How productive were you today? Do you know? Did you track it? What method did you use? A to-do list? A pomodoro timer? I’d bet you were really really productive. I bet you got a lot of things done and checked off all those little boxes right? So here’s a different question…did any of it matter? Sure, you were productive…but for what purpose? To what end?

I think many of us forget to ask that last question in our day to day lives and work. As a society, we’ve been so focused on how to be productive that we’ve developed an endless stream of strategies and tools to make it easier. This exploded further in 2020 and the following years as the pandemic created a national and global shift towards fully remote or hybrid work. A shift that, I hate to break it to you, isn’t going to go away.

Resources

https://www.etymonline.com/word/productivity

https://www.zarvana.com/new-productivity-definition-that-wont-burn-you-out/

https://www.oecd.org/sdd/productivity-stats/40526851.pdf

https://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/a-brief-history-of-productivity

https://prezi.com/d7swdmdturqy/us-economy-in-1600s/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Z49g-A2AQI