How we earn procrastination
This article does not reveal the secrets of the universe and does not establish new moral imperatives. However, I hope it will be useful to someone. An existential impetus to writing this article and understanding the thoughts presented, happened to me when one fine day, my thoughts were curled into a black hole, from the wild cries of a technical director discussing some non-working moments. The next star of mental activity, conceived a little later, sucked there, after I managed to kick on the knee (the neighbor who sits opposite). And another colleague finished off, almost immediately snapping into the back of my chair. Looking at the clock, which showed six o'clock in the evening and looking at its productivity, I wanted to cry. Why so? I began to remember, analyze the fate of my bitter and the result of this analysis, and this article became.
So, meet - the scourge of our time, procrastination. One way or another, this newfangled word became familiar to all office workers. There have even been published numerous recommendations on how to deal with it and become productive again. To one degree or another, these tips are useful, but the main drawback of psychological articles, apart from the fact that they were written by psychologists, is an insufficient analysis of the causes and the victorious march of procrastination.
Reason number one.
')
So, at first there was darkness and God created the light. Rewind events a bit forward and, finally, we have the pleasure to see Vasya. Vasya has just graduated from the institute for a conditional lawyer and is eager to earn his first money. He miraculously works as an intern in a certain company, works hard, at the same time learning what the institute did not tell, and retraining what was taught wrong. Fast forward three years ahead and what do we see? Instead of the persistent trainee Vasya, before our eyes there is a typical office plankton, Vasily, who instead of plowing in from morning to evening, slowly looks at the phytones in blots and bloody accidents on YouTube. Why did Vasily change so much? It seems to be a procrastination a few years ago and did not smell, but got infected again!
The fact is that Vasily learned to work. Even with the more complex tasks that he is currently doing, he is able to complete his work in 3-4 hours. Slavery was abolished, but, in spite of this declared fact, Vasily cannot raise his fifth point and go to enjoy life. He must steadily remain under the watchful eye of his boss for all 9 hours, otherwise the free Vasily will be dismissed and will die no less freely without shelter and food. Vasily could have gone to ask for more tasks, but then there are several dilemmas at once. At first, there may be no tasks. Not every company can boast a real flow of tasks. Come Vasily and demand more work, you get the impression that you don’t need a full-time employee. The risk of being on the street or moving into the category of part-time workers is too high and our hero does not do that. Secondly, even if a company with a large number of tasks, there, most likely, there is a department. The people who work in it are not at all interested in innovation. Of course, there is a hypothetical chance to become a boss and show yourself, but the fact of the matter is that the chance is hypothetical, but the hatred and sabotage of colleagues, as well as the fact that you will plow in, getting probably the same amount is almost one hundred percent. Conclusion: Vasily does not take risks and accepts the rules of the game of the team, which, as a self-organizing system, seeks to minimize the burden and complexity on itself. Do the same in this situation? That's right, to pretend that you work diligently all 8 hours, actively arranging likes in the meantime and do not forget to remove the salary from the card. And then, physically, Vasya cannot bring himself to work any more than 8 hours, but the same 3. Procrastination is increasing and enslaving.
Reason number dvas.
But it was a prelude, only one facet of the problem, and now let's move on to the main issue. Does the factory work system have a similar effect on IT staff? And not only she. In our favorite IT, things are even worse, and here's why. The main capital and at the same time expenses in IT companies are employees. Here's an example of technology. Technique thing capricious, put powerful servers in the back room without ventilation and air conditioning, and they will burn. Plant 50 programmers in close open space - you see how they plow! Then they will burn, but this is not a big concern for the employer, he will get his profit and pay for the maintenance of the employee with interest. Under the accomplished fact that it is stupidly cheaper to contain as many slaves as you want in a small area, of course, they began to fasten various advantages, such as sociability, development of team spirit and other nonsense. All these advantages are easily refuted by elementary reasoning. Do you need a colleague to discuss an important issue? And what have openspace? Most likely, you will go into a negotiation room so that you will not be disturbed and you will not distract others. If you were sitting in different offices, than the meeting would not take place? It becomes easier only in one case, you can pull a colleague at any time to ask any trifle. In such a scenario, the company and you lose. You, because instead of learning to do something yourself, forced someone to do the difficult part of your work and safely forgot how to do it. And your more experienced colleague, admits two bugs and makes the task an hour, frantically trying to build what he would have written in 15 minutes, you do not distract him.
Someone may object, this is not an openspace problem, this is a problem of people who work there. Crafty business should not deceive the Padawan: "In the silence of the individual offices, only the accounting department works." The director is not ready to risk money, but your health, why not. It is yours. Yes, even if all people are evil, and not from the unnatural conditions in which they fell. May be. But how do you solve this problem? Among the 50 people there will definitely be talkative, nervous, screaming, in general, people for every taste. And curb them will not work. Beat them after work, dismiss? The repressions are blind, it will only get worse. As a result, we get a problem that you cannot solve, it is impossible not to notice the noise. Because it is not predictable noise, like the chirping of birds, and the people who are nearby are not your wife. Feel free to feel in such an environment is impossible for most. What does the majority choose in order to smooth out this problem? Well, of course, headphones with music. And here you are in the first trap. Like Pavlov's memorable dogs, you very soon begin to develop a reflex, listening to certain music = working. Try after a year to work without music, but no longer works. Some psychologists are optimistic about this as some advantages and even advise to create working play lists, thus setting up your body to work and barring procrastination. But in fact it is a disastrous path, the first step into the abyss. The concept itself is to fight the noise by other noise, it works only when performing the same type of work, well known to you actions. But you are entering a new professional level, where CNTRL + C CNTRL + V with Stackoverflow will not work anymore. There you suddenly have to think, and it turns out pretty bad if it happens simultaneously with your favorite vocal and instrumental ensembles.
What to do, how to be? Ostap Bender advised to think. But he, a rogue without shelter and certain occupations, should be advised, as well as easy to think, out, how much time is free. And we are successful people, so we need to work. As a result, we fall into the second trap, we begin to process. Come much earlier, leave later to do important things with a minimum number of colleagues. At first, when we are young, vigorous, we have puppy enthusiasm, assigning variables to values, it rolls. However, we again find ourselves in the embrace of procrastination, when the brain tells you - “To work during working hours? And why do you want the evening? And the night is given to sleep? ". At the same time, it doesn’t mean that from 10 to 19 o'clock we become like Mexicans and doze lazily in a hammock. We are waiting for exciting rallies, highly intelligent working correspondence, solving small problems. It turns out, we work. Even sitting looking at the cats and reading a fascinating article, “How to make friends of Lisp with Javascript”, we do not rest, the information load is dripping. And after 19, an extremely “useful” process is waiting for us: “throwing straws into a camel's hump”, where we ourselves are in the role of a desert ship. We multiply by the frequent absence of normal ventilation in open spaces (which has a beneficial effect on brain vessels and, consequently, its activity), the presence of natural light and voila! We are waiting for a surprise from our ruthless organism, which, after a couple of years of such a regime, sends a well-dosed amount of hormones, which directly say: “Seduced? Do you want to go to the movers? ” Running in the mornings, going to the gymnasium somewhat reduces the concentration of hormones, but only postpones the inevitable, namely, when you don’t need to look at the monitor for a year and a half, the interest in beating the keyboard will wake up again. To destroy all the neural connections that are associated with the creation of code and constant stress, disastrously affecting the body.
But the exciting position of the porter is waiting for us later. And now we are waiting for procrastination, because it does not matter how much we postpone business. We postpone them. And the body is such a thing, be sure to cling to the opportunity not to strain, even when it is already a deadline, but only then 9 pm.
Squeeze and recipes.
Actually, our task is to prevent procrastination! Or fix it. The tips will be logical and simple, as in the “He and She” section of Cosmopolitan magazine. Do not allow easier. First, do not go to work in openspaces. If there are no other newspapers, but experience is needed, there is no need to cosplay the slave at the gallery and sit chained to one place. Use for work quiet places, recreation areas, for example. And do not sit down to the music. The administration looks askance at you, considers it autistic, puts ultimatums to sit incessantly? Do you really need such a job? Second, do things right away. And how they did, but sit still for 4 hours, study. There are a lot of unknown things in the world and you will be surprised how much time will be enough for you. Are the authorities looking askance at you, who is learning memorable English? Makes you brush the weed? Do you really need such a job?
If you have already sat down on the bed of procrastination, then you already have a rich working experience. Therefore, you have a unique opportunity not only to avoid and heroically overcome the negative influences of the working environment, but to change it. It is not necessary to put exclusively material questions at the forefront when choosing a job. Follow the first step, do not work in open spaces, if possible rigidly. Point two is similarly required. This will keep you as an employee and productive worker for decades.
I described all these horrors known to almost everyone, so that you understand how slowly but surely a person destroys his good habits, and to work productively throughout the day is also a habit . And, more often than not, he does this not because it's so interesting to sit on Facebook. I dare to assert that the king is not real, but procrastination is imaginary. Actually, the systematic nature of the causes of procrastination, the slow development of this, does not clearly understand the relationship between the above causes and consequences. People begin to torment themselves, not understanding the traps into which they fell against their will. And consequently, they begin to struggle with themselves, without solving the real problems that led to this state of affairs, respectively, losing and resigning. Personally, I realized the influence of the stated reasons for procrastination, not because I was sitting in the openspace. And because I was sitting there, after 3 months of mostly remote work. This period helped me compare myself and my performance and rethink the reasons for my own procrastination. Actually, this is the most important thing, to understand the problem, to understand the causes, and the recipes for cure can be different. I hope my experience is useful to someone.
So, meet - the scourge of our time, procrastination. One way or another, this newfangled word became familiar to all office workers. There have even been published numerous recommendations on how to deal with it and become productive again. To one degree or another, these tips are useful, but the main drawback of psychological articles, apart from the fact that they were written by psychologists, is an insufficient analysis of the causes and the victorious march of procrastination.
Reason number one.
')
So, at first there was darkness and God created the light. Rewind events a bit forward and, finally, we have the pleasure to see Vasya. Vasya has just graduated from the institute for a conditional lawyer and is eager to earn his first money. He miraculously works as an intern in a certain company, works hard, at the same time learning what the institute did not tell, and retraining what was taught wrong. Fast forward three years ahead and what do we see? Instead of the persistent trainee Vasya, before our eyes there is a typical office plankton, Vasily, who instead of plowing in from morning to evening, slowly looks at the phytones in blots and bloody accidents on YouTube. Why did Vasily change so much? It seems to be a procrastination a few years ago and did not smell, but got infected again!
The fact is that Vasily learned to work. Even with the more complex tasks that he is currently doing, he is able to complete his work in 3-4 hours. Slavery was abolished, but, in spite of this declared fact, Vasily cannot raise his fifth point and go to enjoy life. He must steadily remain under the watchful eye of his boss for all 9 hours, otherwise the free Vasily will be dismissed and will die no less freely without shelter and food. Vasily could have gone to ask for more tasks, but then there are several dilemmas at once. At first, there may be no tasks. Not every company can boast a real flow of tasks. Come Vasily and demand more work, you get the impression that you don’t need a full-time employee. The risk of being on the street or moving into the category of part-time workers is too high and our hero does not do that. Secondly, even if a company with a large number of tasks, there, most likely, there is a department. The people who work in it are not at all interested in innovation. Of course, there is a hypothetical chance to become a boss and show yourself, but the fact of the matter is that the chance is hypothetical, but the hatred and sabotage of colleagues, as well as the fact that you will plow in, getting probably the same amount is almost one hundred percent. Conclusion: Vasily does not take risks and accepts the rules of the game of the team, which, as a self-organizing system, seeks to minimize the burden and complexity on itself. Do the same in this situation? That's right, to pretend that you work diligently all 8 hours, actively arranging likes in the meantime and do not forget to remove the salary from the card. And then, physically, Vasya cannot bring himself to work any more than 8 hours, but the same 3. Procrastination is increasing and enslaving.
Reason number dvas.
But it was a prelude, only one facet of the problem, and now let's move on to the main issue. Does the factory work system have a similar effect on IT staff? And not only she. In our favorite IT, things are even worse, and here's why. The main capital and at the same time expenses in IT companies are employees. Here's an example of technology. Technique thing capricious, put powerful servers in the back room without ventilation and air conditioning, and they will burn. Plant 50 programmers in close open space - you see how they plow! Then they will burn, but this is not a big concern for the employer, he will get his profit and pay for the maintenance of the employee with interest. Under the accomplished fact that it is stupidly cheaper to contain as many slaves as you want in a small area, of course, they began to fasten various advantages, such as sociability, development of team spirit and other nonsense. All these advantages are easily refuted by elementary reasoning. Do you need a colleague to discuss an important issue? And what have openspace? Most likely, you will go into a negotiation room so that you will not be disturbed and you will not distract others. If you were sitting in different offices, than the meeting would not take place? It becomes easier only in one case, you can pull a colleague at any time to ask any trifle. In such a scenario, the company and you lose. You, because instead of learning to do something yourself, forced someone to do the difficult part of your work and safely forgot how to do it. And your more experienced colleague, admits two bugs and makes the task an hour, frantically trying to build what he would have written in 15 minutes, you do not distract him.
Someone may object, this is not an openspace problem, this is a problem of people who work there. Crafty business should not deceive the Padawan: "In the silence of the individual offices, only the accounting department works." The director is not ready to risk money, but your health, why not. It is yours. Yes, even if all people are evil, and not from the unnatural conditions in which they fell. May be. But how do you solve this problem? Among the 50 people there will definitely be talkative, nervous, screaming, in general, people for every taste. And curb them will not work. Beat them after work, dismiss? The repressions are blind, it will only get worse. As a result, we get a problem that you cannot solve, it is impossible not to notice the noise. Because it is not predictable noise, like the chirping of birds, and the people who are nearby are not your wife. Feel free to feel in such an environment is impossible for most. What does the majority choose in order to smooth out this problem? Well, of course, headphones with music. And here you are in the first trap. Like Pavlov's memorable dogs, you very soon begin to develop a reflex, listening to certain music = working. Try after a year to work without music, but no longer works. Some psychologists are optimistic about this as some advantages and even advise to create working play lists, thus setting up your body to work and barring procrastination. But in fact it is a disastrous path, the first step into the abyss. The concept itself is to fight the noise by other noise, it works only when performing the same type of work, well known to you actions. But you are entering a new professional level, where CNTRL + C CNTRL + V with Stackoverflow will not work anymore. There you suddenly have to think, and it turns out pretty bad if it happens simultaneously with your favorite vocal and instrumental ensembles.
What to do, how to be? Ostap Bender advised to think. But he, a rogue without shelter and certain occupations, should be advised, as well as easy to think, out, how much time is free. And we are successful people, so we need to work. As a result, we fall into the second trap, we begin to process. Come much earlier, leave later to do important things with a minimum number of colleagues. At first, when we are young, vigorous, we have puppy enthusiasm, assigning variables to values, it rolls. However, we again find ourselves in the embrace of procrastination, when the brain tells you - “To work during working hours? And why do you want the evening? And the night is given to sleep? ". At the same time, it doesn’t mean that from 10 to 19 o'clock we become like Mexicans and doze lazily in a hammock. We are waiting for exciting rallies, highly intelligent working correspondence, solving small problems. It turns out, we work. Even sitting looking at the cats and reading a fascinating article, “How to make friends of Lisp with Javascript”, we do not rest, the information load is dripping. And after 19, an extremely “useful” process is waiting for us: “throwing straws into a camel's hump”, where we ourselves are in the role of a desert ship. We multiply by the frequent absence of normal ventilation in open spaces (which has a beneficial effect on brain vessels and, consequently, its activity), the presence of natural light and voila! We are waiting for a surprise from our ruthless organism, which, after a couple of years of such a regime, sends a well-dosed amount of hormones, which directly say: “Seduced? Do you want to go to the movers? ” Running in the mornings, going to the gymnasium somewhat reduces the concentration of hormones, but only postpones the inevitable, namely, when you don’t need to look at the monitor for a year and a half, the interest in beating the keyboard will wake up again. To destroy all the neural connections that are associated with the creation of code and constant stress, disastrously affecting the body.
But the exciting position of the porter is waiting for us later. And now we are waiting for procrastination, because it does not matter how much we postpone business. We postpone them. And the body is such a thing, be sure to cling to the opportunity not to strain, even when it is already a deadline, but only then 9 pm.
Squeeze and recipes.
Actually, our task is to prevent procrastination! Or fix it. The tips will be logical and simple, as in the “He and She” section of Cosmopolitan magazine. Do not allow easier. First, do not go to work in openspaces. If there are no other newspapers, but experience is needed, there is no need to cosplay the slave at the gallery and sit chained to one place. Use for work quiet places, recreation areas, for example. And do not sit down to the music. The administration looks askance at you, considers it autistic, puts ultimatums to sit incessantly? Do you really need such a job? Second, do things right away. And how they did, but sit still for 4 hours, study. There are a lot of unknown things in the world and you will be surprised how much time will be enough for you. Are the authorities looking askance at you, who is learning memorable English? Makes you brush the weed? Do you really need such a job?
If you have already sat down on the bed of procrastination, then you already have a rich working experience. Therefore, you have a unique opportunity not only to avoid and heroically overcome the negative influences of the working environment, but to change it. It is not necessary to put exclusively material questions at the forefront when choosing a job. Follow the first step, do not work in open spaces, if possible rigidly. Point two is similarly required. This will keep you as an employee and productive worker for decades.
I described all these horrors known to almost everyone, so that you understand how slowly but surely a person destroys his good habits, and to work productively throughout the day is also a habit . And, more often than not, he does this not because it's so interesting to sit on Facebook. I dare to assert that the king is not real, but procrastination is imaginary. Actually, the systematic nature of the causes of procrastination, the slow development of this, does not clearly understand the relationship between the above causes and consequences. People begin to torment themselves, not understanding the traps into which they fell against their will. And consequently, they begin to struggle with themselves, without solving the real problems that led to this state of affairs, respectively, losing and resigning. Personally, I realized the influence of the stated reasons for procrastination, not because I was sitting in the openspace. And because I was sitting there, after 3 months of mostly remote work. This period helped me compare myself and my performance and rethink the reasons for my own procrastination. Actually, this is the most important thing, to understand the problem, to understand the causes, and the recipes for cure can be different. I hope my experience is useful to someone.
Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/300418/
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