4 ms·

Ah yes! It's not enough if you're great at your job, or even if you do other people's jobs... Instead you have to have this checklist of your quarterly goals,

Ah yes! It's not enough if you're great at your job, or even if you do other people's jobs... Instead you have to have this checklist of your quarterly goals, on which you can go through with your engineering manager on biweekly 1-on-1 meetings! And of course you should make a nice spreadsheet and a confluence page documenting your progress, since we're data driven :) Did you fix a major fuckup in some legacy component? Where are the numbers? Ah, then it's not visible enough for a promotion, here's your 1% raise instead. Do you see Paul over there? He made great progress this quarter! One of his goals was to write a blogpost each week, and guess what, he did! He's on a great growth trajectory, and well deserves his promotion. Long story short: it's a great way to drive away your best talent while keeping the confluence page and blogpost writers.

hopler 8y ago
It's OK if we lose people who don't care about contributing to the organizational goals and coordinating with teammates, who just want to mess around on whatever amuses them.
- aaaaaaaaaab 8y ago
  W-hat? Where did you get that from? I'm telling you, fixing a serious issue in a legacy component is anything but amusing. I'd be happy writing blogposts about the current framework of the week, but if I uncover an issue while working on my regular tasks, I'm gonna try to fix it instead of sidestepping it.
matwood 8y ago
> Did you fix a major fuckup in some legacy component? What if that legacy component was no longer in use? Is there some bigger picture in play? I've been at bad companies before, so I understand being cynical. But, having people just do whatever they feel like also does not work. From the outside it looks like Google has quite a bit of this, so they are clearly trying to get people on some path. The messaging app situation shows it hasn't quite worked yet (from the outside anyway).
- aaaaaaaaaab 8y ago
  >What if that legacy component was no longer in use? Is there some bigger picture in play? Said legacy component was (and is) making a substantial chunk of the companies revenue.
- commandlinefan 8y ago
  > What if that legacy component was no longer in use? He was actually assigned by his manager to investigate the problem. Source: am a programmer.
  - steelframe 8y ago
    All of life is a series of negotiations. Those who can negotiate more effectively come out ahead. This is true whether you are discussing your compensation when joining a new company or whether you are hashing out what you work on. If your manager asks you to do something, ask them how the thing they are assigning will help advance your career. Ask the manager how -- if you deliver on what they ask -- they will go to bat for you when they are sitting in the room with their peers justifying your evaluation score. Be willing and able to simply state, "I don't know how you can expect me to spend my time and energy on something that won't help me advance my career." If your manager can't understand or respect that, then that's great! You have a clear warning sign that it's time to fire your manager.

hopler 8y ago

It's OK if we lose people who don't care about contributing to the organizational goals and coordinating with teammates, who just want to mess around on whatever amuses them.

aaaaaaaaaab 8y ago
W-hat? Where did you get that from? I'm telling you, fixing a serious issue in a legacy component is anything but amusing. I'd be happy writing blogposts about the current framework of the week, but if I uncover an issue while working on my regular tasks, I'm gonna try to fix it instead of sidestepping it.

matwood 8y ago

> Did you fix a major fuckup in some legacy component? What if that legacy component was no longer in use? Is there some bigger picture in play? I've been at bad companies before, so I understand being cynical. But, having people just do whatever they feel like also does not work. From the outside it looks like Google has quite a bit of this, so they are clearly trying to get people on some path. The messaging app situation shows it hasn't quite worked yet (from the outside anyway).

aaaaaaaaaab 8y ago
>What if that legacy component was no longer in use? Is there some bigger picture in play? Said legacy component was (and is) making a substantial chunk of the companies revenue.
commandlinefan 8y ago
> What if that legacy component was no longer in use? He was actually assigned by his manager to investigate the problem. Source: am a programmer.
- steelframe 8y ago
  All of life is a series of negotiations. Those who can negotiate more effectively come out ahead. This is true whether you are discussing your compensation when joining a new company or whether you are hashing out what you work on. If your manager asks you to do something, ask them how the thing they are assigning will help advance your career. Ask the manager how -- if you deliver on what they ask -- they will go to bat for you when they are sitting in the room with their peers justifying your evaluation score. Be willing and able to simply state, "I don't know how you can expect me to spend my time and energy on something that won't help me advance my career." If your manager can't understand or respect that, then that's great! You have a clear warning sign that it's time to fire your manager.