I used to work at a company that supplied engineering services to refineries. One of the engineers told a story comparing a refinery start-up in America to another country where the refinery was on an island. In an American refinery start-up, they would work extra hours to complete the start-up in time but on the island, if they didn’t complete the start-up during the day they would postpone to the next day. “Island Time”
I also used to work at an aluminum smelter. One of the engineers there told me he worked at a smelter near the jungle in Brazil they employed workers who lived in the jungle. The company found that the initial amount they were paying the workers was too much because they would not return for days until they ran out of money. The company started to pay them less so they would come back day after day.
These stories are to share that there are different ways to work and the importance it holds in our lives.
I keep coming back to the question “Why are we so hurried at work”?
Here are some ideas:
- Unrealistic deadlines
- Unaccounted for unknowns
- Driven by the upper-level managers, stockmarket, or competition
- We do it to ourselves (the inmates are running the asylum).
- Our anxiety is driving us. The voice inside our heads is telling us something bad will happen if we don’t work at a hurried pace.
- It is how our culture (American or the company) works
- Being pulled along someone else’s personal goals
- Trying to complete everything attempting to get a break that never comes (never getting ahead)
- Attempted industrialization of knowledge work
- Lack of clear activity metrics and how our actions impact those metrics leads us to just hurry and hope it impacts the goals.
- Performative goal to show peers and our boss that we are doing good
- Prove ourselves or reach a career goal
- Impatience
- Fear of layoff (after being laid off a few years ago I struggle with this)
- Afraid of procrastinating
- We don’t know any better
This does not quite capture it and I am going to keep pondering this. Though, what would happen if we slowed down a little?
Why do you work like you are so hurried? Who demands that you work this way?