Comment by sublinear
Sure, but what if the person moving the tables is in the middle of a larger logistical problem?
Caterers and guests are coming. More interruptions in the form of calls, texts, and emails don't stop and each is also "just 10 seconds".
I think it's pretty rare to find jobs where your role is so clearly defined that all you have to do is move tables. Most work asks that you solve a high level problem nobody else wants to deal with. You probably weren't asked to move tables. You were more likely asked to coordinate a venue for a wedding or something. The people assigned to you who were told they'd only have to move tables end up not finding them. Interrupting them is just as unacceptable because now they have to rush to home depot to buy them at the last minute and they're out of billable hours. They deliver the new tables and now you're the one moving them yourself.
Interruptions suck for everyone because there are always leaky abstractions and messy dependency trees. People incorrectly assume some details are trivial and factoring out the pain points is at least discouraged if not considered insubordination. Bad management and bad planning are everywhere.
> Interruptions suck for everyone because there are always leaky abstractions and messy dependency trees
I think the "dependency trees" is usually the most obvious killer. You're putting tables away... who made sure everyone's even out of the building? Who cleared the stuff off the tables?
Even ignoring that... Even if the job is just purely "move tables", I'd propose a simple thought experiment: We're operating a venue for events. Imagine a church basement. We have 75 tables and a large closet we keep them all in between events.
You can choose one of two people to clean up after an event:
Person A has put these tables away 176 times over that past year.
Person B has put these tables away 3 times over the past year.
(If you're not looking and going "yeah those two things look exactly equal", than intuitively I think you have some sense that even unskilled positions benefit from experience and skill.)
If I'm the venue owner and I'm paying hourly for cleanup, I'd put my full faith in Person A. It's not a "skilled" position or a "knowledge" job, but someone that has done it that many times has likely found the easiest and quickest way to get it done with minimal wasted time. When exceptions come up they know what to do or who to talk to. They've also realized that carrying a rag in their pocket and wiping the table before they put it away costs them 5% extra time now, but saves us overall a bunch of time because the event set up shift no longer needs to run around with paint scrapers to remove dried cheese from half the tables after fondue night.
I think, in general, the idea of "unskilled" labour should be applied more to "the barrier to entry" more than "the people that work in that labour". Many "unskilled labours" _can_ be done by someone with no skill. They are done _well_ by someone with a lot of experience and effort that I think make a lot of "knowledge jobs" look pathetic in comparison.