Efficiency vs Effectiveness - A Productivity Tip

Confusing efficiency with effectiveness struck me as I read a post, Subtle Self-Sabotage at Work, on Water Cooler Wisdom. This post describes some important self-sabotage practices that you might be doing at work. Confusing efficiency with effectiveness caught my eye and has been stuck in my head since reading that post.

This topic directly affects me, many others and strikes at the core of our changing work environment.

Before we begin, some brief definitions are required.

Efficiency is defined as "accomplishment of or ability to accomplish a job with a minimum expenditure of time and effort."

Effectiveness is defined as "adequate to accomplish a purpose; producing the intended or expected result."

Let's look at efficiency vs effectiveness in real world settings.

SMS (text messaging) vs Calling

I remember a commercial, a few years ago, that featured two young people in a loud room. They yelled at each other, but couldn't hear. Then one pulled out their phone and texted a message to the other. Bam! The message was delivered, despite the noise.

In this situation text messaging was efficient and effective. It was efficient because it required less effort to type than to yell (especially if the other person can't hear you). Also, it was effective because the goal was reached - you communicated a message to your friend.

To me, it seems that text messaging has moved away from practical situations like this. Now text messaging is used to avoid talking to people.

For example, I was planning New Year's Eve with a friend and we were texting each other. After about 20 minutes of this, we decided to call each other and finished planning our night quickly. We should have called each other from the beginning. In this example, texting was less efficient, because it took longer to type than speak. Effectiveness was roughly the same in either case because we were communicating.

In your personal and professional life take a moment to think about efficiency and effectiveness when you communicate. It's only better to switch to a new medium if you can communicate the same message faster, or communicate the message better.

Driving Traffic

I drive a fair amount of traffic to this blog and http://www.beYOU.tv (where I work). It is always tempting to write short articles or posts because they're efficient. Short posts take less time than long posts. However, what is the effectiveness of these posts?

You may have noticed that I write fewer posts here, but each post is longer and more substantial. I find that longer posts, that provide some real information, outperform short posts. In other words, long posts are more effective because they generate more traffic.

This is a good example of how some people work more, but accomplish less. If I write 5 short posts in the same time it takes to write one long post and the traffic generated is equal, then the short posts are more efficient. But, if the one long post generates more traffic, then it is more effective becuase more output (traffic) was generated.

Effectiveness is what you are paid for! Effectiveness is getting things done. Only when you are effective should you try to speed up the process (efficiency). There is no point in doing something faster if it isn't generating results. No matter how quickly you multiply a number by zero, you still get zero.

This is where I see people get into trouble. Many people seem to be working harder and harder, yet they don't get any more work done. Work is all about getting things done. A simple "to do" list could help these folks a lot. Simply place tasks on your "to do" list, then work to cross them off. Stop checking your email, blackberry, ect. Just get things done!

Remote vs In Person

In college, I had the option to take some classes online. One of my major concerns was are they effective as regular classes - do you learn as much? The answer is no, they aren't. They are close, but nothing is comparable to being in a classroom with an instructor.

It's harder to ask questions online and there is always some type of technical mishap, which wastes time. However, online classes are efficient because they save the student time.

In a work setting, this is comparable to meeting in person, on the phone, a teleconference or not meeting but communicating through twitter, email or text messaging. Evaluate the impact of your meetings. Are people understanding the information that is presented? If not, you should reconsider how you meet.

The Point

The fruits of your work, what you produce, is what will make you great - this is how effective you are. The speed at which you produce your work, efficiency, is also important. But the work itself must be making a difference, it must be effective, otherwise there is no point in being more efficient.

Do not allow yourself to get tangled in "busy work". Organize your tasks and time, then go down your list and complete the tasks. When you complete your tasks, you are being effective, now speed up that process to become efficient, but make sure you remain effective.