For me the difference is often that I'm willing to put in what is essentially unpaid overtime for tasks I love, because I enjoy it and want to see that route succeed (a bit of selection bias here).
Its not that I'm less productive writing your CRUD application with set of 6 different popular obscure libraries of the week, it's just that when I reach a point where I've spent 40-45 hours doing that, I'm going to report back that it needs more time, because it does. I'm less likely to report back something I love needs more time, because I'm already giving it more time.
So often that efficiency difference you see is me consuming tech debt or cost in the form of personal time. It has little to do with the fact I struggle because I think the work is silly or meaningless and more to do with the fact that I'm not giving 110% if I feel it's meaningless, but you will get 100%. Not slacking on the boring tasks, just giving additional effort on the interesting tasks.
Its not that I'm less productive writing your CRUD application with set of 6 different popular obscure libraries of the week, it's just that when I reach a point where I've spent 40-45 hours doing that, I'm going to report back that it needs more time, because it does. I'm less likely to report back something I love needs more time, because I'm already giving it more time.
So often that efficiency difference you see is me consuming tech debt or cost in the form of personal time. It has little to do with the fact I struggle because I think the work is silly or meaningless and more to do with the fact that I'm not giving 110% if I feel it's meaningless, but you will get 100%. Not slacking on the boring tasks, just giving additional effort on the interesting tasks.