Don’t turn your job into “productivity theatre”

Hello and welcome to Working It.

I am back from a family holiday in rural France, which was lovely but I was very run down. Too many of us work like crazy in the run-up to summer time off, then we collapse on holiday 🥱. That’s no good for us, or for family and friends.

How do you pace yourself at work so that the vacation isn’t a finishing line that you cross in a state of exhaustion? Email me: isabel.berwick@ft.com or DM on LinkedIn. We’ll feature the best. (If you are writing to tell me about your daily naps — you can stay anonymous 🤫.)

Read on for why “performative work” — not real work — takes up far too much of our time and in Office Therapy I advise a reader who is worried that a colleague may be in an abusive relationship.

How “performative” work foils productivity

I keep seeing mentions of “performative work” — as opposed to real work — and the more dramatic “productivity theatre” concept. Both of these phrases are describing the working hours we spend doing things just so we can be seen to be doing them. These tasks are not key to organisational goals, or to our own performance.

Examples might include replying immediately to emails from superiors, even when it takes you out of the “flow” of more pressing and important tasks. Or going to superfluous meetings because you need to signal internally that you are important enough to be in the room. (Meetings, in general, are a performative activity.)

According to a recent Slack global State of Work report, employees spend 32 per cent of their time on work that gives the appearance of productivity, rather than on actually useful activity.

Productivity theatre has always been with us (remember old-fashioned presenteeism, where we used to stay late in the office just because the boss did?). There has, though, been a lot more buzz about it since the pandemic. Remote work has spooked bosses, because it creates “productivity paranoia”. That’s a way of summing up leaders’ worry that staff they can’t actually see in the office aren’t working hard enough.

How do we get past performative work and focus on the important things? Trust from our leaders is a big one, but that’s a whole different newsletter topic. Workplace tech and automation will also help, with the caveat that it can become a massive time suck. Chris Mills, head of customer success at Slack (so presumably someone who wants people to use the platform wisely) reckons that flexible working is also key to a productive future. He says:

“Executives are concerned that providing flexible hours will lead to a decline in productivity — highlighted [in the Slack survey] by 40 per cent of managers. Yet about the same number of employees argue they are actually more productive when able to choose the hours they work.”

Want more? Beyond performative work lies “LARP-ing” your job, in which you treat it like a “live action role playing” game. The writer Anne Helen Petersen, author of Out of Office (I recommend subscribing to her Culture Study newsletter) popularised this concept. LARPing, she writes, describes “the way we try and show evidence that LOOK, OVER HERE, I AM WORKING”.

How do you get past performative work and gaming-lite to focus on what really matters? All ideas, book recommendations and tips welcome and we will share them here. Email me: isabel.berwick@ft.com.

This week on the Working It podcast

When I wrote in this newsletter about men and loneliness, the response was overwhelming. Many men told me they were lonely and lacked opportunities for connection.

On the Working It podcast this week I talk to Max Dickins, author of the memoir Billy No-Mates, about how he fixed his own friendship problem. Max now works with workplaces to help build connection and friendship for men. Along with my colleagues Ethan Wu, co-host of the new Unhedged podcast, and the FT’s careers agony uncle, Jonathan Black, we work through some of the problems — and possible solutions. My favourite was Ethan’s idea for games rooms with PlayStations in workplaces. “Meet men where they are,” as Ethan wisely says 🎮.

Office Therapy

The problem: A wonderful colleague signed off work suddenly with stress and left us in the lurch on a couple of projects. We had a video meeting to tie up loose ends and wish her well. In this meeting her husband was in the room. (She thought we couldn’t see him.) She seemed to be reading from a script at times, was robotic etc. I am concerned about her being coerced. The husband might, however, just be concerned — she is unwell, after all. Is there any action that would be helpful — or not? I am the project lead but not this woman’s line manager.

Isabel’s advice: I’d first suggest you (and anyone facing a similar dilemma) learn more about domestic abuse and coercion. Start with the Everyone’s Business campaign, run by the charity Hestia. My colleague Emma Jacobs wrote a good feature about DA and the workplace.

The practical step you can take is to alert your colleague’s manager and/or the HR department about your concerns. The CIPD, the UK professional body for HR professionals, advises colleagues in your situation not to “make assumptions or act differently towards an individual — aside from giving opportunities for support — because you suspect they are experiencing domestic abuse”. It’s unclear what’s going on here, plus, as the CIPD points out, “when abuse is happening, employees may not recognise they are in an abusive situation or may choose not to tell you if they are being abused. That’s their choice and should be respected.”

In short, all you can do is be supportive — and alert the right people. The CIPD has resources and advice here.

Got a question, problem, or dilemma for Office Therapy? Think you have better advice for our readers? Send it to me: isabel.berwick@ft.com. We anonymise everything. Your boss, colleague or underlings will never know.

Five top stories from the world of work

1. Move over millennials, perennials are on the march: Pilita Clark’s column casting doubts on the validity of age-based cohorts at work has been one of the most-read articles on FT.com this week. People love debating this topic!

2. Corporate diversity in the crosshairs after Supreme Court ruling: US companies are braced for a wave of challenges to their diversity, equity and inclusion policies after affirmative action in colleges was struck down by the heavily conservative-leaning Supreme Court.

3. Internships in the age of hybrid work: Another summer of half-empty offices means interns are not getting the full in-person experience. What’s the best way to offer meaningful internships? The FT’s Aquila Quinio and Rafe Uddin report.

4. The return of the in-office doctor: Big finance and law firms are starting to bring medical staff back on site, a common practice in the US but now becoming more common in the UK in a move that helps staff to dodge lengthy NHS waiting times. Some now offer a whole range of wellbeing professionals.

5. Sir David Adjaye: the celebrated architect accused of sexual assault: An FT investigation by Josh Spero and Anjli Raval highlights the cases of three women who have made allegations against the renowned architect including of sexual assault and running a toxic work culture.

One more thing

The fight over what constitutes free speech, along with accusations of “wokeness” and “cancel culture”, is increasingly fraught, especially in universities. In a long article (don’t say I didn’t warn you) for the London Review of Books, the philosopher Amia Srinivasan* outlines the arguments on campuses and beyond. It’s a must-read to understand this political moment — with big implications for workplaces if the current polarisation continues.

*Henry Mance did a fascinating interview with Amia last year.

A word from the Working It community

When I asked “why is everyone so angry at work?” — we got a big response from readers. Laura McHale, a leadership psychologist, offers a really interesting take on this: anger is on the rise because of an epidemic of “corporate gaslighting”.

“This gaslighting takes a few forms — from marginalising dissenting voices, vacuous corporate communication, to job descriptions (and performance reviews) that put the onus of managing complexity and role conflict on individual employees, giving leaders a free pass to ignore many underlying managerial problems that create ambiguity and conflict.

“As for what can be done, we can start by not ignoring the psychological injuries of work — and by honouring reactions to them as legitimate. And we can hire and promote leaders who will not tolerate gaslighting employees. This doesn’t mean emboldening bullies and trolls. Nor does it mean that employees are always “right.” It does mean respecting the value of dissent, and respecting the courage that it takes to speak truth to power.”

Got more solutions to the workplace anger problem? Email them to isabel.berwick@ft.com. And if you’d prefer to soothe us all, send a photo of where you are working from this summer. We love to see your inspiring views and office set-ups.