It is because true productivity is very hard to identify, specially when you factor in quality, mainteinability, efficiency and timeliness. That is why managers should be as qualified as the people they manage.
Programmers do some thinking & some typing, the more you do of one, the less you do of the other. (don't remember the original author)
The lazy engineer is the best engineer.. If not for lazy people we would still be living in caves
Unfortunately, in the world of programming, most people get rewarded for putting in extra hours rather than for being good at their jobs.
My pointy-haired manager rejected a design that I developed for our current project because I think he didn't understand it... instead we went and cloned the existing bug-ridden, convoluted, user-hostile app, following its example at every opportunity, and leading to a HUGE increase in project scope... exactly what I had predicted and attempted to avoid.
In the end what should have been a six-week project for a good 4-person team turned into a 4-month crunch for a 10-person team saddled with several run-of-the-mill and a few genuinely incompetent members... and the worst of the incompetent ended up being the primary architect based on his ego and politics.
Programmers do some thinking & some typing, the more you do of one, the less you do of the other. (don't remember the original author)
The lazy engineer is the best engineer.. If not for lazy people we would still be living in caves