Joe Rohde argues that businesses prioritize efficiency over effectiveness. Speeding up paint mixing doesn't make a better painting. Polishing silverware makes it shine but doesn't change what it does. Effectiveness, not mathematical efficiency, matters in creative work.
You need a clear sense of the difference between efficiency and effectiveness. Business strategies are often obsessed with efficiency, and efficiency, like Euclidean mathematics, has to be measured against some fixed object somewhere to understand the gradation, right? Creative stuff isn't that way. Speeding up the time with which I mix paint and apply it to a surface is not necessarily gonna get me a better painting. And yet polishing my silverware is not going to make my spoon any bigger, not gonna make my fork any sharper. It just makes my silverware more beautiful. So you have to instill this attitude that effectiveness is more valuable than mathematical efficiency.
