12 ms·

In Praise of Quitting Your Job, or The New Work Ethic.

161 points by pstinnett 16y ago

biggitybones 16y ago
I've been in consulting for 2 years, and switching projects is like leaving a job and starting a new one. I've gone through exactly what was described, and by 9 months it was outright defeat. I just quit that gig for a startup and couldn't be more happier with the move. This felt like reading what's deep within my subconscious.
- cageface 16y ago
  This article struck a real chord with me too. I stayed far, far too long at my last job and it's only after finally getting bored enough to quit that I've realized how corrosive it's been to my motivation for everything.
- peteypao 16y ago
  upvote!
dsplittgerber 16y ago
One can probably have a good discussion whether one can force the muse to speak to oneself (see Steven Pressfield - The War of Art). Still, the author has quit several companies after working for them for just 6-12 months at best and still sees the companies as being the problem, not himself or his attitude. To each his own, but it makes you wonder if his advice is valid and not an excuse.
- madair 16y ago
  Depression isn't attitude
  - kscaldef 16y ago
    And "unhappy at work" isn't the same as "diagnosed as depressed by a professional". I have a feeling that the author wasn't using the word in the clinical sense.
    - fadzlan 16y ago
      Regardless of semantic, I would argue that when you are really, really hate what you are doing, depression is not a surprising outcome.
    - madair 16y ago
      Depressing response. It is revealing how many people vote up this protestant work ethic judgmentalism masquerading as concern for correct professional diagnosis. What, his emotional concerns are not legitimate to you for some reason? How about you expound on that a bit, maybe reveal a bit more about your delightful world view. Why even dilly-dally with that...why don't you just tell him to grow up and enjoy his cubicle already like all the rest of the poor schmucks in cubes. Hell, maybe you could send a message to working stiffs everywhere that they should get a professional diagnosis before they leave a our soul killing corporate work culture, feel better, then encourage others to do the same. (OMG, how would the captains of industry stay all captainy with so much free thinking!? ;) I hate how people randomly heap shit on the plight of people. Crass. Mean-spirited. Farcical.
- pieratt 16y ago
  The bad guy here was not meant to be the employer, though I can see where you'd get that impression. It's a statement against the lack of control that is inherent to most work environments, and a brief waxing on the effect that has on a person's ability to build great stuff. I'm not a lazy person. I enjoy working, and I have at least a little bit to show for it. So the email was an exploration of why this ceases to be the case when I've spent a certain amount of time working for someone other than myself. The only feasible conclusion that I've come to is what I wrote. Ideally not so much an excuse as a reason.
watmough 16y ago
To an extent this is a reasonable way to put it, but in all honesty, there's much more to software engineers than whether their programming muse is satisfied or not. For example, I'm happy whenever I can make users happy. Even if I'm just writing a data loader script, if the script is fast, gets the users' data loaded correctly, I'm happy and fulfilled. Put in a situation, where I'm unable to make users happy, maybe through clashing with company objectives like making money on a badly written contract, or bad design, I'm miserable. Deprived of feedback from users, or stuck writing designs, I'm miserable. If you are always miserable after 9 months, you need to have a deep think about what sort of jobs you are applying for, or whether pursuing the work at all is worth it. There are decent companies out there, that are customer focussed, and that use new technologies and development methods that stress individual creativity. Go find them.
nroach 16y ago
This piece struck me as very insightful. Not as advice per se, but as a window into the motivations of Creators. This part in particular: "Creation is a deeply personal and rewarding activity, which means that your Work should also be deeply personal and rewarding." I think if you talk to founders who have left companies several years out from the company's inception, the loss of that sense of engagement and "ownership" in the creative sense is a major driver of departures. Some may stay for the financial aspects of "ownership", but once things devolve into board meetings and committees, the spark is gone.
ahoyhere 16y ago
Yes. _Your muse can only be treated as the secretary of a subcommittee for so long before she decides to pack up and look for employment elsewhere. If you aren’t able to own the product and be creative, then you aren’t able to do your work, and if you’re not doing your work then you’re negating a very real part of your personality, which is no good for anyone. No good for you and certainly no good for your employer._ That is why I quit my jobs… and consulting, period, in the end. I couldn't stand to watch people wreck my work. My heart couldn't get excited about such a compromise. And sure, I could have spent a decade learning how to really work a committee -- but to what end, exactly?
- tocomment 16y ago
  What do you do now?
  - olefoo 16y ago
    She's a wildly successful entrepreneur and UX person, she's probably spoken at more conferences than you've attended.
  - thesethings 16y ago
    So she doesn't have to stan herself out, I will. (http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=stan http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=stan) Lately... She's a Javascript/ front-end developer (co-creator of Twistori + everytimezone for example), business thought leader type (did i just say "thought leader?" Sorry.), and co-founder of the SaaS service http://letsfreckle.com http://letsfreckle.com. But none of those things would get much as much attention as they do if it weren't for the fact that she is an amazing user experience/ interface maker. These skills make the things she works on (from books to slides to web form interactions) really friendly and fun. (I have no professional affiliation with her. But full disclosure: We are Twitter friends. #realtalk)
jnovek 16y ago
"The longest was 12 months at [Redacted], and that was only because I wanted my options to vest. I handed them my resignation on my 366th day." This made me livid. I don't hire engineers with the intention of firing them the day before they vest, why would it be ethical to wait until the day after your cliff to quit? [EDIT] Let me clarify. This individual seems to have decided months before that they would quit the day after their vesting cliff. Everyone here thinks that's ethical and appropriate? I'm not questioning whether it's legal, of course it's legal. It's just not very honorable. A vesting cliff exists so that both parties -- employer and employee -- can have a chance to get to know each other before stock is granted and make sure that they're making the right decision.
- jayp 16y ago
  Cliff vesting is deferred compensation. Your concern about an ethical paradox is invalid.
  - staunch 16y ago
    It's not. It's contingent compensation. If it was merely deferred compensation, and you quit early, the company would owe the pro rata amount that you worked (at the 1 year mark).
- moonpolysoft 16y ago
  Your employment agreements set up the economic incentives for working at your company. If the agreement is 1 year cliff to vest and the employee took advantage of that why would you get mad? You got a years worth of work out of that person and in exchange that person got his/her stock. Sounds like a fair deal to me. On the other hand, firing an engineer right before he/she vests is unethical because you are getting almost a years worth of work without having to pay out the stock. Also it is a pretty good way to get sued by said employee.
  - moonpolysoft 16y ago
    Responding to the grandparent's edit. I disagree with your premise that a vesting cliff exists as a "getting to know you" period. It is a guarantee of a minimum investment of time for a given amount of equity. The person put in the required time and now wants to do something else. This is not dishonorable in the least. You seem to be confusing personal relationships with business relationships. This might explain why you see quitting as a sort of betrayal.
mmt 16y ago
Ownership not as a percentage of equity, but as a measure of your ability to change things for the better. I found this succinct expression to be the most valuable (perhaps even the tldr summary). A percentage of equity, as laughably small as it tends to be for non-founders, might not even serve as an alignment of financial interests.
wccrawford 16y ago
I've been with the same company almost 5 years now. While I occasionally have times that I'm incredibly frustrated, I can deal with that because I know that I work daily to make things better. (A co-worker would laugh at this because he thinks we don't do enough better-making. He's leaving.) I've seen this company's software turn from 'oh ---- that's crazy' to 'man, this sucks' and it's continuing to get better. While I'm making it better, I'm also adding features and pleasing the users of the software. And despite the state of the code, it ALL works. That's very important. For me, the key to job happiness is simply to be making things better. For guys like at this article (and my co-worker), it apparently means having everything be perfect from the start. I don't know how people can live like that, since they will always be disappointed.
- boucher 16y ago
  The author isn't saying things need to be perfect from the start, just that he's frustrated by imperfection being introduced by people other than himself, especially when it's the result of compromise or design by committee. The argument is inherently selfish -- I want to own everything -- but I think it's pretty natural for some people. The thing I hated most about contracting for other people was knowing that I was being hired because I'm good at designing and building apps, and still being forced to do something I knew was a bad idea because the client demanded it. I think the best contractors instinctively know how to pick clients who trust them and can be convinced by compelling arguments, and are themselves good at arguing their case in the face of opposition.
- hasenj 16y ago
  Things don't have to be perfect from the start, they have to be in such a way that you are free to make things better.
  - deleted 16y ago
    [deleted]
cmarv 16y ago
Why isn't this person just a consultant? There is nothing wrong with just being a sprinter, but isn't there something to be said for being able to run the marathon? If the spark is gone after only a few months at a company, seemingly no matter what the company, maybe the problem is within and not with the companies that you're working with?
- mgkimsal 16y ago
  Or maybe there is no 'problem' at all. Different people work in different ways.
markstansbury 16y ago
I can sympathize. I've been at plenty of jobs where my ideas were uniformly ignored--not rejected, or outvoted: ignored. That's deflating. It makes work not just menial but downright demoralizing. And it causes the employee to stop thinking and stop trying, which is bad for everyone. Now I wanna go watch Office Space.
bhellman1 16y ago
These are insights that I can relate to easily. Question: How did the companies you worked for end up down the road after you left?
Construct 16y ago
Ownership not as a percentage of equity, but as a measure of your ability to change things for the better. In any company it is difficult to find ownership and recognition at the lowest levels of the corporate hierarchy. If you only work for the company for less than a year, as the author proudly admits to, then you should not expect to be given substantial influence in the company. Influence and recognition must be earned, and that takes time and hard work. The bigger and more established the company, the more time this will take. If you're impatient, then you're going to have to work at a startup or start your own company. From my experience, the trick is to get engaged and routinely demonstrate that you care. If you begrudgingly implement or design every request that comes your way from the confines of your cubicle, of course you will burn out. If instead you ask your boss about the customer's needs or take the initiative to track down and talk to the sales person in charge of the account for some additional detail, you've effectively taken a small piece of ownership and showed some initiative. This rarely goes unnoticed, and definitely factors into decisions involved influence, ownership, and recognition in the future.
- hasenj 16y ago
  > If you're impatient, then you're going to have to work at a startup or start your own company. I think that's exactly the point of the article. > the trick is to get engaged and routinely demonstrate that you care It's hard to care when you don't have ownership. It's impossible to 'demonstrate that you care' when you don't actually care that much. > If instead you ask your boss about the customer's needs or take the initiative to track down and talk to the sales person in charge of the account for some additional detail, you've effectively taken a small piece of ownership and showed some initiative. I do that sometimes, but it often falls on deaf ears. The response is often: yeah the product sucks, our design sucks, but that's how it is, we know that and we're not gonna let you fix it; we need you to work on XYZ instead.
- mgkimsal 16y ago
  If you only work for the company for less than a year, as the author proudly admits to, then you should not expect to be given substantial influence in the company. ======================= Explain VPs and midlevel execs that come in and are given substantial influence on day 1. They've not worked at the company, yet are given staff, budgets, division and respoonsibility, sometimes (often?) before it's known if a) they're really competent and b) a good corporate fit. Seeing that sort of stuff happen can lead people like the OP to despair even more of being able to make any substantive impact.
deleted 16y ago
[deleted]
agentultra 16y ago
I just came out of a 2.5 year stint. Before that I went into consulting because I couldn't hold down a job for even a year. I figured it was boredom and thought the solution was to simply expose myself to a constant stream of new problems. Turns out it was simply ownership that was the problem. I never felt in control. By ownership I mean ownership of my domain (area of involvement, etc) in the project. I don't mean ownership as in control and possession. The kind of ownership that kept me around at my last gig was the kind that let me make suggestions, criticisms, and decisions that were taken seriously. I had responsibility to back up every claim I made and that responsibility kept me highly motivated to produce software I could. It made the project feel more collaborative and kept me involved as a part of its development. What kills that motivation is a loss of that ownership. In the final months of my last gig we brought on someone who took total ownership of the project practically from design to implementation. It no longer felt collaborative. I felt like a monkey in a room of monkeys trying to type out Shakespeare; as if I could replace myself with a junior programmer at half my salary and things would still run smoothly. That's not a good feeling and such loss of ownership (or lack of it in the first place) is completely demoralizing. I get the sense that the OP was referring to this kind of ownership. The kind that makes you feel involved and responsible. But does that mean you should quit your job? I don't think so. Some jobs will have ups and downs. I didn't leave my job when they brought the new guy on. I was going to stick it out... just circumstance brought my tenure there shorter than anticipated. I think you can stick it out in this way as well and avoid "depression." I take pride in my work and it does affect me very personally.. but you have to keep things in perspective. Especially when you have other people relying on you to keep your job.
haskellforlife 16y ago
Ownership is grand, but it comes with a price: fear.
- fadzlan 16y ago
  That is not so bad. Without fear, there would be no feeling like adventurous, which is a kind of feeling when you DO overcome fear.
pmichaud 16y ago
This speaks really strongly to me. This is why I stopped working in the field too. It's not impossible to find an awesome job, but it's also not easy. It's maybe as difficult to find a good job as it is to find a good programmer.
JoeAltmaier 16y ago
Its nice to be able to decide between art, ownership and equity. As my old minister used to say "We can have all the morals that we can afford".
pvdm 16y ago
"Three elements of true motivation: autonomy, mastery, and purpose" Daniel Pink
swaroop 16y ago
This reminds me of the "Self-Determination Theory" that Cal Newport emphasizes: "To be happy, your work must fulfill three universal psychological needs: autonomy, competence, and relatedness." -- http://calnewport.com/blog/2010/01/23/beyond-passion-the-science-of-loving-what-you-do/ http://calnewport.com/blog/2010/01/23/beyond-passion-the-sci...
Oxryly 16y ago
What a load of crap! This is some strange entitled rationalization of his friend's fear of commitment. And it's an attempt to legitimize the author's own fear of commitment. > I’ve worked for a handful of companies over the course of the last 6 years. I started all of them with a fair amount of enthusiasm, but within 5 months of each I dipped into a depression. By 7 months the work was having a tangible effect on my mood and outlook, and by nine months, I’ve quit almost every job I’ve held. Does the author really think that the next job will hold something different? That somehow there's some magical workplace around the corner where reality never sets in and the inevitable drudgery of "work", creative or not, can be put off forever. Pure fantasy. "Ownership" is missing the point. If you believe you must define your creation or contribution in terms of some neatly measured production (like code or design) you are missing the point of your own existence. If you think that there's some fixed body of work you have control and ownership over -- that you must defend and slave over -- you are missing the point. Every second you exist at your job (and everywhere else for that matter) is an opportunity to create the world as you see it. Every second is an opportunity to be creative, to express the person that you are in see that borne out in your work and with your coworkers. The depression and negative outlook the author points to is a failure to be. It's a shrinking away reality -- the reality of the opportunity and commitment that he faces each day he comes to work. He does himself and everyone around him a great disservice by shrinking and turning away like this instead of waking up to what is in front of him. I've been at my job for 8 years and there were many times I wanted to storm out in disgust or just not show up in the morning. But then I realized that every job will be like this if I do quit, that I was bringing my own fear of being or committing with me wherever I go and finding perfect opportunities to manifest it. I stood up and took responsibility for these fears and the negativity and said "enough". I still occasionally find myself doing work that doesn't "inspire" my "muse"... but it really is only a matter of perspective. My muse can be inspired by change in attitude, but a positive conversation with a coworker, by seeing change manifest around me as it manifests in me. I'm no longer defeated by this negativity. I no longer seem my work neatly delineated -- I no longer need to defend anything or pour enormous effort into some limited creative endeavor. The opportunities in front of me are always limitless. Every second is created anew.

161 points by pstinnett 16y ago

I've been in consulting for 2 years, and switching projects is like leaving a job and starting a new one. I've gone through exactly what was described, and by 9 months it was outright defeat. I just quit that gig for a startup and couldn't be more happier with the move. This felt like reading what's deep within my subconscious.

cageface 16y ago
This article struck a real chord with me too. I stayed far, far too long at my last job and it's only after finally getting bored enough to quit that I've realized how corrosive it's been to my motivation for everything.
peteypao 16y ago
upvote!

dsplittgerber 16y ago

One can probably have a good discussion whether one can force the muse to speak to oneself (see Steven Pressfield - The War of Art). Still, the author has quit several companies after working for them for just 6-12 months at best and still sees the companies as being the problem, not himself or his attitude. To each his own, but it makes you wonder if his advice is valid and not an excuse.

madair 16y ago
Depression isn't attitude
- kscaldef 16y ago
  And "unhappy at work" isn't the same as "diagnosed as depressed by a professional". I have a feeling that the author wasn't using the word in the clinical sense.
  - fadzlan 16y ago
    Regardless of semantic, I would argue that when you are really, really hate what you are doing, depression is not a surprising outcome.
  - madair 16y ago
    Depressing response. It is revealing how many people vote up this protestant work ethic judgmentalism masquerading as concern for correct professional diagnosis. What, his emotional concerns are not legitimate to you for some reason? How about you expound on that a bit, maybe reveal a bit more about your delightful world view. Why even dilly-dally with that...why don't you just tell him to grow up and enjoy his cubicle already like all the rest of the poor schmucks in cubes. Hell, maybe you could send a message to working stiffs everywhere that they should get a professional diagnosis before they leave a our soul killing corporate work culture, feel better, then encourage others to do the same. (OMG, how would the captains of industry stay all captainy with so much free thinking!? ;) I hate how people randomly heap shit on the plight of people. Crass. Mean-spirited. Farcical.
pieratt 16y ago
The bad guy here was not meant to be the employer, though I can see where you'd get that impression. It's a statement against the lack of control that is inherent to most work environments, and a brief waxing on the effect that has on a person's ability to build great stuff. I'm not a lazy person. I enjoy working, and I have at least a little bit to show for it. So the email was an exploration of why this ceases to be the case when I've spent a certain amount of time working for someone other than myself. The only feasible conclusion that I've come to is what I wrote. Ideally not so much an excuse as a reason.

watmough 16y ago

To an extent this is a reasonable way to put it, but in all honesty, there's much more to software engineers than whether their programming muse is satisfied or not. For example, I'm happy whenever I can make users happy. Even if I'm just writing a data loader script, if the script is fast, gets the users' data loaded correctly, I'm happy and fulfilled. Put in a situation, where I'm unable to make users happy, maybe through clashing with company objectives like making money on a badly written contract, or bad design, I'm miserable. Deprived of feedback from users, or stuck writing designs, I'm miserable. If you are always miserable after 9 months, you need to have a deep think about what sort of jobs you are applying for, or whether pursuing the work at all is worth it. There are decent companies out there, that are customer focussed, and that use new technologies and development methods that stress individual creativity. Go find them.

nroach 16y ago

This piece struck me as very insightful. Not as advice per se, but as a window into the motivations of Creators. This part in particular: "Creation is a deeply personal and rewarding activity, which means that your Work should also be deeply personal and rewarding." I think if you talk to founders who have left companies several years out from the company's inception, the loss of that sense of engagement and "ownership" in the creative sense is a major driver of departures. Some may stay for the financial aspects of "ownership", but once things devolve into board meetings and committees, the spark is gone.

ahoyhere 16y ago

Yes. _Your muse can only be treated as the secretary of a subcommittee for so long before she decides to pack up and look for employment elsewhere. If you aren’t able to own the product and be creative, then you aren’t able to do your work, and if you’re not doing your work then you’re negating a very real part of your personality, which is no good for anyone. No good for you and certainly no good for your employer._ That is why I quit my jobs… and consulting, period, in the end. I couldn't stand to watch people wreck my work. My heart couldn't get excited about such a compromise. And sure, I could have spent a decade learning how to really work a committee -- but to what end, exactly?

tocomment 16y ago
What do you do now?
- olefoo 16y ago
  She's a wildly successful entrepreneur and UX person, she's probably spoken at more conferences than you've attended.
- thesethings 16y ago
  So she doesn't have to stan herself out, I will. (http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=stan http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=stan) Lately... She's a Javascript/ front-end developer (co-creator of Twistori + everytimezone for example), business thought leader type (did i just say "thought leader?" Sorry.), and co-founder of the SaaS service http://letsfreckle.com http://letsfreckle.com. But none of those things would get much as much attention as they do if it weren't for the fact that she is an amazing user experience/ interface maker. These skills make the things she works on (from books to slides to web form interactions) really friendly and fun. (I have no professional affiliation with her. But full disclosure: We are Twitter friends. #realtalk)

jnovek 16y ago

"The longest was 12 months at [Redacted], and that was only because I wanted my options to vest. I handed them my resignation on my 366th day." This made me livid. I don't hire engineers with the intention of firing them the day before they vest, why would it be ethical to wait until the day after your cliff to quit? [EDIT] Let me clarify. This individual seems to have decided months before that they would quit the day after their vesting cliff. Everyone here thinks that's ethical and appropriate? I'm not questioning whether it's legal, of course it's legal. It's just not very honorable. A vesting cliff exists so that both parties -- employer and employee -- can have a chance to get to know each other before stock is granted and make sure that they're making the right decision.

jayp 16y ago
Cliff vesting is deferred compensation. Your concern about an ethical paradox is invalid.
- staunch 16y ago
  It's not. It's contingent compensation. If it was merely deferred compensation, and you quit early, the company would owe the pro rata amount that you worked (at the 1 year mark).
moonpolysoft 16y ago
Your employment agreements set up the economic incentives for working at your company. If the agreement is 1 year cliff to vest and the employee took advantage of that why would you get mad? You got a years worth of work out of that person and in exchange that person got his/her stock. Sounds like a fair deal to me. On the other hand, firing an engineer right before he/she vests is unethical because you are getting almost a years worth of work without having to pay out the stock. Also it is a pretty good way to get sued by said employee.
- moonpolysoft 16y ago
  Responding to the grandparent's edit. I disagree with your premise that a vesting cliff exists as a "getting to know you" period. It is a guarantee of a minimum investment of time for a given amount of equity. The person put in the required time and now wants to do something else. This is not dishonorable in the least. You seem to be confusing personal relationships with business relationships. This might explain why you see quitting as a sort of betrayal.

mmt 16y ago

Ownership not as a percentage of equity, but as a measure of your ability to change things for the better. I found this succinct expression to be the most valuable (perhaps even the tldr summary). A percentage of equity, as laughably small as it tends to be for non-founders, might not even serve as an alignment of financial interests.

wccrawford 16y ago

I've been with the same company almost 5 years now. While I occasionally have times that I'm incredibly frustrated, I can deal with that because I know that I work daily to make things better. (A co-worker would laugh at this because he thinks we don't do enough better-making. He's leaving.) I've seen this company's software turn from 'oh ---- that's crazy' to 'man, this sucks' and it's continuing to get better. While I'm making it better, I'm also adding features and pleasing the users of the software. And despite the state of the code, it ALL works. That's very important. For me, the key to job happiness is simply to be making things better. For guys like at this article (and my co-worker), it apparently means having everything be perfect from the start. I don't know how people can live like that, since they will always be disappointed.

boucher 16y ago
The author isn't saying things need to be perfect from the start, just that he's frustrated by imperfection being introduced by people other than himself, especially when it's the result of compromise or design by committee. The argument is inherently selfish -- I want to own everything -- but I think it's pretty natural for some people. The thing I hated most about contracting for other people was knowing that I was being hired because I'm good at designing and building apps, and still being forced to do something I knew was a bad idea because the client demanded it. I think the best contractors instinctively know how to pick clients who trust them and can be convinced by compelling arguments, and are themselves good at arguing their case in the face of opposition.
hasenj 16y ago
Things don't have to be perfect from the start, they have to be in such a way that you are free to make things better.
- deleted 16y ago
  [deleted]

cmarv 16y ago

Why isn't this person just a consultant? There is nothing wrong with just being a sprinter, but isn't there something to be said for being able to run the marathon? If the spark is gone after only a few months at a company, seemingly no matter what the company, maybe the problem is within and not with the companies that you're working with?

mgkimsal 16y ago
Or maybe there is no 'problem' at all. Different people work in different ways.

markstansbury 16y ago

I can sympathize. I've been at plenty of jobs where my ideas were uniformly ignored--not rejected, or outvoted: ignored. That's deflating. It makes work not just menial but downright demoralizing. And it causes the employee to stop thinking and stop trying, which is bad for everyone. Now I wanna go watch Office Space.

bhellman1 16y ago

These are insights that I can relate to easily. Question: How did the companies you worked for end up down the road after you left?

Construct 16y ago

Ownership not as a percentage of equity, but as a measure of your ability to change things for the better. In any company it is difficult to find ownership and recognition at the lowest levels of the corporate hierarchy. If you only work for the company for less than a year, as the author proudly admits to, then you should not expect to be given substantial influence in the company. Influence and recognition must be earned, and that takes time and hard work. The bigger and more established the company, the more time this will take. If you're impatient, then you're going to have to work at a startup or start your own company. From my experience, the trick is to get engaged and routinely demonstrate that you care. If you begrudgingly implement or design every request that comes your way from the confines of your cubicle, of course you will burn out. If instead you ask your boss about the customer's needs or take the initiative to track down and talk to the sales person in charge of the account for some additional detail, you've effectively taken a small piece of ownership and showed some initiative. This rarely goes unnoticed, and definitely factors into decisions involved influence, ownership, and recognition in the future.

hasenj 16y ago
> If you're impatient, then you're going to have to work at a startup or start your own company. I think that's exactly the point of the article. > the trick is to get engaged and routinely demonstrate that you care It's hard to care when you don't have ownership. It's impossible to 'demonstrate that you care' when you don't actually care that much. > If instead you ask your boss about the customer's needs or take the initiative to track down and talk to the sales person in charge of the account for some additional detail, you've effectively taken a small piece of ownership and showed some initiative. I do that sometimes, but it often falls on deaf ears. The response is often: yeah the product sucks, our design sucks, but that's how it is, we know that and we're not gonna let you fix it; we need you to work on XYZ instead.
mgkimsal 16y ago
If you only work for the company for less than a year, as the author proudly admits to, then you should not expect to be given substantial influence in the company. ======================= Explain VPs and midlevel execs that come in and are given substantial influence on day 1. They've not worked at the company, yet are given staff, budgets, division and respoonsibility, sometimes (often?) before it's known if a) they're really competent and b) a good corporate fit. Seeing that sort of stuff happen can lead people like the OP to despair even more of being able to make any substantive impact.

deleted 16y ago

[deleted]

agentultra 16y ago

I just came out of a 2.5 year stint. Before that I went into consulting because I couldn't hold down a job for even a year. I figured it was boredom and thought the solution was to simply expose myself to a constant stream of new problems. Turns out it was simply ownership that was the problem. I never felt in control. By ownership I mean ownership of my domain (area of involvement, etc) in the project. I don't mean ownership as in control and possession. The kind of ownership that kept me around at my last gig was the kind that let me make suggestions, criticisms, and decisions that were taken seriously. I had responsibility to back up every claim I made and that responsibility kept me highly motivated to produce software I could. It made the project feel more collaborative and kept me involved as a part of its development. What kills that motivation is a loss of that ownership. In the final months of my last gig we brought on someone who took total ownership of the project practically from design to implementation. It no longer felt collaborative. I felt like a monkey in a room of monkeys trying to type out Shakespeare; as if I could replace myself with a junior programmer at half my salary and things would still run smoothly. That's not a good feeling and such loss of ownership (or lack of it in the first place) is completely demoralizing. I get the sense that the OP was referring to this kind of ownership. The kind that makes you feel involved and responsible. But does that mean you should quit your job? I don't think so. Some jobs will have ups and downs. I didn't leave my job when they brought the new guy on. I was going to stick it out... just circumstance brought my tenure there shorter than anticipated. I think you can stick it out in this way as well and avoid "depression." I take pride in my work and it does affect me very personally.. but you have to keep things in perspective. Especially when you have other people relying on you to keep your job.

haskellforlife 16y ago

Ownership is grand, but it comes with a price: fear.

fadzlan 16y ago
That is not so bad. Without fear, there would be no feeling like adventurous, which is a kind of feeling when you DO overcome fear.

pmichaud 16y ago

This speaks really strongly to me. This is why I stopped working in the field too. It's not impossible to find an awesome job, but it's also not easy. It's maybe as difficult to find a good job as it is to find a good programmer.

JoeAltmaier 16y ago

Its nice to be able to decide between art, ownership and equity. As my old minister used to say "We can have all the morals that we can afford".

pvdm 16y ago

"Three elements of true motivation: autonomy, mastery, and purpose" Daniel Pink

swaroop 16y ago

This reminds me of the "Self-Determination Theory" that Cal Newport emphasizes: "To be happy, your work must fulfill three universal psychological needs: autonomy, competence, and relatedness." -- http://calnewport.com/blog/2010/01/23/beyond-passion-the-science-of-loving-what-you-do/ http://calnewport.com/blog/2010/01/23/beyond-passion-the-sci...

Oxryly 16y ago

What a load of crap! This is some strange entitled rationalization of his friend's fear of commitment. And it's an attempt to legitimize the author's own fear of commitment. > I’ve worked for a handful of companies over the course of the last 6 years. I started all of them with a fair amount of enthusiasm, but within 5 months of each I dipped into a depression. By 7 months the work was having a tangible effect on my mood and outlook, and by nine months, I’ve quit almost every job I’ve held. Does the author really think that the next job will hold something different? That somehow there's some magical workplace around the corner where reality never sets in and the inevitable drudgery of "work", creative or not, can be put off forever. Pure fantasy. "Ownership" is missing the point. If you believe you must define your creation or contribution in terms of some neatly measured production (like code or design) you are missing the point of your own existence. If you think that there's some fixed body of work you have control and ownership over -- that you must defend and slave over -- you are missing the point. Every second you exist at your job (and everywhere else for that matter) is an opportunity to create the world as you see it. Every second is an opportunity to be creative, to express the person that you are in see that borne out in your work and with your coworkers. The depression and negative outlook the author points to is a failure to be. It's a shrinking away reality -- the reality of the opportunity and commitment that he faces each day he comes to work. He does himself and everyone around him a great disservice by shrinking and turning away like this instead of waking up to what is in front of him. I've been at my job for 8 years and there were many times I wanted to storm out in disgust or just not show up in the morning. But then I realized that every job will be like this if I do quit, that I was bringing my own fear of being or committing with me wherever I go and finding perfect opportunities to manifest it. I stood up and took responsibility for these fears and the negativity and said "enough". I still occasionally find myself doing work that doesn't "inspire" my "muse"... but it really is only a matter of perspective. My muse can be inspired by change in attitude, but a positive conversation with a coworker, by seeing change manifest around me as it manifests in me. I'm no longer defeated by this negativity. I no longer seem my work neatly delineated -- I no longer need to defend anything or pour enormous effort into some limited creative endeavor. The opportunities in front of me are always limitless. Every second is created anew.