Focusing on things often causes you to get worse at them, so businesses intentionally keep most employees away from profit or from thinking about it. In ZIRP land this might be because they're banking tech workers so they won't start their own startup, or in case someone comes up with a better thing for them to do.
Instead you do artificial projects and it either impresses people enough to get you a good performance review or it doesn't.
This often produces customer surplus (like when companies release cool open source projects they didn't need to write) so it's a good thing, maybe.
This is an interesting idea I haven't heard before. Specifically on "Focusing on things often causes you to get worse at them" are you saying that's due to a Goodhart's law kind of effect?
Having trouble thinking of examples of this from my own experience but they're all mostly social/political (often trying to hard in these realms can be to your detriment)
can you say more? maybe i read to much into a snarky remark but i think your idea is interesting
Instead you do artificial projects and it either impresses people enough to get you a good performance review or it doesn't.
This often produces customer surplus (like when companies release cool open source projects they didn't need to write) so it's a good thing, maybe.