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Survey: Managers Working More Hours Today Than Five Years Ago

CHICAGO — Sixty percent of laundry managers who responded to June’s Wire survey say they’re working more hours today than five years ago and spending much of their time overseeing production and quality control, performing supervisory duties and enforcing rules and regulations.
Twenty-four percent say they’re working about the same amount of time, and 16% say they’re actually working less.American Laundry News quizzed respondents on time management and where they find themselves focusing much of their energy while on the job. The magazine asked them to identify their “most time-consuming tasks” and to select up to three from a list.
Production oversight/quality control, supervisory tasks (writing job descriptions, hiring, scheduling and performance evaluations) and rule/regulation enforcement were each selected by at least 40% of respondents. Some other time-consumers are meeting with upper management and peers (32%), materials/inventory management (28%) and handling complaints/public relations (24%).
Dividing time between production areas and their office is something virtually all respondents do, but the division varies greatly across the board. A 30%-70% split between production and office was selected most often, followed closely by 20-80, 40-60 and 70-30.
Almost two-thirds of respondents say they’ve received specific instruction or training in time management. Virtually all of them — 96% — make to-do lists for themselves.
More than 70% set aside a specific time or day of week to get caught up on correspondence, handle office tasks, read trade journals and other things. Many managers come in early or stay late to accomplish those tasks.
Subscribers to American Laundry News’ Wire e-mails — distributed weekly — are invited to participate in an industry survey each month. The survey is conducted online via a partner website. Each survey is developed so it can be completed in 10 minutes or less. Readers are encouraged to participate, as a greater number of responses will help to better define operator opinions and industry trends.
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Have a question or comment? E-mail our editor Matt Poe at [email protected].