Productivity is a measurement, busy is an action. Busy is having things to do, and truly busy is having one or more things that you need to do as soon as you finish what you are working on. To Do lists can certainly look like you are busy and at times they can keep you very busy. However, having a To Do list can also keep one productive.

Productive is the act of using one’s time efficiently and dedicating the appropriate amount of time to each task that needs to be completed. When used in the workplace, productivity can also speak to the number of people who are assigned to complete each task. If several people are completing the same task, none of them executing a unique aspect of the task or adding quality by having the second person involved, that does not lead to productivity.

As a nurse leader I remember having the conversation about when are people “too busy”. As an employee, having something that needs to be done as soon as you are finished with your current task is being busy and being productive. Having tasks that are not being completed because the employee is unable to get to them is being too busy. There are times, from an employee standpoint, there may be an objection expressed that they are too busy. As an employee, it is important to remember that when you signed that contract with your employer, the expectation was that you would be performing tasks for all the hours your employer pays you for. So, an employee is not too busy if there is something to do as soon as the job is finished. If there is not something to do when that task is completed, then there is a lack of productivity, though depending on the work place, this can also be a necessary flexibility to be available for the incoming critical needs.

Taking on the role as a freelance medical health writer, I find productivity and busy more difficult to measure and contrast. Busy, I believe, is pretty easy, all the hours dedicated to my profession are filled with meaningful work. However, what is productivity?  Well, productivity might be the number of articles I complete that are published. If that is the accepted definition, then how is that output measured. Is it the time I spend writing the article, or writing and researching, or writing, researching, and pitching? What about the time spent searching for the perfect publication, or the perfect audience, or completing the contract and agreeing upon the terms? And what about return on time spent, am I more productive if I am working for a more lucrative client? What about if the issue I am writing about is critical for the understanding of an audience who has a lack of resources, am I more productive then?

It appears I have exposed more questions than answers. In the black and white of employer/employee relationships, I believe it is easier to define both busy and productive. Could that be because, as a leader, I am looking from a 10,000-foot perspective? As a freelance writer, I am looking while standing in the weeds, the view is different. Also, the completion of one distinct task is not as easily defined as it was from a clinical standpoint. In the end, I believe that busy is easy to explain. Productive, for now, I believe that I need to judge that at the end of a project, or maybe by the week or the month, or some other time frame.

As a nurse leader, being able to understand and convey productivity helped to define the needs of the unit and the staff. As I continue to look at the iterations of productivity in the freelance world, will I be able to define the needs better for myself in the future?