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I can respect this opinion and as I get older I realize how little I actually care about work. I am not really passionate about tech, security, etc, I just know

I can respect this opinion and as I get older I realize how little I actually care about work. I am not really passionate about tech, security, etc, I just know a lot about it. I basically never talk about it with anyone, I have absolutely no interest in meetups, and I don't care about the news (past the minimum needed to keep up to date for my job) The only thing I care about is money, and making more money. I don't care about your company mission, I don't care about D&I initiatives, I don't care about culture, just money. I will do an excellent job, better than anyone else, if you pay me well. Even though I don't have any passion for the work, I still do an amazing job because I know it will directly lead to more money. I don't think its a big deal to want to skate by as long as you actually get work done. Just find an SE job in a company that doesn't harp about its culture. IME the more they talk about D&I, the more annoying the company will be about brainwashing everyone to drink the corporate koolaid. Stay far away from any SaaS companies as they usually want devs to do support or be on call for their shitass app. I don't know what skills you have but most lower-level programming is much easier in terms of not dealing with BS. Anything involving JS nonsense (frontend or backend) will involve a lot of product and people.

wayoutthere 6y ago
> IME the more they talk about D&I, the more annoying the company will be about brainwashing everyone to drink the corporate koolaid. Expect this to only ramp up given how diverse and queer Gen Z is. What passes for diversity among the Gen X / Boomer bosses isn’t good enough, and they have enough options that D&I has quickly become a competitive advantage. Every client I have is going in hard on DEI (diversity, equity, inclusion) as a result — you just can’t hire the best young talent otherwise. This is the downside of Citizens United for corporations — by creating an outsized role for corporations in a democracy, corporations are implicitly expected to reflect the ideals of their employees rather than shareholders. This limits their agility and has strained relationships with employees who are now working to organize / unionize to achieve their goals. If this isn’t a role employers want to play, they are free to lobby for a law to protect them from themselves; otherwise the battle lines (and collateral damage) over any labor vs capital dispute will be drawn wholly within the company.
- kjjjjjjjjjjjjjj 6y ago
  This is a real shame. I wish we could do something to stop this insanity. Their dogmatic approach to D&I is really scary honestly. On top of that, you are marked if you are a "cis white male". It doesn't matter if you are an immigrant. It doesn't matter if you are jewish (less than 0.003% of the global population, so one of most minority minorities), doesn't matter if you have a rich ethnic background with white skin. Why can't people just get rid of the racists and sexists without going crazy?
  - wayoutthere 6y ago
    Because that’s not what it’s about; it’s about having a diverse leadership that more closely resembles the makeup of our nation and communities. Cis white men make up only about 30% of our population but account for probably 80% (and that’s being generous) of positions above middle management. It’s the cultural homogeneity that’s the business problem, and that doesn’t get solved without the right optics. Most of these jobs are not so hard that a person who is appropriately trained / supported couldn’t do them. Again, gen Z is the most diverse generation in history. If you want to hire talent over the next decade, your company’s leadership needs to resemble your prospective employees because they take it as a hiring signal. The problem isn’t cis white men; it’s the sense of entitlement that cis white men often walk around with. I have plenty of coworkers who are white men and great allies because they recognize that others are not entitled to the same things based on pretty arbitrary criteria. But the entitlement (“you’re gonna take the job I’ve been working towards for years and give it to a new ‘diversity’ hire!?”) is the problem, especially in the upper ranks.
    - knightofmars 6y ago
      > But the entitlement (“you’re gonna take the job I’ve been working towards for years and give it to a new ‘diversity’ hire!?”) is the problem, especially in the upper ranks. Thank you for pointing out this exact mindset. As a cis white man myself, if I was up against someone else for the same position and we were equally matched in all ways except the other individual was in the minority when compared against the overall make-up of the position's peers, then I would fully expect the company to pick the other individual over me. Diversity is valuable because different life experiences which provide a different perspective are valuable. Additionally, a company is far more likely to attract top talent from diverse pools if you have diversity in your company. (I just realized you said this in your original post! "If you want to hire talent over the next decade, your company’s leadership needs to resemble your prospective employees because they take it as a hiring signal.")
granshaw 6y ago
Some related advice: some management actually LIKEs folks that are primarily money motivated. It makes the picture much simpler for them compared to others who are motivated by vaguer things like “interesting problems”, “career progression” etc At one job during goal setting with my manager I put it like “I wanna be making $x by next year. Let me know what I need to do to get there, and if that’s too much, how close can we come, and what’s needed for THAT” Later on he’d tell others how impressed he was by that and how the clarity made life for him easy
- thelean12 6y ago
  I'm one who mostly cares about money. It's funny that you say "career progression" as something separate from being motivated by money. I care a lot about career progression because it means more money. If I could continue getting a 10-15% raise every year, I wouldn't care if I never got promoted. Call me "Junior Engineer" for my entire career idc.
  - granshaw 6y ago
    Yeah, I say even better – more responsibility/stress for those pay bumps is often a raw deal
edem 6y ago
Yea I just finished with a "training" about D&I. I just don't get it. Those people who didn't care still won't care but they will be pissed too. It won't have an effect on those who cared. At this point I think it is a necessity for most companies to do this shit though. I've heard stories about investors pulling their support because the company wasn't "diverse" enough. They are trying to force a solution for this Catch 22 and it isn't helping: you don't get more women into IT until IT becomes friendly for them. IT won't become friendly until there are more women in IT. (substitute women for whatever PC term you want to use)
- submittochrist 6y ago
  You don't get more women into IT for the same reason you don't get more women interested in steam-trains.

wayoutthere 6y ago

> IME the more they talk about D&I, the more annoying the company will be about brainwashing everyone to drink the corporate koolaid. Expect this to only ramp up given how diverse and queer Gen Z is. What passes for diversity among the Gen X / Boomer bosses isn’t good enough, and they have enough options that D&I has quickly become a competitive advantage. Every client I have is going in hard on DEI (diversity, equity, inclusion) as a result — you just can’t hire the best young talent otherwise. This is the downside of Citizens United for corporations — by creating an outsized role for corporations in a democracy, corporations are implicitly expected to reflect the ideals of their employees rather than shareholders. This limits their agility and has strained relationships with employees who are now working to organize / unionize to achieve their goals. If this isn’t a role employers want to play, they are free to lobby for a law to protect them from themselves; otherwise the battle lines (and collateral damage) over any labor vs capital dispute will be drawn wholly within the company.

kjjjjjjjjjjjjjj 6y ago
This is a real shame. I wish we could do something to stop this insanity. Their dogmatic approach to D&I is really scary honestly. On top of that, you are marked if you are a "cis white male". It doesn't matter if you are an immigrant. It doesn't matter if you are jewish (less than 0.003% of the global population, so one of most minority minorities), doesn't matter if you have a rich ethnic background with white skin. Why can't people just get rid of the racists and sexists without going crazy?
- wayoutthere 6y ago
  Because that’s not what it’s about; it’s about having a diverse leadership that more closely resembles the makeup of our nation and communities. Cis white men make up only about 30% of our population but account for probably 80% (and that’s being generous) of positions above middle management. It’s the cultural homogeneity that’s the business problem, and that doesn’t get solved without the right optics. Most of these jobs are not so hard that a person who is appropriately trained / supported couldn’t do them. Again, gen Z is the most diverse generation in history. If you want to hire talent over the next decade, your company’s leadership needs to resemble your prospective employees because they take it as a hiring signal. The problem isn’t cis white men; it’s the sense of entitlement that cis white men often walk around with. I have plenty of coworkers who are white men and great allies because they recognize that others are not entitled to the same things based on pretty arbitrary criteria. But the entitlement (“you’re gonna take the job I’ve been working towards for years and give it to a new ‘diversity’ hire!?”) is the problem, especially in the upper ranks.
  - knightofmars 6y ago
    > But the entitlement (“you’re gonna take the job I’ve been working towards for years and give it to a new ‘diversity’ hire!?”) is the problem, especially in the upper ranks. Thank you for pointing out this exact mindset. As a cis white man myself, if I was up against someone else for the same position and we were equally matched in all ways except the other individual was in the minority when compared against the overall make-up of the position's peers, then I would fully expect the company to pick the other individual over me. Diversity is valuable because different life experiences which provide a different perspective are valuable. Additionally, a company is far more likely to attract top talent from diverse pools if you have diversity in your company. (I just realized you said this in your original post! "If you want to hire talent over the next decade, your company’s leadership needs to resemble your prospective employees because they take it as a hiring signal.")

granshaw 6y ago

Some related advice: some management actually LIKEs folks that are primarily money motivated. It makes the picture much simpler for them compared to others who are motivated by vaguer things like “interesting problems”, “career progression” etc At one job during goal setting with my manager I put it like “I wanna be making $x by next year. Let me know what I need to do to get there, and if that’s too much, how close can we come, and what’s needed for THAT” Later on he’d tell others how impressed he was by that and how the clarity made life for him easy

thelean12 6y ago
I'm one who mostly cares about money. It's funny that you say "career progression" as something separate from being motivated by money. I care a lot about career progression because it means more money. If I could continue getting a 10-15% raise every year, I wouldn't care if I never got promoted. Call me "Junior Engineer" for my entire career idc.
- granshaw 6y ago
  Yeah, I say even better – more responsibility/stress for those pay bumps is often a raw deal

edem 6y ago

Yea I just finished with a "training" about D&I. I just don't get it. Those people who didn't care still won't care but they will be pissed too. It won't have an effect on those who cared. At this point I think it is a necessity for most companies to do this shit though. I've heard stories about investors pulling their support because the company wasn't "diverse" enough. They are trying to force a solution for this Catch 22 and it isn't helping: you don't get more women into IT until IT becomes friendly for them. IT won't become friendly until there are more women in IT. (substitute women for whatever PC term you want to use)

submittochrist 6y ago
You don't get more women into IT for the same reason you don't get more women interested in steam-trains.