I spent the weekend working on renovating our downstairs bathroom now that I have time to dedicate to the renovation of our home. My plan was to add wallpapers to the wall, lay the moulding to separate the upper side of the wall from the lower, and finally, change the tiles.
The first two tasks, while more involved than I anticipated, went extremely well. The feeling of being able to use my hands while accomplishing a task left me with sense of plenitude. It served as a blank template to allow my mind to expand.
I sometimes find that the best form of meditation happen when we let ourselves be enthralled by whatever activity we’re engaging in. The mind, finally free of any expectations, starts to run and wander to different places. Far places, that sometimes help us reconnect to who we are….Anyway.
Then, it came time to replace the floor tiles.
At first, I thought this activity would be just as easy and enjoyable as the previous ones, but soon enough, I realized that it was a lot more difficult than I thought. Laying down tiles is one thing, but having to lay them around tricky areas such as the vanity, or the toilet or the bathroom is a completely different story. It involves measuring the area, creating a template, drawing the template on the tile and finally cutting the tile in the shape of said template.
After watching countless YouTube videos on how to tile around a toilet, I was finally able to create a somewhat decent template. However, in the middle of the work, I realized that it would have made a lot more sense for me to hire someone to do the work. Alas, I was already 3/4 of the way there, so I decided to keep going and finish it.
In all, I took me 3 days (with multiple breaks) to finish something that would have taken 3 hours for a professional to complete. I ended up doing the job the best way I could, but I knew a professional would have done an even better job. I realized that I robbed myself of time well spent doing something I enjoy (nature walks, reading, writing), and I deprived a contractor from being paid for their work (which if we had gone by my hourly rate at my previous job, would have cost less than my time working). Double loss.
This experience got me thinking, and inspired me to draw a parallel between this experience and the professional world.
In the professional world, we’re sometimes asked to wear multiple hats: project manager, analyst, marketer, whatever the case may be. But just because one can do multiple things doesn’t mean they should. The time spent doing the things that do not directly fall under our purview robs us of the time we should be spending doing our job. And I find that in these instances, the quality of the work ends up suffering.
An account manager isn’t a project manager and vice versa and while one could do the job of the other, they wouldn’t be able to do it as best as the other person, or with less time and that is where it is important to draw the line with each role and associated responsibilities.
Organizations should ensure that each role is fulfilled by someone with the qualifications for that role specifically. While it could be cost efficient to have someone cover multiple roles, it’s a strategy that ends up costing more in the long term. When each person does what they are supposed to do, they are likely to do it well and to work collaboratively to produce a better outcome, the same way, me hiring someone to do the tiles would have ended up in a double win.
Even Nature teaches us that.
Everything in nature has its purpose and function, and a Business should reflect the image of this divine law. Every employee should fulfill a specific role with distinct responsibilities associated.
Going against this law, results in inefficiencies.
There is a always an opportunity cost one must pay for going with one option against another, and while having an employee multitasking can prove to be cost efficient in the short run, the long-term ramifications are that it would not be.
To come back to my story, I did learn my lesson though, and I will make sure to hire someone for the next time.
