By Ian Ash
One simple, but highly effective, method of ensuring alignment and clarity on a role in a business is to write a position description (PD) or job description (JD).
This is best written in terms of the role’s responsibilities rather than tasks since knowing what a person is responsible for is far more empowering and engaging than simply writing a task list, plus it is necessarily more succinct.
An additional benefit is there should be little or no need to update it ever again since responsibilities in a role very rarely change whereas the tasks associated with them frequently do.
It is a sad fact that most small and medium-sized enterprises don’t tend to define these extremely useful documents since the belief often pervades that ‘people should know what is expected of them’.
While fine in theory, in practice when staff performance issues become apparent, the cause can often be traced back to a mismatch in expectations of the role itself, which a documented PD/JD could well have mitigated.
Some companies do have position descriptions defined and while roles such as sales manager, operations manager, financial controller, quality manager, etc, may be written down, I am yet to find one that has defined the role of the chief executive.
So why is this? Perhaps similar to the above view, a chief executive ought to know the responsibilities of the role.
However, if this is missing, the chief executive may well feel responsible for everything and hence feel the need to be across what is happening across all areas of the business. No wonder that the most common issue that afflicts chief executives is the universal ‘lack of time’.
The antidote to this is to push responsibilities as far down in the organisation as possible. So, for example, the sales manager has the responsibility for hitting the company’s sales budget and the quality manager is responsible for product and service quality.
If this is done for all the key functions in the business, then what is left for the chief executive to do?
Well, here are the five key areas that cannot be delegated and for which the chief executive remains ultimately responsible:
1. Business strategy
Identify the primary focus areas for the business, company culture and definition of business goals. It defines what the business is trying to achieve and hence the associated priorities.
2. Management team leadership
Development and support of the leadership team with a particular focus on communication and accountability.
3. Financial performance
The chief executive is the only person with complete oversight of the sales and operations capability and a big part of the job is keeping these in balance. Ultimate responsibility for the profit and loss is here.
4. Commercial direction
Determine partnerships, relationships with key stakeholders and coordination of risk analysis.
5. Corporate governance
Ensure that the company is compliant with corporate and government rules and regulations and authorise contracts with staff, suppliers and customers.
If you are chief executive, check what you are actually doing against the above list and see how your day-to-day activities compare with the above chief executive responsibilities.
Ian Ash is the managing director of OrgMent Business Solutions.
