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One problem faced by the individual executive is managing his own time. The study of time management is useful because it focuses on the manner in which the executive, who must get things done by controlling the actions of others, does his own job.
T
I ime is a valuable resource. It is an asset which is apparently available to the manager in unlimited quantity at no cost. Yet many managers find that their most significant resource constraint is lack of sufficient time. Moreover, time is an irreplaceable asset. A demotivated employee whose behavior becomes counterproductive to organizational objectives can usually be replaced (albeit at some cost); most material resources can be renewed or replaced with a substitute. However, the executive is forced to spend his own time and that of his subordinates, whether he chooses to or not, and at a fixed rate. Once increments of time are used, they cannot be replaced. Given this consideration, a manager’s individual contribution to the achievement of organizational objectives is a function of how well he manages his own time. Unless he uses time effectively, his impact on organizational accomplishment will be less than the maximum. Until he learns to overcome the problems of time management, he will be relatively ineffectual at getting things done by controlling rhe activities of others.
Problems: Whereas the manager of a profit-making organization can use the profit objective as a criterion for making decisions concerning the use of his time (or any other decisions) and for evaluating the impact of those decisions, the military officer or the bureaucrat cannot use this obviously helpful guideline.
The most fundamentally significant time-management problem for the bureaucrat/executive is that his organizational objectives are often not specific and the results he is expected to produce are not quantifiable in a way that can be aggregated to evaluate “mission” success.1 The Secretary of Defense is expected to manage an organization, the objective ot which is national security. The Chief of Naval Operations leads a Navy tasked with an objective of controlling the seas. Fleet commanders, type commanders, wing commanders, project managers, air squadron and ship commanding officers are all bureaucrat/ executives who must make decisions in an environment characterized by the absence of specific, agreed-upon, aggregate measures of effectiveness. If the executive cannot objectively judge the state of his organization’s bottom line, the problem of how to spend his own time is obviously compounded. He may spend too much time avoiding apparent errors which do not necessarily degrade mission accomplishment because he will not be evaluated by his seniors in terms of mission-related quantifiable or
'Peter F. Drucker, The Effective Executive (New York: Harper & Row', Publishers, 1966), pp. 25-51.
objective measurements of his output. He may fall prey to the trap of efficiency and assume that long working hours, per se, or time spent doing things right, whether or not they are the things necessary to accomplish organizational objectives, are proper criteria for managing his own time or that of his subordinates. He may avoid spending time on long- range planning or on generating innovative ideas because these will not bear fruit during his relatively short tour of duty. He may use most of his time to accomplish his own clearly definable career objectives, rather than the soft, uncertain, or immeasure- able objectives of his organization. In the extreme, he may spend all of his time managing the flow of information to please his seniors or to avoid “rocking the boat.” The first time-management problem for the military manager therefore relates to the nonprofit objectives of bureaucratic organizations.
A second problem results from the fact that the executive is a thought worker.2 The nature of the operative task performed in the non-executive role clearly structures time use. It is the role of the officer of the deck, for example, to spend four hours at a time on the ship’s bridge directing the structured activities of the watch team. But the executive role involves no such operative task. His job description involves organizing, planning, directing, staffing, evaluating, controlling, integrating, communicating, and decision-making. These functions involve the executive in thought work rather than the performance of operative tasks. The nature of this thought work is generally unstructured because at any given time the executive must decide what he is going to think about. The executive is constantly faced with the problem of directing his thought skills toward one of a number of alternative activities in an unstructured environment. The fact that he has to decide what he is going to do with his time, and that there is no apparent “right” decision, creates a time-management problem.
Another aspect of the time-management problem relates to span of control. At the more junior level, functions and responsibilities of officers are well defined and relatively narrow. The power plant branch officer in an aviation squadron, the main propulsion assistant on board ship, the ground support equipment officer at an air station, the training command instructor, all have narrowly defined functions to perform. This limited span of control tends to force the more junior officer to allocate his time in order to concentrate on the objective at hand. If he does not,
2R. Alec Mackenzie, The Time Trap (McGraw-Hill Book Company, 1975).
it is apparent that he is simply not doing his job. Even at more senior levels the span of control frequently does not involve an inherent time-management problem. The “air boss” on board a carrier, the air squadron maintenance officer, the chief engineer, the project manager, the ship’s navigator, and the staff administrative officer, all may be very busy men, but their span of control is narrow enough to force them to spend their time on the “right” activities.
Executive, or thought worker, billets, however, are characterized by a broad span of control which is void of obvious guidelines regarding time management. It is possible for the high-level executive not to do his job and for this not to be apparent to others or to himself. A commanding officer’s job description involves responsibility for the safe accomplishment of whatever tasks may be assigned his unit, in war or peace, and for the operational readiness of his command. Captains and admirals are frequently responsible for the effectiveness of many units; for the productivity of large elements of the shore establishment; for the mission readiness of a fleet; the air, surface, or subsurface arm of a fleet; a task force; or the entire Navy. Each senior officer’s “job” is superimposed on all jobs within his broad span of control.
At the executive level, a manager is not provided with built-in incentives to spend time on activities which will produce optimum organizational effectiveness. He may concern himself with too many details and thereby fail to give enough attention to matters of greater significance. He may concentrate on matters such as community affairs, base cleanliness, or VIP visits which have a low “payoff” with
The destroyerman—like the aviator, supply officer, or nuclear submariner—spends so much time learning and operating in his field that, by the time he gets near the top of his profession, it may be too late to become an effective general administrator.
respect to mission accomplishment. Or he may concentrate on matters which are already running smoothly. One can imagine a CNO, responsible for the mission readiness of the entire Navy, spending a few hours a day for a few weeks or months, grappling with the problem of whether or not to change the basic enlisted uniform, making training movies designed to upgrade the self-image of naval personnel, or wrestling with the problem of admitting women to the Naval Academy. Such situations describe an executive with an extremely broad span of control who perhaps has succumbed to one element of the time trap. There are so many trees in the top-level executive’s span of control that they may block his view of the forest.
Because of the nature of his job, the executive’s time belongs to everyone else. He is thus subjected to the problem of absorbing, interpreting, and using a potentially infinite flow of upward communication. Everyone wants to brief the boss. Everyone has a “high-priority” problem which calls for a “short- fused” decision by the boss. At times, the organizational structure fails to provide for any functional integration of subordinates’ activities below the level of the top executive. The boss must frequently deal with problems which come to his attention in a piecemeal fashion. It then becomes difficult to sort and integrate information and to organize the manner in which time is spent dealing with information and comments from subordinates. This sort of problem tends to be particularly acute because the perceived need for visibility is almost always on a subordinate’s hidden agenda. When subordinates believe that “the squeaky wheel gets the grease,” the executive is subjected to a cacophony of “squeaky wheels.” He is forced to spend a good deal of his time attempting to tune in to the “frequency” of that one squeak which actually represents significant friction in the organizational machine. In addition, the upward flow of information is usually distorted by subordinates’ desire to prevent “bad news” from reaching the boss. This incentive can result in a wide range of counterproductive activities, ranging from the omission of relevant facts to the overt falsification of reports. The executive can thus be blinded from a view of reality by a smoke screen of positively colored information. The capacity of modern data-processing
A Typical Time Log for Aviation Squadron Commanding Officer
DAILY TIME LOG GOALS /M’ 25 . r<CCC“, jj. , \Prr*n*+v^m. 'rr'aXtA^e c+notc&m. *s— i---------------------------------- TIME ACTION PRIORITY* COMMENT |
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0900-1000 | full | Z | ---------- C7------- ^--------------------- ;---------- •-------------------- C&rr^&eZc, U+\auuaJL &€Lu*r^*ct~~ ZbtrdQ. |
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1000-1030 | fLi | Z | J&mJ~ ddo. ooogCh. *«_«_ ^uuWum.. s5AhJL<Z- /JiOoyySa CoAAjZhde, aoZiov^. |
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*rr\a^. U~ '&+^xZz2LP | z | '’yyyOfl*-** Ao-vvi au*Js (&b>+(bi+-n. ^ |
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1130-1200 | /Sua*^ "-ncceXi*^ | zf(°) | acZCd. ZtZ~u> Them -Zao^rnoo&iA '-vUet~ ac^6m^eu-&-i\AJl. |
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1200-1230 | fe- <yZci, M/)S iEj -TiayK-jte | >J(°) | Ue. a£a&*4*L^c, ~{LruuJ u>4^jft‘jtkA.f>Ls4ZU++a4- ivaax- ttuejHj XZjJc. UMZ*. &cSl ®|j>-tf- |
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1230-1300 | OUl/- dudeC^ ^u*uMi4 | z | T/lamy dZ&oce^autAACAj-o >-j£x^»vo J2*3c~ uUd- |
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1300-1330 | CO C4J8JL4 &A. COv^a | 3 | Ue, do caM~x aC*cor\. ^ |
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* 0 - Wasted 1 - Important, Urgent 2 - Important, Not Urgent 3 - Urgent, Not Important 4 - Routine TIME ACTION PRIORITY* COMMENT | |||||||
1330-1400 | uOxA. &cCHlo. aUziZe*.t, *ti eppZn. yitLUxat d. | l | Co*-eJ- P^n. tctejQc^ZZZZL. | ||||
1400-1430 | 'xJkutoa ieV~ | 3 | C*u*cd. -&**■*. aUZe^dZLoL | ||||
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1600-1630 | OppdtA. "TLLtA4- fttCAlboonA. &■*- , '4+rr^+rCou>>3 ZZ&4*04 ^cAmaOoJ^ 6 | / | -Aav-o. WA^i. 235C«lc- jUoioo»r** ‘^M^O dTTtCiL, | ||||
1630-1700 | Yboif-a* "**« ^t&JtxjqSf slo cA*jh ufclcA. cuH^f | z | '~yVu**~A uxa* ■£*.*.£. | ||||
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1730-1800 | '7naTdtZ**o**<-e-~ ‘VfsiT& | A/o |
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1800-1830 | fZ> <7^. <^tUZCf*i- O O&A*- | / | -jetOL, ddo^e, ~Z / | ||||
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equipment can increase the magnitude of this information flow and thereby aggravate the problem.
Furthermore, if the upward communication system which is theoretically supposed to provide the executive with an undistorted picture of reality does not do so, he will have to take the time and initiative to tune in on reality. Often, this means getting out of both the office and his required thought worker mode of operation. If the commanding officer of an air squadron spends most of his time flying, he will probably neglect necessary executive functions which are performed in the “cockpit” of his “large mahogany desk.” If he spends all of his time closeted in his office, he will have an inaccurate perception of his squadron’s operational problems and capabilities. When a ship’s commanding officer retreats to the security of the bridge or the cabin and assumes that the upward flow of information provides an accurate picture of reality, he becomes vulnerable to unpleasant surprises.
What about the squadron commodore, the wing commander, the type commander, the numbered fleet commander, the fleet commander in chief, the Washington-based systems commander, or the CNO? In these cases the time tradeoff between personal observation/inspection and the reliance on an upward flow of information obviously becomes a more serious problem. The requirement to develop a realistic perception of an organization in the face of a massive amount of upward flowing, positively colored information thus creates a time-management problem.
Another problem is the perception senior officers have of themselves as operators rather than managers. Most high-level executives have been socialized into organizations by demonstrating some specific expertise (as opposed to being thought workers). Almost all have been salesmen, engineers, pilots, gunnery officers, navigators, scientists, etc. They have adopted the value system which goes along with each specific field of endeavor and have learned to expect satisfaction from practicing as operators. They have become somewhat parochial regarding their operational expertise. In other words, they are motivated to practice rather than to manage.
Many executives, while cognitively accepting their roles as thought workers, succumb to the inertia of emotional pressure to continue operating. It is difficult for them to make the distinction between doing and managing. In many cases, the executive knows that he can perform operating functions more effectively and efficiently than subordinates. The executive’s dedication to accomplish objectives, the ego satisfaction he derives from performing operative deeds, and his identification with an area of operative expertise, all create obstacles to his devoting sufficient time to thought-worker functions such as planning or integrating the activities of others. An advancing state of technology tends to create career patterns whereby the individual, who will eventually rise to the top, stays a specialist longer. As a result, he finds that making the transition to generalist (executive) is difficult. The nuclear submariner, for example, must spend so much time and energy learning and operating in a specific field of expertise that by the time he gets near the top of his profession it may be too late to become an effective general administrator. The same may be said of the aviator, the destroyerman, the supply officer, or the guided- missile expert.
Another time-management problem is caused by human perceptual limitations. It is a well-established fact that many executives do not really know how they use their time. The human mind, without some objective reference datum, is simply not capable of accurately estimating how much time goes where. When an individual is placed in a quiet, dark room he loses all sense of time orientation. Apparently, a similar loss of time orientation occurs when incoming stimuli increase to the point of loading or overloading perceptual or cognitive capacity.
Examples of this phenomenon abound both in management literature and in common experience. “Time flies when you’re having fun” is a common expression. Researchers have found that couples engaged in sexual activity cannot accurately estimate elapsed time. The student who is writing a final examination tends to lose all track of time as he attempts to recall vast amounts of intellectual stimuli, to reexperience the process of receiving ideas or facts. The busy executive, constantly bombarded by large amounts of incoming stimuli, is operating in an environment of almost complete time disorientation. Unless he does something to get his bearings in this respect, he may flounder in a sea of unmanageable time.
Most people tend to respond to the attractive, the interesting, the pleasurable, and to avoid the unpleasant, the dull, or the painful. One aspect of the time-management problem is caused by the fact that the executive’s perception of which stimuli will result in “pain” and which will result in “pleasure” is a function of his own particular value system and cognitive set. If he expects to find a crisis particularly rewarding, i.e., if he places a high value on the ego satisfaction he derives from playing the role of “leader in a crisis,” he will probably respond to those stimuli which he perceives as crises. He may even subconsciously go out of his way to create crises so that he can assume this role. Furthermore, he may neglect structuring his organization or controlling the organizational process so that recurrent crises can be avoided. If he particularly values social affiliation, he may respond to those stimuli which hold the promise of fulfilling this need, such as the invitation to a long three-martini lunch, the friendly phone call of an associate, or the wardroom bull session.
The problem is that the activities which the executive may expect to find rewarding and the choice of action that will best achieve organizational objectives are frequently not the same. High-level bureaucratic executives, particularly military officers in peacetime, often have the power to choose the ways they spend their time without direct interference from the environment. It is not an organizational norm for an admiral to question the time management of a captain. It is not an organizational norm for an executive officer to suggest to a commanding officer that he spend more time on long-range planning. If the organization assumes that rank brings wisdom (an organizational norm?), the more senior officer is vulnerable, even with the best of intentions, to fall prey to the time trap of working on what is interesting and rewarding to him rather than on what may be important to the organization.
Another problem concerns the plague of time- wasting interruptions or diversions. Literature on the subject of time management contains long lists of time wasters. A sampling of such lists would include: visitors, meetings, phone calls, socializing, paperwork, recurring crises, trivial routine, and correspondence. But every executive knows that dealing with phone calls, participating in meetings, etc., are activities that are part of his job and cannot be avoided. The problem is not that potential time wasters are a real part of the environment, but that most of these seemingly necessary activities tend to prevent the executive from performing the thought-worker functions which are required in order to accomplish organizational objectives.
The trade-off which executives must make between focusing on short-range and long-range problems and opportunities is another concern. The executive is characteristically threatened by the “tyranny of the urgent.” He has an obvious need to deal with day-to-day operations. However, his potential contribution to organizational effectiveness may be primarily a function of time spent on thought-work activities which deal with the future. This can be a vicious circle. The seemingly urgent problems of the present may have been caused by a failure to focus on the long-range agenda in the past. The size and certainty of today’s “can of worms” can easily prevent an executive from concentrating on the problems and opportunities of uncertain future. When tomorrow or next year comes, the “can of worms” will still be there, only larger. In his quest for a high-probability payoff for time invested, the executive may deal with future uncertainty simply by avoiding it. He may feel that it does absolutely no good for him to concentrate on the fact that his ultimate objective is to “drain the swamp” by tomorrow when he is up to his neck in “alligators” today.
The executive is theoretically provided with time to use at his own discretion because he has the power to delegate. Whereas managing is generally defined as getting things done through people, delegation is giving people things to do. A manager who does not delegate is not managing. There are many obstacles to effective delegation. The executive’s ego may cause him to decide to avoid delegation because he feels that he can perform a task better than a subordinate. The perceived need for personal visibility may force an executive to “do” rather than to manage. Effective delegation usually involves the executive in the process of training subordinates. He may feel that there is not enough time to perform this function. The executive may, in effect, reverse delegation. When subordinates do not have the skills or the authority to do their jobs, he may make decisions for them. Subordinates will pass the buck concerning functions and decisions up the chain of command. This reverses the process which is supposed to free the executive to perform his thought work. Finally, the executive may create time-management problems for subordinates by not delegating the work load evenly. This problem occurs when the boss, attempting to perform the delegation and/or staffing function, finds a good horse and rides him to death.
Suggested Solutions: Once the nature of the time- management problem is understood, strategies for avoiding the time trap are readily suggested. Prescriptive principles involve control systems, diagnosis and introspection, and time use planning and regulation. Executive effectiveness is a function of the organizational climate and structure. Without the existence of some control system which identifies organizational purpose, objectives, and goals, outlines strategy, defines output measures to be evaluated, and provides for some type of program review, there is little the individual manager can do to avoid mismanaging his own time. The structure of a control system, such as management by objectives, provides the criteria for an executive to make time-management decisions. Without such a system, there is no rational way for the individual executive to use
judgment in the management of time. If, for example, one objective of the Department of Defense is the establishment of good community relations, this goal will be clearly identified when it is systematically integrated into the control system of ,the department. This will include the establishment of priorities, some way of measuring (or at least estimating) the state of community relations, and the setting of time-oriented standards. Once this is done, an executive can properly devote some of his time or his subordinates’ time to activities specifically designed to accomplish community relations objectives. It is clear that the usefulness of attending activities such as those sponsored by the Rotary Club or Chamber of Commerce, or providing plans for disaster control in the civil sector can be evaluated only in the context of the primary mission or purpose of the organization.
In a bureaucracy there is frequently a multiplicity of possible objectives and therefore the need to establish priorities. There is a large spectrum of strategic planning options and therefore the need to make and promulgate specific plans. There are complex formal and informal lines of communication and therefore the need for objectives and plans to be well understood at all levels. There are surrogate output measures which must be used—therefore, the need to avoid measures which do not truly indicate effectiveness or are dysfunctional. Until these needs are somehow fulfilled, there is no reference point for the management of time.
Output measures must be chosen so as to provide incentives which motivate executives and their subordinates to spend time doing the things that will result in objective achievement. For example, the maintenance officer at an aviation command may be confronted with a goal of a certain number of items repaired or made ready for issue each month. An objective measure of efficiency such as this should motivate the executive to spend his thought work hours at activities (organizing, planning, staffing, controlling, etc.) designed to get the maximum number of items ready for issue. As a result, he may sacrifice quality for quantity and encourage subordinates to work on the quick and easy jobs rather than the time-consuming, tough, important projects. The use of such an output measure is counterproductive because it creates an incentive to spend time managing functions which do not necessarily result in the best possible operational readiness of aircraft.
Once output standards are set, the program review element of a management information system should be on an exception basis.'* Those control milestones which are not being met represent the squeaky wheels that merit the “grease” of executive attention. A management-by-exception approach limits the upward flow of information by identifying, in advance, the sort of data which those at the highest levels “need to know.” Management by exception :,Lester R. Bittcl, Management by Exception (New York: McGraw-Hill Book Company, 1964).
will protect the executive from the time-wasting problems that are always part of an unmanaged flood of upward communication. The management-byexception rule can be applied to meetings, briefings, and informal communication. There should be some attempt to eliminate hidden agenda items such as a subordinate’s perceived need for visibility.
Time-management problems which result from the perceptual obstacles previously referred to can often be solved by keeping a time-use log. The time log serves the purpose of answering the question, “Where has the time been going?” An analysis of the executive time log will identify time wasters which do not contribute toward individual and organizational effectiveness. Such an analysis can help the executive establish criteria for distinguishing between matters which are routine and matters which truly demand his attention. If the time log is inordinately filled with recurring apparent crises, there is probably something wrong with organizational procedures and policies, something which must be corrected if the top-level executive is to be able to do bis job. For example, a ship’s commanding officer may log his time use and find that each time the ship gets under way some failure of departmental readiness creates a problem that demands his personal attention. He may find that each time recurring reports are due there is a “flap” which demands that he spend his time and energy in crisis management. Upon reflection, he may discover that there is no such thing as routine, only crisis. Such a time-use analysis will enable the executive to make policy decisions and to establish routines designed to prevent recurring crises, and thereby to protect his own time.
Time log analysis enables the executive to evaluate how effectively he delegates work to others. If there is a long list of activities that could have been accomplished by subordinates, it should become clear to the executive that he is not spending his time getting things done through others. Examples of such warning signs are: the drafting of correspondence, the analysis of raw data, and communicating with members of other organizations on matters which are the concern of subordinates.
The executive who logs his time can come to some conclusions concerning the availability of discretionary time. He can answer the questions: “How much of my time is controlled by others?”, “How much of my time is used at my own discretion?”, “How much time do I have to reflect on the fundamental or long-range obstacles to the successful achievement of organizational goals?”, “Is all, or most, of my time taken up by solving short-range problems?” Once time use has been logged and analyzed, the executive should make an overt attempt to plan and regulate it. This involves the simple, but often overlooked, procedure of planning each working day by noting intended use of time and using this schedule in order to avoid time-wasting interruptions or activities. A prerequisite to effective time planning is the establishment of priorities concerning each task. The highest priority tasks should be those most likely to have a significant impact on organizational effectiveness and should be completed prior to attacking those lower on the list.
Finally, the executive should schedule the use of discretionary time. The “how to” of this time use prescription depends on the particular working environment. If interruptions caused by telephone calls or by subordinates are obstacles to effective time use, they will have to be overtly blocked. A properly trained and employed secretary can be of great assistance here. Some executives find it helpful to schedule a quiet time either at home or in the office. Many executives believe that discretionary quiet time is best scheduled early in the day when they are most alert. Taking work home in order to complete tasks free of time-wasting interruptions does little good when mental energy has run down in the course of the day.
Conclusion: Of course, no manager is plagued by all time-management problems in equal doses, and no solution is perfectly applicable to all circumstances. The usefulness of a general problem analysis and prescriptive formulation depends on the willingness and ability of the individual officer to examine his own situation with insight, to diagnose his own time- management problems, and to apply suggested ideas effectively. The most fundamental and perhaps most important question that each officer must answer is, “What should I do with the limited time and energy available to me?”
1 i Commander Sloane was commissioned in 1957 upon
graduation from the Naval Academy. He has served in m various aviation patrol squadrons as department head
l XwJpjM and aircraft commander and has commanded Fleet Sup- I port Squadron Eight (VC-8). In other operational tours, has served >n the USS Lexington (CVT-16) and the staff of Commander Antisubmarine Force, Atlantic Fleet. Since commissioning he has attended the John F. Kennedy Graduate School of Public Administration at Harvard University, where he received a master's degree and did post-masters work as a selectee in the Professional Development Program. He has also completed a course of study in aerospace safety at the University of Southern California. Commander Sloane has served as an instructor of history and political science at the Naval Academy. In 1976, he graduated from the Naval War College with highest distinction. He is now an instructor of management at the War College.