Where Most People Get Productivity Completely Wrong
Why They Fail To Get The Results That Are Possible
Hey Seekers!
Welcome to Today’s Edition of the Seeking Sageship Newsletter!
Your Daily Guidance to Go Beyond Leadership!
All Subscribers have Access to the Free Section…
1%+ Compounded Improvement in 1% of Your Time Maximum!
Plus, a Preview of the “Psychophysiological Freedom” Paid Section Is Available!
Let’s Dive In…
Where Most People Get Productivity Completely Wrong
Why They Fail To Get The Results That Are Possible
You hear about Productivity All the Time.
Businesses talk about their Workforce Productivity.
Leaders talk about How Productive they are.
Yet...
Nearly Every Time I Hear People Discuss Aspects of Productivity...
I Notice that they get it Wrong...
Completely Wrong.
The Reason is that they Fundamentally Misunderstand What Productivity Is.
People usually think it is rather Simple...
You Put In More Hours...
You Get More Results...
The More Results, the More Productive.
But this is a Flawed Understanding of Productivity.
Which We Begin to Understand and See when We Understand Human Psychophysiology.
See, the "More In, More Out" Belief is based on the Idea of a "Simple System".
If I can Make Five Units an Hour...
And I Work for Five Hours...
Then My Productivity is Twenty-Five Units.
But Humans Consistently Fail to Be So Precise when it comes to Productivity.
To be Fair, Robots Fail Too...
It's Called "Maintenance".
But in Humans, the Variations are More Easy to See.
One Hour You May Make Five Units...
Then Another Hour You Make Six Units...
Then a Third Hour You Make Three Units...
Then the Fourth and Fifth You Make Six Units...
For an End of Day Productivity of Twenty-Five...
But Completely Inconsistent.
However, the Scale in Reality is Significantly Larger.
Let's just look at the Difference between someone in Burnout and Someone in Flow States.
These Represent "Opposite Ends" of the Spectrum of Productivity.
In Flow States, according to the Research, We Become Five Times More Productive than the "Average" Person.
In Burnout, according to the Research, We Become Four Times Less Productive than the "Average" Person.
Now the "Average" Person has been Trending Downward in terms of Productivity Over the Years between when the Flow Research and Burnout Research was Done...
So, the Productivity Potential is in All Liklihood Larger than This...
But for the Sake of the Data, Let's say that the Productivity Potential Difference is Twenty Times...
If "One" is Average, then we get Five times More Productive (5 x 1) Divided by One Quarter Productive (1 / 4) is Twenty ( 5 / .25 = 20).
This Means that what takes One Person in Burnout Twenty Hours to Accomplish...
One Person in Flow States Could Accomplish in One Hour.
Already We See the Linear Model Failing.
But it Goes Further because You Cannot Maintain Flow States Perpetually.
Each Flow State Lasts Fifty to Ninety Minutes, with a Ten to Thirty Minute Break Needed Between...
Assuming No Distractions that Destroy the Flow State.
Why?
As Living Beings, we Need Energy (Mg-ATP) to Function...
And a "Lot" of Energy to Enter into and Maintain the Flow State.
More Energy than Your Body can Physically Produce.
You Must Build a Supply, Get Into Flow, which Burns Through the Supply, then Resupply before You Can Effectively Get into Flow Again.
So...
If you Push People to Work Eight Hours Straight...
You will Push them Toward Burnout, Faster.
The More Hours Worked Beyond This...
The Faster the Decline toward Burnout.
It works on a bit of a Curve...
As You Push Longer...
The Results become Dramatically Worse.
What this All goes to Reveal is that Productivity is Not a Linear Equation...
It is a Complex System...
Made Far More Complex when You Begin to Put People Together.
Why?
If You Take Someone who can get into Flow, and You Combine them on a Team with Someone who is in Burnout...
These Individuals will Mostly Cancel Each Other Out...
Especially because, usually, people are Not Trained in Neurocardiology, and so the Person in Burnout will actually "Pull" the other Person Out of Flow.
Then...
If You Put Two People Experiencing Flow Together, their Productivity Tends to Become Magnified beyond the Individual Five Times Increase...
And if You Put Two Poeple Experiencing Burnout Together, their Lack of Productivity Tends to Become Magnified Below the Four Times Decrease.
This is How Small Teams in Small Organizations generally Outperform Gigantic Teams...
The Small Teams are Locked in Group Flow Together and Gaining Exponentially Better Results...
While the Gigantic Teams are Stuck in Group Burnout Combining to Reduce their Productivity Potential...
Assuming that the Teams in Group Burnout are Not Obtaining Negative Results...
Where the Organization is actually Moving Backwards rather than Forwards...
Which is Far More Common than People Believe.
In Fact, it is Possible for a Company to Get Negative Productivity Results...
While Simultaneously Showing "Revenue Positive".
Their Revenue is Not actually a Factor of Productivity...
But Rather their Category Dominance and Overall Changes in the Economy.
Often, a Company Rises and becomes Known for their Category...
They get a Disproportionate Amount of their Market Share...
76% of the Market on Average...
And they Maintain that Dominance until their Category until a New Category becomes More Relevant...
Regardless of their Productivity Results.
When Many Companies utilize Subscription-Based Models, that Must be Paid for Customers to Keep Services...
It means that the Company Simply Needs to get the Initial Market Dominance to Continue to Make Revenue...
After that Market Dominace is Maintained, their "Productivity" plays Little to No Role in their Revenue Results.
Though the Revenue Numbers May Increase through Raising Prices or the Economy Growing...
Their True Productivity is Actually Dropping Behind the Scenes...
And the Company begins to become what I call a Zombie Business.
They Continue to "Live"...
Consuming Resources...
But are Actively Damaging Everyone Around, Including Employees and Customers.
This is Why, when a New Category is Created, Zombie Businesses are Forced into One of Two Options...
Collapse...
Or Consume the Company that Would Replace Them.
It is also Why the Innovative Companies that are Purchased by Zombie Businesses Immediately Stop Being Innovative...
When they are Consumed by an Organization that is Consumed with Group Burnout...
They become Consumed in Group Burnout as Well...
And their Productivity Diminishes Completely.
Reaching Our Productivity Potential is Important if the Goal is to Create Exponential Innovation or to Change the World...
But when We Fundamentally Fail to Understand How Productivity Works as a Complex System...
We Fail to Gain True Results...
And may Fall into Negative Results Unknowingly.
All while Appearing to be Successful by Society's Broken Standards.
If You Understand True Productivity, though...
You can Accomplish More than Most Could Ever Imagine.
Those Who Seek Sageship Also Cultivate Others!
Share this Article Today With Someone Who Needs It and Earn Exclusive Rewards!
Are You Ready To Become A Sage?
Paid Subscribers will Gain ‘Exclusive’ Access to…
Read the Entire “Psychophysiology Freedom” Deep Dive Section for Exponential Results
Access to the “Full” Paid Archive (Check Out the Cultivation Center for More)
Connect Further in the “Subscriber Only” Chat & Comments Section
“Directly” Impact Regenerative Projects around the Globe
With “More” Coming In The Future…
It’s Time to Change The World!
Psychophysiological Freedom
For Paid Subscribers
So, what can We Do to Get Real Productivity?
How do we Maximize it to the Highest Levels?
Let’s Dive In…
Keep reading with a 7-day free trial
Subscribe to Seeking Sageship: Beyond Leadership to keep reading this post and get 7 days of free access to the full post archives.