[rapjr9]

I watched my manager fall into the "I'm so busy" trap over a few decades. At first he planned things carefully, allowed extra time, adjusted schedules based on feedback. Then his friends started filling him full of business management ideas that I think they got from magazines. Things like "just ask for more, you'll be surprised that your employees will deliver" and "don't give raises above inflation" and "start the next project immediately after the previous one" instead of giving employees some time to relax. Part of this advice he pickup up from medical professionals, who have always had insane work schedules (80 hours shifts as a resident, really? Why doesn't medicine listen to its own advice?) There are lots of older medical professionals who edit a journal, give speeches, consult with companies, are writing a book, are running a blog, doing research, and are still seeing patients in their practice! They have trained themselves to get sleep in 20 minute increments, to push through when they feel sick, and to always take on any opportunity that presents itself no matter how busy they are. And because they demand this of themselves they also demand it from everyone who works for them. It is completely destructive, after a few years of this my manager could no longer remember anything beyond the last week, was setting ridiculous deadlines ("we can do the experiments and write a journal paper in two weeks, but it has to be world class"), and basically missing all his deadlines because they were stupidly unreasonable. His professional career took off though, which added even more tasks to his work, which gave his employees a respite because he had to reduce the number of meetings with them. So it looks to me like there are some meme's that came out of the management/medical worlds that profess to get the most out of employees and they have been widely adopted, but they do not work and just grind up people. If you can ride it out you become a big important person, but you also become dead inside and can't hear anything anyone says any more.