“How do you talk about discretionary judgment in the Job Description?” Corina asked.

“Right at the top,” I replied. “And attached to each Key Result Area.”

“Okay, I have a supervisor position. The Key Result Areas are:

• Scheduling
• Equipment Maintenance
• Safety
• Production

“The prescribed duties are easy,” Corina explained. “The supervisor has to post the schedule, maintain the equipment, prevent time-lost accidents and meet the production schedule. How do you figure in discretionary judgment?”

“The first element to establish is the Time Span of Discretion. How long do you, as the Manager, expect the team member to be able to make routine decisions (using their discretionary judgment) without having to come to you for direction? And that Time Span may be different in each Key Result Area.

“Let’s start with scheduling. How far into the future do you expect your supervisor to schedule your team members in their work assignments?”

Corina squinted, “I believe next week’s schedule is always posted the Wednesday before.”

“And what about the week after that, and two weeks out and three weeks out?”

“Well, those aren’t posted, but the supervisor has them in a notebook on his desk. They’re not finalized because some people may have vacation, or the production schedule may require overtime.”

“So, the supervisor is looking out four weeks into the future, using his discretionary judgment, making decisions about work assignments based on things like vacation and production schedules. Would you say the Time Span of Discretion is about four weeks?”

“Yes,” Corina began to nod. “It’s not just that the supervisor posts the schedule on Wednesday. To do an effective job, it’s the discretionary decisions being made four weeks out, in his notebook, looking ahead.” -TF