Skip to main content

REDUNDANCY--DOES IT ACTUALLY INCREASE PRODUCTIVITY???

Image
By
The May 2001 issue of The Harvard Business Review has an excellent article called, "Effective Managers Say The Same Thing Twice (or More)

http://hbr.org/2011/05/defend-your-research-effective-managers-say-the-same-thing-twice-or-more/ar/1

Research by Tsedal Neeley and Paul Leonardi of Harvard Business School and Northwestern University respectively showed that by shadowing '13 managers in six companies for more than 250 hours....that one of every seven communications by these managers was completely redundant with a previous communication using a different technology.  They also saw that the managers who were deliberately redundant moved their projects forward faster and more smoothly.' 

What was also profoundly interesting was that those managers without power planned their redundant communications whereas those with power rarely planned their redundant communications.  Also those without power ensured that there was very little time between the first communication and the second communication.  The reason for this is seems is seemed was that managers with power got as much done, but it took them longer and they spent more time on damage control or in crisis mode because they assumed their requests were being fulfilled before realizing they need to follow-up.  The reason being was that they were in a position of power and believed because of that people would automatically do as they requested.   One very interesting quote was that "managers with power assume their authority motivates others."    

This very difference was also noted in the context of the message, the researchers also noted.  They noted that managers without authority did not use directive messages as much as those in power did.  Those without power use the tone of persuasion more often.

The net result of this research was that this redundancy saw that managers who were deliberately redundant moved their projects forward faster and more smoothly.

So it would seem that being redundant can actually increase productivity.  Fascinating!!!!!

Bob
Labels:

Comments

  1. SusanMay 9, 2011 at 2:14 PM

    Very useful. Volunteer coordinators understand managing without power. Wives, too! :)
    I confess I prefer the expression "deliberately redundant communication" to "nag, nag, nag"!

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

JUST WHAT EXACTLY IS A SUPPLY CHAIN AND HOW DOES A LOUSY VIRUS SCREW THEM UP SO INCREDIBLY WELL!

By
Recently, I have had quite a few people ask me in the course of small talk, what exactly is this "supply chain" talk they are hearing about again regarding th e Delta variant of the Covid-19 virus.    They've heard the horror stories on     toilet paper or disinfectants in many stores.  Now we've heard of hoarders over-stocking their own homes or selling these products on the street corner at inflated prices.  Many people ask how can this be; what causes this; we are in the 21st century; etc. I remember the start of this current problem back in the 1960s (perhaps earlier) with the start of such programs as MRP (Materials Requirement Planning), but certainly not limited to this program and parlaying further into programs and schemes like J-I-T (Just-In-Time).  Bottom line and perhaps over-simplified, these programs were and are intended to speed up production and cut costs.  There are newer and greater programs like Le...
Post a Comment
Read more

The Flaw Of Averages

By
Yes, this post will be primarily a copy of a Harvard Business Review (HBR) article.  The article is the point of this blog. Over my decades in consulting, one of the major requirements in our niche was to insure that our clients received the savings we had forecast that they would achieve in a mutually agreeable manner.  In the very beginning, when I started back in 1974, computers were not easily available or accessible as they had to be huge room-size machines and many clients did not even have them.  So we used adding machines with paper tape to the shortly thereafter personal hand held-calculators.  Personal computers starting with the very first Apple or Radio Shack model proved far superior but had minimal calculating capacity.  None were perfect and because of this limitation, a straight line average over a years period was typically used to compare history to current and prove savings had been achieved. ...
Post a Comment
Read more

Do You?

By
 Do you procrastinate?  I know I do it more often than I would like to admit.  We all have a tendency to procrastinate.  Very recently, I saw this photo in a LinkedIn post.   To be legally clear, this is a billboard type advertisement by Nike. They are very famous for their "Just Do It" slogan.   Now they have two and they have combined both into an even more powerful expression. The definition of "procrastinate" from the Oxford dictionary is: "to delay or postpone action; put off doing something."  It is like the old colloquialism "Manana."  Mañana is tomorrow in Spanish.  We all do it to one degree or another.   From a business perspective, to procrastinate is a terrible situation if you or a great many people in a company or organization do it.  If it occurs too often or too much, then what does it do:  it has the probability to DELAY MOST EVERYTHING.  Is that what you really want?  No, I doubt it.  It very we...
Post a Comment
Read more