Effective Time Management: Task and Assessment

Time management is of concern to most managers and employees that have some control of their daily schedules. It is also a concern to executives and managers that want their employees to be productive at work. Those employees who know how to effectively manage their time appear to have an advantage over those who don’t. Research helps highlight how successful employees are in finding appropriate strategies to put their efforts to maximum use.

Successful completion of goals and tasks requires employees to maintain the ability to schedule their time appropriately and make the most effective use of their efforts. The success of the business, as well as it managers, rely on strong and poor time management (Bahtijarevic, et. al., 2008). Time can be seen as a resource that when used effectively is a competitive advantage to organizations when compared to those organizations the ineffectively use time.

Successful time management can mean different things to different people and should have a process. Time management requires the ability to decide what should be accomplished, the importance of those tasks, and the priority of these tasks (Lakein, 1973).  With an effective method employees are more knowledgeable of the requirements each day and more focused in their efforts.

Effective time management requires a process that is helpful in conceptualizing available time resources as allocated to the organization. According to Macan et. al. it is necessary to 1.) set goals and priorities; 2.) making lists; and 3.) have a preference for the organizations needs (1990).  Not having a preference for the organization means that time will be used on more personal and less constructive activities.  

A study conducted by Mitrovic, et. al. (2013) helps to understand time usage within a Serbian company and how businesses can more effectively improve upon that time management. It aims to study the degree in which employees effectively schedule their time and helps to define factors in this effective time management.  A total of 180 employees out of a possible 220 responded to the survey.

Results:

-Daily planning of the day’s tasks was best done immediately after arriving at work. It is suggested that is a tallying of all required tasks, their arrangement and then understanding the amount of time each of them needs to be completed. 

-56% of employees plan their schedules daily, 24% do this irregularly, and 20% didn’t plan on a regular basis. This helps highlight the use of time resources are not being effectively utilized. 

-49% of employees know their most productive part of the day, 22% do not know when their most productive time is and 29% are unsure of when their most productive time is. Employees should understand when their most productive times are and utilize this time effectively. 

-70% of employees knew what the most important tasks for tomorrow were, 12% didn’t know what the most important tasks for tomorrow were and 17% were unsure. Employees should learn how to be more aware of upcoming tasks and learn how to be proactive in their scheduling of time. 

- 39% of employees did not update their project plans, 27% of employees were not sure, and 34% updated their project plans.  Employees had more difficulty managing their time on longer term projects.

The study helps highlight the necessity of training employees to effectively use their time in order to maximize time resources and human capital. The results indicate that effectively managing time requires the use of lists of tasks that are prioritized and have appropriate time allocated to each of these tasks. The best time of the day to prioritize tasks is early in the morning. The longer and more tasks the project requires the less ability employees have to plan their time accordingly.

Bahtijarevic, et. al (2008). Siivremeni menadzment.  Zagreb, Skolska knjiga

Lakein, A. (1973). How to get control of your time and your life. NY: New American Library.

Macan, et. al. (1990). College students time management: correlations with academic performance and stress. Journal of Educational Psychology, 82.

Mitrovic, S., Bozidar, L, Knoja, V. & Nesic, A. (2013). Employee time management: a case study from Serbia. Metalurgia International, 18 (1). 

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Retaining Competitive Advantages through Specialized Human Capital

Organizations seek to develop uniqueness that will allow them to create competitive advantages that allow them to better compete on international markets. The combination of human capital and organizational factors helps develop those firm specific qualities. The development of human capital through firm-specific skills will further retain the talent of organizational members and encourage lower levels of knowledge loss or competitive posturing.

Competitive advantage is a unique organizational strength a company develops over competitors through the offering of higher products, value, or benefits that justifies higher prices on the market. It is a condition whereby an organization is more efficient and productive than those it competes with. Such firms are seen as competitive, “if it is able to create more economic value than the marginal competitor (Peteraf & Barney, 2003: 314). Through this competitiveness, additional benefits are earned by the organization that other companies have a hard time emulating. 

Competitive advantage can be found in the development of human capital within an organization. Such competitive advantage comes from employee skills and abilities that cannot be easily passed from one firm to another (Kor & Leblebici, 2005). Thus skills and abilities help employees work in patterns and methods that other organizations will have difficulty time copying without copying all of the unique aspects of the firm.

Skills and abilities can be developed within other organizations which reduces the overall competitiveness of the subject firm. However, even though such skills apply to other firms their true value lies in their combination of technology, product markets and assets (Teece, 1986). Such firms are able to combine the various components that create uniqueness in order to develop new market strengths. It is this combination of strengths that is difficult for organizations to develop without significant research, cost and energy.

To develop competitive advantage through human capital it is important to see employee skills as a total portfolio that fosters firm strength. Some skills are general while others are more firm specific (Lazear, 2009). It is the firm specific skills that have the highest value and exchange rate with the organization. It is through the development of employee skill specificity that organizations can not only create competitive advantages in human capital but also the ability to retain such capital due to its value being tied to the firm. 

Let us take an example. Two employees are seeking higher paychecks. Each has their own particular portfolio of skills and abilities. The organization that understands the unique skills and abilities of their employees can combine other assets to drive higher levels of unique competitive advantages. In this example, employee 1 has skills that are unique to the firm while employee 2 has skills that are more general. Employee 1 is likely to be retained by the firm because their skills are non-transferrable. Employee 2 can apply their skills wherever they decide to work and are more likely to move to another company. 

Firm specific capital is difficult to transfer to other companies (Hashimoto, 1981). The more specialized the employee and their abilities the less opportunity they have to move to a competitor and obtain comparative wages and income. This specialization makes their value worth more to the home firm where they are likely to be paid the highest rate of income. 

Developing competitive advantages means combining the organizations unique qualities with available human capital to develop strengths that other firms cannot copy. Organizations that develop specific firm related skills are less likely to lose this intellectual capital to other companies that do not have the same needs. General skills provide appropriate foundations for human capital development but can be easily transferred from one firm to the next. Employees will also desire to retain employment as their firm specific skills have the highest exchange rates of value. To develop stronger competitive advantages requires the ability to take general skills and foster firm specific skills that have the highest competitive advantage for both the employee and the company by retaining employment.

Hashimoto, M. (1981). Firm-specific human capital as a shared investment. American Economic Review, 71: 475–482.

Kor, Y. & Leblebici, H. (2005). How do interdependencies among human-capital deployment, development, and diversification strategies affect firms’ financial performance? Strategic Management Journal, 26: 967–985.

Lazear, E. (2009). Firm-specific human capital: A skill weights approach. Journal of Political Economy, 117: 914-990.

Peteraf, M. & Barney, J. (2003). Unraveling the resource based tangle. Managerial and Decision Economics, 24: 309–323.

Teece, D. (1986). Profiting from technological innovation: Implications for integration, collaboration, licensing and public policy. Research Policy, 15: 285–305.

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The Concept of Business Cycles and Recession in Economics

Economic cycles are a natural part of business life and have occurred in one form or another for nearly every generation. These boom and bust cycles exist in everything from the biological organisms to stock market investing. It is often beneficial to view economic theories of business cycles to understand how imperfect information impacts the national economy as it moves through these growth patterns. Such cycles are many years in the making and can have a devastating impact on the economy if recovery is not forthcoming.

Bob Lucas, a Nobel  Prize Laureate, developed a monetary theory of business cycles that helps explain economic growth spurts and decline (1972). To him, inaccurate perceptions of economic factors contribute to these cycles that push the system out of homeostasis. Firms, and their management, only have limited time and resources for understanding their environment and typically focus on only that information which is needed for their immediate purposes. It takes considerable amount of effort for firms to figure out what changes in the environment are temporary and what changes are more permanent. It is this inaccuracy that leads to market overreaction that veers the system off of course.

It is beneficial to see how this works in a smaller market. Organizations working within a localized market determine the prices they can reasonably sell their products (Lucas Jr., 1972). Price is impacted by the amount of purchases and the supply of  products. With perfect information quantities adjust to supply while prices respond to aggregate spending shocks. Accordingly, with imperfect information firms respond to aggregate spending shocks in the short-run but not the supply quantities in the long run. This can create overproduction which impacts the economic chain throughout a business cycle and even into the next generation.

A model developed by Paul Samuelson (1958) helps to further explain the concept of a generational contract. Two generations, one young and one old, are engaged in the market. The young sell part of their production to the old who give the young financial compensation. The young hope to save some of the money in the anticipation of purchasing products from the next generation. The entire process works off of anticipation and an implied social contract. It is believed that by producing today the young will reap the rewards of their work tomorrow.

The wider impact of this veering off of course can impact generational growth potentially breaking the generational economic cycle. Artificially adjusting the market in one generation could have an impact on the economic viability of the next. Using the above example it is possible to see how an economic problem is created if one generation cannot produce and save in order to purchase from the next generation. As the money supply dries up, underutilized human capital, and contraction limits employment opportunities it will effectively leave one generation worse off than preceding generations. To fix this problem may lay in expanding the market to other nations (i.e. selling of products and services) to use excess labor capital, improve investment returns, and create natural liquidity in cash flow.

According to Dobrescu and Paicu (2012), when additional monies are injected into the system the prices of products increases which causes inflationary pressure. In essence, the products are rising in monetary terms but not in their real earthly value. An injection of money from a large generation of people with easy credit will impact the amount of money available for the next and smaller generation who are selling their production. A large market expansion could cause a comparatively large contraction later. The excessive use of credit and debt artificially inflates the system while ignoring underlining market principles. A contraction in such a situation is likely to be more devastating when a products "real worth" becomes realized (i.e. housing crisis).

We learn that as economic firms overact to market increases they will increase production based upon price increases. If credit markets are artificially expanded to increase purchases it hedges out the next generations purchasing power and money supply. One of the generations will need to pay the debt back or default on the debt. There will be a large contraction, or market flux, when this money is not available for purchases of products that keep the generational exchange of money and labor in full growth. As the market contracts the GNP and economic system slows down. The cost of debt becomes over-burdensome in an economic recession creating additional difficulties in market clearance.

Boom and bust cycles are common in normal economic activity. Such boom and bust cycles often follow an increase in production and then a quick contraction as resources are used up (Sherman & Hunt, 2008). The same cycle can occur in credit markets, production of goods, housing prices, or even entire economies. When boom and bust cycles are large it can impact generational growth patterns as seen in a long-term economic recession. Before an economic system can move back into homeostasis it must complete a market clearing of excess supply and demand. However, excessive periods of market clearing mechanisms may change the underlining assumptions of the entire economic system.


Dobrescu, M. & Paicu, C. (2012). New approaches to business cycle theory in current economic science. Theoretical & Applied Economics, 19 (7).

Lucas, R. (1972). Expectations and the Neutrality of Money. Journal of Economic Theory, 4, pp. 103-124.

Sherman, H. & Hunt, E. (2008). Spread of the business cycle. Economics: An introduction and progressive views (6th Edition). Armonk, NY: ME. Sharp.