We Pay for Time, Then Wonder Why Things Take So Long

Look at how most working arrangements are set up, and what each one actually asks of the people inside it.

The employee sells time. They show their value by ticking off milestones, turning up happily, staying busy and being a team player. A nod to management at the right moments helps.

The contractor also sells time. They honour the contract and keep themselves busy until the term ends.

The manager is rewarded for having obedient direct reports, for expanding their territory and their staff, for keeping that staff happy, and for showing achievements to leadership.

The vendor sells services and products to you. Their job is to make you feel happy with what you bought.

None of this is a criticism of the people in these roles. Most of them are doing exactly what the arrangement asks of them. That is the point.

What none of them are paid for

None of these social, professional or legal arrangements are based on offering maximum value in exchange for money.

Read the list again. Time, busyness, attendance, obedience, headcount, happiness. Every one of these can be measured, and every one of them can be delivered in full without much value being created at all.

An employee can tick every milestone and still leave the organisation no better off. A contractor can be busy for the whole term and solve nothing that matters. A manager can grow a team of forty and deliver less than a team of ten. A vendor can leave you feeling very good about a product you did not need.

Nobody in this picture is cheating. They are being paid for the things they are being paid for.

Why simple things become complicated

This is one main reason things take too long.

When people are paid for time, there is no reward for finishing early. When managers are rewarded for the size of their territory, there is no reward for making a function smaller. When vendors are rewarded for keeping you happy, there is no reward for telling you something you would rather not hear.

So simple things get complicated. A task that could be finished in a week fills the month it was given. A process that could be removed gets its own team. A problem that could be solved gets managed instead, because a managed problem keeps everyone busy and a solved one does not.

And people resist change. Not because they are stubborn, but because change threatens the very things the arrangement rewards. A new system that removes manual work also removes the busyness that proved someone’s value. A restructure that simplifies reporting also shrinks someone’s territory. Resistance is often just people protecting what they were told to protect.

A familiar picture

Consider an organisation replacing an old finance system.

The internal team is measured on keeping the project on schedule, so they report milestones as complete when the documents are signed, not when the outcome is achieved. The contractors are engaged on day rates, so a longer project is not a problem for them. The business managers want their own processes kept intact, because those processes justify their teams. The vendor wants a satisfied client and a smooth sign-off, so difficult conversations are softened or delayed.

Every party is behaving sensibly within its own arrangement. Every status report is green. And two years later, the organisation has a new system running the old processes, at three times the original budget.

Nobody failed at their job. The jobs were simply not designed around value.

The leader’s position

As a business owner and leader, you feel the pain of this, yet there is very little you can do.

You cannot rewrite employment law. You cannot change how every vendor in the market prices their work. You cannot make a manager stop wanting a larger team by asking nicely. The arrangements are bigger than any one organisation, and they have been in place for a long time.

What you can see, often more clearly than anyone else, is the gap between what you are paying for and what you are getting. That gap is where the frustration lives.

A possible starting point

Maybe good starting points are thinking of, and engaging, people and vendors that work on value delivery rather than time.

That is easy to say and harder to do. Value is harder to define than hours. It requires you to be clear about what outcome you actually want before anyone starts work. It requires the other party to accept some risk, because being paid for outcomes means not being paid for effort alone. And it requires both sides to trust each other enough to agree what success looks like.

But the alternative is to keep paying for time and keep wondering why things take so long.

The questions that remain

Here are some questions to ponder.

Look at the people and vendors you rely on most. What are they actually paid for: their time, or the value they deliver?

If one of them finished their work in half the time, would they be rewarded or penalised?

And in your own role, what are you rewarded for? Is it the same thing you would want to be paid for?