4 ms·

I think this is the type of writing that I like the least. Someone trying to come up with another smart theory on Why Things Are Bad and Why Other People Are Me

by 121789 4y ago

I think this is the type of writing that I like the least. Someone trying to come up with another smart theory on Why Things Are Bad and Why Other People Are Mediocre (with the implication that he is not), with no supporting evidence and very little career experience to back up the observations made

fullshark 4y ago
Don't forget a made up graph to illustrate their groundbreaking theory.
myth_drannon 4y ago
It's the usual management excuse when things are going south that hey hired too many mediocre people. Let's fire the whole team and have a new hiring process so we only hire the top 1%, 10xers. Two hard leetcode in 1 hour (2 interviews like that) and 2 day homework should be enough to weed out the low performers(but actually the process will be optimized to hire desperate devs and new grads).
- le-mark 4y ago
  You left off the punchline: But still offer the same mediocre pay and required in office attendance.
llaolleh 4y ago
I agree with you. This is a really low quality blog post. All the author did was add a fancy graph and some words to something that everybody knows - if a 1-2 good engineers leave, then everyone else bounces out of there.
- ChrisMarshallNY 4y ago
  >fancy graph Not sure I'd call it "fancy." I've watched corporations chasing out high performers for decades, yet still manage to achieve their goals. They don't excel, and often end up being "part of the road," as Stuart Brand might say, but they never regret chasing out talent, and also never regret chasing talent away at the interview stage. I know that I nursed my butthurt, with a secret "they'll regret not hiring me!" thought, for a couple of years, and realized that it didn't matter one whit. One or two of the places actually ended up going belly-up, and I like to flatter myself into thinking I could have "saved them" (SPOILER: No, I wouldn't have. They just would have sidelined me, and gone over the cliff anyway, like my previous employer). Human nature can be very disappointing, sometimes.
AnotherGoodName 4y ago
It's also doing the astrology thing of calling out common circumstances in an effort to have people go hey that's me! '“Refactoring” becomes a rallying cry instead of shipped.' I can imagine product managers right now saying 'hey that's me' this must be true. Note that an ask to refactor rather than continually shipping fast is a sign of mature engineering and is common.
username_my1 4y ago
I feel like these posts are getting upvoted by people worried about their jobs / want to convince themselves that everything will fall apart if they leave their job.
PragmaticPulp 4y ago
Good advice blogs talk about how to fix problems and turn the ship around. Bad advice blogs just write vaguely relatable complaints that are generic enough to get a wide audience to empathize from their past experience. The reader is supposed to imagine themselves as the superior engineers in the story (the heroes) and imagine the people the bad engineers and business people as the villains. Stoking the reader’s ego is a classic engagement farming technique.
torginus 4y ago
Most people are mediocre (tech-wise). This is not to say that a few chosen ones possess the inimitable spark of genius, it's just for most people a job's a job. Nobody pays to think about how to make the tech stack better outside of company time. And when you try to push your hare-brained schemes, the management reaction is of skepticism of the benefits and worry about the potential risks. Driving these kinds of improvements is a risky, thankless job, that's not necessarily good for your career. Most people either want to work as little for as much money as possible, so they phone it in, or want to get promoted, which usually involves playing office politics.
antisthenes 4y ago
Not even that. They take an already existing concept (Brain drain) and decide to tell the world in multiple paragraphs about why we should use the new term Talent Cooling instead. No compelling reason is provided, except "it has to do with startups".

by 121789 4y ago

fullshark 4y ago

Don't forget a made up graph to illustrate their groundbreaking theory.

myth_drannon 4y ago

It's the usual management excuse when things are going south that hey hired too many mediocre people. Let's fire the whole team and have a new hiring process so we only hire the top 1%, 10xers. Two hard leetcode in 1 hour (2 interviews like that) and 2 day homework should be enough to weed out the low performers(but actually the process will be optimized to hire desperate devs and new grads).

le-mark 4y ago
You left off the punchline: But still offer the same mediocre pay and required in office attendance.

llaolleh 4y ago

I agree with you. This is a really low quality blog post. All the author did was add a fancy graph and some words to something that everybody knows - if a 1-2 good engineers leave, then everyone else bounces out of there.

ChrisMarshallNY 4y ago
>fancy graph Not sure I'd call it "fancy." I've watched corporations chasing out high performers for decades, yet still manage to achieve their goals. They don't excel, and often end up being "part of the road," as Stuart Brand might say, but they never regret chasing out talent, and also never regret chasing talent away at the interview stage. I know that I nursed my butthurt, with a secret "they'll regret not hiring me!" thought, for a couple of years, and realized that it didn't matter one whit. One or two of the places actually ended up going belly-up, and I like to flatter myself into thinking I could have "saved them" (SPOILER: No, I wouldn't have. They just would have sidelined me, and gone over the cliff anyway, like my previous employer). Human nature can be very disappointing, sometimes.

AnotherGoodName 4y ago

It's also doing the astrology thing of calling out common circumstances in an effort to have people go hey that's me! '“Refactoring” becomes a rallying cry instead of shipped.' I can imagine product managers right now saying 'hey that's me' this must be true. Note that an ask to refactor rather than continually shipping fast is a sign of mature engineering and is common.

username_my1 4y ago

I feel like these posts are getting upvoted by people worried about their jobs / want to convince themselves that everything will fall apart if they leave their job.

PragmaticPulp 4y ago

Good advice blogs talk about how to fix problems and turn the ship around. Bad advice blogs just write vaguely relatable complaints that are generic enough to get a wide audience to empathize from their past experience. The reader is supposed to imagine themselves as the superior engineers in the story (the heroes) and imagine the people the bad engineers and business people as the villains. Stoking the reader’s ego is a classic engagement farming technique.

torginus 4y ago

Most people are mediocre (tech-wise). This is not to say that a few chosen ones possess the inimitable spark of genius, it's just for most people a job's a job. Nobody pays to think about how to make the tech stack better outside of company time. And when you try to push your hare-brained schemes, the management reaction is of skepticism of the benefits and worry about the potential risks. Driving these kinds of improvements is a risky, thankless job, that's not necessarily good for your career. Most people either want to work as little for as much money as possible, so they phone it in, or want to get promoted, which usually involves playing office politics.

antisthenes 4y ago

Not even that. They take an already existing concept (Brain drain) and decide to tell the world in multiple paragraphs about why we should use the new term Talent Cooling instead. No compelling reason is provided, except "it has to do with startups".