I think I like the thinking that’s in this general direction, but just to list some additional counter-considerations:
almost all of the predictable difference in your realized impact from your theoretical maximum would be due to contigent factors outside of your control.
You can try to solve this problem somewhat by saying Y% of your ex ante expected value
But it’s hard (but not impossible) to avoid problems with evidential updates here (like there’ll be situations where your policy prevents you from seeking evidential updates)
the toy example that comes to mind is that unless you’re careful, this policy would in theory prevent you from learning about much more ambitious things you could’ve done, because that’d be evidence that your theoretical maximum is much higher than you’ve previously thought!
The subjectivity of Y is problematic not just for interpersonal dynamics, but from a motivational perspective.Because it’s so hard to know both the numerator and especially denominator, the figures may be too noisy to optimize for/have a clean target to aim at.
In practice I think this hasn’t been too much of a problem for me, and I can easily switch from honest evaluation mode to execution mode. Curious if other people have different experiences.
I think I like the thinking that’s in this general direction, but just to list some additional counter-considerations:
almost all of the predictable difference in your realized impact from your theoretical maximum would be due to contigent factors outside of your control.
You can try to solve this problem somewhat by saying Y% of your ex ante expected value
But it’s hard (but not impossible) to avoid problems with evidential updates here (like there’ll be situations where your policy prevents you from seeking evidential updates)
the toy example that comes to mind is that unless you’re careful, this policy would in theory prevent you from learning about much more ambitious things you could’ve done, because that’d be evidence that your theoretical maximum is much higher than you’ve previously thought!
The subjectivity of Y is problematic not just for interpersonal dynamics, but from a motivational perspective.Because it’s so hard to know both the numerator and especially denominator, the figures may be too noisy to optimize for/have a clean target to aim at.
In practice I think this hasn’t been too much of a problem for me, and I can easily switch from honest evaluation mode to execution mode. Curious if other people have different experiences.