7 ms·

While I only worked at Apple for about 8 months (started as a summer intern), I can completely echo this. It's never that we _have_ to stay later, it's that we

by borski 16y ago

While I only worked at Apple for about 8 months (started as a summer intern), I can completely echo this. It's never that we _have_ to stay later, it's that we _want_ to. You really have a dedication to the product because you want your customers to love you; that was the overall mindset. With a deadline, that means you'll do almost anything to meet it and succeed. As for the secrecy, you're totally right. I roomed with 3 other interns during the summer and none of us would talk shop, ever. When interviewing for other companies later, nearly all my answers about what I did at Apple were "I wish I could talk to you about that, but the most I can do at this point is talk 'around' it, if you will, since that's an unreleased product." Not at all unlike government secrecy. All that said, it really was a glorious place to work. I miss a lot about it; the seemingly infectious excitement and passion for the products was really driving. I loved being in that environment. :)

ig1 16y ago
And of course if someone doesn't stay later it means they're not dedicated to the product, so obviously aren't suitable for promotion, salary increases, etc.
- borski 16y ago
  No, actually, that wasn't usually how it worked. It was all about performance rather than time spent on-site. If you could get done in 4 hours what took me 8, you would be just as eligible for any promotions as I. Probably more-so, however, since you'd probably have worked 8 hours anyway and gotten twice as much done. ;)
  - ig1 16y ago
    It sounds to me like your saying that if someone wanted to work an 8 hour day, they'd have to match what you do in (say) 12 hours ? i.e. if someone was equally productive (or even 25% more productive), but still produced less than you purely because they worked the scheduled hours, than they'd be less likely to get promotions, etc. ?
    - borski 16y ago
      Potentially, but promotions are generally given for work that exceeds expectations; isn't this the way it should be? Producing the 'minimal expected' amount of work for a prolonged period of time (reliability) is cause for being promoted as well, I suppose, but takes more time.
      - stonemetal 16y ago
        So you're saying if I wanted to get promoted I should work 20 hr days? After all working 12s is expected because everybody does that.
      - borski 16y ago
        It's not a matter of hours. There has to be cause for promotion, correct? Whether that is exceeding expectations (be it by working longer hours, or simply being better, etc.) or being reliable over a prolonged period of time; these are both valid reasons to get promoted. I'm sure there are others as well. Hours are a flawed metric for engineering, usually, since different people get different amounts done in the same amount of hours. But surely there should be some meritocratic reason for a promotion?
      - ig1 16y ago
        Sure, I'm not disputing that, but it means that if you want to be treated like everyone else when it comes to promotions, redundancies, etc. that you're forced to work 12 hour days when at other companies you could just work 8 hour days to get equal treatment. And remember while you like your job now, what happens if you start to like it less (or you have a family, etc.) but you can't reduce your hours otherwise you'll get penalized for it. One day you'll wake up and realize you're working for EA. (Ref: http://andymerrett.co.uk/2004/12/09/ea-the-human-story/ http://andymerrett.co.uk/2004/12/09/ea-the-human-story/)
        aaronblohowiak 16y ago
        productive workaholics will get rewarded over regular competent staff; overlooking their contribution is a good way to lose them. as an employer, would you want to lose your most productive staff so you can give "equal" treatment to less productive members? That being said, i think there should be no exemptions for overtime pay.
kenjackson 16y ago
It's never that we _have_ to stay later, it's that we _want_ to. I hear this from people, but I rarely buy it. I'm not saying that you didn't want to stay later, but say Tim wanted to just work 8 to 5 each day, would everyone say, "Hey that's cool. We feel bad that you can't stay later, but it's 100% fine that you work 8 hours per day"? It just seems like places I've been, if a handful of sufficiently respected productive members of the team stay late consistently (for whatever reason) there becomes strong social pressure that everyone stay late.
- borski 16y ago
  At least in my (admittedly short) experience there, I can't say there was much social pressure to stay late. You had deadlines, you had to do what you had to get done, and it had to be done well. How long it took you to get there or at what times of day didn't matter very much, if at all.
  - matwood 16y ago
    Giving people impossible deadlines that they can only achieve by staying late is the same thing as just forcing them to stay late.
  - borski 16y ago
    I never had impossible deadlines. I don't think anyone else around me did either.
    - shasta 16y ago
      Presumably he meant "impossible in a 40 hour work week," so that if you're killing yourself with an 80 hour week to meet deadlines, you're not a counterexample. Of course, there's a prevalent opinion around here that working over 40 hours a week always decreases your productivity (and not just per hour), and the people who buy into that will likely find this definition of impossible to be silly (since as a corollary, every possible thing is achievable in 40 hour weeks).
InclinedPlane 16y ago
An honest question: Why do you want to work such long days when there is so much evidence that total productive work per week doesn't increase beyond around 40 hours of work for most knowledge worker jobs, especially software development?
- borski 16y ago
  I find that I have significantly more than 40 hours of usefulness in any given week. I almost never work 9-5 M-F. I usually show up later, and stay later; in my experience, I feel most awake later in the day and do my best work later as well. Occasionally, if I'm working on a problem, I can get a lot more (efficient) work done keeping at it rather than leaving and having to spin up again on it. At other times, of course, leaving is the only way to clear my head and find a solution. It all really depends on your working habits; mine just don't tend to be very consistent. :)
- chollida1 16y ago
  > when there is so much evidence that total productive work per week doesn't increase beyond around 40 hours of work for most knowledge worker jobs I don't think this is true, though maybe you can find a source to prove it? What I've often heard and read is that the percentage of work falls off after a certain amount of hours per week. or put another way, working 80 hours may not give you a doubling of productivity over 40 hours but it will increase the amount of productive output.
  - loewenskind 16y ago
    Science says otherwise: http://archives.igda.org/articles/erobinson_crunch.php http://archives.igda.org/articles/erobinson_crunch.php
- Robin_Message 16y ago
  You're right to bring this up, and certainly those studies are the best hard numbers we have, but: Do the studies correct for employee satisfaction with working more, corporate culture, employee skill, employee personal life status, or level of excitement/interest in work? Because I think all of those would be a positive factor at Apple.

by borski 16y ago

ig1 16y ago

And of course if someone doesn't stay later it means they're not dedicated to the product, so obviously aren't suitable for promotion, salary increases, etc.

borski 16y ago
No, actually, that wasn't usually how it worked. It was all about performance rather than time spent on-site. If you could get done in 4 hours what took me 8, you would be just as eligible for any promotions as I. Probably more-so, however, since you'd probably have worked 8 hours anyway and gotten twice as much done. ;)
- ig1 16y ago
  It sounds to me like your saying that if someone wanted to work an 8 hour day, they'd have to match what you do in (say) 12 hours ? i.e. if someone was equally productive (or even 25% more productive), but still produced less than you purely because they worked the scheduled hours, than they'd be less likely to get promotions, etc. ?
  - borski 16y ago
    Potentially, but promotions are generally given for work that exceeds expectations; isn't this the way it should be? Producing the 'minimal expected' amount of work for a prolonged period of time (reliability) is cause for being promoted as well, I suppose, but takes more time.
    - stonemetal 16y ago
      So you're saying if I wanted to get promoted I should work 20 hr days? After all working 12s is expected because everybody does that.
    - borski 16y ago
      It's not a matter of hours. There has to be cause for promotion, correct? Whether that is exceeding expectations (be it by working longer hours, or simply being better, etc.) or being reliable over a prolonged period of time; these are both valid reasons to get promoted. I'm sure there are others as well. Hours are a flawed metric for engineering, usually, since different people get different amounts done in the same amount of hours. But surely there should be some meritocratic reason for a promotion?
    - ig1 16y ago
      Sure, I'm not disputing that, but it means that if you want to be treated like everyone else when it comes to promotions, redundancies, etc. that you're forced to work 12 hour days when at other companies you could just work 8 hour days to get equal treatment. And remember while you like your job now, what happens if you start to like it less (or you have a family, etc.) but you can't reduce your hours otherwise you'll get penalized for it. One day you'll wake up and realize you're working for EA. (Ref: http://andymerrett.co.uk/2004/12/09/ea-the-human-story/ http://andymerrett.co.uk/2004/12/09/ea-the-human-story/)
      - aaronblohowiak 16y ago
        productive workaholics will get rewarded over regular competent staff; overlooking their contribution is a good way to lose them. as an employer, would you want to lose your most productive staff so you can give "equal" treatment to less productive members? That being said, i think there should be no exemptions for overtime pay.

kenjackson 16y ago

It's never that we _have_ to stay later, it's that we _want_ to. I hear this from people, but I rarely buy it. I'm not saying that you didn't want to stay later, but say Tim wanted to just work 8 to 5 each day, would everyone say, "Hey that's cool. We feel bad that you can't stay later, but it's 100% fine that you work 8 hours per day"? It just seems like places I've been, if a handful of sufficiently respected productive members of the team stay late consistently (for whatever reason) there becomes strong social pressure that everyone stay late.

borski 16y ago
At least in my (admittedly short) experience there, I can't say there was much social pressure to stay late. You had deadlines, you had to do what you had to get done, and it had to be done well. How long it took you to get there or at what times of day didn't matter very much, if at all.
- matwood 16y ago
  Giving people impossible deadlines that they can only achieve by staying late is the same thing as just forcing them to stay late.
- borski 16y ago
  I never had impossible deadlines. I don't think anyone else around me did either.
  - shasta 16y ago
    Presumably he meant "impossible in a 40 hour work week," so that if you're killing yourself with an 80 hour week to meet deadlines, you're not a counterexample. Of course, there's a prevalent opinion around here that working over 40 hours a week always decreases your productivity (and not just per hour), and the people who buy into that will likely find this definition of impossible to be silly (since as a corollary, every possible thing is achievable in 40 hour weeks).

InclinedPlane 16y ago

An honest question: Why do you want to work such long days when there is so much evidence that total productive work per week doesn't increase beyond around 40 hours of work for most knowledge worker jobs, especially software development?

borski 16y ago
I find that I have significantly more than 40 hours of usefulness in any given week. I almost never work 9-5 M-F. I usually show up later, and stay later; in my experience, I feel most awake later in the day and do my best work later as well. Occasionally, if I'm working on a problem, I can get a lot more (efficient) work done keeping at it rather than leaving and having to spin up again on it. At other times, of course, leaving is the only way to clear my head and find a solution. It all really depends on your working habits; mine just don't tend to be very consistent. :)
chollida1 16y ago
> when there is so much evidence that total productive work per week doesn't increase beyond around 40 hours of work for most knowledge worker jobs I don't think this is true, though maybe you can find a source to prove it? What I've often heard and read is that the percentage of work falls off after a certain amount of hours per week. or put another way, working 80 hours may not give you a doubling of productivity over 40 hours but it will increase the amount of productive output.
- loewenskind 16y ago
  Science says otherwise: http://archives.igda.org/articles/erobinson_crunch.php http://archives.igda.org/articles/erobinson_crunch.php
Robin_Message 16y ago
You're right to bring this up, and certainly those studies are the best hard numbers we have, but: Do the studies correct for employee satisfaction with working more, corporate culture, employee skill, employee personal life status, or level of excitement/interest in work? Because I think all of those would be a positive factor at Apple.