Have you ever had your team say ‘we need more resources to get the work done’?

If so, then you find yourself in a position to either convince management to hire more or deliver the bad news to your team telling them there just isn’t budget to do so. Let me tell you, this is what it means to be between a rock and a hard place! You have to fight for your team as a leader, right?  You also have to fight for the good of your company. So, what do you do? Here are a few points to consider:

Baseline capacity: Most salary budgets are calculated using the 2080 working hours rule. Assuming an 8 hour day (knowing that is not the norm for salaried employees but hear out the concept), there are 2080 work hours in a year. Say you have 10 days of vacation and take 5 sick days, leaving you with 1950 work hours or ~244 work days. You then have ~30 minute lunch breaks, time walking from meeting to meeting, some in the bathroom, etc. This leaves about 1800 hours left to actually work with. However, let’s face it; they also get shifting priorities thrown at them. A good employee is realistically only about 80-85% efficient so I recommend using this as your productivity capacity baseline. Then, when your team is faced with that important project, goal, or late night deliverable, and they are not being constantly being burned out, they will be better equipped to stretch their capacity to get the job done when that end is in sight. Now, how do you make the most of that remaining 1800 hours?

Preserving capacity: Using a balanced planning approached, your team should preserve a certain % capacity for routine tasks, a certain % for process improvement or projects, and at least 5-10% for development. The #1 thing to fall by the wayside is the personnel development piece. This is highly likely because success and monetary rewards are usually based on project goals, quotas, targets, etc. These tend to trump other priorities in order to meet goal. It is pretty rare to see a goal set around employee satisfaction or retention. Long story short, if you don’t invest in your people, they won’t be your people for the long haul. You can read more about the concept of a balanced scorecard in this Harvard Business School working paper.

Making the most of capacity: Let’s think about good, better, best for a minute. It is important to differentiate what makes you busy from what makes you achieve results. In this competitive world, it is imperative to get the right results. When determining what needs to be accomplished, it is helpful to have something to gauge against to determine good, better, or best. This is where your mission statement comes into play. By defining what you are really trying to achieve, you can determine which options would be best to help you accomplish that path. One tool I love to use is the Hoshin Planning X-Matrix. This helps you map out the long term objectives and short term goals needed to reach your aspirations. (This method can also be used at a personal goal level if you are able to be that focused). This method also minimizes inconsistent direction and helps to prevent poor communication.

My advice is to start with the X-matrix to determine where you are going and what it takes to get there. Then, establish your balanced scorecard approach to help you keep a holistic view. Re-visit these two tools bi-annually to determine if you are still on the right path. It may take a few tweaks to perfect, but it will inevitably become a framework for communication, strategic alignment, and calibrating to your true north.