Walk through any large organisation today and you will see an impressive level of activity. Calendars full of meetings. Emails at midnight. Dashboards tracking deliverables. Yet ask what has actually changed in the last six months, and the silence is deafening. Busyness has become the new productivity, and it is quietly killing progress.
The culture of constant motion feels productive. It rewards visibility. People who look busy are assumed to be adding value. But activity is not the same as advancement. Actually, a lot of companies are hooked on corporate theatre: progress is shown but results aren’t achieved.
Busyness is a comfort zone. It gives people the illusion of control. The busier we are, the less we have to confront difficult questions like: Is this work actually moving us forward? Are we solving real problems or just recycling them? The honest answer in many cases, is no.
The problem starts at the top. Leaders measure performance in terms of hours, outputs, and optics rather than by impact. They reward responsiveness over reflection. They confuse agility with chaos. And so, teams fill their time with meetings that exist only to prove they are working hard.
Real progress requires subtraction. It demands the courage to stop doing what no longer adds value. Yet in most organisations, stopping is heresy. Projects accumulate, initiatives overlap, and priorities multiply until exhaustion replaces excellence. The result is burnout disguised as dedication.
I once advised a company where every department claimed to be “strategically aligned.” They had weekly syncs, quarterly offsites, and a shared digital tracker. Yet when we mapped their actual objectives, only 40 percent of their work connected to the company’s stated strategy. The rest was noise. Nobody meant to waste time; they simply never stopped to question where their energy was going.
Leaders must redefine productivity. Progress is not about how much is done, but how much that matters is completed. The future belongs to organisations that measure impact, not effort. It is time to replace performance theatre with thoughtful execution.
Key Takeaways
- Busyness signals effort, not progress.
- Corporate theatre rewards motion over meaning.
- Strategic subtraction is as important as execution.
- Productivity without reflection leads to waste and burnout.
- True progress requires saying no more often.
Try This
At the end of this week, review your calendar. Identify three recurring meetings or tasks that do not directly advance a strategic goal. Cancel or delegate them for one month. Track what happens. You will probably discover that nothing breaks — except the illusion that everything is essential.
Closing Thought
If you have ever ended a week exhausted but unsure of what you achieved, share this. The future of work is not faster. It is clearer.
