Comment by liquid_thyme

>But if you say "this work will get the client's hospital equipment monitoring suite out sooner; if it works reliably, they'll be able to deploy it sooner, and it'll save the lives of some sick kids," then that'll also get the work done a little faster, and it'll make you feel good about doing it.

The problem is that the smart ones will easily figure out that 'this next version will save lives' is a total lie. If your monitoring product doesn't work, it gets dumped and replaced. In developed countries, if your code has the potential of harming someone you're in a heavily regulated industry. The software in those industries is speced out in enormous detail to avoid this problem.

>Arbitrary tension is a patch that you put on work that has no meaning. "We want you to go faster because it will make our metrics go up which might raise the stock a few percentage which might make our investors a few extra millions" has no meaning, which is the root problem.

I disagree. Financial goals are the easiest to understand for people, and also easiest to communicate, and personally for me easiest to reason about how to achieve them. Just hit a number and you're done, collect your bonus and go do something you enjoy. As they say, the best way to ruin something you love doing is by making it your job. IMO people who chase some higher purpose and meaning are destined to be forever unhappy at their job.