Creativity and Trust
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| From Morguefile |
The chapter is called "They're Not 13" and here's a more full quote than the article used*:
When you treat people like children, you get children's work. Yet that's exactly how a lot of companies and managers treat their employees. Employees need to ask permission before they can do anything. They need to get approval for every tiny expenditure. It's surprising they don't have to get a hall pass to go take a sh!#.
When everything constantly needs approval, you create a culture of nonthinkers. You create a boss-verses-worker relationship that screams, "I don't trust you."
What do you gain if you ban employees from, say, visiting a social-networking site or watching YouTube while at work? You gain nothing. That time doesn't magically convert to work. They'll just find some other diversion.
And look, you're not going to get a full eight hours a day out of people anyway. That's a myth. They might be at the office for eight hours, but they're not actually working eight hours. People need diversions. It helps disrupt the monotony of the workday. A little YouTube or Facebook time never hurt anyone.
Then there's all the money and time you spend policing all this stuff...
What got me thinking was the line, "People need diversions."(emphasis his, or, um, theirs) I have most of my "breakthroughs" when I'm thinking about something else - or when I'm thinking about nothing, relatively speaking.**
I've worked in schools (I used to be a teacher - substitute for a few years and secondary English, though that doesn't show in this blog, does it?) where the internet police clamp down hard - in fact, even cell phone usage is restricted (there's some kind of hardware you can buy or something? Or maybe it was just a lucky building location?) I've been in workplaces where everything has a usage code. You need to make a copy? We're tracking that. Heaven forbid you make a dozen personal copies of something. That might break us. Or whatever. I don't know what the mindset is.
But sometimes when I'm working on something my mind goes pretty far afield - creativity is generally pretty unrestrained. Now I suppose that if your job is accounting, they don't want much creativity - and whatever kind of creativity they might encourage wouldn't involve YouTube...but it still might somehow be INSPIRED by YouTube - or, while you're watching that stupid viral video of the whatever, your mind is still processing the Jenkins account in the background whether you're aware of it or not, and you might just have that lightbulb go off and think of exactly the thing you need in the middle of a diversion, simply because you're NOT pushing yourself too hard.
Ever watch House ? He's always having those sudden insights when he's thinking about something else. Of course that's fiction. But that kind of thing happens. Well, happens to me, anyway.
And in order for it to happen, it requires a certain level of trust.
That time "surfing" isn't time "goofing off" or whatever. That some diversions are necessary, even helpful.
*Yeah, it was a Christian article, so it was edited, without, of course, indicating that it was edited...sigh...
**I contend you can't actually think nothing. I have tons of stuff running though my head all the time. At any given time there will be a song playing in my head, I'll be remembering something, planning something, watching something, listening to someone, etc. How can you not think ANYTHING?
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