Confused About Roles, Duties, and Responsibilities? Let's Clear It Up Together!

Dear All,

Can anyone help in giving me a clear picture of the roles, duties, and responsibilities? These terms are overly used and sometimes create confusion among us. I work for a manufacturing company and would like to organize a training session on this.

Thanks in advance for your help.

Amit Aggarwal

Duty
Behavior showing a proper regard or sense of obligation. Justice, morality. One's occupation or position.

Responsibility
Obligation, to do what is asked. If you say you're going to do something, do it. Trust, honesty, to care for another when one can't, be responsible for yourself and your actions.

Role
Role is like a position on which duty and responsibility will come, like a project manager or team leader.

Ashish
Delhi

Dear Amit,

I suggest that you put the thinking cap on and consider all the "roles" that you have. For example, I am a father to my children, a husband to my wife, a former tutor to my students (when I worked), a researcher, a subordinate to my "boss," a son to my parents, etc. Considering any one of these roles, I will have certain responsibilities and duties to fulfill.

I recall an episode of Judge Judy on television where a girl had been entrusted to be looked after by a neighbor. The girl was left at home with a stranger (a man) when the lady went out. The mother of the girl sued her. To cut the narrative short, the Judge found the lady guilty. She stated that to fulfill the obligation or responsibility of looking after the girl entrusted to her, the lady had the duty of not leaving her with a strange man.

I hope you can think along those lines; also, kindly search the web for more examples.

Have a nice day.

Simhan
A retired academic in the UK.

Hi, this is Vinoth. I'm working in a manufacturing company. My designation is Personnel Officer, but I am not working at that officer level. So, please provide me with the proper roles and responsibilities for this post.

Dear Amit,

I believe you are familiar with the term "Job Analysis," which refers to the systematic study of a job assigned to an employee. As part of this analysis, HR personnel should conduct a detailed study of (1) Tasks, (2) Duties, and (3) Responsibilities.

Through this analysis, the company identifies what individuals do in their jobs and what they need for satisfactory work.

(1) Tasks:
Tasks are simple units of work; they are identifiable work activities with specific purposes. For example, typing a covering letter.

(2) Duties:
A collection of tasks is referred to as duties, which is a sequence of events performed by an individual. For instance, EPF calculation, preparation of challan, payment of cash in the bank, preparation of monthly returns, creating covering letters, and sending reports to the EPF Office.

(3) Responsibilities:
Responsibilities entail the obligation to perform these tasks and duties.

Thank you.

Thank you for the clarification. I have done this exercise; however, everyone seems to be ignorant when something goes wrong. They either blame their colleagues or their seniors for this. Please help and guide on how to handle this situation.

Regards,
Amit Aggarwal