Are You Producing More AND Are Less Productive?

They are producing, but are they productive?

How can you produce more and be less productive? Have you ever been real busy, but know that you haven’t been very productive? Well, I’ve had that happen to me many times. Sometimes, at the end of the day, I am completely worn-out from having been busy all day, yet I haven’t really produced what I wanted. Even as a retired person, I have felt this way. Why and how does this happen?

Producing strokes for a productive kayak experience!

I think the above questions are important ones to consider when trying to quantify a person’s performance. Too often, one’s performance it assessed based on how busy instead of how productive a person is. There are many times when producing (being busy) does not make us more productive.

For some examples of producing more and being less productive, let’s first consider the assessment of a teacher. Many educators are given a good assessment simply based on the number of college credit hours s/he has successfully attained instead of how well the teacher teaches. Producing more college credit hours does not necessarily make the educator more productive as a teacher. In a similar way, a student is often rewarded a grade based on how many assignments are turned-in instead of what the s/he has learned. Another example is rewarding a person a large payment based on producing a large number of clients, instead of producing clients that actually help the company’s profit. The point is, even though you produce a lot, you may not be a productive person. It all depends upon what you are producing and how that enables you to be productive.

How many days have you spent being constantly busy and when the day is over, you’re disappointed with what you have accomplished?  How can this be good for you? Generally, when you are constantly busy and accomplishing little, you will push yourself even harder the next time to get more done. Isn’t this stressful? Of course it is!

Busy on the “hamster-wheel of life!”

I don’t think we should push ourselves harder when what we did before was not getting us the production for the effort produced. You see, when this is happening, our plan, goal, purpose and/or priority is out sync. We need to develop a clear purpose, set a few short-term and long-term goals and stop running like we are on a hamster-wheel.

If you are doing more and accomplishing less, then maybe it’s time to slow down, reassess and approach what you’re doing in a different manner. Again, develop a clear purpose, set a few short-term and long-term goals and know that you are moving in the right direction toward being more productive.

It is important that we have a clear purpose with reasonable goals. We don’t want to be swimming toward an island and realize that what we thought was an island is a mirage, or the island is many miles further than we can swim. Ouch!

So, let’s all focus on being productive and not on producing!

How about a “productive” comment to show what you are mentally producing? :-)


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