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A role is written as its outcomes, the responsibilities that produce them, the limits of its authority and a measure, sized from the tasks it takes over, with its reporting line drawn before the hire.
Paper packet. Every task here also exists on screen, where it is checked automatically; answers written on paper are not assessed by Nydus. When you are back at a device, enter your answers there.
You will write a role as outcomes, responsibilities, limits and a measure, pick out the limits of its authority, draw who reports to whom after a hire, and size the role's hours from the tasks it takes over.
You can choose which work to hand over and hand it over with an outcome and authority. When there is enough of that work, it becomes a role, and a role should be written as carefully as a process.
| Term | What it means |
|---|---|
| Role | A set of work one person is accountable for. |
| Outcome | What the role delivers, in a way anyone can see. |
| Responsibility | A task that produces the outcome. |
| Limit | What the role may not decide alone. |
| Measure | How anyone can see the role is working. |
| Reporting line | Who each person answers to. |
'General assistant, must be hard-working and flexible' describes nothing the business needs done. It attracts everyone, lets the person guess what matters, and makes every disagreement later a matter of opinion.
Bright Home Cleaning's team-leader role is written in four parts instead:
Each part does a job. The outcome says why the role exists. The responsibilities say what the person spends the week doing. The limits stop the role deciding things the owner must, and stop the owner second-guessing the things it may. The measure lets both see, without argument, whether it is working.
Another way: table
The same role, written two ways.
| Vague | Written |
|---|---|
| Team leader | Every move-out clean passes first time |
| Hard-working | Allocates jobs, walks through each apartment, trains new cleaners |
| Flexible | Re-cleans up to 100 dollars; more goes to the owner |
| Reliable | Monthly first-time pass rate |
Another way: steps
Size a role from the tasks it takes over, not from a round number. Maya's studio assistant takes over packing (7 hours a week), trimming and handles (4) and cleaning the studio (3): a 14-hour role. Advertising 20 hours would leave the assistant idle or doing work nobody planned; advertising 10 would leave packing half-done.
Before anyone is hired, draw who reports to whom afterwards. When Bright Home Cleaning hires a team leader, the three cleaners report to the team leader and the team leader to the owner, and the owner stops giving cleaners instructions directly, or the team leader has responsibility without authority.
Start from the tasks. The delegation list from the last lesson: the tasks that passed the four tests, with their hours.
Write the outcome. One or two sentences: what will be true each day or week if the role is done well.
List the responsibilities. The tasks, each linked to its standard work.
Set the limits. Spending limits, decisions that go to the owner, complaints that must be passed on.
Choose a measure. One or two figures the business already records or can easily record: pass rate, on-time rate, orders packed.
Size and place it. Add the tasks' hours; draw the reporting line.
Check the role. Read it as the person who will do it: could they tell, at the end of a week, whether they had done well? Read it as the owner: does every decision the role might face have a clear answer about who makes it? And check the hours against the tasks; a mismatch means the role will be either idle or rushed.
Starting from tasks is allowed because the role exists to take work off the owner. Tasks already written as standard work give the role a ready set of methods and standards.
Writing an outcome is needed because tasks alone do not say what matters. A cleaner who completes every task but whose apartments fail inspection has not done the job; the outcome says so.
Setting limits is allowed, and helpful to both sides, because it removes guessing. The person knows what they may decide; the owner knows what will come to them.
Choosing a measure is needed because without one, judging the role becomes a matter of impressions, and impressions are where most workplace disagreements start.
A good measure is simple, already recorded or easy to record, and tied to the outcome. For a packer: orders out by 4 pm, and returns for damage. For a team leader: first-time pass rate. For a front-desk role: calls answered within three rings, and bookings with no errors. One or two figures are enough; five or six make the role feel watched rather than measured.
Avoid measures the person cannot influence, such as total sales for a role that does not sell, and measures that reward the wrong thing, such as plates per hour without a quality check, which rewards rushing. Check each measure against the outcome: if the measure went up, would the outcome really be better?
Limits are often seen as a sign of distrust. They are the opposite. A new team leader with no stated limits must guess, on every unusual decision, whether the owner will back them. Guess wrong once and they stop deciding anything. A team leader who knows they may approve a re-clean up to 100 dollars decides those confidently, and passes bigger ones on without worry.
Widen limits as the record grows. After a season of good decisions, the re-clean limit might rise to 200 dollars, and handling routine complaints might move into the role. Write each change into the role, with the date, so both sides know where the line now is.
Some of what a role involves is set by law. Federal and state rules decide whether a role must be paid overtime, which depends on its duties and pay, not only its title; whether the person is an employee or an independent contractor, which depends on how the work is controlled; and what must be posted or provided to employees.
A clear written role helps here too, because it shows what the work actually is. Look up the current rules for the business's state from official sources, such as the U.S. Department of Labor and the state labor department, before hiring, and note where and when you checked. The local-rules lesson later in this course covers how.
Small businesses are tempted to bundle unrelated work into one role to make up the hours: a little packing, a little bookkeeping, a little social media, a little cleaning. Each piece may be sensible on its own, but together they have no shared outcome, and the person in the role is pulled between them with no way to know which matters most on a busy day.
Group tasks that serve the same outcome. Packing, trimming and studio cleaning all serve 'orders leave on time, to the standard, from a working studio'. Bookkeeping serves a different outcome and fits better with a part-time bookkeeper, or stays with the owner for now. If the related tasks do not fill enough hours, a smaller role, or a shared role with another business, is usually better than a mixed one.
The written role becomes the job ad almost unchanged. Lead with the outcome, because it tells candidates what the work is for. List the responsibilities plainly, so people who want that work apply and people who do not, do not. State the hours, the pay range and the schedule, which some states require in job postings. Mention the measure, so candidates know how they will be judged.
An ad like this draws fewer applicants and better ones. The next lesson uses the same written role to decide what evidence would show a candidate can do the work, which is much easier when the work is written down, and much fairer to every single candidate who applies for it.
A role written before anyone does it is a best guess. After the first few months, review it with the person in it: which tasks take more or less time than expected, which limits came up most, whether the measure reflects what really matters.
Change the role on paper when the work changes. A shop assistant whose role grew to include ordering should see ordering in the role, with its limits and its standard. A role that stays accurate is easy to train someone new into, easy to judge fairly, and easy to cover when the person is away.
A bakery in Salt Lake City advertised for 'a hard-working, passionate bakery assistant, flexible hours'. It hired three people in a year, and each left within months. The owner's exit conversations showed the same pattern: each had expected a baking job and found mostly washing and packaging, and none knew how their work was judged.
The owner rewrote the role from the tasks she actually needed done: packaging wholesale orders (12 hours a week), washing trays and equipment (8), and shaping rolls to the written standard (5), a 25-hour role. The outcome: every wholesale order packed and labeled by 6 am. The limits: may substitute a roll type only from an approved list; any shortage reported to the owner by 5:30. The measure: orders out on time, and cafés' complaints about packing.
The next ad drew fewer applicants, almost all of whom wanted exactly that work. The person hired was still there two years later, and had become the bakery's morning lead.
The U.S. Department of Labor's guidance on overtime exemptions looks at a role's actual duties, not its title, when deciding whether overtime applies. A written role that describes the real work helps the business apply those rules correctly and is useful evidence if a question ever arises.
A job title is a role. 'Team leader' says nothing about what is delivered.
Personal qualities describe the role. 'Hard-working' describes a hope about a person.
Leave it flexible, so they can help with anything. A role without edges cannot be done well or measured.
Reporting lines sort themselves out. Two bosses giving different instructions is how they sort themselves out.
More measures are better. One or two, tied to the outcome, are enough.
Write the outcome.
$\text{customers served quickly; stall stocked all morning}$
What the role delivers.
List the responsibilities.
$\text{weigh, bag, take payment, refill crates}$
Each with standard work.
Set a limit.
$\text{price changes only with Monica's say-so}$
Where decisions stop.
Choose a measure.
$\text{longest line; empty crates spotted}$
Easy to see.
Size the hours.
$6 \text{ hours on Saturdays}$
From the tasks.
Write the outcome.
$\text{every bike to standard, ready on the promised day}$
Checkable weekly.
List the responsibilities.
$\text{services; test rides; parts orders}$
Each with standard work.
Set the parts limit.
$\text{up to 50 dollars without asking}$
Where decisions stop.
Set the estimate limit.
$\text{over 150 agreed with Dev first}$
Before the customer is told.
Choose a measure.
$\text{percent ready on the promised day}$
From the job tags.
Draw the reporting line.
$\text{reports to Dev}$
One line.
Write the outcome.
$\text{every move-out passes first time}$
Why the role exists.
List the responsibilities.
$\text{allocate jobs; walk-throughs; train}$
The week's work.
Set the limits.
$\text{re-cleans up to 100; complaints to the owner}$
Where decisions stop.
Choose a measure.
$\text{monthly first-time pass rate}$
From the inspection results.
Size the hours.
$\text{30 cleaning} + 8 \text{ leading} = 38$
From the tasks.
Draw the reporting lines.
$\text{cleaners to leader; leader to owner}$
One boss each.
Plan the review.
$\text{after three months, with the leader}$
The role on paper kept true.
Write the outcome.
$\text{every lunch plated to standard, on the pass in 40 s}$
What the role delivers.
Set a limit.
$\text{menu changes only by the owner}$
Where decisions stop.
Choose a measure.
Neighborhood Kitchen is writing a role for a lunch assistant. Which line states an outcome for the role?
Complete the worked solution: Northside Repairs' new shop assistant will take over checking bikes in ($6$ hours a week), test rides ($3$ hours) and cleaning the workshop ($4$ hours). Dev was about to advertise a $20$-hour role. Find the hours the tasks need, the idle hours a $20$-hour role would leave, and the hours the tasks need over a four-week month.
Find the hours the tasks need.
$(\text{check-in}) + (\text{test rides}) + (\text{cleaning}) =$ t
The role sized from its tasks.
Find the idle hours.
$\text{twenty} - (\text{task hours}) =$ i
Hours with no planned work.
Find the month's hours.
$(\text{task hours}) \times \text{four} =$ m
For the schedule.
Say what to advertise.
$\text{the task hours, not a round number}$
Neither idle nor overloaded.
Lines from Bright Home Cleaning's role for a team leader. Match each to the part of the role it is.
| Outcome | Responsibility | Limit | Measure | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Every move-out clean passes its inspection first time | ||||
| Walk through every apartment with the checklist before leaving | ||||
| May approve a re-clean up to $95$ dollars; anything more goes to the owner | ||||
| Monthly first-time pass rate |
Northside Repairs' role for a second mechanic. Mark every line that sets a limit on the role's authority.
This task has no paper form; do it on a device.
Bright Home Cleaning is hiring a team leader. Afterwards, three cleaners will report to the team leader, and the team leader to the owner. Draw each reporting line with 'reports to'.
This task has no paper form; do it on a device.
Bright Home Cleaning's team leader is measured by the first-time pass rate of move-out cleans. This month the team did $50$ move-out cleans, and $46$ passed inspection first time. What is the measure this month, as a percentage?
Answer:
A dental office in Milwaukee is replacing its full-time receptionist with part-time roles. The front-desk tasks take $12$ hours a week on the phones, $10$ hours scheduling and $8$ hours on billing. The first part-time role is $25$ hours a week. How many hours a week must a second role cover?
Answer:
A bookshop is hiring for $13$ hours a week. Which is the best opening for the role description?
Lesson test: one question per skill, one attempt each, no hints. Your answers are checked when you submit.
Maya's studio assistant role takes over three tasks: packing orders ($6$ hours a week), trimming and handles ($4$ hours) and cleaning the studio ($3$ hours). Fill in the hours for each task and the hours the role needs a week.
| Hours a week | |
|---|---|
| Packing orders | |
| Trimming and handles | |
| Cleaning the studio | |
| Hours the role needs |
You can turn 'general assistant' into a role someone can succeed at and anyone can check. Tell someone why limits help the person in the role as much as the owner. Next: the evidence that shows who fits the role.
20. Your turn: Neighborhood Kitchen's lunch assistant, step 3
$\text{plates sent back, per week}$
Tied to the outcome.