Project Management and Delegation

It is always fascinating to see the ability of some organisations/people to execute things in a perfect manner. The skill to execute strategy is by far the most important skill that has to be acquired. At a personal level, it requires Discipline, Dedication and Determination. In teams the goal has to be achieved by taking the team along on all these parameters along with ensuring that it remains motivated and the individual members grow- i.e. quiet acute personnel management.

Delegation is the basic current that runs the team and probably is the most important aspect that a project managers should look at.

Usually, delegation is seen as a tool to either offload tedious work or something that the person delegating the assignment is not interested in doing. The assumption is that it will help the individual gain productive time. However, while working in teams, it is never the goal.The goal is to finish the project in budget with a motivated and happy team.

Actually, delegation should be to offer interesting stretch goals to the team members. The most tedious work needs to be kept for oneself along with project management. This is the best way to finish tasks fast and as desired, because it is highly likely that the work you offload and are not interested in doing, your team member does not like to do it as well. This makes it really tough to get the tasks finished as desired.

Teaching 100,000 english

That’s the mission I aspire to acheive to contribute to social responsibility. I think it will be immensely beneficial if I can somehow build a process and a coalition to enable teaching the english language to atleast 100,000 people.

It is a worthwhile mission because it will allow individuals a foot in the globalised world. It is far more important in this age and time because of the availability of technology that can easily provide accessibility to internet on mobiles – the most widespread medium of communication in India. If we can all somehow learn english , we can be the biggest content contributor globally. This will allow us to shape world opinion the way we see things, and hence close cultural ties with the world. Ultimately, leading to more and more jobs and a brighter economic future.

Secondly, I think the fact a large proportion of population would be educated – it would bring sense into our democratic system. The other day I was going through a forwarded email about the education qualifications and criminal records of our parliamentarians. I was saddened to see that more than 20 percent of the strength of the house had criminal records and the educational qualifications were also not something to be really proud of. It is also sad to see that people who have been uneducated have not led their community to education and a bright future. However, I resigned myself to an apathetic attitude – thinking that the leaders are representatives of their voters. If the voters, want such leaders than they should be there. I think the reason for existense of such kind of leaders is the prevailing scarcity for everything (security, education, healthcare facilities, infrastructure, etc.) leading people to elect those who can arm twist their way to snatch some proportion of the scarce pie for their constituency members. With education and proper laws things can change and better governance will be provided as it will be difficult to fool and divideople.

The Pyramid – Contd

Concerns

The disillusionment with century old management practices is resulting in a change in the socio-spiritual behaviour. Mutual trust is in short supply. No longer, people stick to a single job. The individualistic behaviour is superseding the collective behaviour- the feeling of brotherhood. The bogey of competition is used to justify unfair and unethical practices.

It must be realised that increasingly offices are replacing society and friends as support system. Individuals nowadays, spend close to 14 hours in office on average. These long and stressful hours in office hardly allow scope for engaging in social causes or give time to discover self. (Did Mumbai stop even for a second after the blasts?). Office and company are now the social prism in which individuals now earn their credibility. The work and the office culture give meaning to people. The organisations must realise this fact and make it sure that they change and trust individuals. They must allow them to grow and realise themselves. They must allow equality of opinion and pay them equitably.

Otherwise they stand to lose the battle for talent.

The Pyramid

I came across an interesting book on organisation behaviour which was trying to prove that although we have advanced in technology and in social and political behaviour, our management practices have not changed much over the last 100 years or so.

Perspective

We still work in a pyramid type hierarchial organisations. No matter how much the world is going flat, our organisational hierarchies aren’t. The advance of technology has allowed the world to come close to each other, but the gap between the top executive and the workers hasn’t reduced. It doesn’t even matter that the world has rejected dictatorship and authoritative regimes enmasse, democracy is still seen as a threat in ‘modern’ organisations.

The orders still flow from top to bottom and everyone has to comply. All decisions regarding strategy and management are percolated down the ladder, without involving people who will execute the strategy. Moreover, there is hardly any reverse feedback. The workers still work in assembly line mode and perform specific task mechanically without trying to understanding the ‘why’. This is probably from the time of Henry Ford. An important aspect of the pyramid structure is that the employees are not considered worthy of trust and are treated as resources – dispensable after use.

The system holds on
Although, most of us do not work in a manufacturing unit, still, we can relate to it. We the ‘knowledge workers’ are working under similar if not the same managerial controls. We are required to do only a certain kind of task repeatedly. It doesn’t matter whether we have engineering and management degrees with us. We are still not treated as responsible adults – the bags are frisked before you leave office.

You are expected to do only a specific kind of task mechanically without questioning the company policy. You need to take permissions for every additional thing you intend to do. You are to file a report for the time you spend in the office. You are expected to come at a certain time and cannot modify your schedule as per your convenience or the way you think it would be best to execute the project. The results are a second priority control is the first.

I believe bureaucracy and dictatorship are hallmarks of the pyramid system where someone else decides for you. I think, in such a system, employees often work under fear and intimidation of the bosses rather than out of a sense of fulfillment of the job.

To cite an instance, at my earlier job, there was an internal academy to train the workforce to meet project requirements. Every aspect of the academy was micro-managed by the corporate executive and every program was decided on behalf of employees. I, being a fresher, found the atmosphere repulsing as I saw the managers treating all the employees as small kids rather than adults. It was like going back from college to kindergarten again. You even needed to ask permissions to drink water! and had all these security cameras all over your head to monitor your mischievous activities.

At one of the town hall meetings (large meetings where employees talk to bosses) I had the naivety of questioning the Vice President of the multi billion dollar company on why don’t we give more freedom to employees, allow them to at least learn whatever they want in an academy, and take up roles that is based on their interest in the organisation. I got that you-prove-it-you-are-a-kiddie look and an answer that the money company spends on employees is to achieve its end goal (read profit) and everyone has to work in a mission mode. In other words, company has a lease on your soul since it employs you. I disagreed and resigned soon after as i didn’t find the job fulfilling. I realised that the same behaviour transcends most organisations.

To be continued………