Measure results, not hours(mobile.nytimes.com)
mobile.nytimes.com
Measure results, not hours
http://mobile.nytimes.com/2012/10/07/business/measure-results-not-hours-to-improve-work-efficiency.xml
26 comments
At least you get a few quiet hours between 6 and 9 to actually get things done. I've noticed much less resentment of people who come in after 10 and leave after 6. Same hours, different perception.
Because somehow, no one sees you come in, but everyone sees you go home.
Because somehow, no one sees you come in, but everyone sees you go home.
How would the hours I spend on a remote desktop session count in your office?
I'm a teacher, its outcomes all the way for us, and being there when the class meets.
I'm a teacher, its outcomes all the way for us, and being there when the class meets.
His boss should really pick up on that and figure out some way to communicate it. Mentioning casually at a status meeting that this person gets in early and as a result leaves early and that this is a good thing would work: it's subtle acknowledgement and approval which I'd guess is enough.
I think bottom line, don't work at a place that cares more about the amount of hours you work as opposed to the results that you produce. Life is too short for this shit. There are a lot of job opportunities in companies and teams that understand results and care less about even showing up to the office as long as they are highly productive.
The few people who actually know what he does completely respect him; but no one else gets it.
I am curious for this guy whether he doesn't care. For me, I'm similar in some respects at my workplace. I don't do the things that I think are BS and a waste of time, even if they're mandated by various senior people. Though some things, I do if my manager talks with me privately, asking me to help him get it done for whatever political reason may exist (politics is usually the only reason why I do things that are garbage, and my manager has to convince me).
I don't do the best work in the world, but I am above-average at my workplace. I am given a lot of the high-priority and difficult projects. I recently have been first or second choice for various role changes, which I'd normally jump at if my current projects were not so critical and the fact that I'd already committed (I am one of the cheesy guys who says that my word is stronger than oak). The fact is, I have the respect of the people I deem most important, and that's proven out by who gets what projects, and how I'm given a long leash for various stupid things. I don't care what any of my peers would think, though the fact is that most of them do respect me and many come to me for advice about various matters.
I agree that it's possible it won't work. But I'd also say nobody should be cocky enough to start doing this until they've truly proven themselves through multiple hellfire crises (i.e. established track record when the chips are down). With a proper track record, there is no reason why it won't work.
And in that scenario, even if it's only a few people who respect me, that's enough. They are the ones I care about. If 95% of the company thinks I'm doing nothing or am worthless, that's fine. What matters to me is if I'm respected by the 5% who take care of my raises, promotion opportunities, and company strategy and budgets.
I am curious for this guy whether he doesn't care. For me, I'm similar in some respects at my workplace. I don't do the things that I think are BS and a waste of time, even if they're mandated by various senior people. Though some things, I do if my manager talks with me privately, asking me to help him get it done for whatever political reason may exist (politics is usually the only reason why I do things that are garbage, and my manager has to convince me).
I don't do the best work in the world, but I am above-average at my workplace. I am given a lot of the high-priority and difficult projects. I recently have been first or second choice for various role changes, which I'd normally jump at if my current projects were not so critical and the fact that I'd already committed (I am one of the cheesy guys who says that my word is stronger than oak). The fact is, I have the respect of the people I deem most important, and that's proven out by who gets what projects, and how I'm given a long leash for various stupid things. I don't care what any of my peers would think, though the fact is that most of them do respect me and many come to me for advice about various matters.
I agree that it's possible it won't work. But I'd also say nobody should be cocky enough to start doing this until they've truly proven themselves through multiple hellfire crises (i.e. established track record when the chips are down). With a proper track record, there is no reason why it won't work.
And in that scenario, even if it's only a few people who respect me, that's enough. They are the ones I care about. If 95% of the company thinks I'm doing nothing or am worthless, that's fine. What matters to me is if I'm respected by the 5% who take care of my raises, promotion opportunities, and company strategy and budgets.
This seems to be common sense to everyone who is not a "boss" and unheard of to anyone who is. Find me a company that actually follows this philosophy, and sign me up. I have yet to find one real example.
Here's the real problem companies face with people like me. If I only had to get the work done, I could be in the office for maybe one day a week. With all that free time, I would be able to do something on my own so that I wouldn't even need to work for them at all anymore. Then what do they do? By trapping me there for 40 hours a week and limited vacation time, it's very difficult for me to comfortably escape.
Here's the real problem companies face with people like me. If I only had to get the work done, I could be in the office for maybe one day a week. With all that free time, I would be able to do something on my own so that I wouldn't even need to work for them at all anymore. Then what do they do? By trapping me there for 40 hours a week and limited vacation time, it's very difficult for me to comfortably escape.
I worked in an office where we got the work done... and we did.
And then we were given more tasks. And more tasks. To the point that there was no way to get everything done on a deadline.
At some point I said to myself, I could pull an all-nighter, still have missed deadlines, or I could go home at 5, and have maybe one less missed deadline. It was an easy choice.
Unless you work in a place that only has need for a finite amount of work, no matter how effective you are getting things done, there will always be more things to do. If there is only a finite amount of work to be done, then an employee is not what you need - a contractor is.
(Of course a good manager will balance the number of engineers to the work load. Ours did say that he had enough to hire two more engineers -- but didn't know if he would have this much work for them next quarter.)
And then we were given more tasks. And more tasks. To the point that there was no way to get everything done on a deadline.
At some point I said to myself, I could pull an all-nighter, still have missed deadlines, or I could go home at 5, and have maybe one less missed deadline. It was an easy choice.
Unless you work in a place that only has need for a finite amount of work, no matter how effective you are getting things done, there will always be more things to do. If there is only a finite amount of work to be done, then an employee is not what you need - a contractor is.
(Of course a good manager will balance the number of engineers to the work load. Ours did say that he had enough to hire two more engineers -- but didn't know if he would have this much work for them next quarter.)
how much you work at a salary job is a constant negotiation between the worker and the boss.
It sounds like your boss screwed the pooch on that one, though. Killed the goose that laid the golden eggs.
It's a hard negotiation, really, for both parties, as different people function differently at different stress levels. But yeah; most bosses optimize for but-in-seat time rather than for actual productivity, which, of course, does not increase shareholder value or employee happiness; It's bad for everyone.
Personally, I think it's a symptom of 'optimizing for appearances' - the managers run the companies, sure, but they don't own them, so they don't care about real productivity, only about the perception of productivity.
It sounds like your boss screwed the pooch on that one, though. Killed the goose that laid the golden eggs.
It's a hard negotiation, really, for both parties, as different people function differently at different stress levels. But yeah; most bosses optimize for but-in-seat time rather than for actual productivity, which, of course, does not increase shareholder value or employee happiness; It's bad for everyone.
Personally, I think it's a symptom of 'optimizing for appearances' - the managers run the companies, sure, but they don't own them, so they don't care about real productivity, only about the perception of productivity.
This is silly. A company doesn't hire you to get a specific thing done. A company hires you to achieve specific results continuously. If you are able to achieve those results, they raise the bar to take advantage.
For example. A company goal might be to increase revenue 10% month over month. This might get broken up by each level of management into smaller and smaller tasks until it hits your desk under the guise of 'Make sure the website is internationalized since we're translating to 3 languages at the end of this month'.
If you are able to accomplish that task early, that doesn't mean your job is done, that just means that you can do more to help contribue to the company increasing their revenue by 10% month over month.
Also: Keep in mind that no one knows for sure if the tactics chosen to accomplish a goal will actually work. They are guesses. Redoing the website, starting the new marketing campaign, landing the new client, delivering a project on time, are all just things we do to increase the odds of achieving our goals.
For example. A company goal might be to increase revenue 10% month over month. This might get broken up by each level of management into smaller and smaller tasks until it hits your desk under the guise of 'Make sure the website is internationalized since we're translating to 3 languages at the end of this month'.
If you are able to accomplish that task early, that doesn't mean your job is done, that just means that you can do more to help contribue to the company increasing their revenue by 10% month over month.
Also: Keep in mind that no one knows for sure if the tactics chosen to accomplish a goal will actually work. They are guesses. Redoing the website, starting the new marketing campaign, landing the new client, delivering a project on time, are all just things we do to increase the odds of achieving our goals.
At best, I've seen a few instances where very (very) small consulting firms may internally adhere to this and then just bill a client whatever they feel the appropriate amount(s) are for their work, split out into chunks of hours on invoices, so as to give the appearance to the clients that the billable model is in effect.
This is clearly fraud and worth suing and winning over. Charging standard "shop hours" like a mechanic, in advance, is one thing, but just making up a price afterward and pretending it was hours worked?
Billing client for reading internet, paper or chatting by the watercooler is also a fraud. Yet noone cares. As long as client is satisfied with results and the price everything else doesn't matter all that much.
[deleted]
You basically ran into Parkinson's Law. :) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parkinson%27s_Law
Interesting timing. The NYTimes has a piece today on Dick Costolo[1] which mentions Peter Thiel talking about Twitter employees heading home early and how Costolo is staying at work late to get employees to do the same thing.
Even the leading companies/leading people in our industry seem to look at 'hours spent at work' as a signal of overall productivity.
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/07/technology/dick-costolo-of...
Even the leading companies/leading people in our industry seem to look at 'hours spent at work' as a signal of overall productivity.
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/07/technology/dick-costolo-of...
It's broader than productivity alone. A team that's working long hours can be perceived as more committed, dedicated and in a fighting mood.
It's really all about team dynamics and corporate culture.
See, successful entrepreneurs are, more often than not, binary beings that totally devote themselves to their company and expect other the other people in the team to do so as well. Someone can come and work for 5 hours and accomplish just the same as he would over 11 hours but it may send the wrong message to the group - that the company is secondary to personal life and that just meeting your obligations is really enough, no need to do beyond that.
Furthermore, some people wouldn't be able to accomplish the same over a short working day; how would that make them feel spending 11 hour days in the office, while their colleague leaves after 6 hours and still gets appreciated?
It's really all about team dynamics and corporate culture.
See, successful entrepreneurs are, more often than not, binary beings that totally devote themselves to their company and expect other the other people in the team to do so as well. Someone can come and work for 5 hours and accomplish just the same as he would over 11 hours but it may send the wrong message to the group - that the company is secondary to personal life and that just meeting your obligations is really enough, no need to do beyond that.
Furthermore, some people wouldn't be able to accomplish the same over a short working day; how would that make them feel spending 11 hour days in the office, while their colleague leaves after 6 hours and still gets appreciated?
> how would that make them feel spending 11 hour days in the office, while their colleague leaves after 6 hours and still gets appreciated?
Hopefully like an unproductive lump who needs to learn how to turn off Hacker News and Facebook during the day so they can also get some work done.
Hopefully like an unproductive lump who needs to learn how to turn off Hacker News and Facebook during the day so they can also get some work done.
From the article it doesn't sound like he is trying to enforce long hours for everyone. Being CEO he wouldn't have time to talk in depth to employees about non critical issues.
So providing he doesn't burn out doing it, it is probably going to help the company a lot if he can put in the extra hours to be across some of the lower level stuff.
So providing he doesn't burn out doing it, it is probably going to help the company a lot if he can put in the extra hours to be across some of the lower level stuff.
"By emphasizing results rather than hours, I'm able to get home at 7 p.m. for dinner with my family nearly every night"
And, here, I assumed that by emphasizing results he meant getting home around 5...
And, here, I assumed that by emphasizing results he meant getting home around 5...
When I read the article, I expected that assuming all this responsibility allowed him to go home earlier than 5, or take some afternoons off. But it seems he is only working slightly less overtime. I don't get this work culture.
This is something that the large clients for legal services have been advocating for a while. It is generally called project based billing. Many legal fields operate more or less on project based billing nowadays, even if they technically operate on hourly billing. (Usually the billing is hourly but there is understanding about how long each project should take).
I think this is very dangerous and tends to reward mediocre work. But it is probably inevitable too, because in the legal field a large client will usually eventually get what he/she wants.
This article actually shows a big danger about project based billing. Notice his second piece of advice (Reduce Reading). Can you imagine having a lawyer who thinks he does not have to read everything to the end? This will end badly for some poor client.
I think this is very dangerous and tends to reward mediocre work. But it is probably inevitable too, because in the legal field a large client will usually eventually get what he/she wants.
This article actually shows a big danger about project based billing. Notice his second piece of advice (Reduce Reading). Can you imagine having a lawyer who thinks he does not have to read everything to the end? This will end badly for some poor client.
I completely agree with this. Measuring productivity solely by hours in front of a screen is completely useless.
On the other hand, tracking hours can be really benificial too, if done correctly. I love using DeskTime.com for personal use (for company use it seems counterproductive) since it lets me easily track how much time I've spent on productive apps/web sites compared to unproductive apps/web sites.
Yesterday I had a great work day for example, I spent 14 hours in front of the computer screen. 11 hours of those were spent in productive apps/websites, like my text editor, FTP, terminal, API-documentation sites, CRM, admin backend etc and 1h 30m in unproductive apps/websites like Hacker News and Reddit.com.
I got quite a lot done, so I was really satisfied with my day. On the other hand I spent over 3 hours trying to fix what turned out to be a missing comma in a configuration file. If I had spotted the error faster I could have spent more than 3 hours less time working, while still being just as productive. If I had more experience with the things I did yesterday I could probably have done as much in half the time.
Just goes to show that even "productive hours" isn't the most important thing, the only thing that matters in the end is the results.
On the other hand, tracking hours can be really benificial too, if done correctly. I love using DeskTime.com for personal use (for company use it seems counterproductive) since it lets me easily track how much time I've spent on productive apps/web sites compared to unproductive apps/web sites.
Yesterday I had a great work day for example, I spent 14 hours in front of the computer screen. 11 hours of those were spent in productive apps/websites, like my text editor, FTP, terminal, API-documentation sites, CRM, admin backend etc and 1h 30m in unproductive apps/websites like Hacker News and Reddit.com.
I got quite a lot done, so I was really satisfied with my day. On the other hand I spent over 3 hours trying to fix what turned out to be a missing comma in a configuration file. If I had spotted the error faster I could have spent more than 3 hours less time working, while still being just as productive. If I had more experience with the things I did yesterday I could probably have done as much in half the time.
Just goes to show that even "productive hours" isn't the most important thing, the only thing that matters in the end is the results.
Productive hours are the right thing to measure. Some task can take few hours or minutes depending on luck. Also expeirience but that's already factored into your hourly rate. If you had fixed (low) pay for adding missing coma you'd have to swollow the risk that it might take you hours and pay a little. That's what most programmers and lawers try to avoid by charging hourly rates.
You might find the Personal Software Process to be of interest.
non mobile version: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/07/business/measure-results-n...
Interestingly, I find the mobile version much more readable on my laptop.
How does a manager measure results between two guys, one that has 18 very easy todos done, vs a guy with 3 very difficult todos done when the manager can't even comprehend the difference between the difficultly level of the tasks. Then the easy task guy looks like a rockstar, and the rockstar problem solver looks like a lazy douche.
These things are a little more complex than they first appear..If you realize that performance has to be aggregated and reported up the food chain, then you'll understand why even a very competent manager cannot really afford to measure performance by the metrics he believes to be most accurate, just the ones that are easiest for his Boss to understand and send up the food chain.
Unfortunately, your job as a "mid-level manager" is not to get your unit functioning with the utmost efficiency. Rather your job is to make you own Boss look as good as possible, while making sure your unit/group continues to function at an acceptable level.
A manager who can't figure out the difference between 18 easy items and 3 difficult items is already incompetent to manage those projects.
Perhaps you've seen the article on the front page about effort estimation for programmers [1]. I know when I'm handed a bug to fix, until I find the cause I have no idea if it'll be a three hour task or a three day task.
If programmers don't know up front how much effort a task will take, how should managers?
[1] http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4621268
If programmers don't know up front how much effort a task will take, how should managers?
[1] http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4621268
The bad manager cannot tell the difference, and usually ends up looking like an idiot to his director.
The problem with management types vs. individual contributors is that managers have more time in the org and usually have friends who can bail them out. So a bad worker will get fired, but a bad manager will get reassigned or even promoted.
The problem with management types vs. individual contributors is that managers have more time in the org and usually have friends who can bail them out. So a bad worker will get fired, but a bad manager will get reassigned or even promoted.
That's very sweet, but the problem with this idea is that hours worked is very easy to measure - But value created is much harder. Even if you could measure that relatively precise, what happens if an employee spends a lot of time on a task that later turns out to be worthless. Are you going to punish him for that? That hardly seems fair.
Basically, we measure time worked because it correlates pretty good with effort made and that in turn tends to correlate with value produced. Unless you work in a field where the value is easily measured (Like sales), there really is no alternative.
Basically, we measure time worked because it correlates pretty good with effort made and that in turn tends to correlate with value produced. Unless you work in a field where the value is easily measured (Like sales), there really is no alternative.
If I got the projects assigned to me done in 10 hours, I would just be assigned more projects instead of being allowed to take the rest of the week off. That seems to be the culture of my company: productivity is punished with more work, rather than rewarded with extra time off. My boss jokes about it all the time by saying "no good deed goes unpunished around here" but he doesn't realize that it's not a joke. It's reality. :(
There are places where you are paid for the fact that you come into the office and that people who see you are content with you. This creates culture of staying late.
There are places where you bill by the hour. This causes slacking off because you have financial incentives to work longer.
There are almost no places where knowledge workers are paid for results because you can't objectivly asses results. They must be assesed by a human. Manager most likely is too clueless to asses them. He also might be evil and just reward loyalty to him instead of the value of the work done.
I think that the most efficient environment is to pay for each hour but closely monitor what the people are doing and communication between them. You'll have to pay much more then the competition though because people factor in slacking off into their expected pay. So not many companies bother. They prefer to accept some degrees of slacking off especially because that enforces the illusion of company as one happy family.
There are places where you bill by the hour. This causes slacking off because you have financial incentives to work longer.
There are almost no places where knowledge workers are paid for results because you can't objectivly asses results. They must be assesed by a human. Manager most likely is too clueless to asses them. He also might be evil and just reward loyalty to him instead of the value of the work done.
I think that the most efficient environment is to pay for each hour but closely monitor what the people are doing and communication between them. You'll have to pay much more then the competition though because people factor in slacking off into their expected pay. So not many companies bother. They prefer to accept some degrees of slacking off especially because that enforces the illusion of company as one happy family.
Wow, this sounds like it came directly out of the ROWE playbook, http://www.gorowe.com/, something we practice at my job to much success.
I also would be interested in a blog post about this. Seems to me (and some other commentators) on this thread, that very often there's an "infinite" amount of work to do, and I don't see how that squares with "we pay you for results".
A team I was on a few years ago did scrum (poorly). We had a list of tickets the product owner wanted done for the sprint. Except, more often than not, additional tickets would be added into the sprint (Either because us engineers found dependencies or because of additional bug requests).
Scrum doctrine says that you now have a broken sprint, and all bets are off. Did it matter to management? Nope.
This was a large Rails project (about 7 full time developers for a year+). It's possible it's different when you're working on many small projects.
I guess my worry about ROWE is situations where the result is, "Implementing all your tickets on your plate" and worries about what happens in environments where tickets get added to your plate such that the number of your tickets on Thursday == the number of your tickets on Tuesday. (Even though you implemented 6 tickets between now and then). I would certainly be interested in any comments/information/thought you have on a situation like that.
A team I was on a few years ago did scrum (poorly). We had a list of tickets the product owner wanted done for the sprint. Except, more often than not, additional tickets would be added into the sprint (Either because us engineers found dependencies or because of additional bug requests).
Scrum doctrine says that you now have a broken sprint, and all bets are off. Did it matter to management? Nope.
This was a large Rails project (about 7 full time developers for a year+). It's possible it's different when you're working on many small projects.
I guess my worry about ROWE is situations where the result is, "Implementing all your tickets on your plate" and worries about what happens in environments where tickets get added to your plate such that the number of your tickets on Thursday == the number of your tickets on Tuesday. (Even though you implemented 6 tickets between now and then). I would certainly be interested in any comments/information/thought you have on a situation like that.
I work with Jonathan as a client - and my organization also does ROWE. I can say for a certainty that it works great for Rails projects. It comes down to intrinsic vs. extrinsic motivation.
Hours, made-up deadlines, etc. are all forms of extrinsic motivation which have been proven to destroy creativity, problem solving, and productivity.
ROWE needs to be a part of a bigger whole at how we look at and motivate employees. If you just drop ROWE into your current organization without taking a systems-level view, you're likely to fail. ROWE is like Agile - it's not a panacea - but if you zoom out and incorporate the philosophy at a systems level, I think you'll get great results.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_mG-hhWL_ug
Hours, made-up deadlines, etc. are all forms of extrinsic motivation which have been proven to destroy creativity, problem solving, and productivity.
ROWE needs to be a part of a bigger whole at how we look at and motivate employees. If you just drop ROWE into your current organization without taking a systems-level view, you're likely to fail. ROWE is like Agile - it's not a panacea - but if you zoom out and incorporate the philosophy at a systems level, I think you'll get great results.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_mG-hhWL_ug
Yes, Agile in not a panacea: you can't just drop it into an existing org and expect things to be rainbows and kittens. It needs to be accepted both at the grass-roots level AND management level.
Then when Agile fails a person or an organization it's Agile's (or Scrum's) fault... when it's really a people problem.
I guess I'm just waiting for the blog articles, 10 years from now, bemoaning ROWE because it didn't save an organization with a toxic environment. :-) (And feeling sorry for the poor developers involved).
Then when Agile fails a person or an organization it's Agile's (or Scrum's) fault... when it's really a people problem.
I guess I'm just waiting for the blog articles, 10 years from now, bemoaning ROWE because it didn't save an organization with a toxic environment. :-) (And feeling sorry for the poor developers involved).
As an addendum to what Matt said, like any substantial initiative, ROWE needs support from the whole organization to succeed.
But as you mention Ryan, it is super easy for those being measured to game metrics and optimize so that they look good. Mitigating this effect is very challenging and one that we continually face but our approach, and it has held up well so far, is to focus on people over process. I.e., our results include questions like "Are developers happy?" and "Are clients happy?"
Nebulous questions with unquantifiable metrics like these keep us honest and communicative with our clients and focused on the process of setting reasonable expectations that satisfy all. We stay focused on the people and change the process to ensure results, and expectations, are met.
Results may change from developer to developer, client to client, and week to week! We expect them to change as we make progress on the project.
But as you mention Ryan, it is super easy for those being measured to game metrics and optimize so that they look good. Mitigating this effect is very challenging and one that we continually face but our approach, and it has held up well so far, is to focus on people over process. I.e., our results include questions like "Are developers happy?" and "Are clients happy?"
Nebulous questions with unquantifiable metrics like these keep us honest and communicative with our clients and focused on the process of setting reasonable expectations that satisfy all. We stay focused on the people and change the process to ensure results, and expectations, are met.
Results may change from developer to developer, client to client, and week to week! We expect them to change as we make progress on the project.
Can you explain how your company uses ROWE? Was it there when you started, or did you witness the shift from hour-based work/pay to results-based work/pay?
I work in the same place as Jonathan, and have found working in a results only work environment to be an extreme step up. I started after the transition, and it was a very obliviously different environment than anywhere else we work.
The way we work is that we have very focused week or month or quarterly results we are responsible for, and we have a very transparent way of seeing who needs to do what and what is getting done. Beyond that, it's a big part of our culture not to be negative is someone chooses to work different hours or out of the office. It's their results to complete, and they know how they work most effectively.
You've got a bunch of stuff up on our blog about ROWE as well: http://highgroove.com/tags/rowe
The way we work is that we have very focused week or month or quarterly results we are responsible for, and we have a very transparent way of seeing who needs to do what and what is getting done. Beyond that, it's a big part of our culture not to be negative is someone chooses to work different hours or out of the office. It's their results to complete, and they know how they work most effectively.
You've got a bunch of stuff up on our blog about ROWE as well: http://highgroove.com/tags/rowe
Carol Dweck says we should praise effort, not success, if we want people to love challenges and practice persistence.
So, praise effort, measure results, but don't worry about time spent at a desk.
So, praise effort, measure results, but don't worry about time spent at a desk.
This is true for teaching children the value of persistence and effort.
In a work environment, however, it teaches everyone that all that is valued is wasteful heroics.
In a work environment, however, it teaches everyone that all that is valued is wasteful heroics.
Heroics? How is carrying through on things that take long term effort anything like wasteful heroics?
It's not. I think we're talking about different things.
Heroics are unavoidable -- sometimes there's no alternative. But it can slip into a pathological state where only heroic effort is recognised and rewarded; and so becomes the norm.
When you say "praising for effort", I thought you were making the same class of error.
Heroics are unavoidable -- sometimes there's no alternative. But it can slip into a pathological state where only heroic effort is recognised and rewarded; and so becomes the norm.
When you say "praising for effort", I thought you were making the same class of error.
"In general, don't waste your time creating A-plus work when B-plus is good enough. Use the extra time to create A-plus work where it matters most."
I wish I did more of this ...
My old company had this down to a T.
First, you only had to complete your EU mandated 37.5 hours per week. If you went over (without a good reason like an urgent project deliverable,) they would ask why you were being inefficient, and if you needed more managerial support or more resource on your team.
Second, you had to account for every one of those 37.5 hours against tasks and their estimates - and you often didn't write your own estimates (and when you did, it was with manager review.)
Your results, therefore, were based on slip and gain against quite realistic estimates, and if there was serious slip on an estimate (e.g. 2 hours work took you a day) there would inevitably be a review (although, generally, one focussing on how you could improve next time.) Hours worked were measured too, though, and if there was a lot of work and not enough resource and you stayed late to fill the gap, you were rewarded (especially if this was sustained over a long period of time.)
If I procrastinated some of my time away at this place, I had to catch up the time later in order to make my weekly status look acceptable. As I worked there, I got better at getting my assigned stuff done during standard office hours, and avoiding working late evenings and Saturdays (which I hated more than resisting procrastination, it turned out!)
Oh, a final point - they also had flexible working hours (one guy would start at about 3pm and work until midnight! I tended to fall into a 10-6 or 11-7 pattern..) so if people weren't in at 9am, noone raised an eyebrow. Indeed, I was told not to arrive before 10am on my first day, as there would likely be noone to let me in.
I think ultimately this is about organisational culture - something you have to concentrate on defining early on in a new company, and which is almost impossible to change. This is one reason I want to start my own company when I finish my PhD, rather than working for someone else's which doesn't get my work style and punishes me for not fitting in. This is partly why I left that old employer, although it wasn't to do with their perception of how hard I worked, it was a different aspect of their culture.
First, you only had to complete your EU mandated 37.5 hours per week. If you went over (without a good reason like an urgent project deliverable,) they would ask why you were being inefficient, and if you needed more managerial support or more resource on your team.
Second, you had to account for every one of those 37.5 hours against tasks and their estimates - and you often didn't write your own estimates (and when you did, it was with manager review.)
Your results, therefore, were based on slip and gain against quite realistic estimates, and if there was serious slip on an estimate (e.g. 2 hours work took you a day) there would inevitably be a review (although, generally, one focussing on how you could improve next time.) Hours worked were measured too, though, and if there was a lot of work and not enough resource and you stayed late to fill the gap, you were rewarded (especially if this was sustained over a long period of time.)
If I procrastinated some of my time away at this place, I had to catch up the time later in order to make my weekly status look acceptable. As I worked there, I got better at getting my assigned stuff done during standard office hours, and avoiding working late evenings and Saturdays (which I hated more than resisting procrastination, it turned out!)
Oh, a final point - they also had flexible working hours (one guy would start at about 3pm and work until midnight! I tended to fall into a 10-6 or 11-7 pattern..) so if people weren't in at 9am, noone raised an eyebrow. Indeed, I was told not to arrive before 10am on my first day, as there would likely be noone to let me in.
I think ultimately this is about organisational culture - something you have to concentrate on defining early on in a new company, and which is almost impossible to change. This is one reason I want to start my own company when I finish my PhD, rather than working for someone else's which doesn't get my work style and punishes me for not fitting in. This is partly why I left that old employer, although it wasn't to do with their perception of how hard I worked, it was a different aspect of their culture.
It's great that your organization is responsible about it. Sounds like there's a great deal of trust in your organization.
It sounds like there are numerous ways for this to go badly - ie: when it gets noticed that you went over 37.5 hours in some organizations that might start to be a blame game, or you'd start getting requests to "we need it done, but we also need you to do it off the clock so we don't get into trouble for breaking EU regs".
It's great that your organization sees that people might be in trouble and has a mature (aka: not blaming) attitude. I guess I always assume organizations will adopt ROWE without making the appropriate cultural changes.
It sounds like there are numerous ways for this to go badly - ie: when it gets noticed that you went over 37.5 hours in some organizations that might start to be a blame game, or you'd start getting requests to "we need it done, but we also need you to do it off the clock so we don't get into trouble for breaking EU regs".
It's great that your organization sees that people might be in trouble and has a mature (aka: not blaming) attitude. I guess I always assume organizations will adopt ROWE without making the appropriate cultural changes.
just to briefly defend the EU - the 37.5 hour mandate is how much a contract can oblige you to work, not how much work you can actually do. That was, more controversially, recently capped at 60 hours per week or something, which was a massive problem for medical students/interns who wanted to qualify in less than 10 years.
Back to the company, by the time I left the culture had morphed a bit, and people were encouraged to work extra hours to compensate for their slip, where necessary. Still much better than (what I hear of) the US, where stupidly long hours are expected (apparently).
Back to the company, by the time I left the culture had morphed a bit, and people were encouraged to work extra hours to compensate for their slip, where necessary. Still much better than (what I hear of) the US, where stupidly long hours are expected (apparently).
How do you square this sort of mindset with the well-known demands of entrepreneurship? In other words, if it's possible to do great work in short amounts of time, why do most successful entrepreneurs end up working very long hours to make their companies succeed? If it's possible to check out at 5pm M-F and still excel, why do investors look for the highest possible levels of commitment from the founders in whom they invest?
Personally I think stories like this arise from the fallacy that jobs have a set amount of work. Entrepreneurs know that is not true--there is not some predetermined, set amount that an Apple laptop needs to better than an HP laptop. The truth is that any and all competitive advantage should be seized--it might be needed to survive.
Of course not everyone is a founder; most people are employees. But employees have an interest in their company's success too--it keeps them employed. In addition, high performance offers them opportunity for promotions, raises, advancement, publicity, etc.
I think that if you are a talented enough employee to get the "expected" work done in less than the expected time, the thing to do is to fill the remaining hours by doing work that beats expectations. Increase quality even more; put that gold leaf on since you have time. Or, spend that time thinking and inventing an unexpected addition or improvement--or even a new product.
Personally I think stories like this arise from the fallacy that jobs have a set amount of work. Entrepreneurs know that is not true--there is not some predetermined, set amount that an Apple laptop needs to better than an HP laptop. The truth is that any and all competitive advantage should be seized--it might be needed to survive.
Of course not everyone is a founder; most people are employees. But employees have an interest in their company's success too--it keeps them employed. In addition, high performance offers them opportunity for promotions, raises, advancement, publicity, etc.
I think that if you are a talented enough employee to get the "expected" work done in less than the expected time, the thing to do is to fill the remaining hours by doing work that beats expectations. Increase quality even more; put that gold leaf on since you have time. Or, spend that time thinking and inventing an unexpected addition or improvement--or even a new product.
How do you square this sort of mindset with the well-known demands of entrepreneurship?
Because the 'well-known demands' are mostly socially constructed myths rather than reality. Because people are really bad at tracking stuff-done and find tracking hours-worked and looking at stuff-to-do much easier to think about. Because people a really fucking awful at figuring out how productive they are.
I have been a team coach multiple times where I have demonstrated by, weirdly, actually tracking the amount of work done that teams working fewer hours were producing more work. The amount of push back from these sorts of results from management and the team is incredible.
People know that if they only stayed a bit later they would get more done despite lots of evidence, by our tracking stories completed, bug reports, user satisfaction, etc. all went down the more hours people worked.
Tired people make mistakes. Tired people work slowly. You can be tired without 'feeling' tired. In anything but the very short term (and I'm talking days, maybe a week or two tops) trying to do hard intellectual, creative work for more than 30-40 hours a week will make you slower overall - not faster.
Hell - Ford promoted the 40 hour week as the maximum productivity point for physical labour on a production line... and we somehow imagine that working 60 hour weeks is going to make us do more.
People still seem to conceptualise 60 hour weeks as 40 normal hours + 20 extra. In fact it's 60 hours of being knackered where you're probably being half as productive as you would be if you were fully rested - but you're too damn tired to realise it.
Because the 'well-known demands' are mostly socially constructed myths rather than reality. Because people are really bad at tracking stuff-done and find tracking hours-worked and looking at stuff-to-do much easier to think about. Because people a really fucking awful at figuring out how productive they are.
I have been a team coach multiple times where I have demonstrated by, weirdly, actually tracking the amount of work done that teams working fewer hours were producing more work. The amount of push back from these sorts of results from management and the team is incredible.
People know that if they only stayed a bit later they would get more done despite lots of evidence, by our tracking stories completed, bug reports, user satisfaction, etc. all went down the more hours people worked.
Tired people make mistakes. Tired people work slowly. You can be tired without 'feeling' tired. In anything but the very short term (and I'm talking days, maybe a week or two tops) trying to do hard intellectual, creative work for more than 30-40 hours a week will make you slower overall - not faster.
Hell - Ford promoted the 40 hour week as the maximum productivity point for physical labour on a production line... and we somehow imagine that working 60 hour weeks is going to make us do more.
People still seem to conceptualise 60 hour weeks as 40 normal hours + 20 extra. In fact it's 60 hours of being knackered where you're probably being half as productive as you would be if you were fully rested - but you're too damn tired to realise it.
Nowhere in the article does it suggest that you should do anything like let employees go home at lunchtime if they've finished their work - in fact, the author says that under this system, he usually gets home around 7PM. It's more that rewards like bonuses and salary increases should be tied to the results that matter, and not to overtime that could just as easily indicate an ineffective worker as dedication.
And while start-ups often require extreme hours due to the fact that building a successful business is hard, an established business should not demand extreme hours as part of normal business. If you do, you're risking employee burn-out, and probably not taking into account the costs that can lead to. If you need 60-80 hour work weeks to keep your business competitive, then you need to realize that your business is as close to the brink as any start-up, and is probably not sustainable in that state.
And while start-ups often require extreme hours due to the fact that building a successful business is hard, an established business should not demand extreme hours as part of normal business. If you do, you're risking employee burn-out, and probably not taking into account the costs that can lead to. If you need 60-80 hour work weeks to keep your business competitive, then you need to realize that your business is as close to the brink as any start-up, and is probably not sustainable in that state.
> why do most successful entrepreneurs end up working very long hours to make their companies succeed?
There's a mistake in your reasoning in this sentence. An entrepreneur who has to work long hours for years on end is by definition not successful. At least using my definition of success.
I consider myself a very successful entrepreneur, even though my 'preneuring only brings in the equivalent of a modest developer salary. The important part is that it only takes up a few hours of my time each month, leaving the rest open to do what I want.
And, of course, being able to do whatever you want is the core reason to become an entrepreneur.
With that in mind, if you've set off to be your own boss, and you somehow find that you're working longer hours than ever, regardless of the payback, you've failed.
There's a mistake in your reasoning in this sentence. An entrepreneur who has to work long hours for years on end is by definition not successful. At least using my definition of success.
I consider myself a very successful entrepreneur, even though my 'preneuring only brings in the equivalent of a modest developer salary. The important part is that it only takes up a few hours of my time each month, leaving the rest open to do what I want.
And, of course, being able to do whatever you want is the core reason to become an entrepreneur.
With that in mind, if you've set off to be your own boss, and you somehow find that you're working longer hours than ever, regardless of the payback, you've failed.
> In other words, if it's possible to do great work in short amounts of time, why do most successful entrepreneurs end up working very long hours to make their companies succeed?
Because there's a lot to do and very few people around to do it. One of the distinguishing aspects of a startup is that the initial team is very nearly overwhelmed by the sheer quantity of things that need doing, but don't yet have the revenue to hire people and distribute that load properly. No founder is sitting around at 3pm going, "Well, now what do I do for the next two hours?" They're going to sneak in ten minutes of product development, answer a dozen emails, wash dishes in the office kitchen, whatever.
Once a company stabilizes (meaning that its revenue stream is mostly predictable and dependable), it can ramp up employee count to the point where the load is more sanely distributed and there's no longer a reason to work very long hours because everything is properly parallelized.
Because there's a lot to do and very few people around to do it. One of the distinguishing aspects of a startup is that the initial team is very nearly overwhelmed by the sheer quantity of things that need doing, but don't yet have the revenue to hire people and distribute that load properly. No founder is sitting around at 3pm going, "Well, now what do I do for the next two hours?" They're going to sneak in ten minutes of product development, answer a dozen emails, wash dishes in the office kitchen, whatever.
Once a company stabilizes (meaning that its revenue stream is mostly predictable and dependable), it can ramp up employee count to the point where the load is more sanely distributed and there's no longer a reason to work very long hours because everything is properly parallelized.
Speaking for myself, I'm most productive when I work roughly a 3 day week, with 4 days to chill and goof off. So I do that (when customer stuff and my travel schedule allows), and I hope that my employees who feel similarly would do the same. Sort of the opposite of staying late to set an example.
"Doing a half-day?" is the remark I hate hearing the most when leaving at 5. It's said as a joke and yet it's not.
Upvotes for the person who can come up with a good come-back!
(Note, this is not a problem where I work at the moment. And even at places where it's been said, I just ignore it. Just leave at 5 people!)
Upvotes for the person who can come up with a good come-back!
(Note, this is not a problem where I work at the moment. And even at places where it's been said, I just ignore it. Just leave at 5 people!)
Good kids don't get detention.
The author is absolutely correct.
I can't begin to tell you how much this bugs me. It's not about how many hours it takes to do something, it's about the value created from the service or product. Is the answer the author has given worth more or less because his knoweldge and expertise allow him to provide an answer quickly? With hourly billing, it's always less. The client sees it as trivial and the employer sees little or no value.
I see it the other way. Being able to provide an answer or solution quickly shouild be rewarded. Being held accountable for correct and timely results are much more important than simply clocking hours.
Billing hourly, paying employees hourly, etc. are all counter-productive to incentivising knowledge workers to excel. Even the honest ones.
I can't begin to tell you how much this bugs me. It's not about how many hours it takes to do something, it's about the value created from the service or product. Is the answer the author has given worth more or less because his knoweldge and expertise allow him to provide an answer quickly? With hourly billing, it's always less. The client sees it as trivial and the employer sees little or no value.
I see it the other way. Being able to provide an answer or solution quickly shouild be rewarded. Being held accountable for correct and timely results are much more important than simply clocking hours.
Billing hourly, paying employees hourly, etc. are all counter-productive to incentivising knowledge workers to excel. Even the honest ones.
>By applying an industrial-age mind-set to 21st-century professionals, many organizations are undermining incentives for workers to be efficient.
Every step of the American education system felt like this.
That's because the American educational system was set up by industrialists to produce a trained workforce, not for some sort of noble philosophical ideal of enlightenment. You'll note that none of the scions of industry attend public school.
Private schools are mostly the same structurally, they just have better tracking/pace since class sizes are smaller, and they can exclude disruptive students.
!!!
Tracking, pace, small class sizes, and excluding disruptive students makes ALL the difference.
It's the difference between a bespoke education delivered by an excellent teacher, and a shit cookie cutter education delivered by a scantron machine.
Tracking, pace, small class sizes, and excluding disruptive students makes ALL the difference.
It's the difference between a bespoke education delivered by an excellent teacher, and a shit cookie cutter education delivered by a scantron machine.
I don't disagree with you. Buy private shools aren't bespoke tutoring in the tradition of the European aristocracy or student-driven explorations of the world, they are the same lecture/ work/ small project/ test structure of public schools.
The extra teaching resources are there and available for students that want or need them. Most students just care not to.
Montessori schools do not follow the assembly-line model of education.
Montessori schools are all private because institutionalized educational systems aren't interested in switching their fundamental philosophy of education. There is one exception, the Milwaukee school system. I'm not aware of other places that have tried the same.
Montessori schools are all private because institutionalized educational systems aren't interested in switching their fundamental philosophy of education. There is one exception, the Milwaukee school system. I'm not aware of other places that have tried the same.
It's surprising, but I actually count 91 public non-charter Montessori schools. Often they're magnet schools or 'academies', and it looks like very often just elementary.
Somewhere interruptions tie into productivity in a big way yet are rarely addressed. A one-minute interruption doesn't only delay you by a minute, it takes you some time to collect yourself and continue where you left off. Work in an office, away but tethered by phone or even only by IM/text it's all the same to varying degrees. A typical office gets you all these at the same time so the standard work environment is the worst in this sense. Offsite with limited, guaranteed only pre-scheduled contact is the ideal, at least for me.
Give up trying to measure people against some standard yardstick. It doesn't work in school, it doesn't work at work. People have a complex set of inter-relating competencies, and managing them is challenging work, not an exercise in stack ranking them by some index. Don't be lazy.
On the other hand you can also measure things like whether the written code is maintainable, well documented, portable, ...
It's a bit like measuring lines of code or similar things. I kinda wished everybody could be his own boss and be actually be responsible.
It's a bit like measuring lines of code or similar things. I kinda wished everybody could be his own boss and be actually be responsible.
If I get my work done in 2 hours, do I have to work an extra 6 hours as punishment for being super competent?
What constitutes as enough work/value for a day?
What constitutes as enough work/value for a day?
The hourly rate thing has always bothered me. At my internship at Bloomberg the maximum amount of billable hours per week was 40 and usually they'd expect you to put in 8 hours a day. More often than not, I'd finish an assigned task before the day or week was through or I'd be 'direction blocked' where I would be waiting for approval in a design/architecture decision from my mentor or manager while they were busy with something else.
I would find side projects to work on, a form of '20% time', but I always felt really uncomfortable with the whole situation. Was I expected to forgo pay when there wasn't enough work for me? It was a really weird experience. It wasn't like I was a student working part time, I was living alone in NYC over the summer and had rent and food to pay for.
I would find side projects to work on, a form of '20% time', but I always felt really uncomfortable with the whole situation. Was I expected to forgo pay when there wasn't enough work for me? It was a really weird experience. It wasn't like I was a student working part time, I was living alone in NYC over the summer and had rent and food to pay for.
Was it like that for people who had been on the job for years, or just interns? If just interns, they probably had issues in the past with not doing it this way. You've got to earn trust etc.
Can't speak for Bloomberg, but its like that at any company that words on US Government contracts. USG accounting always requires time and materials records for every contract, even fixed price ones. That means everyone who works on USG contracts must keep a time card showing what contracts they worked on and how may hours they worked, completed daily. Every company expects their employees to bill an average of 8 hours per day for some period; at my former employer that meant 40 hours per week, while at my current employer it means X hours per calendar month (where X = 8 * workdays). Underbilling for salaried employees is covered out of company overhead.
Billing additional hours is a little complicated and varies based on the specific projects and company accounting practices. My current employer pays hour-for-hour for extra time billed, and we record all time worked. My previous employer had a hard cutoff at 40 hours (unless overtime was authorized), with the first 40 billable hours worked being what got recorded. If overtime was authorized for a given contract, one needed to work at least 48 hours per week on it to get paid extra, at which point you got paid hour-for-hour. I don't know why they did this, because the USG's preferred method for recording work hours by salaried employees who are not being paid extra is to record all hours worked but reduce the hourly rate accordingly.
Billing additional hours is a little complicated and varies based on the specific projects and company accounting practices. My current employer pays hour-for-hour for extra time billed, and we record all time worked. My previous employer had a hard cutoff at 40 hours (unless overtime was authorized), with the first 40 billable hours worked being what got recorded. If overtime was authorized for a given contract, one needed to work at least 48 hours per week on it to get paid extra, at which point you got paid hour-for-hour. I don't know why they did this, because the USG's preferred method for recording work hours by salaried employees who are not being paid extra is to record all hours worked but reduce the hourly rate accordingly.
Interns are managed differently because they're paid by the hour. Regular employees account for time spent on various projects, but that has nothing to do with your pay and is just a tool for accounting R&D time back to various business units for overall business planning.
I'm a freelancer and, from time to time, my billable hours come to a screeching halt when I can't get the client to tell me what they want done next.
It's a risk of the model. Part of why freelancers cost more per hour.
It's a risk of the model. Part of why freelancers cost more per hour.
"committed" "dedicated" "hard worker"
None of these address intelligence nor even competence - and I think it is a mistake to assume a good manager wouldn't realize that. If a star performer showed up late, left early and never arrived to a meeting on time but they were doing amazing work, they'd be given a lot of leeway to do that - again, by a good manager.
That is how sales works. Top salesmen do whatever they want, nobody questions their methods nor cares about how 'committed' they seem - the only thing that matters is how much more money they are bringing the company than everybody else.
I've never worked at a Google/Facebook/Amazon class tech company but I would imagine it is similar with 10x engineers and designers there.
None of these address intelligence nor even competence - and I think it is a mistake to assume a good manager wouldn't realize that. If a star performer showed up late, left early and never arrived to a meeting on time but they were doing amazing work, they'd be given a lot of leeway to do that - again, by a good manager.
That is how sales works. Top salesmen do whatever they want, nobody questions their methods nor cares about how 'committed' they seem - the only thing that matters is how much more money they are bringing the company than everybody else.
I've never worked at a Google/Facebook/Amazon class tech company but I would imagine it is similar with 10x engineers and designers there.
Being late for meetings is incompatible with doing good work. Either you are interfering with other people's work by stiffing them when they need to talk to you, or you are interrupting your productivity by showing up at all.
10x engineers don't do it on short hours. They do it by working harder in an environment where everyone is smart. Cf Claude Shannon ("achievement is exponential, working 10% longer has a compounding effect, like interest in a bank account") or Randy Pausch ("if you want me to tell you the secret of my success, call me any Friday night at my office")
10x engineers don't do it on short hours. They do it by working harder in an environment where everyone is smart. Cf Claude Shannon ("achievement is exponential, working 10% longer has a compounding effect, like interest in a bank account") or Randy Pausch ("if you want me to tell you the secret of my success, call me any Friday night at my office")
"10x engineers don't do it on short hours. They do it by working harder in an environment where everyone is smart. Cf Claude Shannon ("achievement is exponential, working 10% longer has a compounding effect, like interest in a bank account") or Randy Pausch ("if you want me to tell you the secret of my success, call me any Friday night at my office")"
That is some Gold. Thanks!
That is some Gold. Thanks!
"But your boss is likely to be receptive if you politely raise the question of productivity and show you’re willing to be held accountable for results, rather than hours worked."
Yeah right.
The problem is that it's extremely non trivial to deconstruct your assumptions and social behaviour.
Even if your boss/manager/whatever is clued up and knows his/her stuff, workplaces are a social gathering, and quiet introverted non-socialising members of the team will never get rewarded for their hard work. Especially if they're seen leaving early every day.
Where I work, we have a guy who leaves at 3pm every day; he gets in between 5-6am.
His own team gives him the 'ironic' farewell round of applause when he walks out everyday.
Why? Because he's leaving early.
He's a hard working dedicated worker, but appearances are important, and leaving early makes it appear that you're slacking off, that you're not there when you're needed for that last minute 5pm meeting.
The few people who actually know what he does completely respect him; but no one else gets it.
That's the problem: unless you publize not only to your immediate work peers, but the entire local work area, what you're doing and why, no one gets it, and they make assumptions.
This article would be more useful if it addressed that issue.
Simply saying: Work hard, leave early and get your boss to accept you for who you are... agh. Don't. It wont work.