Proof of Work
Proof-of-work refers to a set of methods by which some entity (a person or a computational system) offers proof that the entity performed a substantial amount of work. Hereafter, I’ll assume that you—dear reader—are somewhat familiar with the concept.
Measures like proof-of-work (PoW) are a necessity in intentionally slowing down otherwise free and uncontrolled operations. PoW’s most extensive critique is the resulting high resource consumption that lacks a corresponding commensurate positive contribution.
Working with a poorly thought-out, or overengineered technology stack, or an overly bureaucratic organization is also a form of proof-of-work.
This claim seems harsh, but even the intentionality of PoW can be observed in organizations.
The first tool people reach for wherever some form of mismatched trust exists is to introduce bureaucracy. This approach makes sense because what better way to prevent abuse of authority than to make the person at a lower trust level ask for permission from someone with a higher trust level? So, each trust issue one encounters results in one more approval hurdle – affectionately referred to sometimes as a “governance gate” or an “approval gate.”
Now, take a step back and imagine how the proliferation of approval gates plays out in a large organization like Google. All organizational activity now involves debilitating bureaucratic overhead. Proliferation of approvals also have the effect of piling on the responsibility of approving upon people who are either unqualified to sufficiently assess the request or simply have no time to go through each in detail.
Unless each approval gate adds substantial value or prevents harm, each such approval decays into proof-of-work –
the only point of getting the approval is to show that you have gone through the work of getting the approval.
Bad frameworks and tech stacks have the same effect. Onboarding onto such a stack is a time-wasting nightmare where people learn non-transferrable skills that they will most likely only use once. Each step in getting something done involves putting together poorly documented and poorly designed pieces and trying to express business logic in leaky abstractions that muddle the separation between intent and implementation. Sprikle an inordinate amount of approval gates on top, and you have our modern large tech company.
The outcome of weeks of struggle is the same as what is achievable within a matter of hours with a better tech stack. You haven’t produced work; you’ve only produced proof of work. The outcome isn’t commensurate with the effort.
Last modified: July 12, 2024
Originally published on: July 11, 2024