Work-Life Innovation |

I sense a shifting in the force! Something is rotten is the state of productivity, and efficiency don’t live here…anymore.

Yep, the game is up. We no longer want (or need) to work 70 hour weeks, spend 15 years negotiating a complex corporate hierarchy and wait 40 years to experience the joys(?) of retirement. We want our lives back, and we want them back now.

There’s an old story about a corporate executive on holiday on a stunning island off Mexico who meets a fisherman. The exec says to the fisherman, “You have a good little business here, you should expand”. “Why should I do that?” says the fisherman. “So, you can earn more money and buy more boats. That, way you would be able to catch more fish.”. “Why would I want to do that?” replies the fisherman. “Well, so you could sell them and earn more money, expand your business even further, maybe even buy up some of the other fishing businesses here and earn even more money. Then, eventually you could sell it all, retire and go live on some beautiful island somewhere!”. “Hmm” says the fisherman, scratching his chin. “you mean like this one?”. “Oh…” says the exec.

Is the fisherman a slacker? Or has he got it right. What are we really working for anyway? Is it really worth the candle to defer your life to some uncertain future in which your too old to do the things you’d love to do now?

Two Models of Productivity

The old model of productivity was all about doing more and doing it more efficiently, so that you could well, do more! This is life in a hamster wheel where the only goal is to optimise the spinning of the wheel. The spinning goes on until you’re told to get off the wheel at 65, given your ‘prize’ of 15 or so years, and sent off to try to recover from the whole ordeal, hopefully before before you slip off your (by then) old and rusty mortal coil.

The new model is all about understanding what would make for a great life now, eliminating anything that doesn’t contribute to that and only then, optimising what’s left. It’s about not waiting for retirement to decide what you would really like to do with your life, but instead experimenting with mini-retirements now to see what works for you. They’re about figuring out your purpose in life early, and working on that from the get go. Where your job is not the main plot line of your life story but a bit part player that provides the material for the main character (you!) to develop.

The new model states that there are only two reasons to have a job. 1. Because its what you love doing, in which case its a vocation and not a job in the common sense, and 2. Because it provides the material means for you to explore what vocation is right for you, and to support you until you can ditch it in favour of that vocation.

Too many of us get sold on the idea that we ’should’ have a career, and that climbing the ladder is all that is required of us. The fact is, that’s boring and depressing, and the old model serves that idea by giving us the tools to do it more efficiently. In this vision, retirement is sold as the golden years of our lives where we can finally quit the world of work and live out our remaining days doing what we always wanted to do. The harsh reality is that most people go into retirement feeling lost, depressed and exhausted because they have no real idea what to do with themselves.

A Whole New Way of Living

The good news is that this isn’t necessary. There are many people living a different kind of life. People who have taken a fresh look at the time they have on this planet, and have consciously designed their lives to make the most of it. People like Dan Clements, who manages to run his business while traveling the world with his wife and children; or Doug Mayle and his wife, touring the world on a sailboat; and Tim Ferris, who automated his income so that he only has to work four hours a week!. These people have re-written the rules of productivity by creating a much more top-down approach to the game.

The Slacktivity Manifesto

To capture the essence of this new model (and to have a bit of fun!) I propose the term Slacktivity - the productivity movement that emphasises working smarter to do less. Slacktivity focuses on discovering ways of working that allows us to do what we really want to do, which is to take it easy, enjoy our friends and family, travel, learn and explore. And like all good movements, Slacktivity requires a manifesto to nail its colours to the mast.

Here then is the 7-point Slacktivity Manifesto.

• We want to work smarter to do less, not more.

• We work to gain the material means to allow us to consciously design our lives to fulfill our dreams, not to get a promotion.

• We do not want to get caught up in the default working for a career trap.

• We demand enough, not more (more money, more success, more gadgets, more horsepower).

• Judge us on our productivity, not on the hours we spend in the office.

• We seek merely a sustainable life, not unremitting financial and/or professional growth.

• We value learning and experiences over pay checks and status.

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