In our constant pursuit of efficiency, countless tools and techniques promise us that, by saving time, we’ll have more of it to enjoy—or, at the very least, be able to handle more tasks in less time. Excel, like many tools, is often marketed in this way: learn these tricks, save hours, become the go-to person in your office. But who truly benefits from this promise of “personal productivity”? Not everyone, as it turns out.
When we look closely, there are four types of people within organizations when it comes to work and reward, each with different motivations and outcomes for productivity:
1. The Hourly Worker: Exchanging Time for Money
This group, such as hourly employees or salaried staff bound by contract, is paid directly for time spent at work. In these roles, efficiency often works against personal benefit. If they save time or streamline tasks, they may find themselves without enough work to fill their day. In extreme cases, this can lead to job insecurity, as employers may decide their role is redundant.
An example from my consulting experience shows this tension clearly. When I helped a team reduce repetitive admin tasks, the result was rebellion, not gratitude. By eliminating a large portion of their duties, the team felt a threat to their job security, as the hours they once filled with satisfying but unnecessary tasks were now deemed redundant. For them, productivity equaled potential job loss.
2. The Expert: Paid for Expertise, Not Necessarily Results
The second group consists of individuals hired for specific expertise. Whether they’re machine technicians or Excel troubleshooters, these experts are often paid by the task or by the hour it takes to resolve an issue. Here, productivity presents a dilemma: if they solve problems too quickly, their income might suffer. If they’re hired for a week and complete the task in a day, do they pack up early and take a pay cut? Or do they stretch out the work?
In my field, many Excel experts face this same quandary. If they optimize a task within hours, they risk finishing before their contract or job assignment ends, potentially leaving money on the table. Here, productivity doesn’t necessarily serve the expert’s financial interests, as they are typically rewarded for time or effort rather than the speed and quality of their solutions.
3. The Value Creator: Rewarded for Generating Real Impact
This group—often those who bring about systemic change—is rewarded for the value they create. Here, productivity and efficiency translate into tangible, measurable improvements. If you can transform a process, save full-time roles, or drastically reduce inefficiencies, your reward is directly tied to the value added. You create value that impacts the entire organization, resulting in exponential rewards.
Consider Jim Rohn’s management philosophy: we are paid for the value we create, not simply for showing up or meeting a basic need. In my own consulting experience, I’ve seen this principle in action. When I helped companies streamline tasks so significantly that entire roles became redundant, I was rewarded with increases in pay and responsibility. My clients recognized the organizational value and saved hundreds of thousands, even millions. Unlike the first two groups, where efficiency can create job insecurity, the value creator’s reward scales with the transformation they bring to the table.
4. The Placeholder: Employed as a Form of Institutional Tradition
This last group is one of the strangest—those kept on simply to fill seats. In some organizations, particularly in sectors with outdated practices, employees are retained more to support management’s hierarchy than to contribute to meaningful work. Saving time here is often counterproductive, as the job’s purpose is to maintain headcount rather than add value. For such employees, the primary objective is to maintain visibility and justify their role rather than increase efficiency.
I’ve encountered this firsthand in organizations that engaged my services only to later resist my recommendations. Although efficiency was the official goal, in reality, they wanted to look efficient rather than actually become efficient.
So, Who Really Benefits from Personal Productivity?
With these four groups in mind, we can ask: who gains from personal productivity? We can dismiss groups one, two, and four almost immediately:
- For the hourly worker, productivity threatens their hours, and thus, their paycheck.
- For the expert, speed is double-edged, potentially reducing their pay if they work too fast.
- For placeholders, efficiency could expose the redundancy of their roles.
Only the third group—those creating transformative value—gains from productivity improvements, but not for personal productivity. Here’s the nuance: their success doesn’t stem from making themselves more productive; it comes from enabling others in the organization to be more productive. This shift in focus—from self to others—is where real, scalable value emerges.
The True Power of Excel (and Productivity): Enabling Others
Excel offers a world of efficiency, from dynamic arrays to Power Query, but these tools serve only the value creator effectively. They enable you to create systemic changes that make an entire organization’s processes smoother, faster, and more responsive. It’s not about saving you five minutes here or there; it’s about introducing efficiencies that ripple across departments, affecting hundreds or thousands of people.
Consider the case of Michael Jr., who, at the lowest level of the hierarchy, used Excel to introduce an efficiency that radically altered his organization. Through a single idea and the willingness to implement it, he transitioned from junior employee to highly valued consultant, recognized and rewarded for his contributions. His success was rooted in making others more productive, not himself.
I’ve seen this principle play out multiple times in my career. As a consultant, I’ve gone into roles meant for basic Excel tasks, only to end up transforming processes on a much larger scale. Each time, my pay increased in proportion to the value I brought to the organization—not because I completed my own tasks faster, but because I enabled entire teams to operate more effectively.
Conclusion: Productivity for Others, Not Yourself
If you want to maximize the power of Excel, don’t aim to save time on your own tasks. Instead, look at the broader picture: how can you use Excel’s capabilities to make others in your organization more productive? It’s a management-level shift in thinking, one that sets apart those who simply do their job faster from those who create lasting value.
In a world that champions personal productivity, the truly transformative power of Excel lies in helping others achieve more. By adopting this mindset, you don’t just save time—you amplify impact, and in doing so, you open doors to rewards that no quick-tip or keyboard shortcut can ever deliver.
This is a podcast by Hiran de Silva. Narrated by Bill.
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