too many hours!!!!

[Zoe Girl]

Okay this is really getting to me, I know it is part of the whole grant funded world but I am struggling. I keep telling my boss that I need time to take care of things and she says yes and then I find out something else that fell apart and I need to handle.

I spent a few hours on Sunday on things and talked to my coworker about work matters like scheduling summer camp staff. When I tell my boss how I am very worried about summer camp and so I want to know where we can flex she just tells me to delegate, well delegating also takes some time to get it all together and train someone to hand it over.

The latest idea is to start planning summer camp next November. As a team last fall we could not get everything done, we had late paperwork and issues all year. So adding summer camp planning means more hours all year,

I am not sure what to say to her, I made some peace with this being more than 40 hours, now I am trying to make some peace as I need more time for personal matters and it is still creeping up, and now our health insurance is going up $70 a month so I need to maybe make some peace with a second source of income or a court battle over child support, but who gets ahead in work by telling their boss they cannot do the hours?

[Miss Cellane]

I think your boss has the delegation thing down pat. She delegates to you.

The system gets bogged down because you don't delegate on further down the line.

Yes, delegating means more time in the short run, because you have to train and monitor someone to do the job you know so well. But in the long run, it is worth it.

You can delegate the tasks you dislike and the tasks you don't do well to someone who will like them and who can do them well. Then save the tasks you like for yourself.

Also, think about how various members of your staff will feel if you delegate to them. Many will see this as an opportunity to show you and your boss that they can take on extra responsibility and do it well. They will feel that you, their supervisor, have faith in them and their ability to do the job. If anyone of them are looking at their current job as a career, this will be a sign that they are on the right path. Or maybe they just need a little more money and the extra hours they get will keep them in this job instead of looking for a new one--and that will save you hiring/training time in the long run, as well.

There are so many possible long-term good things that can come from this.

[Zoe Girl]

Okay not seeing the long term good things, mostly the first half of the school was bogged down in staff personality issues, we did improve but I am not seeing my front line people as capable of doing as much as I really need to delegate. I think some of my summer staff will be able to do more. I did work VERY hard on retaining the staff I had partially because that is what I do well and partially because I knew there was no one else to take the job.

One issue is that while we are fully staffed we really need a one on one for a specific child. My staff is not doing all the projects they plan and is often not putting out many materials for kids to play with because this one child can really run through the room and mess up what other kids are working on. We had a one on one for over a month and then she quit. I wish we could pay more, I wish I could get a raise considering with insurance I make less now, but I also am in a district that has not given raises in over 5 years.

Okay delegating, we will see how that goes. I will see what she says when in November I delegate some of summer planning and then those people get paid planning time instead of adding more to me who is salary therefore we can keep going and going. I have thought about our days off work which are eligible for extra pay are times I can ask for extra planning time and get paid for it.

[rodeosweetheart]

For the one on one child, could you contact a local college that is doing teacher training or internships in Human Services and offer the position as an unpaid supervised setting for credit for a student?

I can think of many students studying education or human services that would be thrilled with that supervision and experience, and could probably get summer school credit for it.

Just a thought.

[Zoe Girl]

That is a good idea, we unfortunately have very strict limits on who we have here for licensed child care. It really is something we can afford in our budget but so many of our sites have been understaffed all year.

[Miss Cellane]

Okay not seeing the long term good things, mostly the first half of the school was bogged down in staff personality issues, we did improve but I am not seeing my front line people as capable of doing as much as I really need to delegate. I think some of my summer staff will be able to do more. I did work VERY hard on retaining the staff I had partially because that is what I do well and partially because I knew there was no one else to take the job.

One issue is that while we are fully staffed we really need a one on one for a specific child. My staff is not doing all the projects they plan and is often not putting out many materials for kids to play with because this one child can really run through the room and mess up what other kids are working on. We had a one on one for over a month and then she quit. I wish we could pay more, I wish I could get a raise considering with insurance I make less now, but I also am in a district that has not given raises in over 5 years.

Okay delegating, we will see how that goes. I will see what she says when in November I delegate some of summer planning and then those people get paid planning time instead of adding more to me who is salary therefore we can keep going and going. I have thought about our days off work which are eligible for extra pay are times I can ask for extra planning time and get paid for it.

Zoe Girl, I thought long and hard before posting this. I'm going to be blunt here.

You have a lot more problems that just a lot of hours to work.

1. You have staff who have "personality problems." I'm assuming that means they don't get along with each other.
2. You have staff who are not competent to delegate responsibilities to.
3. You have a hard time hiring bodies to fill jobs, let alone get good, competent staff.

Clearly, there is a problem with the people you are hiring. I'd take a good look at how you advertise these jobs, to see if you can re-work the ads to attract a better class of employee. I'd go through the hiring process with an eye for hiring at least one person at each site who can take on some of your responsibilities.

Once you have good people in place, work on your evaluation/promotion/raise process. Inadequate work, personality conflicts--these things should be dealt with and the employee put on an improvement plan.

Is the job market so good in your area that these people think they can easily get another job if they are fired? What is it that allows them to act like this at work with no penalties?

Once I read this post, I realized why you are working so many hours. It's because you can't trust your employees. Nothing is going to change until you get that under control.

[SteveinMN]

Once I read this post, I realized why you are working so many hours. It's because you can't trust your employees. Nothing is going to change until you get that under control.
Miss C, I largely agree with your advice.

But, continuing in the vein of being blunt, I would ask ZG if it's that the people she works with are not fully competent for their jobs -- or if that's her perception of them. Here's an article about "functional stupidity" (http://www.startribune.com/lifestyle/209654291.html) that I found to be an interesting possible tie-in:


“There are subtle pressures exerted in organizations to go along with the flow — go along to get along — and if you speak up against something or don’t go along with the leaders’ thinking, they say things like, ‘You’re not a good fit’ or, ‘We have intellectual differences,’ ” he said.

“I think that happens outside of conscious awareness most of the time,” he said. “Most leaders aren’t going to say, ‘I want to be surrounded by yes men.’ They’ll say, ‘I want people around me who will challenge me.’ That’s what they say. But subtly, they exert pressures on people to do just the opposite.”

[Zoe Girl]

Sorry, I forgot to make something clear. I do not have any input in hiring and little in firing. I don't choose who works at my school either. I am slowly learning who can be delegated to but honestly it has been a struggle. I know this is across the department at our almost 60 schools, same issues, taking initiative, completing tasks, using the freakin cell phones, wearing the t-shirt, etc. I do appreciate that my staff NEVER calls out sick, I had to twice send someone home who was willing to work. When you HAVE to have a certain number of staff for a number of kids just being very reliable is important. I do have documented write ups for some issues with staff however it is pretty hard to write up someone for not being able to delegate to, I just keep pushing and working at it.

I have a few better staff for summer camp and I just had one person make all the summer camp calls, she did 1 1/2 hours and we did not get through the whole roster. I am dang glad I had her do it. I have another person who can do another huge paperwork task but only has a few hours to work for me this week. I have staff that are really excited about the projects they planned as well.

It is going to be a huge week, I shopped for camp over 3 hours and came back to 44 unread emails and 3 must-dos for today. I think I just need to meditate on my expectation that a job can be reasonable hours and let go of it, in many ways this is out of my control and needs to be treated as such. I cannot be magically faster and delegating takes time. I learned the hard way that delegating a task you do not know well can lead to disaster.

[Zoe Girl]

BTW Steve, just taking a look at that article. Very interesting. i just got to the part where people do not want to be challenged. Honestly I challenge my supervisor now and then, some things I just have to let go of and I am learning. But this total hours thing is somehing worth challenging to some extent. If all of us on the team are struggling that is different than just me being inefficient. For example our summer camp hiring was a total wreck, we ended up giving jobs to the people who called us instead of having a process, then after I hired people I got the interview questions, after that I was told I needed references (they all already work in our dept). Huge waste of time overall, those are things to learn from so we can all manage our time better,

As the 'challenger' on the team I see value in it, I look at systems and plans and really delve into how they are going to work. Sometimes I find things that are going to be a problem before they are a problem, sometimes we agree to disagree, and very rarely I am wrong (haha). really the 'wrong' times are times we need to talk so I understand what is going on, even if I don't agree sometimes I just need to do it and that is okay.

[fidgiegirl]

It's poor of your boss and of HR to leave you to hire people and not be clear on the process. And I am sorry you are stuck with poor employees, but I get it. It is strange to me though that the hiring process isn't more clear. Here it is crystal clear due to the union. It might not be fast, but it's clear.

I agree that it is worth pushback. In many jobs the job could simply expand infinitely if the worker doesn't put boundaries on it. Good job on having your staffer make those phone calls. That is 1.5 hours of work that is done and you didn't have to do it.

[Zoe Girl]

Thanks, I went on to read more articles related to the one Steve suggested. One was about boss personality types, and how to work with them. I KNOW I am one who does not often give compliments so I was not going to take the flattering advice, besides it sounds really false when you don't mean it. The one peice of advice that made a lot of sense was to ask detailed questions (for bosses who pile on a lot of thngs and are willing to delegate most all of it without clear directions but with high consequences).

It is end of year feedback time and so I need to find appropriate ways to package up a little of the most important information to pass on.

[SteveinMN]

But this total hours thing is somehing worth challenging to some extent. If all of us on the team are struggling that is different than just me being inefficient.


In many jobs the job could simply expand infinitely if the worker doesn't put boundaries on it.
When I meet with former coworkers for lunch, this is a common theme. Upper management (which has chosen to make work their lives) seems to believe that salaried employees especially can be pushed and pushed to do more faster with fewer resources -- or take the extra time to do it. It takes advantage of a bad job market and it takes advantage of people's good natures. And, to a person, my colleagues all say that they had no problem doing this during the really bad days of The Great Recession, but that insisting this is the new normal now is like expecting someone to run an entire marathon at 100-meter speeds. It can't be done. And there will be pushback. It won't be pretty.

BTW, ZG, I'm glad that article was of some help.

[rodeosweetheart]

When I meet with former coworkers for lunch, this is a common theme. Upper management (which has chosen to make work their lives) seems to believe that salaried employees especially can be pushed and pushed to do more faster with fewer resources -- or take the extra time to do it. It takes advantage of a bad job market and it takes advantage of people's good natures. And, to a person, my colleagues all say that they had no problem doing this during the really bad days of The Great Recession, but that insisting this is the new normal now is like expecting someone to run an entire marathon at 100-meter speeds. It can't be done. And there will be pushback. It won't be pretty.

BTW, ZG, I'm glad that article was of some help.

Steve, yes, yes, yes, and yes!!!!!!!

[Zoe Girl]

When I meet with former coworkers for lunch, this is a common theme. Upper management (which has chosen to make work their lives) seems to believe that salaried employees especially can be pushed and pushed to do more faster with fewer resources -- or take the extra time to do it. It takes advantage of a bad job market and it takes advantage of people's good natures. And, to a person, my colleagues all say that they had no problem doing this during the really bad days of The Great Recession, but that insisting this is the new normal now is like expecting someone to run an entire marathon at 100-meter speeds. It can't be done. And there will be pushback. It won't be pretty.

BTW, ZG, I'm glad that article was of some help.


Hmm, this is making a connection for me. I notice that something about this manager being significantly younger than me is part of our overall tension. Sometimes it is that I don't ask for advice in many areas such as having those difficult conversations with families (so your child told everyone you take naked pictures of yourself in the bathroom and post them on the internet, just thought you should know). This year she has stopped telling me how to have those conversations, and it wasn't that I was upset she gave me direction, I figured she needed to learn that I am really good at that part of my job. I was a younger manager and I kinda cringe at those moments where I did a few things that now as the older worker I understand, that is okay.

But what seems significant is the perception of how many hours work should take when you are salary. She spends way more time on her job than I do, I know that. What bothers me is the 'job creep' in time and responsibility is coming from the younger people in management positions. I was just talking to a coworker and our end of year tasks are screwed up royally. We have been shooting for the sky and going bankrupt in time while our foundation is not solid. On the other side of our program with older and more experienced managers they got their end of year checklists weeks ago, had time to sit down with staff and go over it, actually planned that it would take time.So in the middle of her telling me to delegate I was not given the materials in time so I could delegate. I have staff here but it is not instant to turn over tasks. I also realize we did not get the box and envelopes that we need to pack up all the paperwork to be turned in. Sigh, that means we will look like crap and possibly be in trouble but I have a feeling that it will more reflect on her than us this time at least.

Okay gotta work on this,