1.- The example. - During the visit to the Madrid railway museum (on the Paseo de las Delicias), the evolution of the railway is very well perceived (from mule carts to high speed). It is the evolution of productivity. A similar evolution should have the rest of institutions, such as hospitals, companies of any kind, foundations, town councils, public bodies, and especially in colleges, universities and business schools. The lack of change, innovation and positive evolution (increased productivity) is the fundamental cause of the crisis.
2.- One definition of the many. -Productivity is efficiency for efficiency; both at the level of person, institution or nation. Effectiveness means knowing what to do; do what needs to be done. Efficiency means performance; do it well done, that is, know how to do it.
Everyone has a problem with both. At higher levels, managers often have the problem rather with effectiveness, and at operational levels rather with efficiency. There is nothing worse than doing very well what we should never have done. It is preferable to do what must be done, even if it is done on a regular basis.
3.- Need for continuous increase in productivity. - The quality of life and the degree of well-being of a society is adequate when there is constant growth in productivity. It does not mean working harder, harder or harder (or more technology), but working smarter. In that case, as if by magic, social problems of all kinds begin to disappear (unemployment, robberies, absence of children, divorces, unfair demands, drug addiction, etc.) And vice versa, when productivity stagnates, the bubble of problems social of all kinds, even the most unsuspected begin to grow and it is not possible to stop them by any procedure. (Not even if we change the constitution 50 times).
Every business is doomed for life to have to constantly increase its productivity to maintain consistent profitability. If this increase is lacking, the institution and all its members are subject to a real process of decapitalization and impoverishment.
4.- Back with politics. -When one studies the History of Productivity, throughout all the ages, one ends up encountering important political considerations, which cannot be avoided, as we would like. Two examples:
1.- The Berlin Wall was not brought down by political pressure, but by pressure due to the great difference in productivity on each side of the wall.
2.- The Spanish drama of the crisis is largely due to the fact that the word and the concept "productivity" has been cornered and despised by unions and socialists. It is logical: "productivity", which is above all a culture, means innovation and change. It opposes the "status quo", stability, permanence and "acquired rights" and demands crudely honest and realistic approaches.
5.- The causes and consequences of improving productivity.
1.- Innovation and continuous improvement in the work that all the institutions are doing, which is the main engine of progress, job demand and cost reduction.
2.- Learning and continuous training from basic to advanced and from child to retired professional.
3.- Good example of the political class with rigorous analysis of things, absence of ideologies, demagogies, abstract and absurd theories. That is, with an old-fashioned ethical approach. (It is much less important to get all the short-term monetary, fiscal, etc. policies where attention is currently diverted).
The consequences of improving productivity are:
1.- Social welfare. Quality of life. More children, fewer divorces, greater family integrity, less violence in all its forms.
2.- Greater knowledge and better educational level. More to be each one to his own without talking about what is not known, or sentencing about what is not experienced. Greater confidence. Fewer victims of demagogy and revolutionary politicians. Less ideological pressures and political lies. The truth is told without throwing balls out.
3.- Optimal use of all kinds of resources. Higher levels of real income and above all a sharp reduction in social inequalities.
6.- The causes and consequences of worsening productivity.
1.- Bad example and excessive demagoguery of politicians and intellectuals, generally from the left, who, betraying their condition, forge numerous mediocre beliefs through the media that lead to widespread impoverishment and blaming others.
2.- Excessive pressure in the short term. Search for the "hit". Profitable desire at all costs.
Corruption. Emergence of a perverse capitalism. Great social differences appear.
3.- Poor working conditions. General yearning for a comfortable and safe workplace. Abundance of low-skilled jobs. To much fear.
The consequences of worsening productivity are:
1.- Loss of competitiveness, degradation of the entire productive fabric of the country with the consequent disappearance of companies and jobs. Generation of generalized poverty.
2.- Increase of conflicts and social dangerousness.
3.- Absence of Social Responsibility and degradation of the environment in all senses.
