Here is a really typical case of “poor time management,” but not by me. They changed my class time at a late date, without telling me, so the hour would be convenient for one of the retired friends of one of the Fulls, who likes to take classes.
I found out from the students that the class time had been changed and asked the secretary what was happening; she said she could not remember but there was an important reason it had to be changed. It was too late for some of the other students to fit the change into their schedules, so they were slowed down on progress to degree.
Meanwhile, I tried to advertise the course again, at the new time, but it was too late. It only had half the original number of students, so it was cancelled. I got a beginning foreign language course instead. Then, mysteriously, I was asked to teach the original course as “independent study” to the senior citizen, at the time to which it had been rescheduled.
And then I understood why the course had been rescheduled in the first place. Meanwhile the department chair, ostensibly, really wanted me to be recruiting majors. I asked him why he did things like this if he really wanted people to make progress to degree. And whether he really wanted me to use research time for an “independent study course,” especially of this type.
He told me that “community connections” and the language requirement were more important, and that he did not mean it literally about recruiting majors. He only meant that another faculty member should go easier on grading for another of our “community connections.”
These kinds of things were lucky accidents, though, he said – because we could cite them as a reason publishing was impossible. “It will be good cover for you all,” he said laughing.
Axé.
coldhearted scientist وداد 
No!
Amazing, hunh!
That’s not time bad time management skills. Bad time management skills is when my university cancelled the MW 3-4:15 teaching load for no apparent reason, and forced me to teach those courses on a MWF 50 minutes schedule. They are usually the upper level courses. It is not that they gave me a bad time slot to teach: it’s that showing movies in class is much less effective, since I usually have to break them in three. And i prefer longer upper level classes, so i can structure the discussion better. That’s bad time management: some bureaucrat decided what was better without consulting anybody. What you are talking about is plain old good corruption, not bad time management.
I meant 3-4:15 teaching slot.
I’m using the term an arch way. It did mess with the time of those affected, and *we* got accused of “poor planning” later.
I’m stunned. Any chance of getting that newly discovered sympathetic administrator to take a hand?
This was the former chair. This kind of thing happened all the time for about ten years. The new one is the new chair.