Planning and scheduling are the least exciting of all the leadership dynamics. Yet, they are very critical. Many leaders and managers are in instant planning (reaction) mode as soon as they power up their devices on the way to the office. There are so many leaders still in this “get things done” mode 24-7:
- Bottom line
- Take charge
- Want the Reader’s Digest version
- Direct
- Results only
We know that although there is an array of success in this reactive focus of bottom line results; the essence of this technique is a solo and often isolated one. Individual and quick decisions can either go well or fail. By slowing the process down and involving others in the decision, leaders will often find increased opportunity and even quicker results. Slowing things down to speed things up is also a great leadership trait that minimized mistakes.
Planning creates participation and it certainly increases the quality of communication from one sided to all sided. Setting priorities and offering a written layout to both decision making and problem solving increase a team focus and an understanding.
Assessing goals and objectives through collective dialogue and honest discussion can actually decrease the error rate substantially, especially in complicated situations.
Planning and scheduling should be considered integral processes no matter the frequency in daily activities. Setting priorities does indeed increase accuracy. Change often requires isolating one issue at a time. Often when a leader makes a decision with one sweep of the hand, it affects a number of people, tasks and activities. This can generate even bigger issues with goals, objectives, and responsibilities.
Proper planning can establish priority and accurate work share within the organization. On the other hand, over thinking a decision or problem is also very problematic. Taking planning through the middle course of involvement and interaction works much of the time and eliminates the mistakes of reactive leadership. Thinking not reacting will always support the planning and scheduling.