{"id":1300,"date":"2011-04-29T17:04:30","date_gmt":"2011-04-29T21:04:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dwan.org\/?p=1300"},"modified":"2019-11-23T17:05:10","modified_gmt":"2019-11-23T22:05:10","slug":"the-opposite-of-work","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dwan.org\/index.php\/2011\/04\/29\/the-opposite-of-work\/","title":{"rendered":"The Opposite of Work"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

I saw a good talk by Jane McGonigal at PAX East. She spoke based on her book Reality is Broken<\/a>, which is about how many of the traits developed in playing games (particularly video games) are terrifically useful to succeeding at life.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

One of her slides was (and I\u2019m paraphrasing here): \u201cThe opposite of play isn\u2019t work. The opposite of play is depression.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

I spend an increasing amount of time thinking about what it means to have a \u201cjob.\u201d About what it means to work \u2013 especially about what it means to work \u201cfor\u201d someone. I think a lot about the difference between doing what you\u2019re told, adding value to an organization no matter what<\/strong> you\u2019re told, and putting your own ass on the line by owning what you do. I\u2019ve thought a lot about \u201ccompensation,\u201d and whether time, product as requested, or results are the best metric on which to be rewarded. I also think a lot about the power dynamics of witholding money until someone does what you want them to do.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

These feel like very grown-up thoughts.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s pretty horrifying to me that work falls so squarely on depression for most Americans. Play and work are perceived as opposites, which isn\u2019t fair to either. Broadly, we seem to see \u201cplay\u201d as the useless crap that you would rather be doing, and \u201cwork\u201d and the useful crap that you don\u2019t want to be doing. Sure, yes, I get it. The rent must be paid \u2013 but it seems like a damn shame of a way to spend a human life.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Of course, I\u2019m insanely lucky. I work with a team<\/a> that has somehow managed to stay out of that world, for the most part. Sure, we have to pay our dues \u2013 pick lucrative gigs and so on. However, I\u2019ve seen us turn down genuinely profitable opportunities for reasons that range from ethics all the way down to \u201cthat sounds like a crappy way to spend 3 months.\u201d It\u2019s odd to me that the latter reason looks weird to me on the page. What sensible business<\/strong> would turn down a profitable gig because it wasn\u2019t fun<\/strong>? I\u2019ll tell you: It\u2019s a business run for the benefit of the people who make up the team \u2013 not for the benefit of some imaginary \u201ccorporate good.\u201d Still less are we run for the benefit of investors.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That\u2019s the core of my recent thinking: Businesses should run for the benefit of the team doing the work. Sure, it\u2019s still competitive. No namby-pamby un-american socialism here. Just \u2013 when we compete \u2013 let\u2019s be sure that the people getting their hands dirty have some skin in the game. I\u2019m not opposed to anything as big and vague as \u201ccapitalism.\u201d Being opposed to \u201ccapitalism\u201d is like being opposed to \u201crain.\u201d You have to get a hell of a lot more specific before it\u2019s a useful statement.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Actually, you don\u2019t have to get more specific \u2013 but it helps. Otherwise you\u2019re just whining.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What I am opposed to is what we\u2019re doing now: Millions of people spending the majority of their lives unhappy. Longing for the chance to do some useless crap that \u2013 they think \u2013 will be better than the useful but hateful crap where they spend their days.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I think we can do better.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I saw a good talk by Jane McGonigal at PAX East. She spoke based on her book Reality is Broken, which is about how many of the traits developed in playing games (particularly video games) are terrifically useful to succeeding at life. One of her…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[39,42],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1300","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-management-leadership","category-real-life"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dwan.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1300","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dwan.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dwan.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dwan.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dwan.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1300"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/dwan.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1300\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1301,"href":"https:\/\/dwan.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1300\/revisions\/1301"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dwan.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1300"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dwan.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1300"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dwan.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1300"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}