Practice: Energized Work

[Kent Beck]

Energized Work

Work only as many hours as you can be productive and only as many hours
as you can sustain. Burning yourself out unproductively today and
spoiling the next two days' work isn't good for you or the team.

Where does this penchant for long hours come from? I'm often asked for
"scientific" evidence for the practices in XP, as if science could
somehow bear the responsibility for project success or failure. Work
hours are one area where I wish I could turn this argument around. Where
is the scientific evidence that members of a software team produce more
value in 80-hour weeks than in 40-hour weeks? Software development is a
game of insight, and insight comes to the prepared, relaxed mind.

In my own case I think I turn to long work hours as a way of grabbing
control in a situation in which I am otherwise out of control. I can't
control how the whole project is going; I can't control whether the
product sells; but I can always stay later. With enough caffeine and
sugar, I can keep typing long past the point where I have started
removing value from the project. It's easy to remove value from a
software project; but when you're tired, it's hard to recognize that
you're removing value.

When you're sick, respect yourself and the rest of your team by resting
and getting well. Taking care of yourself is the quickest way back to
energized work. You also protect the team from losing more productivity
because of illness. Coming in sick doesn't show commitment to work,
because you aren't working effectively.

You can make incremental improvements in work hours. Staying at work the
same amount of time but managing that time better is an improvement.
Declare a two-hour stretch each day as Code Time. Turn off the phones
and email notification, and just program for two hours. That may be
enough improvement for now and may set the stage for fewer hours at work
later.



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[Amir Kolsky]

And if you feel very tired, say after lunch, retire somehwere and take a
nap, 15-20 minutes of nap time will totally transform the rest of your day.

It is better that a rest area be designated so that when your brain does
turn into a sleepy mush, and your fingers start doing their epileptic dance
on the keyboard, you can take a relaxed nap, on a comfy chair, and come back
revitalized.

I know of a few habits that are more effective at increasing productivity
than the power nap...

Amir Kolsky
XP& Software




_____

From: Kent Beck [mailto:kentb-***@public.gmane.org]
Sent: Monday, November 01, 2004 9:52 AM
To: xpbookdiscussiongroup-***@public.gmane.org
Subject: [xpe2e] Practice: Energized Work


Energized Work

Work only as many hours as you can be productive and only as many hours
as you can sustain. Burning yourself out unproductively today and
spoiling the next two days' work isn't good for you or the team.

Where does this penchant for long hours come from? I'm often asked for
"scientific" evidence for the practices in XP, as if science could
somehow bear the responsibility for project success or failure. Work
hours are one area where I wish I could turn this argument around. Where
is the scientific evidence that members of a software team produce more
value in 80-hour weeks than in 40-hour weeks? Software development is a
game of insight, and insight comes to the prepared, relaxed mind.

In my own case I think I turn to long work hours as a way of grabbing
control in a situation in which I am otherwise out of control. I can't
control how the whole project is going; I can't control whether the
product sells; but I can always stay later. With enough caffeine and
sugar, I can keep typing long past the point where I have started
removing value from the project. It's easy to remove value from a
software project; but when you're tired, it's hard to recognize that
you're removing value.

When you're sick, respect yourself and the rest of your team by resting
and getting well. Taking care of yourself is the quickest way back to
energized work. You also protect the team from losing more productivity
because of illness. Coming in sick doesn't show commitment to work,
because you aren't working effectively.

You can make incremental improvements in work hours. Staying at work the
same amount of time but managing that time better is an improvement.
Declare a two-hour stretch each day as Code Time. Turn off the phones
and email notification, and just program for two hours. That may be
enough improvement for now and may set the stage for fewer hours at work
later.



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[Russell Gold]

Post by Kent Beck
Energized Work
Where does this penchant for long hours come from?

Probably from the observation that you can increase overall
productivity *in the short run* by working just a bit longer. We all
do it. The end of the day comes and you are oh so close to having your
task complete, so you work an extra hour or two and finish - and go
home in triumph. You don't really feel noticeably tired, so you figure
it is a good idea to do it. Then you get to a point where you are just
3 or 4 hours short - and it goes on. It becomes really unsatisfying to
leave when you think you could feel much better if you stay a bit
longer. Then it feels irresponsible to leave when you are behind
schedule, and you might be able to catch up a bit by working longer
hours.

And of course, to managers who think they are running a sausage
factory, it is a pure win to extract more hours from exempt
employees...


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[Steve Hayes]

Post by Russell Gold

Post by Kent Beck
Energized Work
Where does this penchant for long hours come from?

Probably from the observation that you can increase overall
productivity *in the short run* by working just a bit longer. We all
do it. The end of the day comes and you are oh so close to having your
task complete, so you work an extra hour or two and finish - and go
home in triumph. You don't really feel noticeably tired, so you figure
it is a good idea to do it. Then you get to a point where you are just
3 or 4 hours short - and it goes on. It becomes really unsatisfying to
leave when you think you could feel much better if you stay a bit
longer. Then it feels irresponsible to leave when you are behind
schedule, and you might be able to catch up a bit by working longer
hours.
And of course, to managers who think they are running a sausage
factory, it is a pure win to extract more hours from exempt
employees...

Sometimes the organisation overall has an ethos that "more hours" =
"more commitment". Perhaps this even makes sense in some divisions on
the organisation. Conversely, in this word view, fewer hours = less
commitment, and we don't want to have less committed employees, do we? I
think it's also partly about control, and partly about envy - people who
are already suffering from long hours don't like seeing other people
working less.
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[Dale Emery]

Hi Kent,

Where is the scientific evidence that members of a software
team produce more value in 80-hour weeks than in 40-hour
weeks?

I once read an article called "The $2,000 Hour" about the high
cost of working beyond a sustainable pace. I can't find my copy
to give the details of what Cooper says. Google turns up this
publication info:

Kenneth G. Cooper, "The $2,000 Hour," IEEE Engineering Management
Review, Vol. 22, No. 4, Winter 1994, pp. 12-23.

Dale
--
Dale Emery, Consultant
Collaborative Leadership for Software People
Web: http://www.dhemery.com
Weblog: http://www.dhemery.com/cwd

Worry is the interest paid on trouble before it falls due.
--William Ralph Inge


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[Tim King]

Post by Kent Beck
Work only as many hours as you can be productive and only as many
hours as you can sustain... Where does this penchant for long hours
come from? I'm often asked for "scientific" evidence... Work hours
are one area where I wish I could turn this argument around. Where is
the scientific evidence that members of a software team produce more
value in 80-hour weeks than in 40-hour weeks?

This always seemed axiomatic to me. Think about it. At one extreme, I
spend zero time doing work, and I get nothing done. At the other
extreme, I work 24 hours a day, and in my younger days I could even keep
that up for a couple days. But if I keep going, fairly quickly I begin
to experience disorientation, then hallucinations, then (so the experts
say) death. And again, I get nothing done. (Because I'm dead.)

So it seems fairly intuitive that somewhere between the extremes,
there's an optimum. The optimum may occur at different points for
different people doing different kinds of work. But who said that 60 or
80 hours is more optimum than 40 for any given individual software
developer? Now factor in team dynamics and the problem becomes even more
complex.

(I've done _measured_ 60 hour work weeks with higher than average
concentration on development. Based on my experience, I guess that most
developers who claim to be working 60 hours a week don't measure their
time, aren't doing 60 hours sustained, and don't know how long they
actually work or how they spend that work time. After one and a half of
these weeks, my brain was turning into mashed potatoes.)

I don't know why developers--or even managers--are so fond of long
hours. It might be the peer pressure or the will to deliver, especially
if one is on the critical path. But whatever the reason, it probably
rests on the false assumption that more hours necessarily means faster
progress.


One "aha" moment came for me just recently. (It seems some of us never
learn.) It was about 3 o'clock, and I had been working since 6 in the
morning. This was on the feet of a long week following another long
week, and I had been looking forward to taking a "comp day" or two of
reduced hours to recuperate. But this particular afternoon, an issue
came up. The code we already had wasn't working right, because of a
change in another subsystem.

Trying to discuss a course of action, I was literally having trouble
just putting together simple English sentences. So I said I was going
home, with the additional note that I had to pick up my kids. (Which was
true.) An engineer from another group asked if I was coming back later.
I said no.

At first I felt guilty for leaving only at 3, even though I had come in
earlier than anyone else. But I consoled myself: if I'm impared enough
that I can't talk straight, I certainly shouldn't be doing software
design. And then I suddenly realized--as if I had never known it
before--that no problem, however serious, is so critical that it can't
wait a few hours for me to get a decent night's sleep. I do not work in
an E.R. No one will die. We probably won't even lose any revenue.

As it turned out, my efforts weren't key to addressing the issue anyhow.

So...

Post by Kent Beck
Burning yourself out unproductively today and spoiling the next two
days' work isn't good for you or the team.

Amen to that.

-TimK


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[Michael Feathers]

Post by Tim King
I don't know why developers--or even managers--are so fond of long
hours. It might be the peer pressure or the will to deliver, especially
if one is on the critical path. But whatever the reason, it probably
rests on the false assumption that more hours necessarily means faster
progress.

I think that many people use hours worked as their own version of "big
visible chart" to show how committed they are. In many organizations
people use hours (consciously or not) as a way of showing that they are
committed enough to be a manager. In others, to show that they are so
committed that they shouldn't be laid off. The key thing is to notice
is that the behavior is there because it has worked in the past or
someone thinks it will work in the future. I have seen cases where
people do start to work more sensible hours just because they are
confident that their effort is apparent due to tracking. I think it
pays to see overwork as a signalling device, albeit a pretty poor one.

Michael Feathers
www.objectmentor.com





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[Nigel Thorne]

Personally I get demitovated when I feel I am not achieving anything.
Demotivation leads to procrastination which leads in a vicious circle
to un-productivity (if there is such a word).

What I find helps is to write on a card each thing I am trying to
achieve, and when they are done, move them to a 'Completed tasks'
space on my wall. Over time this space gets more and more crowded. I
can't look at it without seeing that I am a productive member of the
team, which is enough to kick me back into Energised Work mode again.

I use this as my Big Visible Chart, and not my time sheet. I reason,
the customer is paying for things to get done, not the time I sit in
this chair.

Nigel Thorne
http://www.nigelthorne.com


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[Laurent Bossavit]

Michael,

Post by Michael Feathers
I think that many people use hours worked as their own version of "big
visible chart" to show how committed they are.

That, and the rest of your post: GIWIST.

Cheers,

-[Laurent]-
Truth emerges more readily from error than from confusion.
Francis Bacon




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[Forrest Chang]

A quick thought while I have a chance (sorry for the
incoherence)

I become more and more sure that XP is /not/ "do
these N things all the
time". Yet I remain strong in the feeling that there
is a "thing" that I'm
doing.

Back to things that get more often expressed in
things eastern, this line is related to something I
will be writing comparing skill at s/w developement
w/development of gongfu and how XP ties in closely.

I have a direct parallel in trying to teach a certain
aspect of neijin. There is something called "zhong
qi" (lit. central qi), that in fact is a certain state
of the body. When you first learn it, you get a set
of guidelines to follow. However, there are always a
number of things that happen that hinders the
development.

- folks focus on the guidelines as the goal, not
realizing that 1) the guidelines are there to bring
about a certain result 2) they're just guidelines
The guidelines also usually apply in most
situations, but not all, certain movements seem to
flagrantly violate the guidelines, which they do, but
the body state of zhong qi is there. This is
exacerbated by the fact that folks don't see how such
a posture can maintain that body skills.

I see this related to the shu ha ri thing,
beginner's need the guidelines, skilled practioners do
not. Thoughts at the skilled level can be not
applicable to the beginner and sometimes confusing.

Forrest

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[John Goodsen]

I become more and more sure that XP is /not/ "do
these N things all the
time". Yet I remain strong in the feeling that there
is a "thing" that I'm
doing.
I see this related to the shu ha ri thing,
beginner's need the guidelines, skilled practioners do
not. Thoughts at the skilled level can be not
applicable to the beginner and sometimes confusing.

This sounds a lot like the 3 levels of listening model as well.
You see it all the time when a person is developing skills.

At level 1, there are definitely "things" we do. It's the recipe
that is used to introduce us to the activity. We follow the recipe
consistently and eventually want to vary the recipe (level 2).
Eventually you evolve to level 3 where you are not really
conscious of the specific detailed decisions you are making,
you are "just doing it" - you are a guru/master in the skill.

You can read more on the wiki at

http://c2.com/cgi/wiki?ThreeLevelsOfAudience

----
John Goodsen RADSoft / Better Software Faster
jgoodsen-***@public.gmane.org Extreme Programmer and Coach
http://www.radsoft.com Enterprise Java and .NET Solutions



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[Paul Karsten]

Reminds me of what Ron said in Calgary this year:

"The practices are not XP, the practices are how you learn XP."

Post by John Goodsen

I become more and more sure that XP is /not/ "do
these N things all the
time". Yet I remain strong in the feeling that there
is a "thing" that I'm
doing.
I see this related to the shu ha ri thing,
beginner's need the guidelines, skilled practioners do
not. Thoughts at the skilled level can be not
applicable to the beginner and sometimes confusing.

This sounds a lot like the 3 levels of listening model as well.
You see it all the time when a person is developing skills.
At level 1, there are definitely "things" we do. It's the recipe
that is used to introduce us to the activity. We follow the recipe
consistently and eventually want to vary the recipe (level 2).
Eventually you evolve to level 3 where you are not really
conscious of the specific detailed decisions you are making,
you are "just doing it" - you are a guru/master in the skill.
You can read more on the wiki at
http://c2.com/cgi/wiki?ThreeLevelsOfAudience
----
John Goodsen RADSoft / Better Software Faster
http://www.radsoft.com Enterprise Java and .NET Solutions
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[Forrest Chang]

A quick thought while I have a chance (sorry for the
incoherence)

I become more and more sure that XP is /not/ "do
these N things all the
time". Yet I remain strong in the feeling that there
is a "thing" that I'm
doing.

Back to things that get more often expressed in
things eastern, this line is related to something I
will be writing comparing skill at s/w developement
w/development of gongfu and how XP ties in closely.

I have a direct parallel in trying to teach a certain
aspect of neijin. There is something called "zhong
qi" (lit. central qi), that in fact is a certain state
of the body. When you first learn it, you get a set
of guidelines to follow. However, there are always a
number of things that happen that hinders the
development.

- folks focus on the guidelines as the goal, not
realizing that 1) the guidelines are there to bring
about a certain result 2) they're just guidelines
The guidelines also usually apply in most
situations, but not all, certain movements seem to
flagrantly violate the guidelines, which they do, but
the body state of zhong qi is there. This is
exacerbated by the fact that folks don't see how such
a posture can maintain that body skills.

I see this related to the shu ha ri thing,
beginner's need the guidelines, skilled practioners do
not. Thoughts at the skilled level can be not
applicable to the beginner and sometimes confusing.

Forrest

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[Forrest Chang]

Post by Kent Beck
Where does this penchant for long hours come from?

I think it's related to the fact that in the more
entrenched process they try to reduce the programmer
to "plug compatible programming units", so if 2 units
working 8 hours a day product 16 units of work, then
doubling it should double the output. These numbers
probably make a really good chart for management.
Also long numbers becomes a badge of honor -- "I
worked 100 hours this week...", "Oh yeah, I worked 120
hours, while immersed in a vat of acid...". Mgmt will
reward these supposed acts of heroism, instead of
asking the "what went wrong that you had to work 120
hours?"

XP is the only process that seems to encompass so
many of the human aspects, from motivation, to working
together, not exhausting yourself, etc..

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[Clarke Ching]

Post by Forrest Chang
Also long numbers becomes a badge of honor -- "I

worked 100 hours this week...", "Oh yeah, I worked 120
hours, while immersed in a vat of acid...". Mgmt will
reward these supposed acts of heroism, instead of
asking the "what went wrong that you had to work 120
hours?"

You might want to take a look at this HBR article "Beware the Busy Manager"

http://www.orgcoach.net/pdf/R0202Dp2.pdf

"Our findings on managerial behaviour should frighten you: Fully 90% of
managers squander their time in all sorts of ineffective activities. In
other words, a mere 10% of managers spend their time in a committed,
purposeful, and reflective manner. This article will help you identify
which managers in your organisation are making a real difference and which
just look or sound busy. Moreover, it will show you how to improve the
effectiveness of all your managers - and maybe even your own."