TITLE: Working Too Much Means Never Having to Say "No" AUTHOR: Eugene Wallingford DATE: August 19, 2015 4:07 PM DESC: ----- BODY: Among the reasons David Heinemeier Hansson gives in his advice to Fire the Workaholics is that working too much is a sign of bad judgment:
If all you do is work, your value judgements are unlikely to be sound. Making good calls on "is it worth it?" is absolutely critical to great work. Missing out on life in general to put more hours in at the office screams "misguided values".
I agree, in two ways. First, as DHH says, working too much is itself a general indicator that your judgment is out of whack. Second is the more specific case: For workaholics, doing more work always looks like a reasonable option. As a result, when you are trying to decide, "Should I make this or not?", you never have to choose not to make the something in question -- even when not making it is the right thing to do. That sort of indifferent decision making can be death in any creative endeavor. -----