[muzani]

Tech actually seems really optimal for this.

I get assigned a 8 hour task. I spend 4 hours trying to get it done in 4 hours. The next time I get the same task, it takes 4 hours. I can optimize it even further if it happens a lot, get it done in 10 minutes.

I can 'siphon off' time this way, lowering estimates a little, cutting time spent by a lot, then basically reinvesting the saved time into rest or productivity. The other day we had a meeting; I got all the work done before the meeting ended then waited an hour before showing the result.

There are lots of tricks, like figuring out keyboard shortcuts, IDE plugins, or simply refactoring staging/production builds into a single button. It's surprising how much mental effort and time a shortcut like CTRL/CMD + SHIFT + F saves.

The long term goal is to be so productive that I can probably negotiate a shorter work week or more vacation days instead of a raise, as I already get paid a comfortable amount.

[tacostakohashi]

You can absolutely do that to a huge extent, but good luck actually capturing the productivity gains as an employee. You won't be rewarded with shorter days or salary increases, certainly not in proportion to your productivity increases.

At best, you can use the siphoned off time for learning new things, or networking your way into management.

Employers don't value that kind of thing, possibly because although it increases your efficiency, it also leads to a complicated, brittle environment that is difficult to scale to many employees, and staff that are less interchange and harder to replace.