I understand that part of the Alignment's purpose is to rebuild our job responsibilities with the new priorities as the foundation. However, Kay's metaphor demonstration with the jar of rocks left me concerned. I interpreted her demonstration to mean, "By making the selected changes, staff will now be able to do all of their old tasks plus these new, more valued tasks and not feel overwhelmed." In reality, what attention or study has been given to workflow post-Alignment and ensuring that staff will have adequate time to accomplish their assigned tasks?
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Actually, I think you may have understood the metaphor differently than we intended ... It was meant to say that we can't expect to keep doing the same things and achieve different results. So, putting the rocks and pebbles into the jar differently was meant to show that you can take the same objectives, assign or perform them in specific ways, and achieve the results you want.
The demonstration was meant to show that we aren't going to task folks with doing their old stuff and the new stuff and expect them to not be stressed. Altering your statement, I'd say it this way: "By making selected changes, each staff member will have a more specialized area of responsibility, so that she won't have to simultaneously juggle all of the rocks and pebbles -- she will have specific rocks and specific pebbles assigned to her, and they will all fit in her hands without the need to juggle."
I think the expectation is also that, as we create the new post-Alignment workflow, we will be able to to adjust as needed if we determine there is inadequate time (or other resource) to complete the work. We can always add staff or hours or shift them to priority areas. I think that it is important to recognize that by approaching these issues of capacity and workflows systematically, we ensure that we use the same criteria to make decisions everywhere -- whether it's in Del City or Edmond, Southern Oaks or Warr Acres. That's not only more fair for staff, but for the members whom we all serve.
--Tim