Work vs Progress

It is easy to tell when work is being done or not. Although it is very difficult to tell whether you have made progress on day to day basis, over a period of time you can tell how much progress you made. But what will you do if work is being done and progress is not made.

one of the reasons for this is significant amount of the work you do doesn't lead to progress. managing your work effectively is a skill which gets honed with experience. If you cannot manage your work so that at least 90% of what you do leads to progress then it is clear you need a mentor. someone who has been there done that and who can give direction to your work. otherwise conflicting and irrelevant work is allowed to go on because none in the team noticed, cared or took the time to guide your efforts in more useful directions. Capable people may work away in their private tasks, believing they’re making progress when in reality they’re doing work that will be thrown away or even hurt the project. When someone puts their head down to work, how fast they’re going doesn’t matter if they’re heading in the wrong direction. How a talent is directed can be more important than the size of the talent itself.

The other reason may be what you think is progress is different from what other's in your team think as progress. It may also be because you did what our manager said but what your manager thinks is progress is different from what his superior thinks is progress.This is a classic case of lack of proper communication and understanding within the team. people should sit and conclude exactly what needs to be done to be termed as progress. There are so many names to this process, often called goal setting, vision, project planning. Some firms focus on flexibility and short term cycles (e.g. Agile and XP development for software), others on big long term plans. whatever it is once the goal is set it should not be changed mid-way. if you decide this is what is progress for this week. freeze it. no new work for the week should be given. doing so wont get the additional work get done. it will only jeopardize already set goals.

Enough of reasons. now what can be done so that work you do leads to progress. First thing is defining progress. If you follow a hierarchical structure. you have your team leader or project manager who alone gives all your work. make sure what his/her expectations are on this work regarding what quality he expects etc. In the end it is all about expectations. only by beating his expectations can you say you have made progress.In case you work in a flat structure it becomes relatively difficult. sit with all persons you interact with and note down each person's expectations upfront. It again comes to beating their expectations. If you feel you aren't up to the mark on managing everyone's expectations then let the team know this and request for a small hierarchical set up for some time. till you feel you are up to the mark and can take on multiple people's expectations.

Once you  know the vision and the expectations then everyday track down the work you do and make sure you are progressing towards the  goal at an appropriate pace. Divide all your goals into small units whih can be done in an hour or two. Then everyday before starting to work on a unit, ask yourself these questions :

• This unit of work contributes to which goal(s)?
• How does it help me get closer to that goal?
• How large a contribution is it? (Does it get us 5% closer to the goal? 50%?)
• Is quality sufficiently high?
• What other units of needed work does it support or enable?

Proceed with that unit of work only if you get satisfactory answers for all these questions. what this can lead to is what ever work you are doing will contribute significantly to the progress. Then after every day ask these questions :

• How much closer did my work today get us to finishing the project?
• Does the quality level of your work match what we need?
• What challenges did I overcome?
• What challenges did I prevent from ever happening?
• What difficult, but essential, questions did i ask that others forgot?
• How did i make us more efficient towards our goals today?
• What roadblocks am i currently facing that prevent faster progress?

Answers to these questions will tell you whether you are on road to finish the goals and if you are meeting the expectations set for you.

       These methods aren't any tested  and proven methods to achieve progress. i started implementing these quite recently and it will take some time before i myself know their effectiveness. One more thing i feel is one should be as open about his work as possible. If there is an easy way to do it then let the whole world know what and how you are doing the work. Let anyone and everyone in your team see it and listen to what they have to say about it. be open minded and embrace criticism.  Luckily for us, there is an easy way to share what you are working on. i recently started twittering about what i m working on every 30mins or an hour. In the end it is not an intellectual challenge but a psychological one. knowing what to do is different from wanting to do that. The best way to make progress may not be fun. it’s a simple choice that you, me, or anyone has to choose to make: will I do what I know is the right thing, even if I don’t want to do it, don’t like to do it, or am afraid to do it?

Comments

[Anand Kumar]

Nice post.

You enlisted so many metrices for preparing for your every day work -

This unit of work contributes to which goal(s)?
How does it help me get closer to that goal?
How large a contribution is it? (Does it get us 5% closer to the goal? 50%?)
Is quality sufficiently high?
What other units of needed work does it support or enable?

Now the basic question is that is work so quantifiable a thing? All you are saying is correct, but if you think of so many things, doesn't it clutter your mind instead. If you are working well, you will feel it, you will not need to ask yourself some pre-defined questions and then answer them. Let me know, if asking all these questions everyday helped you..

And 90% efficiency is huge. Even 60 % would be a great figure.