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God! I couldn't stop reading this it was so entertaining but it's also similar to my experience. The type of jobs where the incompetence of your superiors cre

by pwaai 8y ago

God! I couldn't stop reading this it was so entertaining but it's also similar to my experience. The type of jobs where the incompetence of your superiors creates the absence of responsibility due to the sheer number of hierarchial and useless processes and departments. It's ironic that it's at these type of jobs where the bar is ridiculously low, like you really have to seriously put in an effort to get fired. If you are thinking this is the life, please don't, the boredom from not having intellctually stimulating work and responsibilities is very real... but at the same time you are not doing hard labor and making minimum wage so obviously it's a very good deal for most people....I just didn't feel like I can do that for long because of the boredom is too much.....

cornellwright 8y ago
Along with the boredom I'd image you have the anxiety of getting fired or laid off if someone realizes you don't actually do anything. Then when you go to get your next job you won't have anything to show for the last n years.
- pwaai 8y ago
  Well when your CEO is convinced you have product market fit when you dont, raise millions and burn it all in a few years thinking you can hire your way to a robust sales pipeline, it doesn't feel as bad. Especially when the best sales ppl are leaving and you cant hire new fast enough so they stick with whatever they have, even if their book rate is at the bottom. Basically sales teams are for selling but they cant sell products which have no demand and so eventually you are "that" company in the expo with nobody coming to the booths since your marketing involves using shady eastern European seo backlinks and believe repeatedly spamming CEOs and partners. In fact, when your partners turn on you, it's a sign that there is problems at the top level. Usually these type of CEOs are egomaniacs with no discernable skill other than walking around the office taking up conference room to meditate, and thinking he is at TEDtalk...
le-mark 8y ago
I've never actually been forgotten, but I've definitely spent months unutilized. Once was as a consultant through a third party. Job was a 1 year contract to help implement some APIs. they had enough work planned for about one month, then nothing for a loooong time. I worked on some load testing busy work sporadically during this period. It was the type of situation where the on site manger knew he didn't have anything for me, so we just sort of mutually agreed to not discuss it. I was offered to convert to full time by the same manager. I said "Seriously? I haven't done sh-- here?" He replied yeah but I contributed more than a lot of the others. I declined as I had another job lined up already. But I was stunned, still am when I reflect on it.
- fyfy18 8y ago
  If you can afford it, it’s a lot better to have too many people (although your case sounds a bit extreme) than too little. I’m working at a startup where we have too little, and we are rushing to get stuff done without really thinking it through long term. Our tech debt level is growing each day. In your case it sounds like you - and your experience - really helped other members of the team work more efficiently.
  - xab9 8y ago
    I value myself more than to sit around for months so that the company may feel secure. I usually start looking for a new job after a month, since I'm not needed here and I'm bored (I also can't talk about this with the manager, or at least whenever I tried nothing fruitful came out of it; doing opensource or just reading tutorials were usually dismissed - the best managers can come up with in these situations is that you "document everything").
  - toast0 8y ago
    Having too little people isn't too bad, in my experience. There's a lot of things you could do, that you won't be able to do, but nobody will have hurt feelings when you don't do their thing when you don't have enough people to do it. If you've got too many people and you're still pushing back on features, you're going to have a lot more hurt feelings. Plus, at least in my experience, if you know you're not going to have time to redo something, you do it right the first time :)
TeMPOraL 8y ago
> If you are thinking this is the life, please don't, the boredom from not having intellctually stimulating work and responsibilities is very real... Like most software jobs these days? :/.
- pwaai 8y ago
  The single joy I got was a burst of shell scripting I did...out of my own volition to create tools to help AEs as many quarters went by without booking any deals. The tool was very successful and all I did was just receive messages in slack to hit the up arrow key and press enter in my terminal. I guess I could've just did it manually then I'd have a steady supply of repetitive hand eye coordination exercises but I automated it in about a week of concentrated coding at the office because it just felt so good to code and produce something of value after months of redditing and growing fat from all the food and beer at the office. I relished it, it was the single most proudest feeling to announce the tool to the company. I can see software jobs with peers who are self concious about imposter syndrome and other senior egos scrutinizing your commits day after day can add a toll. It was such a relaxing environment to be left on my own to produce such a specialized tool with tremendous productivity and revenue boost. It was only after I introduced this ability we started seeing some bookings. Not many software jobs I experienced had this much freedom and it was exactly the environment that gave rise to such high-multiple value generating tool.

by pwaai 8y ago

cornellwright 8y ago

Along with the boredom I'd image you have the anxiety of getting fired or laid off if someone realizes you don't actually do anything. Then when you go to get your next job you won't have anything to show for the last n years.

pwaai 8y ago
Well when your CEO is convinced you have product market fit when you dont, raise millions and burn it all in a few years thinking you can hire your way to a robust sales pipeline, it doesn't feel as bad. Especially when the best sales ppl are leaving and you cant hire new fast enough so they stick with whatever they have, even if their book rate is at the bottom. Basically sales teams are for selling but they cant sell products which have no demand and so eventually you are "that" company in the expo with nobody coming to the booths since your marketing involves using shady eastern European seo backlinks and believe repeatedly spamming CEOs and partners. In fact, when your partners turn on you, it's a sign that there is problems at the top level. Usually these type of CEOs are egomaniacs with no discernable skill other than walking around the office taking up conference room to meditate, and thinking he is at TEDtalk...

le-mark 8y ago

I've never actually been forgotten, but I've definitely spent months unutilized. Once was as a consultant through a third party. Job was a 1 year contract to help implement some APIs. they had enough work planned for about one month, then nothing for a loooong time. I worked on some load testing busy work sporadically during this period. It was the type of situation where the on site manger knew he didn't have anything for me, so we just sort of mutually agreed to not discuss it. I was offered to convert to full time by the same manager. I said "Seriously? I haven't done sh-- here?" He replied yeah but I contributed more than a lot of the others. I declined as I had another job lined up already. But I was stunned, still am when I reflect on it.

fyfy18 8y ago
If you can afford it, it’s a lot better to have too many people (although your case sounds a bit extreme) than too little. I’m working at a startup where we have too little, and we are rushing to get stuff done without really thinking it through long term. Our tech debt level is growing each day. In your case it sounds like you - and your experience - really helped other members of the team work more efficiently.
- xab9 8y ago
  I value myself more than to sit around for months so that the company may feel secure. I usually start looking for a new job after a month, since I'm not needed here and I'm bored (I also can't talk about this with the manager, or at least whenever I tried nothing fruitful came out of it; doing opensource or just reading tutorials were usually dismissed - the best managers can come up with in these situations is that you "document everything").
- toast0 8y ago
  Having too little people isn't too bad, in my experience. There's a lot of things you could do, that you won't be able to do, but nobody will have hurt feelings when you don't do their thing when you don't have enough people to do it. If you've got too many people and you're still pushing back on features, you're going to have a lot more hurt feelings. Plus, at least in my experience, if you know you're not going to have time to redo something, you do it right the first time :)

TeMPOraL 8y ago

> If you are thinking this is the life, please don't, the boredom from not having intellctually stimulating work and responsibilities is very real... Like most software jobs these days? :/.

pwaai 8y ago
The single joy I got was a burst of shell scripting I did...out of my own volition to create tools to help AEs as many quarters went by without booking any deals. The tool was very successful and all I did was just receive messages in slack to hit the up arrow key and press enter in my terminal. I guess I could've just did it manually then I'd have a steady supply of repetitive hand eye coordination exercises but I automated it in about a week of concentrated coding at the office because it just felt so good to code and produce something of value after months of redditing and growing fat from all the food and beer at the office. I relished it, it was the single most proudest feeling to announce the tool to the company. I can see software jobs with peers who are self concious about imposter syndrome and other senior egos scrutinizing your commits day after day can add a toll. It was such a relaxing environment to be left on my own to produce such a specialized tool with tremendous productivity and revenue boost. It was only after I introduced this ability we started seeing some bookings. Not many software jobs I experienced had this much freedom and it was exactly the environment that gave rise to such high-multiple value generating tool.