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You are conflating hours with productivity. Let's assume that no engineer is getting less than 2 weeks of vacation off a year on paper. Most of these articles
by krschultz 12y ago
You are conflating hours with productivity.
Let's assume that no engineer is getting less than 2 weeks of vacation off a year on paper. Most of these articles are written by people giving 4 weeks of vacation. So we're talking about the difference between a 'stingy' vacation policy and a generous vacation policy being 2/52 weeks in the year.
If people gain more than 4% productivity by avoiding burnout, you net win by giving people more vacation. I would argue that net productivity gain from letting people de-stress is way more than 4%, though I have no numbers to back that up.
- AndrewKemendo 12y agoAgree 100%. I am talking about giving people 1 month off per year. In those cases, how do you maintain efficiency without bloat?
- brational 12y agoHow are you defining efficiency? Do you think it smart to have all of your staff 100% working at all times? What happens when new work comes?
- geofft 12y agoWhat's wrong with bloat? Isn't profitability the goal, not efficiency? If it's best achieved by having more resources so you continue to be profitable when one resource is unavailable, then have more resources. This is as true of hard drives and fire exits as it is of employees. Expanding on a point by brational, see Tom Demarco's book Slack: Getting Past Burnout, Busywork, and the Myth of Total Efficiency. It makes the argument that if your goal is long-term profitability, you must have some excess capacity in human resources at all times. http://amzn.com/B004SOVC2Y http://amzn.com/B004SOVC2Y
- saidajigumi 12y agoSlack is a fantastic book. If you're even the least bit unclear about why/how TFA thinks that minimum vacation is a good idea, then you'll find this a fantastic read.
- GFischer 12y agoI've also learned to appreciate slack when learning about Kanban: http://www.everydaykanban.com/2012/07/27/slack-is-not-a-dirty-word-how-slack-can-improve-your-products/ http://www.everydaykanban.com/2012/07/27/slack-is-not-a-dirt...
- elsjaako 12y agoI was expecting some kind of subgenius material. Please tell me JR "Bob" Dobbs is at least mentioned.