Where do non-functional tasks come from?
I would not look in the village, but I would look in myself
In the previous article “Functional and non-functional tasks» I talked about non-functional tasks and about the fact that they need to be dealt with.
And to understand how to do it, you need to understand, where do they come from? How do they arise?
This is a very non-trivial question, given that non-functional tasks entail wasted resources, increased costs and, as a result, a decrease in the productivity of intellectual labor, and their share, as a rule, steadily and spontaneously tends to increase.
The answer to this question is necessary in order to develop mechanisms to counteract the emergence and growth of NON-functional tasks in the overall flow of tasks of the organization.
Non-functional tasks are generated within the organization – by its employees, including managers.
Some generate NON-functional tasks intentionally, others not intentionally, not intending to cause harm. Deliberately more where there is a lot of politics. More often than not, it’s not intentional.
Non-functional tasks are usually the result of:
not professionalism
good intentions
personal interests
In the case of unprofessionalism, often non-functional tasks arise:
due to insufficient qualifications in the field of justification of cause-and-effect relationships. When plans are drawn up, the algorithm for their implementation, that is, the sequence of tasks, is poorly developed. Cause-and-effect relationships are poorly analyzed in order to understand what depends on what, in order to realize what needs to be done and why. As a result, work begins, as they say, not “from the other end.” They do it, waste time, resources, and come to the conclusion that it was necessary to start with something else, that they still ran into this – something else. Thus, many of the completed tasks turned out to be NON-functional for the current time period.
because of the inability to change and create systems and processes in such a way that it would not be necessary to carry out a huge number of tasks from the field of control, accounting and reporting, information collection. Often, managers in the system and processes lay various inversions to perform tasks from the field of control, accounting and reporting, and information collection. For example, they insert tasks into the process of signing contracts, coordinating them with a mass of departments, or giving a bunch of instructions like collecting information about this or that, compiling a report once a week such and such, etc. d. A lot of these tasks, as a rule, are actually NON-functional tasks. They do not advance us towards the goal in any way, but they take away time and resources. The scope of these tasks is often underestimated. And if you look closely, then in many organizations employees now and then half of their working time either endorse and agree on various documents, then draw up any reports, or enter information into some databases and systems. And this time could be spent on performing functional tasks.
due to leaders not knowing what to do. Not knowing what really needs to be done, the leader begins to load people with any tasks, as long as they are busy, and he can show some kind of activity. The performance of this IBD – Imitation of Violent Activity – this is the performance of NON-functional tasks. This is also a very common phenomenon, which, in my opinion, is also underestimated.
Further, the phrase “with good intentions is the road to hell” is recalled. In a well-intentioned situation, it is not uncommon for people to perform non-functional tasks:
when they begin to believe that they see the situation better on the ground than the leaders, and begin to act on their own. For example, they argue like this, we see below better what the client needs, so we will do as we see fit and what we consider necessary. But, often, this does not correlate with the goals and objectives of the organization, with well-established processes, and as a result, not what should have been done and / or not as it should have been done.
when they do not receive valuable instructions from above and begin to load themselves and determine tasks and priorities for themselves. Responsible employees cannot sit idle, they feel uncomfortable. When they are not loaded with tasks, they begin to invent them for themselves, based on their vision of the situation. This vision may not coincide at all with the goals of the organization. As a result, these people can load themselves with non-functional tasks.
In some cases, the performance of non-functional tasks is dictated by the purely “selfish” interests of the people working in the organization.
Pursuing personal interests:
some lobby their goals to make money for themselves, not for the organization;
others to be noticed;
still others, to realize their ambitions;
fourth, to get the experience they need, not the organization;
fifth, to appear necessary and useful;
sixth, to be busy – to be in business;
seventh, to harm, divert resources and time;
etc.
Sometimes this is done unconsciously, but often quite consciously.
Usually, the whole set of non-functional tasks in the organization is the result of both non-professionalism and good intentions, and personal interests at the same time.
And it is rather difficult to sort non-functional tasks according to the particular reasons for their occurrence. I would say impossible.
But this does not need to be done.
What gives us the knowledge of what was the particular cause of the appearance of NON-functional tasks? Nothing.
Non-functional tasks are a problem in and of themselves. Regardless of the particular reasons that give rise to them.
If the system allows, and even provokes, then non-functional tasks will inevitably appear, whether we like it or not.
Fighting them, without changing and improving the system, is a “fight against windmills”. Useless.
Non-functional tasks are a consequence of general[1]and not special reasons[2]. That is, the problem is not in people, but in the system.
Here I will refer to the authoritative opinion of Edwards Deming:
“Based on my own experience, I can give the following assessment for most problems and opportunities for improvement: 90% of the problems belong to the system (management responsibility); 6% of problems are special”[3].
“No amount of control and no level of professional skill can overcome the fundamental defects of the system”[4].
“Any significant improvement should be the result of changes in the system for which management is responsible”[5].
“It is not intervention that is required to improve the system, but its fundamental change”[6].
This suggests that in order to eliminate non-functional tasks, to reduce their share and influence on the productivity of intellectual labor, it is necessary to change the task flow management system. And this should be done by managers, not employees.
At the same time, the system must be corrected in such a way that it does not allow imposing on the organization or provoking non-functional tasks. And I think that the introduction of the CPP system described in my blog is just such an amendment.
This edit will allow you to rebuild the system in such a way as to exclude the main defects that lead to the appearance of NON-functional tasks, creating the conditions for their occurrence. In addition, it will open up opportunities for further continuous improvement of the system.[7].
After all, in fact, the fight against non-functional tasks is a constant improvement of the “management” process, that is, Task Flow Management. Similar to the fight against losses and defects in physical production.
When we clearly understand and accept that task flow management is a “management” process, and NON-functional tasks are the losses of this process, then we understand how to build continuous improvement of the “management” process by performing the Deming cycle (PDCA) and measuring process indicators − statistics on tasks, including the share and dynamics of NON-functional tasks. Statistics on non-functional tasks will make it possible to fairly unambiguously and specifically assess the losses of the “management” process and ensure the constancy of the goal of improving this process.
The full version of the article is available in my book Wonderful Tasks, or Motaev’s Kozyrnaya “ACE”!
With respect to you and your business, Motaev Alexander
You can discuss this and other blog articles in our Telegram channel “Task flow management”.
[1] – Common causes are system defects (system defects), that is, defects caused by shortcomings in the system itself, are determined by the system, depend on how the system was designed and built, incorporated into it. It is possible to eliminate common causes only by changing and improving the system.
[2] – Special (special) causes are defects that are NOT related to the system (off-system defects), but are associated with transient, fleeting events arising from sources outside the system that interfere with the system’s normal operation.
[3] – Page 278 “General and specific causes of variability and opportunities for improvement. stable system. “Out of the Crisis: A New Paradigm for Managing People, Systems and Processes”. Edwards Deming. Moscow: Alpina Business Books, 2007. – 370 p. ISBN 978-5-9614-0567-5
[4] – Page 279 “General and specific causes of variability and opportunities for improvement. stable system. “Out of the Crisis: A New Paradigm for Managing People, Systems and Processes”. Edwards Deming. Moscow: Alpina Business Books, 2007. – 370 p. ISBN 978-5-9614-0567-5
[5] – Page 275 “General and specific causes of variability and opportunities for improvement. stable system. “Out of the Crisis: A New Paradigm for Managing People, Systems and Processes”. Edwards Deming. Moscow: Alpina Business Books, 2007. – 370 p. ISBN 978-5-9614-0567-5
[6] – Page 288 “General and specific causes of variability and opportunities for improvement. stable system. “Out of the Crisis: A New Paradigm for Managing People, Systems and Processes”. Edwards Deming. Moscow: Alpina Business Books, 2007. – 370 p. ISBN 978-5-9614-0567-5
[7] – Read more about this in the article “Elements of AT that protect the organization from non-functional tasks” In chapter “Dispute on management – on managing the flow of tasks“.
