What would you do if you received this e-mail from your employer?
What would you think if refusal to comply were grounds for losing your job?
There's been a lot of weeping and wailing from Federal workers who received such an e-mail recently—and from many who purport to speak up for them.
I don't understand why.
I know what I would have done, before I retired from my medical center IT job, if I had received such a request: I'd have sat down and put together five of the most important things I'd accomplished during the previous week. The boss was the boss, after all, and this would have been a whole lot less onerous than when he instituted the "no jeans at work" rule.
Much as I like to grumble about needless bureaucratic requirements, this one seems both easy to do and reasonable to request. After all, I was being paid, not for the hours spent sitting at my computer, but for what I accomplished there. My boss didn't know the nitty-gritty of the work I was doing; most managers don't. They're hired to manage the overall picture, not to know the internal details. Keeping one's work in front of their eyes on a regular basis accomplishes several good things.
- It reminds them that your job is important. If it's not, something needs to change.
- It reminds them that you're doing the work you're being paid for. If you're not, you need to be mentored for improvement, or let go to find more suitable work.
- It reminds YOU of these things as well. This is important for your job satisfaction and your self-confidence, which will lead to better work and more accomplishments—unless it demonstrates to you that you are in the wrong job; in which case, the sooner you discover that and do something positive about it, the better.
- If you are on the wrong track in your work, it will alert them while there is still time to make a course correction.
- If you are on the right track, it gives them the opportunity to confirm your direction and strengthen you in that course.
I can't see any downsides. They're not asking for detailed documentation—just five bullet points. Except in very small businesses, where everyone's contributions (or lack thereof) are obvious, what employee doesn't provide documentation of his work? Shifts worked, trash picked up, papers written, classes taught, code created, meals cooked, patients treated, products sold, houses built, cars repaired—most of us are expected to show evidence of our productivity.
It's harder for the self-employed, which includes those of us who are retired. But it's at least as important. When the worker and the supervisor are the same person, some measurement of our success is essential, for our growth, our progress, and our mental health.
So that's why I'm taking the DOGE Challenge.
Nothing fancy; the idea is simply to take a few minutes during the day to note various things that I've been doing. Then at the end of the week I'll choose the five (or so) most significant. I'll be the sole judge of what's "significant"—see the point above about the worker and the supervisor being the same person. 
And I won't promise to share the results here, since they could end up being too personal.
But it's going to be an interesting experiment.
