TM4T Using Your System 3.2.3 - Designing Your Own Job

It is fair to say that the Teaching profession, and its professional bodies, have clear views regarding what the job of Teaching involves. It is all about learning and improving students' lives. It is not about measurement or statistics, or bureaucracy, or administration.

There is inevitably, therefore, some resistance to operations management principles - teaching is, after all, a creative profession, not an industrial process.

This is, overall, a perspective which is shared by the creators of TM4T.

The fact is, however, that a good teacher will inevitably have to carry out administrative tasks in their non-teaching time. At the very least, they will have to plan their lessons, and assess their students' progress. To a person from outside the profession, observing a teacher sitting at his desk with a pile of paper and a spreadsheet, this will look no different to any regular office job - and in all important respects, it is no different.

It needs to be done efficiently, effectively, and in a way which does not cause undue stress to the 'resource' involved ie you.

The TM4T method recommends that you - personally and individually - seek ways to design the way that you work, in order to ensure that you are efficient, effective and stress-free.

The method does not encourage you to embrace unnecessary administrative tasks, and it certainly does not recommend that you try to apply these principles to anyone other than yourself. Why? Because human motivation at work is complex and sometimes counter-intuitive. It is certainly not something which can be done with confidence by a non-professional... with one exception. If we are dealing with 'one-man-motivation', the issues are much, much simpler. There are no contradictory preferences to resolve, no hidden agendas. You know exactly what you like and you do not have to debate it with anyone. You can make your own job better, dealing with ergonomic, flexible working, and job enrichment principles.

So, for your own work, you should do the following

a) Spot the troublemakers

identify tasks - specific physical tasks - which you will be doing repeatedly, and spend time deciding the most efficient means of achieving your objectives. Note that this advice relates to specific tasks (eg 'marking short-answer tests for Y7' and not activities eg 'KS3 assessment' which can be done in many different ways

Your aim should be to reduce any repetitive task to a 'process'. When we talk about ‘processes’ we mean a step-by-step way of doing things. In any repetitive job (this doesn’t necessarily mean boring job, just one that is done several times) there is almost certain to be a generally agreed right-way-to-do-it. In other words, there will be a series of steps which would be recognised by anyone who has done the job before.

If you find that you take longer than usual doing these basic teacher tasks, then try to watch an expert doing it.

b) Choose your battlefield

Make sure that office work (this includes virtually all non-contact time which you do on your own) is done in an office environment. This means a desk with adequate clear space and an ergomomically-sensible chair, readily available equipment well-suited to the task, and an environment conducive to office work (sensible levels of temperature, noise, and distraction).

c) Pick your Time

Plan when you are going to do this work, considering your own moods and preferences, your other commitments, and the availability of resources. Actively seek to make this timing a routine.