Why job descriptions are useless - The Chief Happiness Officer Blog

Why job descriptions are useless - The Chief Happiness Officer Blog Lets do a quick reality check on job descriptions. Ask yourself these three questions: When was the last time you read your job description? Do you remember what it says? When was the last time you did something at work that you could not have done without your job description? If your answers are 1) When I interviewed for the job, 2) Ehmmmm not really and 3) I dont think that has ever happened then maybe its time to rethink the value of job descriptions. I say job descriptions as they exist today amount to little more than organizational clutter and could easily be dropped altogether. Heres why we should loseem and what to do instead. Why lose the job descriptions 1: Nobody reads them anyway Do you? I thought not. I never did. Very few people do. Some companies dont even have them, and they seem to manage just fine. 2: Theyre always incomplete Nobodys job description contains all the crucial things they do or all their important resonsibilities. Theres always more to it than is captured on paper. If everybody in the company did only what it says in their job description, the company would soon grind to a halt. 3: Theyre a hassle to create and maintain Theyre actually a lot of work to write and especially to update. 4: Theyre usually obsolete Most peoples jobs change a lot faster than their job descriptions. In many cases the job description only says what the job used to be like a long time ago you know, way back in the last quarter. 5: They dont help people do their jobs I dont think a single person has ever told me today I accomplished something at work that I couldnt possibly have done without my job description. Theyre close to useless in day-to-day operations. Or have I overlooked something? Is there a reason why job descriptions are crucial (or merely useful) where you work? What to do instead But without job descriptions, how will people know what to do? Amazingly, most people still get their jobs done, even though the only time theyve read their job description was 4 years ago when they signed on. Or if gasp their workplace doesnt have job descriptions. A much more productive and useful system is to let each department or team work out their responsibilities together. Heres how a group of people who work together, eg. a department or a project team, can do something much more useful: 1: List the departments tasks Get the whole group together in front of a whiteboard. Give everyone a block of post-its and let each person write down their tasks and stickem on the whiteboard, one task one each post-it. Let everybody contribute to this list. Make the list as complete as possible. 2: Ask why 3 times For each task your department lists ask Why do we do this? In fact, for each item ask why three times. It might go something like this: Why are we making this report every week? Beacuse Bob in marketing wants it Why does Bob in marketing want it? (Somebody calls Bob) He gives it to the VP of marketing Why does the VP of marketing want it? (Somebody corners the VP and asks her) She doesnt really want it she says she only ever looks at the aggregate reports That would be a good opportunity to stop doing that report every week. For each item on the departments list, keep asking why until you know why your department does whatever it does. In many cases its obvious but some things are done simply because, well, weve always done it. 3: Group the tasks Try to group tasks together that are best done together. For instance Gathering data for sales report, Making sales report and Distributing sales report inside company may be tasks that it makes sense to do together. 4: Let people choose tasks Let people choose the tasks they would most like to work on. Let each employee go to the whiteboard in turn and pick out tasks they like to work on. Of course there are two problems that can occur here: 1: A task is popular more than one person wants to do it This might be handled by sharing the task so people work on it together or take turns doing it. Another solution is to give the task to the person who does it the best. Or the person who needs to learn to do it. Find a solution. 2: A tasks is so unpopular that no one wants to do it Take a close look at that task. Is it really necessary? If no, dont do it. If its absolutely necessary people can take turns doing it or work on it together (shared misery is lessened misery). If there are enough unpopular tasks, each person can take one or two, so theyre about evenly disitributed. If the department almost exclusively has tasks that no one wants, then something is very wrong :o) After all the tasks have been distributed, let each employee write a document containing his or her list of tasks and collect all the documents in a place where everyone can see them. A wiki would be a great place for these lists. 5: Repeat occasionally Repeat the exercise once or twice a year to drop tasks that are no longer necessary, to re-assign tasks so people get some varity in their jobs and to delegate whatever new tasks may appear. Why is this different from regular job descriptions? Its more complete and a truer reflection of what people really do Its easier to update Its more likely to be relevant to people in their jobs It results in the team working together on the departments tasks, rather than everyone working alone on their tasks The result of this exercise: The department eliminates unnecessary tasks People spend more of their time working on tasks that they like and have chosen for themselves remember that one persons chore is another persons dream job The group identifies unpopular tasks and distributes them evenly You avoid the situation where Johnson is always making the sales reports even though she hates doing them, while at the same time Smith, who loves making reports, is grumbling that Johnson always gets to do them Im betting that groups who do this or something similar will see: Vastly increased productivity Higher quality Lower absenteeism Lower employee turnover More happiness at work We did it at the IT-company I co-founded and to our great surprise we found that almost every single task was taken by someone who actively wanted to do it. For example, I got to write our newsletter, cause I really liked that challenge while Brian managed our intranet a task he relished. Because we liked doing what we did we did great work. If wed switched tasks, they would have been badly or not at all. This approach may be a bold move for some companies and a slam-dunk for others but it gives a group something far more useful, relevant and inspiring than traditional job descriptions! Sing it: Job descriptions Huh! What are they good for Absolutely nothing Say it again! In upcoming posts: Why we should also lose the org chart, the employee handbook and the business plan. If you liked this post, Im pretty sure youll also enjoy these: eXtreme Projects 5 business maxims that need to go The cult of overwork Why secret salaries are a baaaaaad idea Thanks for visiting my blog. If you're new here, you should check out this list of my 10 most popular articles. 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