What can we learn from watering the backyard about increasing our productivity and throughput?
What can we learn from watering the backyard about increasing our productivity and throughput?
We often confuse productivity with throughput. In most cases, we want to increase throughput, but we apply mechanisms to increase productivity. Here how to think about productivity and throughput:
Suppose you have a 200 sq. ft backyard, and you water it is using a garden hose. A standard garden hose takes 30 minutes to water the entire backyard. Now you don't want to spend 30 minutes each day watering the backyard. What do you do?
You have two options:
Get another water hose and connect to another faucet. Cover 100 sq. ft with each one, and now you are done in 15 minutes. You just increased your productivity.
Start the water and leave the house. Set a timer for 30 minutes to come back and close the water. Now you have ~25 minutes to do some other work like clipping trees, cleaning shrubs, or making coffee. You just increased your throughput.
(Secret option): Setup an automatic sprinkler system, and you have eliminated the work. You've just increased your productivity and throughput.
Which option do you choose?
We can apply the same logic to creative work. Keep the following formula in mind.
Let's say you have X units of work that will take T units of time under normal circumstances.
If you want to get X units of work in (T - ΔT) time, you want to focus on increasing productivity.
If you want to get X + Y units of work in T time, you want to focus on increasing throughput.
Sometimes it's hard to find option #3, but it always exists. Automation is the key (more on that in the following essay).
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The topics I tweet about are software engineering, productivity, mental models, and personal development, and some witty programming humor 😁