NYT story on the rise of productivity tracking software
Del Tachi:
Quote from: DaleCooper on August 29, 2022, 11:13:34 AM
If a person's productivity can't be measured simply by looking at their accomplishments and whatever work they submit throughout the day/week then their job is likely an unnecessary, fake role. There are many of those in the corporate world.
This is the most uncomfortable aspect of the post-industrial, white-collar economy: most 40-hour-a-week jobs could be done in 15.
DaleCooper:
Quote from: DT on August 29, 2022, 12:43:04 PM
Quote from: DaleCooper on August 29, 2022, 11:13:34 AM
If a person's productivity can't be measured simply by looking at their accomplishments and whatever work they submit throughout the day/week then their job is likely an unnecessary, fake role. There are many of those in the corporate world.
This is the most uncomfortable aspect of the post-industrial, white-collar economy: most 40-hour-a-week jobs could be done in 15.
It's so true.
To play devil's advocate though, a lot of the salary comes from paying someone to essentially be on-call at the office. If you're the guy who helps clients fix problems with their payments or whatever, and none of that is happening at the moment, it doesn't make any sense to invest in productivity monitoring just to make sure they're doing busy work every second of the day, since it'd be obvious without such software if that person was neglecting his responsibilities and ignoring calls or something like that. And then of course there are a lot of white collar jobs that revolve around completing tasks rather than hours worked. Ideally these companies would set some expectations on the minimum amount of accomplishments they expect to be completed each week and then make sure that people are complying with those expectations, but then employers will think they're missing out on something because there's always more work to be done.
From my experience, employers being cagey about what they expect to be completed and by what time has probably hindered productivity more than anything in the white collar environments I've been in. This obsession with doing something, whatever it is, just to appear productive every hour of the day gets in the way of actually channeling your energy into something important.
sting in the rafters:
Quote from: DaleCooper on August 29, 2022, 12:55:25 PM
Quote from: DT on August 29, 2022, 12:43:04 PM
Quote from: DaleCooper on August 29, 2022, 11:13:34 AM
If a person's productivity can't be measured simply by looking at their accomplishments and whatever work they submit throughout the day/week then their job is likely an unnecessary, fake role. There are many of those in the corporate world.
This is the most uncomfortable aspect of the post-industrial, white-collar economy: most 40-hour-a-week jobs could be done in 15.
It's so true.
To play devil's advocate though, a lot of the salary comes from paying someone to essentially be on-call at the office. If you're the guy who helps clients fix problems with their payments or whatever, and none of that is happening at the moment, it doesn't make any sense to invest in productivity monitoring just to make sure they're doing busy work every second of the day, since it'd be obvious without such software if that person was neglecting his responsibilities and ignoring calls or something like that. And then of course there are a lot of white collar jobs that revolve around completing tasks rather than hours worked. Ideally these companies would set some expectations on the minimum amount of accomplishments they expect to be completed each week and then make sure that people are complying with those expectations, but then employers will think they're missing out on something because there's always more work to be done.
From my experience, employers being cagey about what they expect to be completed and by what time has probably hindered productivity more than anything in the white collar environments I've been in. This obsession with doing something, whatever it is, just to appear productive every hour of the day gets in the way of actually channeling your energy into something important.
Can vouch for, I came back from vacation today and got halfway through a week and change’s invoices/statements in 8 hours. Why do we need any performance metrics other than past due statements for missed direct cost invoices/basic budget department variance analysis? Hell, how do you determine the break-even in a cost-benefit analysis of “productivity software” for a service-oriented company? Scientific management and its derivative management styles are so antithetical to contemporary office life.
Aurelius:
Remember the Harry Truman quote that was in Averroes' signature for a long time?
Meclazine for Israel:
I have had tracking software and all my corporate emails monitored I would say for the last 2 years. Some bosses just add another folder in their Outlook and all of your sent and received emails go in there. They own the network.
You just don't use email as much. Keep it tidy, joke free and short. And when you work from home, change to your home PC.
I have had keystroke loggers etc installed to see how much you type. Time monitoring to see what time you arrive at and leave work.
At the end of the day, if you get the results, companies will keep you.
But this style of software analysis will challenge the mental fortitude of some, if not most people.
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