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Do most folks have a desire to be productive?
From doing a quick survey among friend groups and going through some case studies, most folks working in corporates tend to not have the desire to be more productive, whereas folks in smaller firms always have the desire to be more productive but don't have the means. Why do you folks think so?
- codingdave 2y agoBeing more productive in a corporation rarely improves your life. It is just more work for the same result. But in a smaller org, your actions can have actual impact, which often results in actual rewards.
- mathewjk 2y agoThat is definitely true.
- DemocracyFTW2 2y agoOnce when my boss handed me a piece of work to be done for a third party and I immediately replied, like, "can have it in x minutes", he went whoa, let's not ruin the prices. IOW take your time, if we finish too fast too often then before long we'll have to run all day just to keep up with the unrealistic expectations we've unwisely set for ourselves. "Wir wollen doch nicht die Preise verderben" is one thing, the other one is "Gut Ding will Weile haben". Both underappreciated by the young eager colleague next to you.
- mathewjk 2y agoThose are some wise quotes.
- userbinator 2y agoThey've given up because they're powerless to change anything, and they're paid (excessively) well for doing the status quo.
- toomuchtodo 2y agohttps://youtu.be/cgg9byUy-V4 https://youtu.be/cgg9byUy-V4 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drive:_The_Surprising_Truth_About_What_Motivates_Us https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drive:_The_Surprising_Truth_Ab... https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/6197360-the-reward-for-work-well-done-is-more-work-i https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/6197360-the-reward-for-work... https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/11903426-show-me-the-incentive-and-i-ll-show-you-the-outcome https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/11903426-show-me-the-incent... Motivation is usually, but not always, tied to incentives around some combination of financial and emotional rewards of work. Cog output for cog rewards, superstar output for superstar rewards.
- ksec 2y ago- How do you "define" productive? Doing useless work, could feel productive to the employee. Whether the actual work produce anything of value is irrelevant. They were given a task. And they execute on it. - If you ignore the productivity side, and ask if folks have desire to complete work with less time. Then the answer is yes because most human, by nature are lazy. - If you want more efficient so that more work could be done within the same time slot. Then the answer is mostly no. Most people dont want more work or move on to do something useful. I dont think the above is very clear to most on HN and especially programmers. Because those who are interested in technology are also the group that likes to tinker and drive efficiency. This is in opposite to government setting, large Bureaucracy enterprise outside of tech.
- mathewjk 2y agoBut do you think entry or senior level tech folks, just below managers would care about how efficient their code is, if it does the job? I personally am building in the productivity space, a tool and had the same notion as well. But the tool we built is mostly being used by marketers, agencies, sales folks and other folks, wherein they value their time more.
- Aurornis 2y agoThis is a massively loaded question because "productive" is such a vague term. The answer also doesn't generalize to corporations versus small firms. Every company hasn't different incentives. The only constant I've found in my career is that people will self-select into companies that match their ambitions over time. Some company cultures incentivize doing the bare minimum while not rocking the boat. They don't reward productivity. This attracts people who like constant, easy jobs. It drives away people who want to be rewarded for their work and who prefer to be surrounded by people who also work hard. Other company cultures reward productivity and penalize underperformance. These companies attract people who enjoy being productive, while driving away or firing people who don't meet those expectations. I don't think it's clearly delineated between big and small companies, though. It's actually easier to find large corporations that reward people very well for high productivity (FAANG).
- mathewjk 2y ago@Aurornis and everyone here, I truly appreciate your input, which reflects the general consensus. On a personal note, is there any particular practice or tool that has helped you achieve your desired level of productivity?
- not_your_vase 2y agoI don't think it's about the desire to be productive. All of the "productive" people I know simply love doing their job - they don't consider it a job, but rather having fun (interrupted with meetings). If they didn't have this job, they would still do the same thing whole day, without pay. Most "not-too-productive" people tend to consider their job as a way to pay the bills, and count back the seconds until 5PM. (Not saying it's a bad thing. Just that attitude has a huge role)
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