[HN Gopher] It's Time to Embrace Slow Productivity
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It's Time to Embrace Slow Productivity
Author : rbanffy
Score : 20 points
Date : 2023-05-19 20:45 UTC (2 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.newyorker.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.newyorker.com)
| wonderwonder wrote:
| Its the lack of consecutive days off, 2 is not enough. 3 would
| really be a change. I bet I would accomplish just as much during
| the week as I do now, workplaces would just have to reduce the
| number of useless meetings. I spend 4 - 5 hours a day in meetings
| and am still expected to deliver actual code. Kill the meetings,
| my code generation would be through the roof. There are several
| things wrong with the American knowledge work place. Trapping 10
| - 15 people on calls for half their day is a huge waste of
| resources and productivity and leads to less work delivered and
| more stress overall.
|
| Cut my meetings in half and give me Friday, Saturday and Sunday
| off and I will show you a 5x developer.
| atleastoptimal wrote:
| More importantly, I think, with AI automation coming in full
| force, we need to decouple one's working hours with their right
| to live a comfortable life, especially for the lower and middle
| class.
| macawfish wrote:
| Seriously. Yet the political will to make this happen gets
| polluted by bitter, vindictive narrative. I hope we can find
| clarity soon to let go of our collective fixation on these
| foolish narcissistic "leaders" who continue to divide and
| conquer us. Though I suppose that fixation is a symptom of
| unresolved junk that might just take generations to work out.
| gffrd wrote:
| This glosses over the fact that jobs are a central piece--if not
| _the_ central piece--of many people's identities in the States.
|
| We've lost religion and communities as things that define and
| provide structure and purpose, leaving us clinging to jobs.
|
| Is this good? No! It's terrible! We should fix this!
|
| However, I'm not convinced that workplace stress is a matter of
| hours ... it may be a symptom of lack of life beyond work--and I
| don't mean in the "there's not enough time" sense.
|
| I appreciate what Cal Newport advocates for, but it always feels
| a little surface.
| screwturner68 wrote:
| Hours aren't usually the problem I think where a lot of the
| stress comes from the fear of getting laid off, losing your
| health insurance and having your car/home repossessed. People
| that have lived these employee purges never recover fully.
| Taywee wrote:
| Many people I've met really could use more fulfilling hobbies.
| petsfed wrote:
| How many of those people feel like they have time to pursue
| more fulfilling activities?
|
| Speaking only for myself, my more fulfilling hobbies feel
| like a zero-sum proposition when I factor in taking care of
| myself, my kids, my home, etc. What little leisure time
| activies I pursue are almost all pursued between the hours of
| 9 and 11pm, because _that 's the time I have_.
|
| I think the OP is right in a lot of ways, that work has
| replaced our other social outlets. But its also the case that
| just existing costs more, so time formerly spent on hobbies
| is now spent on basic lifestyle maintenance, and the time
| formerly spent on basic lifestyle maintenance is spent
| working, or commuting to/from work (because a lot of people
| can't afford to live near they work).
| great_psy wrote:
| Maybe work became the central piece in people's lives because
| they don't have time to devote to other things.
|
| It's a 40 hour work week, but add in commuting and chores and
| decent sleep and you're left with a few hours left for other
| things.
|
| Hard to build an identity around a few hours of something else.
| gffrd wrote:
| I want to add: I 100% agree about the points on "unlimited
| amount of things that could be done" and "unstructured
| urgency."
|
| I'm not sure if this has been found to be an effective
| leadership/management tactic ... or if we sleepwalked our way
| in to this reality (a la ping pong tables), but it's not good.
| davesque wrote:
| I feel like there's nothing inherently wrong with having your
| work take up most of your mental space. With the way we have
| things set up, it seems natural to dedicate most of your
| attention to the place that your money comes from. What's wrong
| is that employers in the US don't reciprocate that attention.
| They're happy to have you committed to them without being
| committed to you. The power balance has gotten way out of
| whack. Time for unions to make a comeback I guess.
| angarg12 wrote:
| https://archive.vn/fEoP7
| tortoise_in wrote:
| This is true. Only one Sunday is off and the working hours for me
| are not fixed! The problem with sales jobs is you have to be
| always on the edge. Like edutech. You need to be always around
| students and their have continuous followups. For personal life
| you have to just manage things in between. I feel I am getting
| angry and I have to do course corrections. But it's hard to earn
| money at the of the day in certain domains. But yes skills
| matters
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