Process versus product. The dilemma of many people in the workplace. The dilemma of having to decide which one is more important and implement it.
I personally want to believe with all my heart that it is the process that really matters and hope that the product follows from the process. But real world does not agree with me.
When we get into a new project, job or habit, we need time to get used to it, right? Then, it will hopefully click with us, eventually resulting in good products. Well, if only it was that smooth.
First, real world may not be willing to give the necessary time to us. We might be expected to speed up the process or even skip one or two steps so we can get the product as quickly as possible.
Second, this process is not linear. There are failures that cause us to go back and then start moving ahead again. Guess what this does to us. It makes us lose time. What does the real world want? Product. When does it want it? As quickly as possible. Losing time is unacceptable. So, there you go. The conflict. The conflict as it is caused by a natural part of the process (failures).
This dilemma exists in all jobs and for all people. So, it applies to me as a PhD student as well.
PhD student job description: do research in your field (ignoring the teaching aspect, which is also quite a common addition to the main job description).
Doing research is very much a process by its nature. Why? Because it means we try one thing and see if it works. If it does not, we try something else. This goes on until we can find something worthwhile. Usually, things are too complicated to solve in the first try. So, it takes multiple attempts to get something tangible. Sometimes, you need experience. Say, you are designing an experiment. The first few attempts usually yield null results. So, it takes experience to get it right.
Not to mention the fact that we start with little trials and aim to extend it. So, the initial stages are usually not product-material anyway. They need extension.
All that requires time.
But eventually, the judgment is made based on the product. We are not judged on what we have learnt from our failures, but rather on how many successes we have had. That is my dilemma.
This dilemma is still unresolved from my end. I don’t know if it ever will be. The best thing to do is to learn how to live with it. But even that requires process.
Do you experience this dilemma? If so, do have a solution for it that works for you?
To Write or not to Write and What to Write 
I think this is why people love talking about their journey or learning about how a respected person got to where they are. While it’s easy to judge a product, like you said, there should be some way to measure the amount of pain that it took to create that product.
As an author, I’ve found that people who have endured the most hardships have the most interesting stories and the most successful authors have found a way to use their personal experience to market their work.
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I definitely agree that the pain involved should be included in evaluation. That would actually really ease the dilemma a bit and help people mentally. For your next point, consistency and durability make room and time for our evolution, which makes us in line with the nature of this whole process. It just requires too much effort on the part of the person. I just wish that something could be done to make this a little easier.
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When I first got in the PhD, I had a hard time understanding what research is and why my advisor wasn’t able to give me more guidance. At one point of time, I felt very exhausted and helpless when I wasn’t able to get any significant findings or information from a dataset I was supposed to work with. I asked my advisor if there was something I was missing. He said, “Well, it looks like you did everything you could with it, and we’re just not going to be able to get anything from this dataset. So we’ll have to try another approach.” This is when I finally started to understand research and why my advisor would give me ideas but never have definite answers for me – because they don’t exist! This understanding did help. I still struggle with the feeling that my PPT slides, papers, or dissertation seem to simplify the research effort, but *shrugs*.
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Sorry for my late reply! That is totally relatable. In fact, I think that we boast too much as human species but we know so little. We are discovering the littlest things yet.
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