One of the biggest realizations in my career was that I needed time to do things. I'm not build for the "fast paced context switching" that so many job ads ask for. They talk about multi-tasking without ever acknowledging the lie that it is. It feels like what they're really doing is switching the work overwork for multi-tasking so that it doesn't sound like the job is terrible.
It's amazing how many job ads that seem interesting suddenly seem terrible when you swap those two words.
I recently came across two different sources talking about not needing 10x employees and just giving people the time needed to do the job right.
First, from Linus of LTT fame, this is not the first time I've heard him talk about just taking the time to do something right. Some of his designers have come from the regular fashion industry and start out baffled that he is willing to shut down and start over an entire product because they're not happy with what they're getting. He doesn't care about what season something should come out in or how much money has been put into the project. If it's not right, then they don't ship it.
The second resource is talking specifically to developers pushing back against silly deadlines imparted on them by customers and managers who have no idea what's going on. I wonder how much bad and buggy code is written simply to hit the deadline of an "agile development sprint".
I've encountered some of this recently when it comes to programmatic unit tests for code we write. While it's acknowledge that the more we write unit tests for code the more robust our code will be long-term, there is resistance to any slowdown in feature pushing so we're told we will do it "sometime later".
That translates to never.
One of the biggest things that's helped me just sit and do the work I need to do without feeling the rush is turning off all notifications. If people can't interrupt me, or get in touch with me, I can't get rushed. This is one reason I find it highly unlikely I'll ever return to an office where people can simply walk in and try to push me.
So, do you take the time needed, or are you rushing because of some arbitrary deadline imposed by someone?
Further Reading