I think it's more that the business-speak label of "productivity" bothers you rather than its underlying idea of efficiency of input effort in relation to desirable output.

The concept of "productivity" doesn't have to be a Peter Drucker style management guru propaganda. Productivity makes us happy because it's an intrinsic human desire to improve our lives. For example, consider a prehistoric hunter in Africa that's running barefoot with a spear in hand and chasing after antelope to kill and eat it. He doesn't need modern McKinsey consultants to tell him he wants to do the least amount of running for the most amount of food. The better that ratio of expended effort to food quantity, the better the productivity. It's just that the hunter didn't label that concept as "productivity". If he has a sprained ankle, his chasing ability will decrease and his productivity will also decrease. He becomes unhappier. If the hunter uses his brain and notices the paths the antelopes use to the watering holes and takes advantage of those patterns to intelligently intercept it, his hunting productivity increases, and he becomes happier.

In the case of this thread's article, it looks like the author is a freelance journalist and so "productivity" to her is writing articles faster and/or writing more articles.