4 ms·

I've found people hate giving numbers to things when estimating how a system would work, or what it would need. Ballparking can really help though. I've found

I've found people hate giving numbers to things when estimating how a system would work, or what it would need. Ballparking can really help though. I've found success asking questions such as "Roughly how much will updating my abstract cost? I won't hold you to the number, but are we talking closer to $200 or $800?". I make sure the numbers are quite far apart, and use it to figure high/low ends of required performance, deciding if something that's not currently the bottleneck will become a bottleneck, etc. Also, converting between hourly and salaried, you can roughly use 40 hrs/week * 50 weeks/year = 2,000 hours/year.

Aachen 6y ago
I wonder what that number is anywhere else in the world. Most countries have a legal minimum paid time off higher than that (the USA is the exception when compared to the vast majority of countries, rich or poor), but most companies give a bit more than the minimum in our field, so what I'm wondering is whether the difference is large enough that rounding it up doesn't make sense. Personally I've got 6 paid weeks off every year (their default, I didn't negotiate that number) plus public holidays (iirc that adds up to another two weeks but maybe it's just one) with both my past and previous employer which were in different western European countries, but I don't know if that's average.
- joe5150 6y ago
  I could be wrong, but I think 50 hours is the result of rounding down from 52, not the result of subtracting two weeks of unpaid vacation. Most people who work a full time hourly job in the US get paid for every week of the year if they only use paid time off.
billme 6y ago
>> “ Also, converting between hourly and salaried, you can roughly use 40 hrs/week * 50 weeks/year = 2,000 hours/year.” Even better, take just take an hourly rate, 2x it, add three zeros = annual salary; literally takes seconds to do once you know 2000 hours per year is the assumed hours worked per year.
- DavidPeiffer 6y ago
  Yes, this is how I do it in my head. I should have mentioned that given the context of the post!
qznc 6y ago
For work days per year, I usually use 200. It is 5 * 52 = 260. Now subtract vacation days in Germany: -30. Minus some holidays. Minus potential illness. In the US maybe 250 is closer and if you can multiply it by 4 in further calculations somehow it becomes a power of ten.
- irrational 6y ago
  American here. I would use 204: 250 - 10 holidays - 10 days of summer hours (something my company does in the summer) - 26 vacation days. My vacation days can actually rollover from year to year (up to a maximum of 60 days), so I could take off more vacations days. But, at a minimum I will get 26 days of vacation (on top of the 20 days of holidays and summer days) per year.
pottertheotter 6y ago
I think a lot of people hate giving an estimate because they have learned from experience that, even if someone tells them they won't hold them to the number, it still happens. You might be the exception, but it seems to happen quite regularly.
- ddrt 6y ago
  Here’s my experience with that: April estimates 5 hours of work but spends 12 on it. She justifies her overage by communicating with the PM and letting them know ahead of time the task is worse off than they thought. But to do it right she will need to go over, by roughly 5 more hours. Song the way she is taking notes of what she’s doing and then screenshots and justifications at the end to explain the work. Bob estimates 5 hours and takes 12. He doesn’t communicate, the work isn’t finished to spec or even partially to spec, he can’t justify his time and argues that roadblocks kept him from finishing. The latter is the person I regularly deal with and I only know one “April”.
  - letientai299 6y ago
    Off topic, but I can't stop thinking about "Your lie in April" reading your comment.
  - dvtrn 6y ago
    My old man spent 30 years working as a mechanical engineer for General Electric in their gas turbine division and used to bring home these sorts of tales similar this with people who reported to him, which subsequently informed him on how he needed to communicate to the manager he reported to on when to expect deliverables. Most memorable from this was watching his reaction while he and I were watching an episode of Star Trek the Next Generation where his exact problem was manifested into reality by his favorite character: https://youtu.be/8xRqXYsksFg https://youtu.be/8xRqXYsksFg Nonetheless, I may or may not have employed my dad’s and Scotty’s method now that I have a team reporting up to me, each with their own strengths and weaknesses in delivery. Grooming them has been a genuine pleasure, though.
  - tdeck 6y ago
dalore 6y ago
50 weeks a year is very US focused. Other countries usually have 4 weeks off a year or more.
- saagarjha 6y ago
  In this case, it's not a huge difference.
  - dmurray 6y ago
    And lots of workers, even hourly ones, get paid for 52 weeks despite taking some of those off.
mncharity 6y ago
One can also use an exponential spread: "Is it more like 1, 10, 100, 1000, ... ?". And do explicit bounding, with high/low confidence bounds. "How many cats live in this neighborhood? Is it more like 1, 10, 100, 1000, and so on?" "Hard lower bound of 1 - that one over there". "Hard upper bound of 1M - we'd be tripping on a cat per sq meter". "Soft lower bound of 10 - I think it likely there are at least 2 more cats somewhere, which gets us to order 10". In an educational setting, bounding has much nicer conversational dynamics than the much more commonly used point estimates. Instead of identity-entangled long chains of approximation, followed by "I don't like your step C", "Well, your step B is a gross underestimate". And then "oh, the answer is X, but we said something else, which we'll now arbitrarily call right/wrong and move on". Instead you can get a much more collaborative "Can anyone suggest another bound, upper or lower, hard or soft?" "Does anyone have any questions about that proposal?" "Any suggestions on resolving those questions?" "Ok, can anyone suggest another bound?" And when bounds are compared to ground truth, there's the richer followup of which bounds held. And while a soft bound blown might be bad luck, a hard bound blown means something was misunderstood, permitting fruitful failure analysis. And it's intensive "scientific dialog" practice - the discussion around each bound is another iteration.

Aachen 6y ago

I wonder what that number is anywhere else in the world. Most countries have a legal minimum paid time off higher than that (the USA is the exception when compared to the vast majority of countries, rich or poor), but most companies give a bit more than the minimum in our field, so what I'm wondering is whether the difference is large enough that rounding it up doesn't make sense. Personally I've got 6 paid weeks off every year (their default, I didn't negotiate that number) plus public holidays (iirc that adds up to another two weeks but maybe it's just one) with both my past and previous employer which were in different western European countries, but I don't know if that's average.

joe5150 6y ago
I could be wrong, but I think 50 hours is the result of rounding down from 52, not the result of subtracting two weeks of unpaid vacation. Most people who work a full time hourly job in the US get paid for every week of the year if they only use paid time off.

billme 6y ago

>> “ Also, converting between hourly and salaried, you can roughly use 40 hrs/week * 50 weeks/year = 2,000 hours/year.” Even better, take just take an hourly rate, 2x it, add three zeros = annual salary; literally takes seconds to do once you know 2000 hours per year is the assumed hours worked per year.

DavidPeiffer 6y ago
Yes, this is how I do it in my head. I should have mentioned that given the context of the post!

qznc 6y ago

For work days per year, I usually use 200. It is 5 * 52 = 260. Now subtract vacation days in Germany: -30. Minus some holidays. Minus potential illness. In the US maybe 250 is closer and if you can multiply it by 4 in further calculations somehow it becomes a power of ten.

irrational 6y ago
American here. I would use 204: 250 - 10 holidays - 10 days of summer hours (something my company does in the summer) - 26 vacation days. My vacation days can actually rollover from year to year (up to a maximum of 60 days), so I could take off more vacations days. But, at a minimum I will get 26 days of vacation (on top of the 20 days of holidays and summer days) per year.

pottertheotter 6y ago

I think a lot of people hate giving an estimate because they have learned from experience that, even if someone tells them they won't hold them to the number, it still happens. You might be the exception, but it seems to happen quite regularly.

ddrt 6y ago
Here’s my experience with that: April estimates 5 hours of work but spends 12 on it. She justifies her overage by communicating with the PM and letting them know ahead of time the task is worse off than they thought. But to do it right she will need to go over, by roughly 5 more hours. Song the way she is taking notes of what she’s doing and then screenshots and justifications at the end to explain the work. Bob estimates 5 hours and takes 12. He doesn’t communicate, the work isn’t finished to spec or even partially to spec, he can’t justify his time and argues that roadblocks kept him from finishing. The latter is the person I regularly deal with and I only know one “April”.
- letientai299 6y ago
  Off topic, but I can't stop thinking about "Your lie in April" reading your comment.
- dvtrn 6y ago
  My old man spent 30 years working as a mechanical engineer for General Electric in their gas turbine division and used to bring home these sorts of tales similar this with people who reported to him, which subsequently informed him on how he needed to communicate to the manager he reported to on when to expect deliverables. Most memorable from this was watching his reaction while he and I were watching an episode of Star Trek the Next Generation where his exact problem was manifested into reality by his favorite character: https://youtu.be/8xRqXYsksFg https://youtu.be/8xRqXYsksFg Nonetheless, I may or may not have employed my dad’s and Scotty’s method now that I have a team reporting up to me, each with their own strengths and weaknesses in delivery. Grooming them has been a genuine pleasure, though.
- tdeck 6y ago

dalore 6y ago

50 weeks a year is very US focused. Other countries usually have 4 weeks off a year or more.

saagarjha 6y ago
In this case, it's not a huge difference.
- dmurray 6y ago
  And lots of workers, even hourly ones, get paid for 52 weeks despite taking some of those off.

mncharity 6y ago

One can also use an exponential spread: "Is it more like 1, 10, 100, 1000, ... ?". And do explicit bounding, with high/low confidence bounds. "How many cats live in this neighborhood? Is it more like 1, 10, 100, 1000, and so on?" "Hard lower bound of 1 - that one over there". "Hard upper bound of 1M - we'd be tripping on a cat per sq meter". "Soft lower bound of 10 - I think it likely there are at least 2 more cats somewhere, which gets us to order 10". In an educational setting, bounding has much nicer conversational dynamics than the much more commonly used point estimates. Instead of identity-entangled long chains of approximation, followed by "I don't like your step C", "Well, your step B is a gross underestimate". And then "oh, the answer is X, but we said something else, which we'll now arbitrarily call right/wrong and move on". Instead you can get a much more collaborative "Can anyone suggest another bound, upper or lower, hard or soft?" "Does anyone have any questions about that proposal?" "Any suggestions on resolving those questions?" "Ok, can anyone suggest another bound?" And when bounds are compared to ground truth, there's the richer followup of which bounds held. And while a soft bound blown might be bad luck, a hard bound blown means something was misunderstood, permitting fruitful failure analysis. And it's intensive "scientific dialog" practice - the discussion around each bound is another iteration.