Your comment makes me think of how short-sighted laziness is endemic or maybe engrained on a cultural level. Or even worse, it's a natural part of our decision-making processes, but I really think culture can overcome it.
Solving the problem of people never learning "one thing" to save hundreds of wasted hours over the years is akin to solving the obesity problem in America. Everybody that is obese knows already that obesity is a health problem, but it takes that little bit of effort to start making it pay off, and nobody has the time/desire to put in that little bit of effort. Meanwhile massive societal forces conspire to both make people overeat and stay inactive, just as they keep them from taking the time to learn new things about their software and work processes.
The reason I think culture and education can overcome these forces is because of another comparable societal problem: the campaign to end smoking actually has gotten a large percentage of Americans, especially youth, to get over that hump or even better never start at all. It took massive investment in public education and time for it to propagate through a generation. So, these are cultural problems: we have a failure to motivate people to explore new computer skills.
Solving the problem of people never learning "one thing" to save hundreds of wasted hours over the years is akin to solving the obesity problem in America. Everybody that is obese knows already that obesity is a health problem, but it takes that little bit of effort to start making it pay off, and nobody has the time/desire to put in that little bit of effort. Meanwhile massive societal forces conspire to both make people overeat and stay inactive, just as they keep them from taking the time to learn new things about their software and work processes.
The reason I think culture and education can overcome these forces is because of another comparable societal problem: the campaign to end smoking actually has gotten a large percentage of Americans, especially youth, to get over that hump or even better never start at all. It took massive investment in public education and time for it to propagate through a generation. So, these are cultural problems: we have a failure to motivate people to explore new computer skills.