What is most important in work is the process or the result. State, process and result. Actions aimed at a result, a goal or Purposeful actions

In personnel records management, it is customary to divide candidates for positions according to their focus on process or result. For example, a process person is not afraid of monotonous work, and can occupy the position of a system administrator, accountant, etc. A performance person, on the contrary, is focused on, for example, fulfilling a sales plan or other planned performance indicators. Of course, in every person there is something from each of the described cases; absolute extremes are rare. The purpose of this article is to determine in which cases it is better to focus on the process, and in which – on the result.

Man-process and man-result in each of us

As we grow, change, and go through different stages of life, one may place more emphasis on the outcome at one time and more on the process at another, and the ideal combination is harmony between these extremes. If you have a clear task and the deadlines for its completion are pressing, of course, the emphasis shifts towards the result, and you somehow don’t think about enjoying the process. But if you constantly function in this mode, sooner or later you stop enjoying at all, which is why many people don’t know how, and this, in turn, leads to.

As many people never tire of repeating, if the process of doing something does not bring you pleasure, then the results will not live up to your expectations. When starting your own business, getting a job, choosing a profession, even deciding whether it’s worth it, always give preference to the activity that brings you satisfaction and will come as a pleasant addition. I have already said more than once that doing something simply for the sake of money is not effective - you will not reach the desired level, and you will not get pleasure, you will only lose yours.

What happens, everyone just needs to enjoy the process and move aimlessly through life, not focusing on the result? Let's look at this statement differently:

• The goal of the process is to obtain pleasant experiences.
• While enjoying the process of your activity, think about what else you would like to achieve in life or how you can strengthen the pleasant state in which you are now.
• and choose the path to it that will bring you pleasure.
• Once you reach your goal, enjoy the result.

As you can see, enjoying the process is not necessarily aimless, it can lead you to the desired results. Don't give up what you really like by agreeing to some benefits in exchange for an activity you hate. It won't bring you any money, I guarantee it. Do what you like, even if no one understands it, even if it does not yet bring you the desired income - do not wait for money, continue to enjoy the process, and it will come by itself!

Finally, I would like to say that in the life of every person there should be something that he does solely for the sake of “fun”, without expecting any results at all. Maybe you like to put gouache blots on sheets of paper - and don’t care that these are not paintings, but strange daubs - enjoy the process! Do what brings you joy in itself.

Man for the most part consists of imaginary contradictions dictated by taste. Anything that does not correspond to current tastes is declared heretical. “Heretic,” by the way, is someone who can choose, from the Greek αἵρεσις - “choice” and “direction, system of education.”

Just a “chooser”, not what you thought!

Imaginary contradictions apply to any issue, so all psychological memes are mostly useless, since they are conversations about the taste of oysters in favor of the poor. For example, if a person is told that he needs to “accept himself,” he will object that how can he change when he is happy with everything.

A similar situation with “orientation towards the process, not the result” - what then to do with the result?! As if if you only “enjoy the process” and live in the “current moment”, then tomorrow there will be nothing to eat. Or, even worse, if you enjoy the process, then “the result will come by itself.”

In fact, there are no contradictions between the result and the process.

It is best to live in the real world, not in the world of imagination. I will not define the dubious word “real”, but you can increase your connection with reality through dialogue with the outside world: you did something - you looked at the reaction - you did it further.

In relation to “plans” and “results”, this means that you can plan to pump up 5 kg of muscle by summer, and in the summer you will wake up and be disappointed, or you may want to gain muscle mass, go to the gym regularly and see what comes out: at what speed what grows, how the body reacts to training, what it feels like. Then, unfortunately, it may turn out that there is no way to gain 5 kg.

The result is a game of imagination (until it becomes real).

When “life makes adjustments to plans” - this is not only “normal”, it is generally the only way not to fall into groundless fantasies. If life doesn’t make adjustments, then who? You? What do you think about yourself? No, seriously, “Man proposes, but God disposes” is just a state of affairs.

(Well, “self-acceptance” means acceptance of the state of things, of course, and not at all connivance).

Same wise saying- more understandable in English, since it is closer to the original Latin: Man proposes, but God disposes (“man proposes, God throws away the excess”) - explains what needs to be done to achieve something. We need to offer more often!

You will laugh, but the result is impossible without the process. Sooner or later something will have to be done, and the better the process, the greater the chances of results.

This “enjoy the process” does not mean at all that you can “fuck off in production.” That is, of course, you can - provided that you are from such enjoy!

For example, a neat and tidy person will enjoy the neat and tidy process and will eventually (if he is lucky) achieve a neat and tidy result (minus the influence of an imperfect world), from which he will also enjoy! If a person organizes the process according to his taste, then he will get the result according to his taste. “What you fertilized is what grew.” All attempts to cheat (cheat on yourself) and get some other result do not lead to anything real.

In this regard, receiving “pleasure” from the process is no different from receiving pleasure from the result: “And God called the dry land earth, and the collection of waters he called the seas. And God saw that it was good.”

Let's take the same clear example workouts: there is the result of “world champion tennis”, and there is a specific workout today, and for the same result it will be more useful if you conduct it with a feeling of full involvement in a specific workout, and not in dreams of a championship.

Focusing on the process does not guarantee anything - even if you have trained perfectly for many years, you may not become a champion. Suddenly you are a crooked freak. If you continue to dream, you will become a crooked freak with a rich imagination (see “self-acceptance”). But hey, at least you had fun playing tennis!

Let's summarize what we learned in today's lesson:

There is no contradiction between the result and the process.
The result is imagined until it is achieved.
The process is real because it happens in the living world, not in dreams.
In the process of (dialogue) with the world, the limitations of you and the world become clear.
Process Maybe lead to a result, but the result has never led to a process!
You need to keep the desired result in mind so that the process is not aimless.
If you want results, organize the process.

Have you ever noticed that we are different? Some people find it easier to work passionately on one task and get carried away process that they don’t think at all about the result, the destination. Others try to complete more different tasks and dream of completing them as quickly as possible to receive result, and not receiving much satisfaction from the process of their implementation. And it also happens that a person enjoys condition, in which he is, not caring at all about where and how to move further. Employers like to gauge a person's mindset during interviews to see if the person is suited for a process-oriented job (such as a help desk worker) or a results-oriented job (a Tier 1 software engineer). I believe that employers generally do not hire people who are wealth-oriented (only if they are the president of the company, let him enjoy it, the main thing is that he does not interfere with J’s work). These three categories are extremes. Although people from each category know how to rejoice and get pleasure in their own way - from a state, a process or a result - you should not deprive yourself of pleasure from the rest of 2/3 of your life.

When did you first get a job as a testing specialist? software, I was more process oriented. It was common for me to sit up at night and code, just for fun. I had a lot of ideas and often rushed into them without thinking about where they would lead. There was no time to stop and think, who am I, what have I already achieved? The attraction to the process resulted in the desire to get two full-time jobs at once (8 hours on one, 8 hours on the other, 1.5 hours for travel, 1 hour for breakfast, lunch and dinner, leaving 5.5 hours for friends, personal life, hobbies, sleep and etc. J ). It is not difficult to imagine what the outcome of such a schedule would be, and how quickly it would occur. Thanks to the head of the department (the second “potential” employer), who dissuaded me from this idea.

Six months later I met my future wife. We spent almost every evening together throughout the summer. I enjoyed every moment of our meeting, while at work things went on by inertia. I didn’t have the same abundance of new ideas as before, and none of the existing ones were put into practice. In a word, I was obsessed with my condition, not thinking about the future, about the results, and not really enjoying the process, since there was no progress. This lasted 3-4 months.

During a late-night conversation after my bachelor party, a friend of mine remarked that I had changed a lot since the last time we met. The fact is that I was then very absorbed in the idea of ​​​​setting and achieving goals, the process was seen as a path that is secondary, no matter which one we choose, the main thing is to achieve the goal in the shortest possible time and immediately set ourselves the next one. Perhaps everything was not so pathological, but the fact remains that at that moment I was very result-oriented.

I believe that each of us at different moments can enjoy both the state and the process and the result. The truth is that these three-arm scales are not always in balance - some part always outweighs. It's always good to stop and enjoy what you have now. Then, think about how this condition could be improved, what would I like to achieve in life? Once you have decided, choose the most pleasant way to achieve your goal - it can be difficult, new, but still enjoyable. Develop, move towards your goal, enjoy every moment of movement, get pleasure from it. Having received the result, enjoy this moment - you did what you truly wanted. Your condition has changed, enjoy what you have received.

It is interesting that all these types of attitudes towards life are very interconnected. If we get really carried away by the process, we will involuntarily receive some results, albeit unconsciously. Enjoying the result obtained, we involuntarily enjoy the state in which we find ourselves. While enjoying the state, we are, one way or another, involved in some process, although, again, unconsciously.

Full and happy life can be lived through harmonization between three components: state, process and result. Determine which part of you outweighs, and try to get more pleasure from other aspects of your personality.

Who are you now, a person of state, a person of process or a person of results?

Today we will talk about simple recipe happiness, which some wise people discovered for themselves a long time ago, and then the science of psychology came and officially confirmed all this.

Let's begin with that...

Psychology distinguishes two types of activity: 1) activity aimed at the result and 2) activity in which the process is more important, and the result seems to be absent, blurred.

Let's talk about these two types of activities.

Actions aimed at a result, a goal or Purposeful actions

How to distinguish these actions from the sea of ​​​​manifold actions we perform?

Targeted actions:

1. Initially very clearly focused on a specific result(go to the forest and cut down a tree with an ax to heat the house).
2. They have very precise and clear criteria for their success or failure(Vovochka: I taught the poem! Teacher Mary Ivanna: Vovochka, I don’t ask: did you teach it or didn’t you teach it? I ask: “You learned?»)
3. Most often they have a well-defined structure, a step-by-step algorithm, an action plan(To bake a pie, you need a series of consistent and precise steps.)
4. Through these actions, we usually successfully (or not successfully, if it didn’t work out) adapt and stand out in society, in society). I drew a drawing. If you win an architects' competition, you get glory, first place from the jury, and a cash prize.
5. With these actions we can change our lives quite predictably.(If I pass exams and tests on time for five years, after five years I will be awarded a diploma of higher education).

Purposeful actions are very useful, aren't they?

But there is one problem with them. Even two troubles.

Firstly, they try to fill ALL human activity (and there is also a second type of activity, do you remember?).

Secondly, the PROCESS of their implementation is usually deprived of: romance, pleasure and awareness-motivation. All this is included in the RESULT.

What's the problem? And the fact is that the result is just a moment. And the process can take years. Deprive yourself of pleasure for years in order to fill yourself with joy... for a moment? But the “moment” may subsequently not withstand such filling and... break.

This is why people who, at the moment of their triumph, should seem to be rejoicing, actually become sad and even panic. Here it is, the moment has come... Why am I not happy?

Well, now let’s look at the second type of human activity that remains. It's being filled

Procedural actions

How to distinguish them from others in the sea of ​​​​various actions that we perform?

Procedural actions:

1. Never clearly and specifically focused on a clear and specific result. (When I drink a glass of light French wine, what result am I aiming for? So that the blood vessels become healthy? Or so that I want to sing “Oh, viburnum”?)
2. Most often, procedural actions do not have precise criteria for a certain “correct” or “incorrect” course. (When I play Easter eggs in the sandbox and build castles on the beach, I don’t consult the instructions)
3. Such actions are devoid of obvious and straightforward practical meaning and benefit.(chattering with a friend).
4. If such actions are artificially given direction, pushing them towards one specific outcome... then they immediately lose their attractiveness and meaning. They “perish” and become meaningless.
5. These are events about which we can say: they make sense on their own.

What do we classify as procedural actions?

Friendly communication,

Admiring nature and people

Philosophical (only non-professional philosophical) reasoning,

Sex (unless it is aimed at some specific thing),

In general, admiring the beautiful, contacting the beautiful and creating something BEAUTIFUL.

Attention!

Do you know what psychology says about procedural actions? She says that it is and only these actions that allow us to be... ourselves!

And the lack of procedural actions makes a person suffocate and feel unhappy.

Indeed. Let's compare a friendly party “just because” and a friendly party “with meaning” (For example, when the boss and his wife are invited to visit, and a branded cake is baked for them).

Is this why some children hate it when their parents have guests at their house? Is this why these children sabotage the guests?

Most likely, they feel that the guests were called for a reason, but with meaning.

Be like children...

What is the recipe for happiness, invented by wise people and confirmed by psychology?

Here's the thing. You need to take a purposeful action and turn it into... a procedural one.

And the fewer actions of the first type remain in your life, and the more actions of the second type (procedural actions) - the happier you will be.

Let me give you an example from sports.

Have you heard the phrase: “It’s not victory that’s important, it’s participation that’s important”?

That is, we came not “to win”... to win at the cost of torn ligaments and broken bones, but to... to hang out in a pleasant company of like-minded people, to spend time usefully.

And now a little test task

Take a sheet and cut it in half. In the first column, write all the PURPOSE actions that come to your mind.

In the second column, write all the PROCEDURAL actions that come to your mind.

Compare both columns.

First question

Which activities from both lists would you really like to do primarily throughout your life?

First question "prime"

So why aren't you doing it?

Second question

What “targeted actions” (from the first column) can you transfer to the second column, that is: change your attitude towards them and make them procedural?

For example, can you make washing dishes or floors a process rather than a goal-oriented activity?

Should the path to work be made not a purposeful action, but a procedural one?

In other words, "action-hard labor» turn into “action-fun leisure”?

You can not? What action can you take? Write it down.

Psychology says that performing purposeful actions helps us adapt and stand out in society.

And I ask the question: maybe it’s enough to adapt to society? Isn't it time to take care of your own happiness?