6 ms·

To summarize #1. A great developer is worth much more than they gets paid in an organization #2. A great developer could create much more value

To summarize #1. A great developer is worth much more than they gets paid in an organization #2. A great developer could create much more value for themselves if they worked for themselves #3. If you can't go work for yourself now, take a non-developer position to leave yourself energy at night for developing your own project I think #1 is very true - a great developer is worth much more than is politically possible to pay them in any organization I have been in. (edit: edw519 has given good examples where he saved the company many hundreds of $k in a few weeks, and got an 'attaboy' in return) #2 is more of a stretch - you need other skills to start your own business and capitalize on your strengths (edit: the reason many of us follow this site). #3 is an interesting idea that I haven't seen expressed elsewhere.

Alex3917 15y ago
"#3 is an interesting idea that I haven't seen expressed elsewhere." It's actually a pretty old idea. The world is full of aspiring actors waiting tables, aspiring writers working at Starbucks, etc.
- kingnothing 15y ago
  I don't think your analogy is quite the same. A better one would be that a journalist or sports writer should take a job as an editor. That would allow him the ability to think about writing all day without actually writing anything, so that he can go home and work on his novel in the evenings.
- blacksmythe 15y ago
  >> full of aspiring actors waiting tables, aspiring writers I perceived the argument differently. A closer analogy might be that if you want to make it big as a screen writer, you should do something besides writing during the day, so you have the mental energy to write your screenplay at night. (not arguing the same point myself - if you want to become a great writer, you should be writing all the time. This might make sense if you have already developed your writing skills sufficiently).
- ryan-allen 15y ago
  He suggests to "become an analyst", what do they do exactly?
nostrademons 15y ago
I've found #3 doesn't actually work all that well. The resource you need to draw on to actually finish things is "executive function", the ability to make yourself do things even if they're boring or unpleasant. This is drained by all jobs - that's why you get paid for having a job. I find that I still have energy to think about programming when I get home from work - that's why I'm on Hacker News or Proggit. I just don't have energy to actually program. Those are two different skills, and it seems actually programming draws from the same pool of energy as keeping customer's orders straight, not from the pool of talking about programming.
- alinajaf 15y ago
  By the way, an easy solution to this is to go to sleep early and pop some 'executive function' off your stack for your own projects in the morning.
  - nostrademons 15y ago
    Yeah, that's basically how I handled it when I was doing my own startup on the side while working a day job at someone else's startup. It can be done, but it's very stressful, both because you're pretty much spending all your waking hours either working or "at work", plus you usually have actual responsibilities at your day job that you're trying to get done while already tired.
veyron 15y ago
#1 itself is a stretch. A great developer may bring more value to the firm than they are paid, but that does not necessarily mean that they are worth much more when considered outside the firm. Let's take a brilliant kernel hacker as an example. His value is great to a company which specializes in low latency hardware, but may not be so much in a small web startup (in fact, may be less valuable than a mediocre web specialist). I think that a lot of people confuse "value to the firm" with "intrinsic value"
c1sc0 15y ago
I found #3 to work great for me. Take on a 'management' position or another position that does not require you to spend mental cycles on programming during the day, then code at night.

Alex3917 15y ago

"#3 is an interesting idea that I haven't seen expressed elsewhere." It's actually a pretty old idea. The world is full of aspiring actors waiting tables, aspiring writers working at Starbucks, etc.

kingnothing 15y ago
I don't think your analogy is quite the same. A better one would be that a journalist or sports writer should take a job as an editor. That would allow him the ability to think about writing all day without actually writing anything, so that he can go home and work on his novel in the evenings.
blacksmythe 15y ago
>> full of aspiring actors waiting tables, aspiring writers I perceived the argument differently. A closer analogy might be that if you want to make it big as a screen writer, you should do something besides writing during the day, so you have the mental energy to write your screenplay at night. (not arguing the same point myself - if you want to become a great writer, you should be writing all the time. This might make sense if you have already developed your writing skills sufficiently).
ryan-allen 15y ago
He suggests to "become an analyst", what do they do exactly?

nostrademons 15y ago

I've found #3 doesn't actually work all that well. The resource you need to draw on to actually finish things is "executive function", the ability to make yourself do things even if they're boring or unpleasant. This is drained by all jobs - that's why you get paid for having a job. I find that I still have energy to think about programming when I get home from work - that's why I'm on Hacker News or Proggit. I just don't have energy to actually program. Those are two different skills, and it seems actually programming draws from the same pool of energy as keeping customer's orders straight, not from the pool of talking about programming.

alinajaf 15y ago
By the way, an easy solution to this is to go to sleep early and pop some 'executive function' off your stack for your own projects in the morning.
- nostrademons 15y ago
  Yeah, that's basically how I handled it when I was doing my own startup on the side while working a day job at someone else's startup. It can be done, but it's very stressful, both because you're pretty much spending all your waking hours either working or "at work", plus you usually have actual responsibilities at your day job that you're trying to get done while already tired.

veyron 15y ago

#1 itself is a stretch. A great developer may bring more value to the firm than they are paid, but that does not necessarily mean that they are worth much more when considered outside the firm. Let's take a brilliant kernel hacker as an example. His value is great to a company which specializes in low latency hardware, but may not be so much in a small web startup (in fact, may be less valuable than a mediocre web specialist). I think that a lot of people confuse "value to the firm" with "intrinsic value"

c1sc0 15y ago

I found #3 to work great for me. Take on a 'management' position or another position that does not require you to spend mental cycles on programming during the day, then code at night.