I heard the phrase "yak shearing" as the term for what this author calls "rabbit holing".
The essay cites Hamming, "I notice that if you have the door to your office closed, you get more work done today and tomorrow, and you are more productive than most. But 10 years later somehow you don't know quite know what problems are worth working on."
This reminds me of a quote by Rab Butler (British Chancellor of the Exchequer, 1951—1955) "It is more important to be generous than to be efficient — that is what I learned at the Treasury." It's about more or less the same thing: generosity of either your time or support gets you involved with other people and their concerns, and that is very important to making contributions of real importance.
The essay cites Hamming, "I notice that if you have the door to your office closed, you get more work done today and tomorrow, and you are more productive than most. But 10 years later somehow you don't know quite know what problems are worth working on."
This reminds me of a quote by Rab Butler (British Chancellor of the Exchequer, 1951—1955) "It is more important to be generous than to be efficient — that is what I learned at the Treasury." It's about more or less the same thing: generosity of either your time or support gets you involved with other people and their concerns, and that is very important to making contributions of real importance.