Is Impact the Way Tech Should Measure Itself?
Changing the world. Making a dent in the universe. Many tech companies market their work this way, to employees, to investors, and to the general public. But is this a good goal? Should “impact” be the way we measure ourselves? A few years ago, I got an email with a pitch like this:
Join us for a talk and Q&A with [Alexander the Great] from Facebook, who will be taking your questions about his work and what its like to work on products that impact billions of people around the world.
The implication of that final clause, “products that impact billions of people around the world,” suggests that the work Alexander does is great and important work, as shown by the number of people impacted. That fetish for impact is a long standing one in Silicon Valley and the global tech culture it birthed. It’s a common shorthand for a company’s ambition and growth prospects. A classic example comes from tech’s patron saint, Steve Jobs, who coined the Apple slogan, “the ones who are crazy enough to think they can change the world, are the ones who do.” Crazy or not, the world of technology is full of many brilliant, thoughtful, high performing people who fall victim to the same peril of every high performance culture: they make what they measure. Is “impacting billions of people” or “changing the world” really what tech wants to be its essential metric?
Let’s first acknowledge that the primary definition of “impact” is one of violence, “the action of one object coming forcibly into contact with another.” With that context, let’s look at it’s second definition, more commonly used in the private sector, “to have a strong effect on someone or something.” On the face of it, this seems like a good thing to strive for. What’s the point of doing something if it won’t result in anything? Without impact, any effort is wasted effort, right? What’s left unsaid here, and often forgotten, is that the worst thing that can happen in our work isn’t “no impact,” but rather “negative impact.” When you consider that third possibility, that the result of your work might be to cause pain or suffering to others, “no impact” or at least, smaller, more focused impact, starts to look like an acceptable, if not desirable, outcome. For example, when driving a car, it’s easy to see the wisdom in choosing to be late rather than speeding and risking an accident.
Yet in our professional lives, experiencing that level of clarity is rare. Part of the reason is that our ego demands we have impact. Many people, including myself, want to matter, want to be important, want to have been important. Our desire for impact is also our desire for legacy. It’s a powerful motivator, but also a selfish one, an ego-driven one, and therefore, a dangerous one. The power that comes from our desire for impact comes with an equal dose of responsibility: to make sure that we are having the right kind of impact.
Missing from the conversation in tech is that impact doesn’t come for free. When the world is changed in a big way, somebody, if not many people, usually gets hurt. For every winner there is a loser. What’s more is that the planet is usually one of those losers. From an ecological perspective, what we really need is less impact, not more.Unfortunately, less of anything isn’t quite as motivating as more. But what about better impact? For all you high performing readers out there, I want to suggest that it’s not enough to do well at your work, however your company defines it. It really matters how your impact is defined, and if you don’t agree with that definition, it’s important to reflect on what kind of impact would be meaningful for you, and maybe even to speak up about that. In the next piece, I will explore some alternatives to “changing the world” for framing the impact we make in technology. Because even Steve Jobs said, “things don’t have to change the world to be important.”
This piece is the first in a series. A link to the next instalment can be found here.
All my pieces are drafts, and feedback and criticism are strongly encouraged.
