You have a point that in life sometimes, particularly in creative tasks, goals are unclear. But goals aren't unclear in a college class that hundreds of students take per year. In fact the goals generally should be listed on a website before you even apply for the course.
But do you not take any sort of measure both before and after the feature launch to evaluate what effect it had? How much “more right” (or not) you got?
How do you know that all the talk with the customers led to a feature that made a difference?
The current grading system teaches people not to ask this. That's a problem.
I would love to see your evidence to back this claim.
> Of course!
Can you tell me a little bit more about the pre and post measures you used? Were they numerical? Were they based on observable facts? Did they give you a sense of how close to (or far from) your goal you landed?
How I measure success (or recognise failure, at least) varies between problems. Sometimes quantitative, sometimes qualitative. Sometimes based on theory and process, sometimes based on observation and outcome.
I rarely, however, find it meaningful to know "how close to the goal I landed" because that generally says more about the goal than the outcome.
So the assertion is that, if grades act as an extrinsic motivator, they replace passion/pride/curiousity as intrinsic motivators? That argument vaguely makes sense to me but personally it feels like more of a “both and”.
As for your approach to measuring success - no offense, but it sounds like the sort of vague, feel-good, don’t-fret-it sort of goal-setting that techniques like SMART goals, KPIs, and OKRs are intended to supercede. Do you do anything like those?
Is your product manager saying, "I give this implementation a C" the point where you go, "whew, I met the goals I needed to meet!" and then you move on to the next feature?
Does that sound like a helpful, healthy interaction?
Does it teach you anything about your users?
When I work on a feature, I collaborate with other developers, product people, and occasionally customers to try to figure out what problems they need solved, and where my work can efficiently fit into that. It's a dynamic, nuanced discussion with no clear right or wrong answer.
That's what we need to teach our children.
The obsession in school with getting the "right" answer stymies critical thinking, exploration, and, well, learning -- which can only happen when you get things wrong and figure out why on your own.