!
Mike-
Not exactly.
Nico-
That answer is why IT people are not loved by business leaders.
Here’s something to help you think about this (this applies in almost all managerial situations): what would you want a subordinate of yours to do if YOU were the boss handing down that 6th ball?
Mark
January 9th, 2007 at 11:09 am
A 10 person team, huh? Eleven people can get a lot done.
I would come back with a plan on how to get it done with the main point that somethings that I used to take care of would be delegated to one or more team members. I would show that I had been coaching one or two subordinates for just such a situation. (Thus bragging on myself and the particular team member.)
The advantage is that as the subordinate does the job, she or he would get recognized for it. Sort of “share the spotlight” kind of thing. This always boosts morale.
Also, I would point out the risks. And as I elaborate on the risks of too much work with too little resources, I would ask for more - a bigger budget, larger team, more tools, whatever…
But before I had this conversation, I would plan out the talking points and even have a dress rehearsal with someone - my spouse, trusted colleague, or someone.
The hope is that the boss continues asking me and my team to take on more responsibility, thus growing the team and, just as important, the reputation of the team.
January 9th, 2007 at 11:51 am
Delegate, coach and develop your people. I would assume that the manager’s small balls are bigger than the direct reports’ small balls. This is a great opportunity to offer more responsibility and visibility to a high performer and the benefits of that roll down hill.
January 9th, 2007 at 12:14 pm
Mark:
I think one should identify with his/her boss which of the 5, or maybe even the 6th, big ball to delegated down to a direct report.
To me, there is an opportunity to grow a direct with real, meaningful work in this situation. I would suggest the manager go to the boss with a plan: 1. who to delegate to, 2. which task to delegate, 3. how will they report, 4. how will they be held accountable for the deliverable.
I think the blog on “Developing Leaders” is the solution to this question.
Jeff
January 9th, 2007 at 12:20 pm
Mark,
Enthusiastically accept the 6th big ball. Being given a 6th big ball is an honor and a priviledge.
Validate that the results of the 6th ball task are beneficial for the company.
Set the expectation with your boss, that when the benefits are realized, that your boss, yourself and your team will benefit in turn.
Set the expectation with your boss and your team that you will review the impact of this 6th ball on a frequent basis.
Work your boss, yourself and your team extra in order to juggle the extra ball.
Evaluate the impact of this additional ball in a set number of days (a week, a month, a quarter . . .). Perhaps this is time to give it back, or to obtain more big balls. With good leadership, benefits will be realized, and additional staff will be added to help with the load of the 6th ball.
Regards,
Steve
ps. Have you had a chance to follow up on this general blog post? –http://www.manager-tools.com/2006/07/what-do-you-think/
January 9th, 2007 at 12:48 pm
Regas - very close to what I was thinking. If I’m being handed a big, bright new shiny ball, it goes to my #1 best performer on my team. The message to everyone else on my team is “be the #1 performer and you’ll get great opportunities too”. Maybe they don’t want it or I have to shift some other responsibilities off them to make it work, but they get first shot at it.
The six big balls and especially this new one get most of my attention. That doesn’t mean that I’m the primary contact on them day to day.
From the standpoing of my boss, I hope that makes him realize that I’m his go-to problem solver. As he hand more and more big balls to me, it can’t hurt. Eventually, he is going to move up and need someone he trusts to solve bigger problems.
Brian
January 9th, 2007 at 1:52 pm
Wasn’t it Drucker that said that managers can only really juggle one or two balls?
January 9th, 2007 at 2:41 pm
Meet with the customer of #6 and determine the customer’s needs. Make sure the same has been done for balls 1-5 and 7-21. Meet with your team to determine if tasks (1-21) can be internally consolidated for efficiency purposes (they remain separate tasks to your customers). If no efficiencies can be found initially, probe your team about the customers’ needs to see if any similarities can be found.
Jamie
January 9th, 2007 at 4:28 pm
I would isolate the big five and then see where I can delegate any of the other 15; chances are some of my “small 15″ are others’ big five. Shifting those balls to them better aligns me and them. Once that is done I take another look at my big 5. I come to grips with the fact I can’t handle another effectively - so I search for the right person for the job.
-Anthony
January 9th, 2007 at 4:58 pm
Rethrow some of your smaller balls to the next juggler down the line (You’ll have to decide how many of your small balls compensate for an additional big one and how you can distribute them to other people, given that they look bigger to them than to you).
You have to expect that at the end of the line, of course some of the small balls will have to be dropped. If you’re lucky, there are so many jugglers in between that they appear VERY small compared to your new big one. Of course, if you’re unlucky, YOU are the one at the end of the line (But then again you probably wouldn’t be a manager, would you?)
No matter what your place in the line is: Shame on you for accepting 20 balls at once in the first place.
January 9th, 2007 at 6:05 pm
Scope reduction, if you want to keep 6 balls.
Priority (set by the user) if you cannot manage scope.
PierG
January 9th, 2007 at 7:03 pm
This whole thread is absolutely *killing* me …
Mark, please answer before I say something I’m really going to regret.
January 9th, 2007 at 7:19 pm
It’s killing me too! I go through this every day, so an answer would be helpful to me (and others too, I suspect).
January 9th, 2007 at 7:55 pm
OK, I’ve thought more about it since this morning… Maybe I’m not the smartest person in the room, but I bet my team could figure out how to get the work done. I would ask them in a brainstorming session. This would get them engaged, feel responsible, and get their “buy-in” all at the same time.
This is an interesting question. Looking forward to the Manager-Tools answer.
January 9th, 2007 at 9:56 pm
I don’t know what the right answer is. The Zen answer would be “Do nothing and see what happens.”
As an MT evangelist myself, I have to wonder what the heck I am doing working 80 hour weeks, since M&M are always on about how no one sees you working after 5pm or rewards it, so doing it is simply an indication of ineffective time management. So, to put first things first, I’m going to fix my time management by journaling my time consumption and find the slack (such as being obsessed with my inbox).
Assuming I was effective with my time, I have to say that the sixth ball doesn’t matter - the work I was already doing is obscenely out of control, and if I can’t brainstorm, hot wash, or otherwise figure out why that is happening and come up with a solution, I’m cornered, and I want OUT.
Therefore, I’m going to warm up the engine on my exit strategy and begin plotting a course for shallower water, because anyone giving me more to do when I’m doing 80 hour weeks and managing my time effectively is someone that I was to distance myself from.
1. I’d leverage the relationships and network that my MT training taught me to build. I’d start looking for another job inside the big company I work for and a chance to start off with a clean slate. I don’t want to work for someone who is comfortable with me doing 80 hour weeks while I have a family. That’s unreasonable and unnecessary. So, I’m out of there, and I’m saying goodbye to that boss.
2. If that failed, I’d leverage the recruiters I built relationships with using the podcast materials here and the regular calls I have been taking. I’d reel in a few favors and start looking elsewhere.
3. I’d take two weeks and keep quiet while developing my transition package, then I would approach that boss who was so generous with the sixth ball and deliver to them my package and 4 weeks notice.
4. I’d train my replacement
5. I would leave.
I realize you were really looking for something else from us, that there is a simple, one-line answer that pulls together all of the teachings here.
I’m offended by the “80 hour week” and I can’t get past that. Lots of people like to say that they are working 80 hours when they are being dramatic and engaging in “corporate bragging”. And if you really track their time, you’ll find in reality they are truly working 50 or even 60 on a bad week - but usually in the high 40’s. 80 hours is a hell of a long week, and anyone with a family to raise working 80 hour weeks either has his priorities all screwed up or has no clue how to delegate and manage his time, imo.
I’m of course assuming that the manager in question has children since it’s me and I do.
:-)
January 9th, 2007 at 10:02 pm
Well, I’m in a matrix org so…I don’t have as much flexibility to delegate to one of my team members. Depends on the task. I’ve been put in this situation a few times. After completely fumbling the first time, this is what I’ve done the rest:
Think about it. Prioritize. Go back to my boss and say, in order to give this the right attention and to produce the right result, I’m going to have to put X (and Y and Z if necessary) on the backburner for the next X weeks/months.
This has always worked. I have enough respect and trust for my boss to know that I mean it and aren’t slacking. Sometimes he took X & Y off my plate and reassigned it to someone else. But usually he just said yes and that was that. If he ever forced it to do it all I would actually refuse because I know I would fail and that’s not an option. Know thy limits.
Okay, how wrong is my answer?!
January 10th, 2007 at 12:18 am
I am new to this, so bear with me…
Given the situation, I know I would want the “shiny new ball”, but I also believe work/life balance is important as well.
I would be honest with my manager about the situation and ask for options he could live with to make this work.
Options like reducing the number of small balls, or reducing the number of large balls, or more importantly, the option of providing me with more resources to manage all my balls.
If he couldn’t live with this, I would have to stick with my values and politely decline.
I believe it is important to know when to say when. Accepting an assignment that puts the effectiveness of your other work at risk isn’t good for you, the manager, or the organization.
Managers that are worth their salt, want realistic answers and realistic solutions. A good manager would rather hear you say “I won’t be able to do this with my current workload or resources” than to see a project get lost in the mire because they were misinformed about your ability or willingness to do it.
That’s my final answer.
Eric Waller
January 10th, 2007 at 2:08 am
As a manager, if I gave my subordinate a new ball they could not handle, I’d expect them to push back, “sorry, I have too much on my plate, can you help me prioritize?”
I’d pushback on the sixth ball - and I’d state my reasons. If this isn’t sufficient, I’d ask the boss to help me prioritize.
January 10th, 2007 at 6:53 am
OK how’s this sound. As a manager-tools manager the “big balls” are one-on-ones, feedback and coaching.
One-on-ones may be an appropriate mechanism for discussion about the 6th ball, but not a means for dealing with it. Coaching isn’t going to work for your boss… So I’m inclined to at least begin with trying the feedback model. How does this sound…
“I really appreciate you trusting me with this 6th ball, when you come to me with these types of assignments here’s what happens…
- I feel honoured/appreciated/good about myself
- I like to know you trust me
- I feel good about new challenges that excite me and make my job interesting
- I get worried about the time I’m able to spend with my family
- I get worried about being able to complete the other 5 balls with the skill and effectiveness that you’re used to
- etc, etc…
Before we go forward I’d like to analyse my time and tasks and report back to you on the impacts of the 6th ball?…
would you be ok with that / what else could I/we do to help me out with my concerns?…”
If my directs took that approach I’d be happy and confident we could work something out.
January 10th, 2007 at 9:10 am
I kept thinking about this Q… my first answer - using a feedback model response - stands, but it probably doesn’t cover the signficance of the change in the nature of my job sufficiently. By adding a 6th big ball the nature of my job has changed significantly (either 20% increase, or 20%change in the nature of the “big ball” tasks). One of my responses would be to review my (and my teams’) position/job description(s). Assuming (big assumption coming up here I know) that my boss understands the importance of setting SMARTER (specific, measurable, achievable, etc…) goals in job descriptions - this probably presents a good mechanism for the analysis/review of the 6th ball issue that I mentioned in my ‘feedback model’ approach above. It also ensures me and my team have clear objectives and expectations at the same time.
I’ll finally add a bit of feedback of my own on this thread. One of the great things about your site and podcasts is that it makes me think about these situations ahead of time. I’m sure Mark’s answer will surpass my own, but just the process of making me think about - what let’s face it is a pretty likely scenario - has led me to come up with (I think?) a better response, than if I’d never thought about this situation at all - 12 months ago I’m sure it would have said something like: me:”Uhmm OK, sure - I’ll let you know how I go…”.
The power of this thinking and learning is huge. Thanks guys!! Look forward to hearing your comments
January 10th, 2007 at 10:41 am
You already have a programmatic approach to One-to-Ones in place and in harness coaching.
The majority of the 15 balls are remnants of previously big balls that you have effectively delegated over time, but as a mentor you still keep one residual small ball in your bucket.
Time has come to weed out the bucket and see which three or so of the small balls you can cascade down.
As a firm believer in “first break all the rules” you know who has a real strength for juggling and who is ready to grab a few extra balls. You set up the conversation and get them to see who they in turn could pass one extra (from their original 20) balls two. Select one or two people. This strengthens the cross skilling and functional expertise with the team and helps with peer mentoring.
This would make some room for your big new shiny ball. Does your boss hear you drop some of your balls? only if he’s there to be subject to it.
In reality even the most finely tuned organization won’t be instantly able to morph to accomodate a new big ball so there will be a period of Atlas effort as you strive to juggle the extra weight. However all ofyour work with frequent feedback, one-to-ones, coaching and even skip levels stands you in good stead to know that it CAN happen. You have a strong relationship with your directs and through skip level meeting you have a connected team and an awareness of what they are capable of.
January 10th, 2007 at 1:11 pm
[begin stream-of-consciousness reasoning]
I’m working 80 hour weeks “but not often”. (what does often mean? Once a month? Once a quarter? Once a year?!)
Boss drops big snarly ball-o-challenge in my lap.
Hmmmm….from what little I’ve gathered in my IC career, I believe that:
1.) most managers are clueless as to your load..and could care less
2.) they don’t want to hear you whine about how hard your life is
3.) their big snarly balls are bigger and snarlier than yours
4.) they care about getting stuff done.
My knee jerk reaction is what US41 said.
Reevaluate where my priorities are. Frankly, the “amount of allowed vacation” is usually less than a person really DOES need to perform at optimum efficiency. (2-3 weeks/year? come ON!) Your muscles and body grow while you sleep. Your brain transfers short term learnings into long term memory while you sleep. While the average [wild generalization warning] workaholic “get ahead” manager does not like it, taking vacation is a GOOD and NECESSARY thing to refresh the brain, gain alternate perspectives, and maintain long term health and success. If you’re not even taking that, you’re burning yourself out AND shorting your family. (assuming your family is a real priority, and not just one that you give lip service too and think “should” be a priority…which I’ve been guility of…)
ON THE OTHER HAND…If I derive my sense of worth from how successful I am at work, then yes - the priority is to succeed and “look good”. In that case, any number of the answers that spouted the “it’s an honor to be given more”, “we’ll split it up” rhetoric will work.
Awwww….crap. But dagnabit, do I really know that I “can’t” do it? Do I really know that I’m doing the best job I can with what I’ve got? What if my manager is dropping this big, snarly ball into my lap to help me see/point out that I need to delegate more to move to the next level? Develop leaders?
Do I treat my capacity as a glass box that can only hold so much of this (finite, well defined) work stuff, or do I say “hmm…this is expanding beyond my limited ability to “manage”. I want to grow/take on bigger challenges, so I need to (have been) developing leaders and begin handing off my smaller balls to see how they handle ‘em.
Oh crud. I just argued myself back around. Ok moderators…we’re dyin here…
January 10th, 2007 at 7:24 pm
As somebody who used to juggle its as easy to juggle 21 or 22 2 balls as it is 20 balls so long as they are the same size. Therfore I’d delegate the 15 small balls to my team who i know can juggle 20 balls (cause they learnt from me) and I’d concentrate on juggling the other 5 big balls along with the difficult but doable 6th big shiny ball
January 10th, 2007 at 7:55 pm
Assess what ‘balls’ each of your ten team members has (you should know this anyway). Tell them to drop some of the balls because it’s guaranteed that some of these either aren’t delivering results or are old/invalid anyway. Delegate some of your 15 smaller balls to your subordinates and make room for the 6th ball. This may include delegating one of your 5 big balls if it can be done (which I’m sure it can).
You want the big new ball (it’s shiny and important so keep it). Delegate and reorganise if necessary for whats best for your team performance.
January 11th, 2007 at 4:44 am
This is interesting. I had always been told that as man gets older, his balls get smaller (from basketball to tennis ball to golf ball). Now, I am given an additional BIG ball. What an honor and I feel younger!
Before I start, let’s take a look at a Manager’s job realistically. To me, a manager’s job is measured by how much you can get out of one plus one. The more the better and it is also a measure of your ability and capacity. Therefore, this is a case of how you can distribute more work down without much resistance or better still if it can be accepted voluntarily.
This first step I am going to take is to create a ‘buy-in’ on the part of my subordinate, vis-à-vis the new ball and possibly, more balls.
What I’ll do is to call a meeting of my group and ask them what their opinion is with regards to the new ball and how they think I can or should handle it. For political reasons or to look good, I expect answers like: congratulations boss, we think you are highly regarded, or you are the man, or the big boss trusted you and what not. (all good words)
That’s when I’ll turn around and tell them – look, our whole team is being highly looked upon! Given new challenges and opportunities, are you all willing to accept it? I am sure the answer is YES. I might even add that those who are not confident have the choice to opt out. The answer is a sure ‘NO’.
This process gives me good reasons to unload some smaller balls to a group of willing or more willing subordinate. It also paves the way for more BALLS or BIGGER BALLS in future.
Do I unload the balls and keep quiet about it? No, my job is to monitor the progress and play the role of removing obstacles and clearing the path as they (subordinate) move along. I am certainly not a ‘Slave Driver’ but a beneficial user of team dynamics.
With regards to my subordinates’ existing work load, I’ll need to help them to work smart by reorganizing, streamlining, etc to reduce duplication and achieve efficiency as we move along. Often we are surprise at how much more that we can achieve.
January 11th, 2007 at 10:10 am
All things being equal, I would treat the additional responsibilities as an expression of my manager’s trust and faith in me and gladly accept. The exception might be if I really was already struggling to cope and this really would tip me over the edge, or if the responsibility was a poison pill (in which case it would probably be a fait accompli anyway).
I would emulate my manager’s behaviour and delegate responsibility for some of my “small balls” to my team members, just as my boss is delegating what is a “small ball” for him to me. I would loathe to delegate a “big ball”, as these are what I am really being paid to look after as a manager, and would be uncomfortable with the possiblity of being fired if the ball is dropped by my direct report.
Of course I would ask for any resources related to the new responsbility to also be transferred, and in any future request for resources would be sure to point out the value being added to the organisation by my team.
There may well be a “right answer” but I am interested to see if there is an answer which everyone will recognise as such.
January 11th, 2007 at 12:47 pm
I think I would assess ball number six first. Is it a re-occurring ball or just a one time ball.
If it’s re-occurring, I would look at balls seven through 21 and possibly have one of my team members take it.
If it’s just a one time ball, then I would prioritize it with balls one through five and tackle it from that angle.
January 11th, 2007 at 1:20 pm
Well, in my division, we have 8 different business units that are our customers, each of which have 5+ top balls they want us to juggle and we only have 3 project managers. This is a very common problem.
When we are asked for the 6th ball we immediatly ask for a re-prioritization and provide the impacts for each. For example if we have invested several weeks and several hundred thousand dollars on a project to date a delay because of a new priority might cost an additional several hundred dollars. We try to spread out our work in the division to keep some level of bench strength to deal with the new priority of the day, but it is just never enough.
My take is you need to evaluate the cost impact by adding an additional ball to the pile, provide the facts on the impact to the customer and manage expectation as to when the new work can begin. Usually the customers are not happy with a delay, but if you take on more than you can handle quality usually suffers and in the end costs the company way more than is ever expected.
January 11th, 2007 at 3:30 pm
On second thoughts, why not quit like you should have done before it got to this anyway. You’re putting in 80 hr days (occasionally), you never take enough vacation and your family never sees you. Why continue under even more stress? Quit and get another job you love that gives you time for what’s important. Life’s too short.
January 11th, 2007 at 4:05 pm
Stuart-
Never said this manager didn’t love his job. Most folks I know - even the ones who have FABULOUS balance, have an 80 hour week a couple of times a year, just like they have family stuff intrude into 40 hour weeks peridically. My kids would like me to take more vacation, but I think if I took 30 days a year, they’d want more.
I didn’t mean to make this situation sound untenable… I meant to provide some parameters to limit Kobayashi Maru/Captain thinking. Members tend to be… clever.
Mark
January 11th, 2007 at 11:22 pm
I’m not a manager and I’m new to this site. So my answer may be completely off base.
I assume the size of the balls corresponds to their importance.
In my opinion, a manager’s job is to prioritize, then to manage his resources to meet those priorities. When an employee is promoted to a manager position, this means more responsibilities (bigger balls). However, this promotion does not mean more work (number of balls). We all have a limit to our work capacity (size of bucket). Thus, I’d argue that the recently promoted manager should have less balls than before.
So, I’m the manager and my 20 balls are already keeping me very busy. So I’m near my work capacity. Now my boss hands me a 6th big ball. If the 6th big ball takes up to as much “space” as the 15 small balls, then the 6th big ball is automatically accepted. The 15 small balls must be displaced.
Now I have 15 small balls that won’t fit in my bucket. If these 15 small balls were important enough for my attention, then these 15 balls are bigger than the balls in my team members’ buckets.
I will now emulate my boss and give my team members some big balls. They, in turn, will either find that the big ball fits, or displace some of their small balls. Now all of my small balls have been taken care of. My team members have now left a pool of their own displaced small balls.
An evaluation now has to be made. The remaining, displaced, small balls can either be ignored or not ignored. If I feel that they can be ignored, then they were never that important in the first place. If I feel that they cannot be ignored, then I will present the remaining small balls to my boss and request more resources (probably in the form of another team member). If he rejects the idea of allocating resources to these small balls, then he doesn’t feel they are important enough to be distributed. Then I adjust my priorities to be in line with my boss’, and these small balls are ignored.
And there, in too many paragraphs, is my answer to Mark’s question.
January 11th, 2007 at 11:34 pm
Ken-
For not being a manager, there’s a lot to like there! (Except at the end there, asking for more resources or dropping balls.)
I am taking this space to say THANK YOU to the great responses we’ve gotten… I LOVE IT! Mike has given me positive feedback about the responses… and I’m having a ball
reading them.
And I will have a BIG blog post tonight about our little juggling koan.
Mark
January 12th, 2007 at 3:12 am
Ah, the sixth big ball - I’ve been working towards an additional big ball. Ahead of adequately addressing your conundrum, one must understand that “big ball” is a relative term. Big balls to me may be small balls to the Boss, and likewise small balls to me may well be viewed as very large balls to some of my subordinates.
Assuming my Boss has passed (dropped?) one of his balls down to me, it follows that either it’s not all that important to him, or I have some specialist skills. Either way, my Boss has given it to me for safe keeping… it is now MY BIG BALL – one of six that will demand my primary focus.
Once I have got my head around the new ball, a staff meeting would be in order to discuss the department and set direction for the next Quarter or Half, and of course to discuss our combined 211 balls.
If I have been jostling to grab one of my Boss’s balls, then one can safely assume that at least a few of my ambitious subordinates will want to grab one or more of my balls too.
During the meeting, as Chair, I will set the goals and vision and we will discuss how the balls will be kept high. I will ensure our collective balls are distributed so small balls assist development and big balls assist careers. I might even work the conversation so some of the crucial balls go to some of my rising stars. I would also like to emphasise (to my department) that one more ball on top of 210 is no big deal when it come to workload – especially considering how ambitious the team is.
Following our meeting, clear Goals and Objectives will be agreed and posted.
January 12th, 2007 at 10:54 am
Accept the ball graciously, recognising it as the compliemt it is.
Explain to the boss that you will need to go away and plan how to include this work with existing commitments and agree with the boss a date and time to present that plan back to them.
Go away and do the maths - include trusted lieutenants from the team in that process.
Present the plan back to the boss making sure that all risks (including impacts on other projects and operational tasks) are discussed and agreed.
January 12th, 2007 at 3:16 pm
Ooops: compliemt = compliment
January 12th, 2007 at 3:43 pm
Can you break one of your big balls into 5-6-7 smaller balls and delegate them?
January 12th, 2007 at 4:52 pm
Explain to your boss that you believe your team is at full capacity, but go on to say you want to deliver.
Note: I’m yet to work for anyone that prefers a problem over a solution!
Say to the boss that you will go away and explore the feasibility of getting everything done (give a date AND time that you will come back to him/her).
Make sure you know what the priorities are, checking against the business plan and job specs. Check with your boss that he/she shares the same view as you on this.
Look at the work, can it realistically be done by you and/or your team? If not, can you second someone from another department, bring in a temp, outsource some work or ask another team to do the work? (subject to business case… MONEY!).
Meet with your boss and re-assure him/her that you can get it done. If you can’t, then put forward your proposal for priorities and show what the impact will be for any tasks that slip or get removed completely.
If you can’t deliver everything, then make sure you supply enough information (but not too much detail) so your boss can make an informed decision.
Summary:
* Communicate!!
* Prioritise
* Think outside the box
* Offer solutions not problems
* Informed decision making
January 13th, 2007 at 8:29 am
Interesting conversation so far. I’m not a manager but would also like to ask for suggestions as to what happens when you are at the end of the line and your boss gives you the 6th ball (entailing an estimated 30 hours a month) and you dont have anyone beneath you to delegate too (which seems a popular option). The rest of the variables stay the same apart from the fact that already a 50+ hour week is normal - I mean expected.
January 15th, 2007 at 11:21 am
Mark asked what answer we would want from a subordinate if we asked them the same question.
I’d want them to ask me what specific results were needed and expected.
By what deadline I wanted it completed, if one was appliable.
What resources, either additional or already available were available to them.
January 15th, 2007 at 3:20 pm
I am posting to this thread because of The Juggling Koan cast. Thank you for bringing it to those who listen to casts and do not spend enough time on the forums. I will confess that I am an I.T. manager. I am responsible for the deliverables of 13 programmers. The Manager-tools principles have made me more successful than if I had relied on my own experiences and all the books I have read. Thank you for all you do.
When it comes to juggling, I have a different opinion because of the metaphor. I do not look at the balls I juggle by “size.” Rather, I consider how “fragile” they are to the business and my team. The balls I juggle are either crystal or rubber. If a team member or I drop a crystal ball, it breaks and results in many distractions to the business and development team. If we drop a rubber ball, it bounces and someone else on the team can pick it up.
When I delegate a task, I take the time to identify when it is a crystal ball. It helps the developer to know that I am extending a level of trust to a highly visible task. In the cast, you identified that it gets bigger through delegation. I believe the crystal becomes thinner and more fragile through delegation. I limit the number of crystal balls a person gets at one time until they prove their ability to carry more than one. If you put thin crystal under too much pressure, it will shatter every time.
January 15th, 2007 at 7:12 pm
Chances are good that with any set of ~challenging tasks~ (let’s migrate away from the “Ball” metaphor), that there are some common key elements among the content of each of the tasks.
Concentrate on those common elements. That sixth challenging task will naturally be addressed if it has common problems that you’re already addressing with your existing tasks.
Also, use the “Bang-for-Buck” method. Value is a formula of Quality, Time and Cost:
V = Q / (T x $)
You want to identify the tasks where the combination of Q, T and $ gives you the best balance.
Quality will be in terms of risk severity and amount of knowledge. If you have a task that has low severity (that is, its small list of problems are fairly solved) and plenty of knowledge (drawings, test reports, BOMs, Code), then this task has a high level of quality. Another task may have more severe problems (absense of code or BOMs, systems currently not functionable, high-level requirements not complete, etc), and if it has a lack of knowledge (no drawings, no ERP data, not much testing, etc), then it will have a low level of Quality.
If (given the realistic ablity to solve the risks), you determine that time-to-customer can be managably quick, then time (T) is low. However, if it is evident that solving problems will be months rather than hours, then T will be high.
If the cost of development, prototypes, testing, etc are expensive, the $ will be high. Otherwise, estimate what it will be as low (rough estimates).
~Be prepared at any time to QUICKLY estimate the Value (V) for any task~. This requires you to have a set of tools at your disposal. Combined with the “Common elements” of each tasks, work on and delegate the tasks with the highest Vs. Make sure your manager is aware and agrees with your Value-Based strategy.
I like the post above by Fitcoder. I’m a believer of identifying the Shattering Points, and solving those first. Shattering Points are system elements that, if flawed, then entire system (or system-of-systems) is destructible. The lynch-pin between a truck and a trailer will have a Shattering Point. Too much pressure to that point will destroy the trailer - and therefore anything it was shipping.
January 16th, 2007 at 12:05 am
[…] Timing is everything… especially when it’s so close to being good timing. Mark recently blogged with our first ever management koan, “What Would An Effective Manager Do?” It was clearly a big hit - we got 45 responses within 2-3 days. Clearly, many of you wanted to know what the answer is, and that’s great - the burning desire to get better is at the heart of all good managers. […]
January 17th, 2007 at 6:06 pm
OK, let’s do some math:
If you get one big ball, you delegate 3 small balls to your directs.
The balls grow, therefore these 3 guys need to delegate again each 3 small balls, generating 9 big balls, and now their directs need to drop 27 small balls, because they have nobody to delegate to, and they cannot handle everything.
So, you have to consider: Is the 1 big ball worth 27 dropped tasks? (and this is just a very conservative estimate with only few levels and number of delegations)
January 18th, 2007 at 12:03 am
Wlandsch-
Two answers.
1. Remember, this is a zen koan. They are designed to help those who are seeking knowledge to see the problem non-rationally. The right answer - and there ARE right answers to koans - to the well known, “if a tree falls in the forest and no one is there to hear it, does it make a sound?” is NO, it doesn’t, because sound requires perception. Sound waves are not the answer.
And…
2. Yes.
Mark
February 6th, 2007 at 3:23 pm
I’m not a manager, currently I’m in a techie/project analyst type of role, but I’ll give it a go. I’m in the UK and work in IT, currently for a large city council, to give you an idea of my experience/cultural background.
The first thing I think you need to admit in that situation is that resources (hours int he working week, access to necessary tools &c) are probably limited. Whilst you may occasionally have lighter weeks the odds are you’re going to be busy pretty much all of the time, your team are similarly probably going to be busy pretty much all of the time. The occasional 80 week and skipped holiday is OK, you probably don’t want to find yourself working 80 hours every week and never having a holiday because you kept taking on more and more tasks.
When you’re given a new task you really have 3 choices, and will probably find that at least one of them will be barred through influences beyond your control. You can drop other load, bring in more resource or redistribute load to improve your ability to handle the load you have plus the new task.
A fourth option that should never have to be an option but far too frequently is, is to refuse the task. I’m not thinking here about refusing a task because you don’t have time, I’m looking at those tasks you’re given that serve no useful purpose at all. There is frequently an assumption that your manager knows what you do and why you do it, this isn’t always the case. Sometimes you do have to go back to your manager with a reason why a task should not be done. A common problem, especially in the UK public sector, is to slap a band aid on an incident (stick another finger in the dyke) and not address the underlying problem. Eventually you run out of band aids (or fingers, depending on your metaphor). A common example in IT areas is the preventative reboot schedule, servers are rebooted on a scheduled basis (can be daily, weekly or monthly) to prevent incidents but no-one ever tries to find out why the incidents occur and address the root problem or even confirm that the incidents still happen (often a new server will be added into the rota for preventative reboots even if it hasn’t had an incident yet).
Dropping other load is the one that I guess will have most other people throwing up their hands in horror and shrieking in disgust. It needn’t be a bad thing though. I think that it’s a good idea to periodically, even when everything seems to be going fine, list out all your tasks with what you do, who you are doing it for, what they are doing with it (if appropriate) when you’ve done it, what the business benefit of that task is and how much it costs (if it’s a weekly task that takes 2 hours then that’s 2 hours a week that you could be spending doing something more useful). I’ve lost count of the number of times I’ve come accross a task that is costing far more than the benefit it brings to the company or failed to achieve what it was intended to do. A big part of time management, from what I can tell, is about deciding what to do. It doesn’t let you do more, it lets you achieve more by choosing wisely what to do.
Dropping chaff, either through a periodic ‘Spring Clean’ or as a result of being given new tasks, can be a good way of accomodating new tasks. I’ve come accross resistance to the ‘Spring Clean’, mostly based on the idea that to so will create ’slack’ in the system. I’ve found the idea of ’slack’ to be a fallacy in most organisations, and the ones where it isn’t are ones where it is vital to their business. Work tends to expand to use the resources available to it. If you have more resources (time, money &c) then I find that rather than sitting idle these resources tend to gravitate to improving the way existing tasks are done or providing the opportunity to take on extra tasks, in the short term it may just provide the opportunity of over-extended resources (especially those of the human variety) to be relaxed for a while or improved (someone who is on an 80 hour a week slog to just keep up with their job doesn’t have the opportunity to look for ways to improve how they do their job or be trained in new and better ways to do it, they are trapped in a Red Queen’s race).
Where ’slack’ does exist, well think about what ’slack’ is. ‘Slack’ is a fire engine that’s not on a call. If one takes a hard lined Capitalistic, Thatcherite, view the fire engine should go from fire to fire putting them out and as it puts out one fire another one starts. If there aren’t enough fires then the excess fire engines goes to scrap. I hope it’s obvious that that would be undesirable, you cannot time manage emergencies. You need enough excess capacity (’slack’) in the system so, when you do have the big-disaster-that-only-happens-once-in-a-blue-moon, you can deal with it. The same principle can be applied to the armed services, medical provision and many other areas, typically those provided by the public sector (indeed much of the waste traditionally associated with the public sector is actually capacity in reserve for the unpredictable). You move from time management to risk management, how much loss are you prepared to accept (people killed, property destroyed, insurance claims &c).
Bringing in more resource can be a good idea, in this context we’re probably talking about another person to whom work can be delegated, but costly. Plus you have to consider how long that resource will be needed for and the cost of aquiring the resource (recruitment, induction and integration). Will this new resource be in a position to take over the work intime for it to be worth the effort? Also will you get the OK from senior management to hire someone?
Redistributing the load is often seen as the easy option, and can be effective. In my experience, however, it’s often a case of shuffling the deck chairs and hoping that the ship will stop sinking. If you delegate a new task or some of your existing tasks to allow you to take on a new task then you have to consider not only will the person you are delegating the task to be able to do it (i.e. has the ability) but also will it be the same scale task for them as it is for you or will they see one of your small balls as a big ball. Presumably if you are senior to someone you are more able (due to more training, experience or just natural ability) to do certain tasks, there has to be a reason you’re paid more than them and hopefully it’s not because you’re better at losing to the CEO at golf than they are. therefore a task that might take you an hour might take them two, indeed even if they eventually are doing the task in that same hour at first it will probably take them three until they become acustomed to it. You also have to consider that to take on the task you have delegated to them they may have to either delegate or abandon some of their current tasks to have the capacity to take on the new, to them, task.
So to get back to the original question, what would I do in that situation? Firstly I’d look at the task and work out if it was something that actually needed to be done or is it another knee jerk reaction, if necessary prepare an arguement for why it’s not needed or something else would be a better alternative. Once a need for that task, or an alternative, has been established, look at how this new task will impact long term resourcing. How can I do this task without 80 hour weeks becoming the norm? Is this something I need to do or can I delegate it to one of my reports? Can I delegate parts of it to my reports and do the remainder myself (if it involves research/data gathering do I need to do that myself or can my reports do that and I just collate the results) so as to spread the load? Then look at what else may have to drop out to ensure capacity and how this can be done. I may have to go back to my manager and say something like “If you want me to do new [big ball] task X then I’ll have to delegate [small ball] tasks D, Q and T to my team and they’ll have to drop I, L and N.” or “To do X I’ll have to cut back on P and S.” but always have a reasoning behind it and be prepared to fight my corner.
Resources are not infinitely elastic, you have to make sure that you’re stretching them for the right reasons.
Stephen
May 29th, 2007 at 11:47 pm
My tuppence worth..assuming one bucket for the whole team.
1. Check to see if ball 21 can be combined with any of the other 15 smaller balls: 20 balls.
2. Bounce a small ball around the team so that one member of the team takes an extra ball for a period.
3. Slice a ball (or balls) and make them into 20 different balls - variation on 1.
4. Spread the smaller balls apart: lengthen the time to deal with small balls and create a big enough gap for new big ball.
5. Juggle: throw a small ball into the air (i.e. bosses desk for review) on a continual basis freeing up time to deal with new ball.
Chris
May 30th, 2007 at 1:32 pm
Chris-
Good ideas…but not what an effective manager would do.
An effective manager would delegate his or small balls to directs and focus more on the 6 big balls.
Mark
May 31st, 2007 at 8:06 pm
Me error, I misunderstood the ownership of the bucket with 20 balls. I assumed everyone had the same balls to play with.
Set another problem Mark, I will try to do better…
Chris
June 1st, 2007 at 11:02 am
Chris-
No worries! We are working on other challenges.
Mark
October 30th, 2007 at 2:46 pm
So, how do the directs handle the slew of big (to them) balls that just landed on them? If they delegate their own small balls to their directs how will those directs handle the new balls. Eventually some balls are going to be dropped, probably quite a lot of balls if this continues for more than a coupel fo layers of organisation.
October 30th, 2007 at 6:15 pm
Stephen,
Yep, balls drop (as they do every day). And that’s the point … delegate effectively and the smallest balls (the ones that are least important) are the ones that get dropped.
Mike