Measure results, not hours

This is something that the large clients for legal services have been advocating for a while. It is generally called project based billing. Many legal fields operate more or less on project based billing nowadays, even if they technically operate on hourly billing. (Usually the billing is hourly but there is understanding about how long each project should take).

I think this is very dangerous and tends to reward mediocre work. But it is probably inevitable too, because in the legal field a large client will usually eventually get what he/she wants.

This article actually shows a big danger about project based billing. Notice his second piece of advice (Reduce Reading). Can you imagine having a lawyer who thinks he does not have to read everything to the end? This will end badly for some poor client.

It's broader than productivity alone. A team that's working long hours can be perceived as more committed, dedicated and in a fighting mood.

It's really all about team dynamics and corporate culture.

See, successful entrepreneurs are, more often than not, binary beings that totally devote themselves to their company and expect other the other people in the team to do so as well. Someone can come and work for 5 hours and accomplish just the same as he would over 11 hours but it may send the wrong message to the group - that the company is secondary to personal life and that just meeting your obligations is really enough, no need to do beyond that.

Furthermore, some people wouldn't be able to accomplish the same over a short working day; how would that make them feel spending 11 hour days in the office, while their colleague leaves after 6 hours and still gets appreciated?

The author is absolutely correct.

I can't begin to tell you how much this bugs me. It's not about how many hours it takes to do something, it's about the value created from the service or product. Is the answer the author has given worth more or less because his knoweldge and expertise allow him to provide an answer quickly? With hourly billing, it's always less. The client sees it as trivial and the employer sees little or no value.

I see it the other way. Being able to provide an answer or solution quickly shouild be rewarded. Being held accountable for correct and timely results are much more important than simply clocking hours.

Billing hourly, paying employees hourly, etc. are all counter-productive to incentivising knowledge workers to excel. Even the honest ones.

How does a manager measure results between two guys, one that has 18 very easy todos done, vs a guy with 3 very difficult todos done when the manager can't even comprehend the difference between the difficultly level of the tasks. Then the easy task guy looks like a rockstar, and the rockstar problem solver looks like a lazy douche.

The bad manager cannot tell the difference, and usually ends up looking like an idiot to his director.

The problem with management types vs. individual contributors is that managers have more time in the org and usually have friends who can bail them out. So a bad worker will get fired, but a bad manager will get reassigned or even promoted.