#70: Too many leaders focus on long-hours
And why you should focus on the outcome instead
Hey friends,
Welcome to the 70th edition of the “Level Up Ladder” newsletter.
It was a fun and busy week, so I got delayed writing this newsletter (wow, 70th edition already!).
As we had a shorter week at work because of a public holiday in Romania, we decided to go to the Danube Delta and work from there for a couple of days.
The Delta is one of the most magnificent places in Europe; it was designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1991 due to its outstanding universal value, both ecologically and culturally. It is the home of 5,500 species of flora and fauna and over 300 species of birds, making it one of the richest areas for biodiversity in Europe.
Also, it’s not the best place to be if you don’t like eating fish.
And, I’m not a big fish fan.
As you might imagine, 90% of the food served in restaurants comes from the water. As I was brought up like a Romanov prince, I hate getting my hands dirty from the little bones so I had to struggle to find things to eat.
Food aside, which I know is my issue, the trip was great. On our free days, we took a couple of boat trips through the canals and it was a fun time.
As the Delta is close to my birthplace, we also took the opportunity to visit my mom and my sister’s, as we hadn’t seen them since Easter. We had dinner at a Turkish restaurant and went for a long walk (definitely my longest walk with them, ever). It was fun seeing them, especially since my niece will leave town for university in a month or so.
Oh, how fast they grow!
Now, we are back in Bucharest; it’s good to be home, but not for long, as we have another vacation coming up next Friday. And I can’t wait to get away from the heat, again.
Time-driven performance vs output-driven performance
Yesterday, I saw this LinkedIn post about Starbuck’s new CEO and his work schedule, so this got me thinking about how we measure performance.
It’s interesting to still see many managers approach performance from a time perspective. What’s even more interesting is the fact that many employees equate time spent in the office with productivity and results.
Let me be clear: I am not saying that working hard is not the way to go, quite the opposite. As I wrote in the newsletter below, the only way you can start a great career is by putting in a lot of effort.
On the other hand, if you put in a lot of time, that doesn’t mean necessarily that you will also have very good results.
Let me put it this way, to be more frank: you could be in the office all day and still have very few results.
If you’re coming in the office at 9 AM, you have coffee for an hour, work for an hour, go for lunch, go on social media after lunch, work a bit more, go for another coffee outside, all while taking a cigarette break every hour, you could leave home at 7 and people would say: wow, what a hard working person.
Let’s be honest, we all have these colleagues, and I was one of them myself, I cannot lie. I had times in my early career when I would do very little and spend most of my time in the office doing other things.
And I almost lost my job because of this, but that’s another story.
So, why do managers still care about time in the office?
First of all, because this is how employee performance was traditionally measured.
Time-driven performance, rooted in the industrial age, assumes that more time spent on work correlates with higher productivity. In a time-driven performance culture, success is often measured by how long an employee works, how many hours they log, and their physical or virtual presence in the office.
For many years, this approach has been the norm, particularly in industries where tasks are repetitive and time-consuming.
When your work is physical, it has very little potential to scale. If you are producing 50 nails per hours, you cannot optimize to the point where you produce 100 nails per hour, so if you want to do that, you just need to work an extra hour.
However, in the tech industry, where creativity, innovation, and problem-solving are key, the limitations of time-driven performance are increasingly apparent.
In contrast, output-driven performance shifts the focus from the time spent on tasks to the results achieved. This approach measures success by the quality and quantity of work produced, rather than the hours logged. Output-driven performance is particularly well-suited to the tech industry, where the ability to deliver tangible results—whether it’s code, product features, or problem-solving—is crucial.
In an output-driven culture, employees are evaluated based on the value they bring to the organization. This might include the number of completed projects, the impact of their work on business goals, or their contributions to team success.
There is, however, a very big issue with output-driven performance: defining clear metrics for performance.
In the traditional approach, this was simple. You worked longer hours, you deserved more. It’s easy to track time; you have a punch card, and your time is recorded automatically.
So, if managers want to incentivize outputs, they need to take the time and define those metrics.
And this is harder than it seems, especially when working in tech:
you cannot define it as lines of code, as efficient code is short
neither as number of bugs solved, as the complexity differs
implemented features? same as with the bugs
It’s a challenge, for sure, and I will come up in a future newsletter about some metrics that I consider good enough for tech people.
Final thoughts
In the end, managers should define what works for them
When you, yourself, are still in the office at 8 PM, it’s easy to consider the people in your team who are also there are high-performers. Though that is not usually the case.
In the tech industry, where innovation and agility are essential, output-driven performance often offers a more effective way to measure and drive success. However, it’s important not to entirely dismiss the role of time-driven metrics, especially in roles or situations where consistent effort over time is necessary.
Ultimately, the goal is to foster an environment where employees are empowered to deliver their best work.
What’s important for your manager—time put in or objective results?
How about you as a manager? What do you care about?
Please let me know in the comments section!
Recommendations
1/ Notion Charts
Notion, which is my favorite productivity tool, just added charts to their database view and it’s pretty neat. This will probably enhance my second brain, and I will show you this soon enough.
2/ New York Times’ list of top books of the 21st century
3/ ’s Substack
A great resource for people who want to become Engineering Managers.
This post is about a great challenge you face as you become a Leader in Tech.
Thank you for reading, and I hope you’ll join me in the comments section for further discussions!
I hope you have a great weekend!
Leo
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Thank you so much for the mention! Appreciate the support.
Great article. I'm looking forward to the metrics to measure performance in an outcome-driven culture. People want to be measured for their outcome/output but the challenge I experience on the ground is that their reasoning and discussion are still around input E.g. I couldn't figure out the new library, I had to go drop my son, etc.