Abby has it exactly right:
“give me a challenge & I work harder, keep pushing right past that to Totally Unreasonable & watch productivity dive bomb”
Some challenges are OK. And they can be downright fun if you have the time to investigate, learn, and resolve them in an intelligent way.
Given the right environment, people will often rise to the challenge and do great things. But just because a some challenges lead to greater productivity in certain environments doesn’t mean that a) it’s sustainable, or b) that it works in every situation, or c) that its the best way to achieve greater productivity.
Build a collaborative environment that has reasonable goals, a good diversity of projects, supportive co-workers, and managers that mentor more than they measure, and I guarantee you’ll have productive employees.
And don’t even get me started on inane concepts like “stretch” goals.
Tags: agile, business culture, project management, quotes, software development
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