Part Two Planning and Decision Making
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was of an emergency nature. Furthermore, he had to answer all the emer¬gency requests from other departments because people wanted to speak only to him.
The supervisor in question refused to accept the potential benefits of better planning. Part of his planning should include training a backup person who could respond to emergencies while he attended to paperwork and planning. Albrecht contends that typical “fire-department” managers are in the crunch mode because of a lack of objectives and a plan for coming to terms with the problems of the department. Also, they lack control over their own time. Managers who fail to plan generally face a career of fire fighting. Their departments can be characterized in this manner:5
The symptoms of the fire department are fairly easy to spot. The most common is that the head person is harried, overworked, and overstressed. Another is the prevalence of “surprises”—unanticipated catastrophes that demand immediate attention—in department oper¬ations. Other symptoms include unseasonal peaks in workloads, general increases in internal pressure to meet frantic schedules and unrealistic deadlines, and continuing demands for superhuman efforts. In other words, fear, panic, and terror are the characteristics of the work day.
Contribution to Mental Health
Effective planning is an important way of preventing potentially harmful stress. When people feel that the job controls them rather than the reverse, a feeling of panic results. The panic sensation is usually accompanied by tension and anxiety. Planning helps give people the feeling that they can conquer the demands of their job. Assume that as the manager of a data processing department, a subordinate of yours tells you, “The situation is hopeless. We are so far behind schedule that we will never catch up. Be¬sides, we are making major errors because of it.”
You then counter that individual’s sense of helplessness with some solid planning: “Okay, the situation looks bleak. But we can do something about it. I have the authorization to subcontract some of our more routine work to an outside data processing firm. We can also hire three office tem¬poraries for up to a month. I think that should help.” Your subordinate will now probably feel an immediate reduction in stress. Over the long range such an approach to stress reduction makes a positive contribution to mental health.
5Albrecht, Supervisory Management, p. 3.
