Autonomy – not asking for help or being independent in an organization

 there is the phenomenon where people dont ask for help and do things the hard way or fail to meet their targets/requirements. They believe that doing the hard thing allows them to keep their autonomy – and that their autonomy depends on not needing to ask for help. 

I noticed this and tried to analyze the autonomy – and they’re right – its worthwhile to suffer for autonomy because with autonomy we have the right to REST. if we are left to ourselves we can take breaks. Everyone works differently, some people take more breaks, some people are very insightful, some people have a lot to work on to be able to keep up with others… etc… 

Autonomy is more important than output – and thus you have people who don’t ask for help, failing, and not communicate their problems. If the output was important then they would sacrifice autonomy. Autonomy is for Rest and Peace of mind. 

When I approach these kinds of problems, while I cannot make people act on my authority, I can change the incentives and the payoffs as IT, by changing how the system works. 

I see this time and time again, and when I realize autonomy = rest = security it just makes more sense. When IT or QA introduces new Processes or Tools – it has to give Autonomy. 

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