Is There a Right Way to Measure Productivity?
In Ecclesiastes 4:7-8, King Solomon tells us, “Again, I saw vanity under the sun: one person who has no other, either son or brother, yet there is no end to all his toil, and his eyes are never satisfied with riches, so that he never asks, “For whom am I toiling and depriving myself of pleasure?” This also is vanity and an unhappy business.”
These are the first verses that came to mind when I saw a recent article in Business Insider (3/1/25) speaking to the topic of productivity, and how many hours it takes to get great results.
The article led with this quote from Sergey Brin, the co-founder of Google. He said, “In my experience, about 60 hours a week is the sweet spot of productivity,”
Immediately contrary to that point of view, John P. Trougakos, a professor of management at the University of Toronto states, “Too much time on the job can lead to an increase in errors and a drop in motivation. Trougakos, who has researched employee well-being, productivity, and work trends, said that rather than a specific number of hours, employers should focus on how people use their time, how they can use technology to boost productivity, and how to minimize interruptions during work hours. When people work more hours, there’s often a diminishing return.”
A third perspective was shared by Heidi Golledge, the founder and CEO of Jobot, a consulting and recruiting firm that uses artificial intelligence. She believes in “burstable bandwidth” for her workers. That means if there’s a key deadline, they can expect to put in more time, “You work a bit harder on those days, but you have to be able to rest and recharge, and then you can come at the problem anew.”
Hmmm, one philosophical overview from King Solomon, and three differing opinions from others. Perhaps you’re like me and over the course of your career, you’ve wrestled between working too much, bursts of frenzied work, a nice vacation, and constantly striving to find that elusive sweet spot of work/life balance. And perhaps like me, you’re still wrestling with it. 🙂
The Scriptures don’t give us a recipe for the question of work and life balance, but they do give us some useful guidance. Consider the following verses:
- Proverbs 10:4 “Lazy hands make for poverty, but diligent hands bring wealth.”
- Proverbs 12:24 “Diligent hands will rule, but laziness ends in forced labor.”
- Proverbs 16:3 “Commit your work to the Lord and your plans will be established.”
- Colossians 3:23 “Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord, not human masters, since you know that you will receive an inheritance from the Lord as a reward. It is the Lord Christ you are serving.”
- Genesis 2:2 “By the seventh day God had finished the work He had been doing; so on the seventh day He rested from all His work.”
From these verses, I can glean that I should work diligently, rest to recharge, work as if God was my boss (because He is!), and trust God for my work’s results. Much more can be said about each of those extracts, but we’ll leave them for now.
Do You Know What You Really Want?
Ok, so where am I going with all this? Here’s my point. Over and over throughout my career coaching executives and working with people at Crossroads in their careers, people think they know what they want and how hard they think they’ll have to work to get it. But rarely have they actually sat down and thought very deeply about what they really want and what they’re willing to do to get it. Both the results they foresee and the cost to get those results.
Instead, they seem to just be looking for a job or career that fits their skills and interests and seems to pay a fair amount. Nothing wrong with that in itself, but inevitably that will lead to unknown surprises because they just haven’t thought about the different possibilities. Even something as straightforward as the number of hours per week they may want to work.
Thankfully, we have an exercise designed to help you think through these things. It’s called, “This, or That” and you can find it HERE.
2 Different Views of Success
I’ll close with the parable of a Mexican fisherman (author unknown) that I first saw as a mural in a small restaurant. I think it brings home our point.
The businessman was at the pier of a small coastal Mexican village when a small boat with just one fisherman docked. Inside the small boat were several large yellowfin tuna. The businessman complimented the Mexican on the quality of his fish and asked how long it took to catch them. The Mexican replied only a little while.
The businessman then asked why he didn’t stay out longer and catch more fish? The Mexican said he had enough to support his family’s immediate needs. The businessman then asked, but what do you do with the rest of your time?
The Mexican fisherman said, “I sleep late, fish a little, play with my children, take a siesta with my wife, Maria, stroll into the village each evening where I sip wine and play guitar with my amigos; I have a full and busy life, señor.”
The businessman scoffed, “I am a Harvard MBA and I could help you. You should spend more time fishing and with the proceeds buy a bigger boat. With the proceeds from the bigger boat you could buy several boats; eventually you would have a fleet of fishing boats. Instead of selling your catch to a middleman, you would sell directly to the processor and eventually open your own cannery. You would control the product, processing and distribution. You would need to leave this small coastal fishing village and move to Mexico City, then LA and eventually New York City where you would run your expanding enterprise.”
The Mexican fisherman asked, “But señor, how long will this all take?” To which the businessman replied, “15-20 years.”
“But what then, señor?” The businessman laughed and said, “That’s the best part! When the time is right you would announce an IPO and sell your company stock to the public and become very rich. You would make millions.”
“Millions, señor? Then what?”
The businessman said, “Then you would retire. Move to a small coastal fishing village where you would sleep late, fish a little, play with your kids, take a siesta with your wife, stroll to the village in the evenings where you could sip wine and play your guitar with your amigos.”
The fisherman, still smiling, looked up and said, “Isn’t that what I’m doing right now?”
Dave Sparkman currently serves as the volunteer Crossroads Career board chair and local ministry leader. He is also the founder and managing director of Spark Your Culture, a corporate culture consulting firm. Prior to that he worked at UnitedHealth Group, a Fortune #5 public company, serving in the role of Chief Culture Officer. His unemployment experience came from the implosion of Arthur Andersen, where he served as the West Region Managing Partner, People.
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