The difference between productivity and efficiency

The holy grail of workdays has two much-mentioned words: productivity and efficiency. Both are valuable and help in the great goal of any job, whether you are an entrepreneur or part of an organization: finish the day's work, and then enjoy the fruits of the work. In 2019 it is not exactly a grace to be workaholic.

The concepts of productivity and efficiency can even be operationally contradictory, but the irony is that we need a balance of both.

Be productive

Productivity would measure that, for example, in your eight legal hours of work you have met the greatest number of goals if not all your pending ones. A productive day would be one where the list is cleared, or even more problems are solved. On an unproductive day, items from the initial (or added) list would remain pending.

Being efficient

We are already getting into the reasons for the debate. For example, being efficient in theory requires solving the slopes but if there were shortcuts or traps along the way to achieve it, it would matter little since it was finally achieved. This lends itself to breaking various rules in pursuit of the end goal.

Startups have something of this mentality, at least the tech ones, with their poster child on Facebook and their motto: Break things and move fast.

The difference

To be efficient would be to publish 1 video with a million views, instead of a hundred videos with 10,000 views, which by sheer effort would feel like something productive. Same end result, different route.

It's the old quality versus quantity debate.

In this essay on the subject, they give a great example:

• A team of software developers fell victim to the crunch time of your company, for the sake of productivity.
• They worked overtime to achieve a production goal. Their reputation as achievers is so great that they are asked for another project.
• What is not taken into account is that the staff I'd be tired and longing for a vacation
• This is how productivity would ruin a project.

Efficiency, the essay says, has more abstract obstacles: order and rules, for example. An example would be Uber, the app, which when reaching new places tends to violate its mobility code in order to arrive before its close competition, in order to create loyalty in the market. What in startup language is understood as disruption, and in theory is efficient, would be an example of focusing on efficiency. But it can bring annoyances by breaking the rules, just like Uber.

The emphasis on productivity can generate burn out in teams.

Focus on which one is better?

No way of thinking, since the ideal is a balance. While efficiency usually requires more teamwork to achieve a series of goals, or productivity measures your effort in a specific number of actions.

Both capacities have to be developed.