I got this question a couple of weeks ago from Michelle Malay Carter at Mission Minded Management. She accurately describes a challenge in applying the research of Elliott Jaques, specifically Time Span to role descriptions.

Question:
What I see is managers are able to look at a description of the nature of each work level and state what level they believe a role falls within, and their description sounds legitimate to me. However, when we try to align that with time span by asking them to articulate a longest task (a what by when), the length of the time span does not align with the described level of work. (Time span plots the role in a lower work level.)

Response:
When managers first create role descriptions, they get all wound up trying to determine what level (Stratum) the role is in. When prompted to describe the longest task assignment in the role, the task often falls short.

Elliott’s experience is that managers often fail to recognize what is really required for success in the role. Their descriptions fall to the observable mechanics of the task and fail to recognize the one element that drives Time Span. The “what by when” refers to the goal. Whenever I have difficulty determining the Time Span of a task, I always go back to the goal. The goal will lead you to a more accurate assessment of the Time Span required.

Example. What is the Time Span of the task in hiring a person to work our customer service counter? The observable mechanics dictate that I create a job description, job posting, conduct interviews and make a selection. The Time Span might be described as four weeks. That would be wrong.

Describing the observable mechanics ignores the “what by when,” it ignores the goal. The goal is to do all of the observable things, then have that new recruit complete orientation, training, shadowing, to the point they can work the customer service desk, solo, without assistance. That’s the goal. And that goal will take four months.

Whenever I am lost in the search for Time Span, the goal will lead me to the right place. Most companies underestimate the Time Span required for success in the role. Because they lost sight of the goal.