The Hidden Costs of Work-Around Cultures
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Work-around cultures develop when employees find ways to circumvent obstacles rather than addressing their root causes. This leads to several unintended consequences. Work-arounds can increase errors and waste resources while promoting the wrong culture and potentially exposing the organization to non-compliance risks. However, employees may see benefits like meeting immediate demands and keeping clients satisfied. To reduce work-arounds, managers must make themselves approachable to reports of problems and respond helpfully in order to build a continuous improvement culture.
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The Hidden Costs of Work-Around Cultures
- 1. The Work-Around Culture: Unintended Consequences of Organisational Heroes
- 2. Definition • A “work-around,” is “an improvised method to circumvent an obstacle, but which does not eliminate the obstacle.” • Work-around cultures are environments where employees work around obstacles that arise to meet the demands of the moment but never make improvements to meet the demands of the future.
- 3. Overview • ‘Work-around cultures’ are pervasive • Work ‘Hero’ • Costly in financial and human terms. • The solution is a continuous improvement culture • Manager responsiveness • Problem-solving efficacy.
- 4. Characteristic Obstacles • Work-arounds can be categorized based on – The characteristics of the obstacle • Rules/processes/procedures • Tools/skills/resources – Employee awareness • Conscious of the obstacle, Rules, SOP’s, SLA’s etc • Unaware
- 5. Work Arounds • The work-arounds that employees are conscious of involve – Bending the rules – Patch-its • Work-arounds that employees are not aware of include – Unintentional noncompliance and – Creative solutions.
- 6. Work Arounds-Costs • Patch It’s – Increasing error – Wasting resources – Employee burnout – Reinforces the wrong culture • ‘Bending’ the Rules – Contractual non-compliance – Legislative non-compliance
- 7. Work Around-Benefits? • Meets immediate needs (SLA’s)? • I am being effective? • Staff fully utilised? • Keeps clients happy? • Doesn’t require involving managers? • Badge of Honour?
- 8. Reporting Problems • Not always ill-advised • May be the optimal course of action • Managers need to know • Willingness to report problems • Management availability • Managers approachability
- 9. Low Employee Burnout WorkaroundWorkaround CultureCulture “Satexciting” Hero CultureHero Culture Reduction in underlying causes of problems ImprovementImprovement Orientated CultureOrientated Culture “Whiny” Employees may overwhelm Organisation Cynical CultureCynical Culture Problem Solving Cultures Cumulative Cost of the Problem ManagerResponsiveness High High
- 10. Take Aways • Work Arounds costly i.t.o. time and money • Communication solves reporting problems • Be responsive to staff reports • Hard Workers ≠ Good Workers
Notas del editor
- “Work-around cultures” are ‘damaging and pervasive in an Operational environment. The cultures and the people are distinctive as constantly fighting fires Employees tend to work around obstacles, often feeling (and being treated !) like a hero in the process, without solving the underlying problems. The reasons for these cultures are manifold, but they are costly in financial and human terms. The solution is an improvement-oriented culture built on manager responsiveness and problem-solving efficacy.
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- Frequent work-arounds can be costly and impair organizational effectiveness. Routinely resorting to patch-it work-arounds can be costly in multiple ways: Increasing error. Work-arounds lead to interruptions, which are associated with errors and failures. They increase the cumulative workload for FMs and the team ; higher workloads are associated with poor performance, SLA failure and burnout Wasting resources. studies have shown that the required hunting and fetching as well as the need to ‘touch’ the fault more than once eat up time and slow progress. ’more haste less speed’ Promoting employee burnout. Persistently lacking resources required to do one’s job takes physical and psychological tolls that lead to burnout. Creates a work-around culture. When work-arounds are common and seen as the ‘way to get things done’ people are less likely to seek system improvements. There’s an insidious aspect to the culture that causes people to dismiss notions of improving things and learn to live with imperfection. Bending the rules can lead to breach and default on the contract due to non-compliance which puts lives, jobs and the contract at risk.
- There are what might appear apparent benefits to work-arounds which can be very compelling on an individual level. For individuals facing obstacles, work-arounds are a way to solve the problem. They: Enable Employees to meet immediate operational need Fool staff into thinking they are being effective They look as though they are busy to their supervisors and managers They appear to keep clients happy, largely because they meet the SLA’s …but at what cost? Don’t require involving managers, which can keep both managers and staff happy. Foster a “hero feeling” on the part of an employee who works around the system for the good of the client. This is a medal of honour. If you are so smart and skilled that you can work around the system and give the best care despite all the obstacles, you are known as a hard worker which is often wrongly reinforced by the approval of the manager and you get promoted for the wrong reasons
- Although work-around cultures impair organizational performance, that’s not to say that work-arounds are always ill-advised. For obstacles that rarely reoccur or have low cumulative costs, work-arounds may be the optimal course of action. Because it is usually managers who address recurrent problems, it is the managers who need to know about problems that require work-arounds. Therefore, FM’s willingness/ability to report problems to managers is a key to reducing work-arounds. However, studies show that in health care facilities when Nurses engage in a workaround, they report the problem just 7% of the time. So the people who know about problems lack the authority to fix them, and the people who can fix problems don’t know about them. Nurses decide whether to bring problems to managers based on their perception of whether the effort is worth their time and trouble. Nurses behaviour is driven by the cultural messages communicated by organizational policies and managers’ behaviors Therefore, the factors key to reducing work-arounds are FM’s willingness to report problems to managers Managers availability Manager approachability and willingness to hear bad news
- Hero culture. This is bred by low manager responsiveness and low cumulative costs of problems. This is where there is little incentive to remove workarounds as the person responsible is made to feel like a hero and is often rewarded as such and hence reinforces the ‘Satexciting’ nature of the work. The Manager is not punished as he often is not aware of the scenario or is not hit on his budget. The rewards are appealing due to the recognition from the client and co-workers. Work-around culture. This reflects low manager responsiveness and high cumulative costs of problems. Lack of Management attention or knowledge of what is needed to solve the problem permanently leads to a continuance of the work arounds instead of a permanent solution whilst the lack of resources and funding will lead to resentment and burnout at operational level Cynical culture. This is when there is high manager responsiveness and low cumulative problem costs. Employees are cynical because high manager responsiveness encourages complaints to be aired but their low-cost to the organizations means they’re not addressed, and the cycle continues. Improvement-oriented culture. In this situation—which is the solution to a work-around culture —there is high manager responsiveness and high cumulative problem costs. Communication between front-line employees and managers is encouraged, problems are reported, and their high-cost nature results in solutions that address root causes. Organizational performance is improved.