more thorough thinking. We'd reflect upon our assumptions and the decisions we make. We'd feed our hunches (see chapter 4) and nurture the exploration of new possibilities and options.
This might happen, if we weren't cursed with efficiency.
2
The Curse of Efficiency
Righto: chapter 2. First, though, let me tell you something about one of the biggest challenges of writing a book – getting the sequence right. I want to unpack so much goodness with you, but before we get there, we need to appreciate the context that goodness serves. The concepts of this book are best shared in a certain order, so that the value of ideas may be fully appreciated.
You might have already noticed, but what we are doing here in part I is essentially ‘framing the problem'. This is an incredibly useful thing to do if you're looking to prime people to be more receptive to an idea. And the idea of this book is a big one – leaders need to systematically go against the grain of default thinking, efficiency and busyness (heresy!), and pioneer uphill, through doubt, angst and uncertainty (madness!) in order to future-proof relevance and obtain strategic advantage. This is too important a notion to not have the problem framed correctly first.
Now you're probably somewhat savvy with The Curse of Efficiency already. And you probably recognise that relentless busyness crowds out our time for good strategic development and meaningful progress. But we can't jump to the answer just yet. After all, leading quests means pursuing better questions – not easy answers. And as you'll discover in part III, staying within the angst of the challenge, resisting the urge to jump to quick fixes and conclusive solutions, is a discipline we need to foster – individually and collectively as leaders. Otherwise, we are only perpetuating the existing paradigm of convenient but shallow default thinking.
This is something I see happen in organisations all too often – someone has a brilliant idea, and begins to promote said idea to their colleagues, only to be met with stiff resistance or general indifference. Bah! What ignorant dinosaurs! Why can't they just appreciate how brilliant this idea could be?
Well, a few things are getting in the way – including the fact that ideas are cheap and often poorly framed16 – but the main thing is that new ideas pose a real threat to people's time. Especially when everyone is so busy being efficient.
THE PROGRESS DELUSION
If I had a dollar for every time someone said they were busy, I'd probably have … a few hundred dollars.17 Being busy has become the new badge of honour. Part of this perception is because we have allowed such a work culture to percolate, but a big part of this is because busyness is just so darn rewarding.
In my previous book, The Game Changer, I raved about the illuminating research into workplace motivation delivered by Professor Teresa Amabile and Professor Steven Kramer. This research all started with the question ‘What makes employees enthusiastic about work?' – an important question for anyone in management or leadership.
And so, more than 600 managers (from dozens of companies, and at different levels) were asked to rank five workplace factors commonly considered significant in influencing motivation: recognition for good work, incentives and rewards, interpersonal support, clear goals and targets, and a clear sense of progress.
These are all good answers, of course (indeed, the selection of these factors was the result of several meta-analyses). But ‘recognition for good work' emerged as the factor considered most powerful at positively influencing motivation.
It's definitely a great factor, but this result came only from the managers. So Amabile and Kramer also explored this concept with employees, following a bunch of people from different companies over several years, and analysing over 12 000 journal entries to see what correlated to the highest level of motivation at work. It turns out, the number one thing that was most important to the employees was actually what the managers ranked dead last – a clear sense of progress.
That's right – the more we sense that our effort is contributing to progress, the more likely we are to stay motivated to invest effort. This Progress Principle was recognised as the #1 breakthrough idea by the Harvard Business Review in 2010 – and it makes a whole lot of sense.
When it comes to leading for the future of work, providing visibility of progress is our most important opportunity.
This applies to nearly all types of work – from formulaic routine work right through to risky pioneering work. Essentially, the more we reduce the latency between effort and meaningful feedback, the more effort we get.
And so, creating visibility of progress, and using a combination of structures and rituals to recognise and celebrate small daily wins is an incredibly important calibration for leadership in the future of work.
This requirement is far less about fixating upon specific, distant targets, and much more about making work that is inherently motivating. Pay people well, and design and lead work that provides people with a rich sense of progress. This, in turn, contributes to work cultures that are much more future-proof – nimble, adaptive and responsive to change.
Think about it like this. Imagine, earlier in your career, you were given an important piece of research to do. Your boss explains that some colleagues are visiting from overseas and she needs this research completed by Monday morning. You are already very busy but, like many of us, you're terrible at saying no – so you say yes, and you go about doing this research (staying back late and even working on the weekend). The research is hard work but it's kind of exciting and interesting too. On Sunday night, you email off the research report.
Monday comes and no word arrives from your boss. You begin to think that perhaps she did not receive the email, but you check and, yes, the email was definitely sent. You figure she must be busy with her guests. Tuesday arrives and still no word. All you want to know is that she received the report okay – it's like an open loop in your mind, a cognitive dissonance that must be closed. You send an email to check.
Finally, on Wednesday morning you receive an email back from your boss, which simply says: ‘Thanks – turns out I didn't need it.'
Bah! I mean, it's nice that she acknowledged it – but you're not even sure that she read your research. And, thus, somewhat deflated you resolve that, should a similar request be made in the future, you're probably going to default to a conservative level of effort.
Which makes perfect sense – we all have a finite amount of time, energy and attention available to us each day. It's only reasonable that we invest our effort into the things that provide the richest sense of progress.
This is why progress visibility is also our biggest threat.
The things that provide the richest sense of progress are usually our defaults – those routine things we've done before, that require minimal cognitive effort to achieve. These things are easy to do, have established precedents, and often provide a rich and immediate sense of progress.
Now imagine this scenario: you are a senior leader within a large organisation. You've just been to a conference where a few of the speakers shared insights that have got you seriously thinking about the mid-term viability of your organisation's business model. You have a hunch that disruption is just around the corner for your organisation – and, unfortunately, this won't be something your organisation is proactively leading. This hunch is only further confirmed through the things you read
It's much better to focus on cultivating strategic options (the focus of part III) and worthy hypotheses (part IV).
The introvert in me tries to avoid talking to many people – so that seems like a big number to me.
