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Are programmers freaking lemmings or something? We're people, damnit. We choose to work overtime for various reasons. Some of which include: putting dinner on

Are programmers freaking lemmings or something? We're people, damnit. We choose to work overtime for various reasons. Some of which include: putting dinner on the table, keeping our jobs, getting our foot in the door, and so forth. In my experience there are only 3 cases for working overtime: 1. You're a new, mediocre, or terrible programmer. You've been given three months to deliver a web site using a framework that practically holds your hand and wipes your ass and yet you still need more time. Everything seems hard. There's nothing you can do but brute-force your way to the finish line: stay up late and work that overtime to get it done and make up for all the time wasted googling, procrastinating, and debugging with a shotgun. 2. The suits messed up. They set a deadline without consulting you. They took on a contract with an incredibly short deadline because the business needs the money. They forgot to plan ahead for the big industry conference and they need something to show off to the other suits that will be there. 3. You've entered a culture of slavery. You just got your foot in the door at a big company. Unfortunately things have been sliding downhill and they never told you just how bad it has gotten during the interview process. Some people who stick to their guns will run for the hills, but you've got bigger responsibilities and cannot afford to take another month off job-searching. If you don't join in, they'll just make you look bad and the suits will fire you. For me it's simple: if I can't get it done in 8 hours a day, someone didn't consult me for an estimate and its their fault. I may choose to work the overtime to get it done, but it's not something I personally tolerate. I value my life more than my work and my free time is important. But sometimes you have to do what you have to do to put a roof over your family's head and dinner on the table. It's not as stupid as, "programmers love working overtime because they're passionate people!" I'm passionate about what I do. But I'm passionate about life. Programming is a part of that. Slaving away to make some other dude rich isn't.

Androsynth 17y ago
4. You own shares in an exciting young company. You own your overtime, not the other way around.
- jquery 17y ago
  Really? Let's do the math: Let's be very generous, you own 2% of the company, so you are entitled to 2% of the company's profits. Let's be generous and assume you contribute 20% of the company's productivity. Your influence on your 2% is equity is 20% x 2% = 0.4%. For this extra 0.4% compensation, you work 50% more hours. 50% divided by 0.4% is about 125x. So you are on the losing end of this deal by a ratio of 125 to 1. Your "screwed factor" is 125. Tweak the variables to find out your screwed factor.
  - jquery 17y ago
    If my calculation is wildly off base, please let me know why, I would appreciate it.
    - trominos 17y ago
      Even assuming that this "screwed factor" is something meaningful, you miscalculated it. I think you're trying to find (percentage increase in work over normal hours/percentage increase in pay over normal pay). If your pay is just a percentage of a company's profits, the amount of equity you hold has no impact on this number. If you working 50% more hours generates 10% more profits (or whatever) for the company, you get 10% more pay for 50% more work, so the screwed factor is 5. Again, this is assuming that the screwed factor is meaningful in the context of a startup, and it isn't. First of all, the different possible outcomes for an early employee of a small startup can mostly be boiled down to two, maybe three: the startup IPOs and you get rich, it gets sold and you get well-compensated, it fails and you get nothing. Treating your income as a very smooth function of the hours you work is misguided in this kind of scenario. Second, contributing to a culture of working really hard on the startup (by working overtime) might be more important than the work you actually do in your overtime. Startup employees don't work in a vacuum.
      - jquery 17y ago
        Appreciate it. Can't really understand you right now, running a high fever, but I'll check back later.
nostrademons 17y ago
There seem to be at least two more cases that I've experienced that aren't on your list: 1. You're learning something new. It will take you X hours of practice to learn it, so if you want to get to the good part and be able to start building cool things with it, might as well get X out of the way. 2. You've got this burning idea for how to do something cool, and if you rest it'll leak out of your brain. Better get it done fast before the inspiration dries up. There was a period a couple months back where I was pulling 12 hour days and working weekends for about 3 weeks. I had something that needed to be finished, and it was complicated enough that I feared that if I set it aside for anything, I wouldn't be able to load the problem back into my head. So I just did it, spending whatever time it took to get it done. And then I spent a week or two working 6-7 hour days. I don't keep score, and I don't think my boss does either. From his POV, the project got done, and that's a win for him. From my POV, I didn't have much planned that month anyway, and my employer has been remarkably flexible when I need to take long periods of time off work, or need to leave early and work a shortened day, or just want to come in at 1 and leave at 10. I won't sacrifice things that are important to me for my job - if an old friend is coming into town and I've got dinner plans with them, I'm not willing to be tied down to my desk. But if it's just a matter of writing some more code or blowing a few more hours on Reddit/HackerNews, I don't really mind writing the code so much.

Androsynth 17y ago

4. You own shares in an exciting young company. You own your overtime, not the other way around.

jquery 17y ago
Really? Let's do the math: Let's be very generous, you own 2% of the company, so you are entitled to 2% of the company's profits. Let's be generous and assume you contribute 20% of the company's productivity. Your influence on your 2% is equity is 20% x 2% = 0.4%. For this extra 0.4% compensation, you work 50% more hours. 50% divided by 0.4% is about 125x. So you are on the losing end of this deal by a ratio of 125 to 1. Your "screwed factor" is 125. Tweak the variables to find out your screwed factor.
- jquery 17y ago
  If my calculation is wildly off base, please let me know why, I would appreciate it.
  - trominos 17y ago
    Even assuming that this "screwed factor" is something meaningful, you miscalculated it. I think you're trying to find (percentage increase in work over normal hours/percentage increase in pay over normal pay). If your pay is just a percentage of a company's profits, the amount of equity you hold has no impact on this number. If you working 50% more hours generates 10% more profits (or whatever) for the company, you get 10% more pay for 50% more work, so the screwed factor is 5. Again, this is assuming that the screwed factor is meaningful in the context of a startup, and it isn't. First of all, the different possible outcomes for an early employee of a small startup can mostly be boiled down to two, maybe three: the startup IPOs and you get rich, it gets sold and you get well-compensated, it fails and you get nothing. Treating your income as a very smooth function of the hours you work is misguided in this kind of scenario. Second, contributing to a culture of working really hard on the startup (by working overtime) might be more important than the work you actually do in your overtime. Startup employees don't work in a vacuum.
    - jquery 17y ago
      Appreciate it. Can't really understand you right now, running a high fever, but I'll check back later.

nostrademons 17y ago

There seem to be at least two more cases that I've experienced that aren't on your list: 1. You're learning something new. It will take you X hours of practice to learn it, so if you want to get to the good part and be able to start building cool things with it, might as well get X out of the way. 2. You've got this burning idea for how to do something cool, and if you rest it'll leak out of your brain. Better get it done fast before the inspiration dries up. There was a period a couple months back where I was pulling 12 hour days and working weekends for about 3 weeks. I had something that needed to be finished, and it was complicated enough that I feared that if I set it aside for anything, I wouldn't be able to load the problem back into my head. So I just did it, spending whatever time it took to get it done. And then I spent a week or two working 6-7 hour days. I don't keep score, and I don't think my boss does either. From his POV, the project got done, and that's a win for him. From my POV, I didn't have much planned that month anyway, and my employer has been remarkably flexible when I need to take long periods of time off work, or need to leave early and work a shortened day, or just want to come in at 1 and leave at 10. I won't sacrifice things that are important to me for my job - if an old friend is coming into town and I've got dinner plans with them, I'm not willing to be tied down to my desk. But if it's just a matter of writing some more code or blowing a few more hours on Reddit/HackerNews, I don't really mind writing the code so much.