About glue work
Is glue work bad? Depends.
One of the problems with managing a bunch of people is figuring out who is doing what. Tasks can be tracked through Jira boards or tickets locked in SNOW. But how do you track the things that are not on the board? Does that make those tasks not important?
There is a word for tasks of this nature: glue work. The extra work that one does to ensure things run smoothly. The things that no one asks for. Like cleaning up resources when they are not in use, like updating SOPs when processes change, like creating documentation in the first place.
There is a problem with this though. These tasks are difficult to track. And these tasks do not often align with business goals.
Business goals are generally, ship new features. It could even be fix bugs, or improve security. It is never improve processes. Improved processes help with better results. They help improve results.
Glue work, hence, can be harmful for an individual worker.
From, Glue work considered harmful:
first, you’re inevitably going to burn out, which will be bad for everyone; second, it’s better to let your team get used to operating at the base efficiency level of the company instead of artificially removing friction for a brief period.
If you do want to do glue work, it must be done tactically, in lean periods, at the star or end of a project, for projects you own or are responsible for.
For other things, do you regular work.
