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The Trap of Overwhelming Demands By Heike Bruch and Sumantra Ghoshal
Develop an explicit personal agenda To minimize the constraint of overwhelming demands, you first must develop a clear personal agenda. That means coming up with a precise idea of what you want to achieve in your job. For example, rather than keeping general aims in mind such as "growth" or "good customer service," try crafting a vivid mental representation of your objectives that includes ways to achieve them. Take the case of Lufthansa's Thomas Sattelberger dream to create the first corporate university in Germany. Although he had multiple demands on his time at Lufthansa, he also had a detailed vision of his goal that enabled him to distinguish important tasks from unimportant busywork. His image? A temple with three pillars – one for each stream of development measures. The roof that bound the pillars together was a robust and visible institution – the Lufthansa School of Business. Supporting the entire temple – the foundation that was needed to build the corporate university – were proper operational HR processes. While reacting to demands can be distracting, the kind of personal agenda that Sattelberger created produces an opposite effect: It allows you to integrate the diverse, loosely related goals for your short- and long-term responsibilities into one broad master plan. You can, therefore, relate immediate and short-term priorities with their long-term purpose – which is ultimately much more inspiring than merely responding to demands. Practice slow management: reduce, prioritize, and organize demands All managers have to deal with formal procedures and ritualistic requirements to some extent – such as attending specific committee meetings and participating in certain events or functions. But many demands that you might accept as given are actually discretionary in nature. You may, therefore, perceive more demands than there are, rather than recognize that some of them are really a choice. Purposeful management, by contrast, means that you examine what you choose to do or not do. That way, you create space for tasks that are important, instead of doing what you like or find most familiar or easy. You will also not feel as tempted to jump impulsively from one thing to another. Set priorities among your tasks, aligning your activities with you agenda. As one manager told us: "To achieve speed in the work that matters, one must practice slow management." Structure contact time Managerial work is primarily interactive and interdependent in nature; rarely do managers work on their own. The problem is that interacting with people is not only time consuming but also exhausting and the main source of the multiple interruptions about which managers often complain. A typical trap of non-action – which leads to feeling as if demands are overwhelming – is getting caught up in intensive interaction with lots of people. Most managers spend much more time with their direct reports than is really necessary or even useful. Younger managers, in particular, often want others to consider them a good boss who cares about subordinates by being unrestrictedly available. But keeping your door open prevents you from accomplishing anything worthwhile. How can you deal with this trap? Try structuring your contact time. For example, Sattelberger set the following policy: His door would be open at certain times, when anyone in the department could bring him problems that required immediate attention. That policy led not only to larger chunks of uninterrupted time but also to higher quality of interaction with his people. Shape demands; manage expectations Some managers constantly worry whether they are meeting others' expectations. Trying to please everybody, these managers tend to get absorbed in speculations about what others expect, about the best strategy to meet those expectations and the consequences of not meeting them. Ultimately, the managers fail, not only because they find no time to pursue their own agenda, but also because in trying to please everyone, they typically end up pleasing no one. Managing with purpose means realizing you cannot meet everyone's expectations. Rather, you must concentrate on your key stakeholders. That means learning that saying a real yes and committing to something inevitably implies saying no to other things. It also means becoming aware of how much influence various stakeholders have on your ability to achieve your goals – and tailoring your responses to those individuals accordingly. Purposeful managers differ from those who try to please everyone by not simply reacting to expectations, but by actively shaping them. Rather than merely meeting the expectations of your key stakeholders, then, you must do everything possible to exceed them. As one manager at Conoco told us: "Meeting expectations, accomplishing demands would mean absolute mediocrity for me. I must do better than what they expect. I cannot be creative if I only concentrate on doing what I have to do." Another strategy is to present your own goals and ideas before your stakeholders have a chance to present their demands. But do so in a way that anticipates others' expectations – as well as provides a means to your own goals. Shaping others' expectations is a long-term strategy that relies on developing sustainable relationships. While most managers do not consciously build and influence relationships, purposeful managers spend a lot of time developing their personal networks. Rather than arbitrarily forming relationships with many people, try deliberately focusing your time and energy on developing strong and close ties with people who can influence the achievement of your goals. While such an approach to building relationships might seem calculating, it never works without a component of genuine warmth, respect and friendship. As a purposeful manager, use your social skills to weave your stakeholders into your agenda – and in the process jointly create new opportunities for purposeful action. |
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