Failure to meet deadlines is an everyday challenge at work. Though inevitable at times, it has detrimental consequences for the company.

It is therefore important as the manager or team leader to understand why that happens in order to find the right solutions.

Emmanuel Rwozi, a customer service manager in Kigali notes that sometimes this happens when employees are not given details on how the project should be handled and the end goal. 

If the team lacks cooperation, it’s hard to consult their top managers for any questions especially if they’re tough and unapproachable. To avoid this, he believes that managers should provide their team with the necessary information, documents and equipment necessary to accomplish the tasks and to also explain expectations.

Rwozi also explains that although the company may want to execute many tasks at a time, sometimes it’s not professional as too many assignments at a go can stress workers who may just submit for the sake of finishing one task and work on another.

This kills workers’ creativity and ability to rest. Once they have too many projects to work on, it’s easy to miss deadlines, he notes. 

This habit, Rwozi believes can be curbed by managers coming up with a time table and assigning different people to perform diverse tasks. With this, employees can program themselves and use the time given accordingly. 

The customer service manager adds that some employees fail to deliver due to procrastination. They push work until the last minute and once the deadline approaches, they rush into it. At that point, they are not working for perfection, but to ensure the task gets out of the way. 

"As a manager, you can tell that some employees are really capable but just don’t perform to the best of their expectations or ability because of carelessness. In such scenarios, provide the best advice and walk with them on the journey of improvement. Let them know that last minute work can lack some important elements, which is why they need to use their time effectively if they are to provide high quality work,” Rwozi states.

Maureen Umuringa, a human resource expert stresses that some employees just fail to meet deadlines out of habit. May be they did it once or twice and didn’t face any repercussions, so they take that for granted.

"There should be warnings and later punishments for employees who fail to meet deadlines without any strong reason. If possible, the deadlines should be communicated in public, for example during meetings so that everyone knows who submits what and when. Everyone needs to be held responsible for their actions.”

However, she notes that some projects done as a team are delayed because some individuals may be slow to accomplish their part. This becomes hard to go to the next step. When one person lags the team behind, chances of submitting in time are low. 

For her, solving this problem requires the team knowing why everyone is actually assigned to do their tasks and the goal they are aiming at. When people don’t know why they are doing certain things, they may not know their importance.