Improve technical thinking: focus on effectiveness in the organization

Introduction: For technology development students, we often face some typical growth problems in organizations, such as: What is the ability to think about technology? The technology reaches a certain level, what is the next stage of growth? How to avoid involution? How to improve your own influence in the organization? To solve these growth problems, the most important thing is to change your thinking mode, and switch from the mode that efficiency and effectiveness and .

Efficiency first in the industrial age

In industrial society, whether it is a worker operating a machine or a soldier on the front line, they only need to pay attention to efficiency to evaluate the pros and cons: a worker who produces 100 standard screws per hour is better than a worker who produces 50 standard screws per hour. The workers are outstanding; the soldiers who can implement the orders of the chief in the first time are better than the procrastinating soldiers; in the industrial age, the standard of judging good and bad is more concerned about doing things right instead of doing the right things.

Effectiveness in the Information Age

In the information age, knowledge workers no longer rely on muscles or flexible hands. They need to use their own wisdom more. At this time, the evaluation criteria have changed: an engineer who writes 500 lines of code a day is not necessarily more than 200 lines of code a day. The level of engineers is high. Real evaluation of the merits of this case study is not efficiency, but work effectiveness , only true wisdom is these organizations generate value and contribution makes sense. If a knowledge-intensive project is wrong at the beginning of its design, then even if its technical architecture is designed to be perfect, it does not make any sense. In the information age, judging criteria, more concerned do the right thing , rather than to do things right, because only do the right thing, to make work effectively.

People will tend to do things their own good and easy, like others tell us how to do things, and this time it is easy to fall into the efficiency trap, neglect to consider whether the thing itself is valid. When doing things again, might as well ask yourself two questions, whether this event brings new opportunities, whether it solves the old problems, because opportunities, the disappearance of the problems is the core indicator of effectiveness measurement .
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How to measure effectiveness

Effectiveness cannot be measured by quantity, nor can it be measured by the cost of inputs. The measurement of effectiveness ultimately depends on the measurement of results. These results should be the direct value created, pioneering innovation, or cutting-edge technology reserves, and the solution of core problems. OKR and KPI should be a commitment to core contribution results, that is, a commitment to effectiveness.

Individual effectiveness

Knowledge workers outside the organization, or independent individuals, basically do not have problems with effectiveness. For example: For an individual doctor, the patient's consultation brings all the problems in. The doctor only needs to solve the patient's illness, and his medical knowledge can be effectively used in the process; for a free-working programmer, The timely delivery of requirements is a perfect proof of the effectiveness of its expertise.

Effectiveness in the organization

In contrast with the independent individual, individuals within the organization is facing on the issue of the validity of the self uncontrollable multiple realities factors:

1. An individual's large amount of time belongs to other people's , and may also face a large number of urgent matters, and it is easy to lack time for forward thinking.
2. The measure of effectiveness depends on the judgment of the organization . Only when the organization recognizes and utilizes your contribution can it reflect value.
3. In the organization, it is easy to pay attention to internal information, while ignores external development and makes limitation judgments.

For example, expert doctors in a hospital organization spend a lot of time connecting with nurses, deans, and pharmaceutical institutions, and their available time is greatly compressed. At the same time, for an organization, the doctor’s contribution that is truly concerned may be How many new doctors are trained by expert doctors, not how many patients are treated. It is necessary to deal with the training of newcomers and the communication within the organization. Expert doctors are likely to ignore the development of external medical technology and gradually lose their expert advantages.

For these reasons, exerting one's own effectiveness in an organization poses greater challenges to individuals. This has nothing to do with the organization. As long as it is in the organization, the challenge of effectiveness will always exist.
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Behind these difficulties, the organization actually brings greater opportunities to the individuals in it. The organization can give individual talents the opportunity to add value . In independent individuals, effectiveness cannot be replicated, while in an organization, a thing that has been proven effective can be promoted and reused to achieve effectiveness superimposition. So in an organization, it is difficult to be able to prove effectiveness, but effective things must not be buried.

How to improve self-effectiveness

• Look at the problem from multiple angles

  • How difficult it is to describe this matter.
  • How difficult is it to produce this.
  • How difficult is it to achieve this.
  • How difficult it is to prove things right.

• Understand the essence of one's own behavior

  • Understand and accept your own behavior, but realize that it is a natural reaction of your subconscious and emotions.
  • Train to use the logical areas of your brain.

• Reasonably allocate time, record, manage, and arrange time:

  • Establish a reasonable system to save communication costs.
  • Dare to refuse things that don’t have to be done at all, and do that is a waste of time and do not help the results.
  • Dare to delegate power to activities or meetings that can be participated by others without affecting the results.
  • Make good predictions, avoid detours, and focus on important but not urgent matters.
  • Reasonably arrange troops to reduce unnecessary management costs.

• result-oriented, attach importance to contact with the outside world and contribution to the outside world:

  • Clear goals and combine your work with long-term goals.
  • Focus on what you can do, not what the organization can bring to you.
  • Try to understand the pain points of the business and users.
  • Establish a good interpersonal relationship with colleagues and partners, and seek inspiration in communication.
  • Cultivate technical vision and try to define existing problems from a higher perspective, from the internal and external dimensions of the organization.

• good at using the strengths of oneself and others:

  • Focus on the strengths of others, not the weaknesses, seek cooperation, and solve problems with your strength.
  • Pay attention to performance appraisal, follow up results, and formulate KPIs and OKRs to be specific and measurable.
  • Control the quality of recruitment, so that fresh blood can always bring new opportunities to the team.
  • Pay attention to the strengths of TL and find effective ways of communication.
  • Setting high goals for yourself and others not letting me do it is generally an excuse for inertia and lack of courage.
  • I know my work ability and habits best, do what I am good at and seek cooperation.
  • Good use of management methods, through organizing meetings or establishing mechanisms, to promote results and output.

• focuses on a few important things:

  • Set aside a lot of time for important things, put important things in front, and only do one thing at a time.
  • Consider the importance set by others as a constraint, not a decisive factor.
  • Pay attention to opportunities, have the courage to do what you think is a priority, rather than prioritize others, dare to be the master of time and tasks.
  • Don't invest energy in things that don't produce value, invest in creating new opportunities for the future.

• Strive to make high-quality decisions:

  • The pursuit of effectiveness is not the pursuit of efficiency, and cannot be satisfied with the execution of orders. Knowledge workers must be able to make decisions about effectiveness and take responsibility for making contributions.
  • Decision-making starts with insights, which are hypotheses that have yet to be verified. To make a decision, you must first have your own insights, and then listen to the insights of others, from the insights, seek facts, and make decisions based on facts.
  • When encountering a problem, assume that the problem is a superficial imagination, not satisfied with the superficial, drill into the fundamental problem, attach importance to strategic problems, and appropriately despise "solving problems."
  • Study what the correct decision is, not what the accepted decision is. Action or non-action must be carried out to the end, not halfway through.
  • Decision-making must have a variety of pre-set evaluation criteria, and ultimately use the most reasonable criteria for feedback measurement, attach importance to the feedback of the implementation process, and confirm the correctness and effectiveness.

Effectiveness is a self-training

Effectiveness is not a course, but a self-training. In self-training, always focus on the creation of value and contribution, so that individuals can create broader development for the organization, and the development of the organization will eventually create a larger platform for effective people to create more opportunities.

Back to the questions in the introduction: What is technical thinking? The technology reaches a certain level, what is the next stage of growth? How to avoid involution? How to improve your own influence in the organization? I think that improving the ability to judge the effectiveness of the current stage may be the unified answer to these questions.

Author: ES2049 / Dell

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