We need more producers

“That department of about 5-10 people creates enough work to employ about 200 people”

That was a comment my dad had made to me one summer day while I was working at the same company.  He was talking about the 5-10 engineers that he managed.  The designs those guys did kept all the manufacturing people employed, all the QA testers, all the shipping guys etc.  

That seemingly innocuous comment has come back to me this week as I realize how few people are actually producing.  I think in larger companies it’s probably even worse.  You have people that live their lives in meeting after meeting.  How can the be producing if they’re scheduled for another 8 hours of meetings tomorrow?  Worse yet, how many of those meetings are either in preparation for other meetings, or contradicting previous meetings?

We don’t need more analysis, more idea people, more yes men, more coordinators.  We need more people who produce.  I don’t even care what you produce, whether it’s software, hardware, widgets, law briefs etc.  Innovation and advancement isn’t accomplished by meetings.  It’s achieved by producing.

Although I see it constantly in business, that’s just a microcosm.  The state of politics in the US is one in which if we had someone who could produce result, he or she would be elected with probably 75% of the vote (I’m assuming there’s a 25% hardline demographic.)

Stop consuming, and start producing.