HBR Article on Productivity

http://hbr.org/2011/05/being-more-productive/ar/1

Nice article on productivity. I like this passage on why you shouldn't treat your employees like they are expendable:

"Tony, you’ve also written about how the cultures of some organizations encourage people to work in ways that are unhealthful and ultimately limit productivity. Why do companies do that?

Schwartz: I remember giving a talk at a prestigious investment bank several years ago. At the end a partner stood up and said, “Mr. Schwartz, this is all very interesting, but we have a thousand people knocking on the door who can’t wait to come in and replace the people we’ve burned out. Why should we worry about giving people time to renew? When they burn out, we just bring in a fresh new group of people, who are thrilled to get the jobs.” I’d argue that in knowledge work, you get more out of a person in the third or fifth or seventh year than out of the replacement you brought in because the first worker collapsed in year two. This is a broader issue that deserves attention. We can’t keep pushing people to their limits and expect them to produce at a sustainably high level of excellence. The companies that build true competitive advantage in the years ahead will be those that shift from seeking to get more out of people to investing in better meeting their needs."