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Work more, cry less, and quite all the whining... is this SV or Full Metal Jacket? That's not advice. It's ignorance. If you cannot get your work done in eigh

Work more, cry less, and quite all the whining... is this SV or Full Metal Jacket? That's not advice. It's ignorance. If you cannot get your work done in eight hours a day there is probably something that's off. Maybe you're underestimating the work. Maybe you're being optimistic about your deadlines. Maybe you're not being honest with yourself about how efficiently you're using your time in the day. After eight hours of working on one thing I'm done. If I've used every hour of that day to it's full potential I don't have the will or inclination to keep working. I usually feel pretty good about going home. Tomorrow's another day at the dream factory. I'll decompress, read a book, hack on something fun, hang out with my wife, get my sleep and tomorrow I'll wake up fresh and ready for the new set of challenges. Whenever a manager or project lead tells me something along the lines of, "just do what you have to do and get it done," I just want to instinctively tackle them and slap them hard across the face. Not because I hate working but because they're standing on the tracks and there's a big freight train coming that they're not seeing. Managers who do that are lazy and are just passing the buck. If they don't want to hear why they're about to get hit by a giant freight train you owe it to the team to do something about it. You don't do that by keeping your mouth shut and your nose to the grind stone. Edit: Fixed some spelling issues.

kamaal 15y ago
There is always, repeat always who is going to do more work than you. That's fundamentally how competition works. And the one who does more work than you do, will always have an edge over you. Both on the shorter and the longer run. There are rewards to do that extra. And that motivation will always drive a person to do more work than you do. And trust me inevitable he will end up being successful someday. You may do a quick comparison and call that extra work 'not worth it' when you compare against other aspects of your life that demand time. But after say a decade when you look back and find that guy to have taken a huge leap ahead of you, suddenly you get that thought that occupies every person in such a situation: 'Why couldn't have I done that?' And then starts the analysis. You will end up finding that you were a lot more intelligent than him yet the guy somehow manage to beat you. That's when you will realize the most dangerous fact of the world. Hard work * time gives surprising success. In my case I will rather take my chances do more work than my peers and even fail. Then have a regret that I could have worked hard and won but I didn't.
- moocow01 15y ago
  Your basing your argument on the idea that everyone is in some linear race and we will all do an assessment of ourselves and everyone else at the age of 40 to see who is ahead. Unfortunately many of the typically unhappiest people do this and they base their assessment on money and job titles. Success is not just about money and job titles. We all (well atleast some of us) have our own versions. One person who goes home after 8 hours may end up dedicating their extra time to building a great family life or hobby while pittying his past high performing coworker who now has made CEO. Who do you think is happier when they look back - the person who followed what they wanted to do or the person who 'won' against their peers?
  - kamaal 15y ago
    I would still say the CEO. As a I CEO I will have all the money in the world to chase any hobby/fun activity I will ever want. Also my kids and family are enjoying luxury and privileges which other families aren't so even they are happy. Also I have time and patience only for one hobby. Most of the time even with a touch schedule I manage to work on my hobby.
    - danssig 15y ago
      Except most people who follow your advice are never going to be CEO. They're going to throw their whole life away chasing this, never to reach it. Other's may get a lot of money exploiting such people though.
- agentultra 15y ago
  You also have to assume that you can maintain focus and efficiency for more than eight hours a day. I've worked fourteen hour days for weeks on end. I was young, driven, and ignorant at the time. All I could smell was success. I felt like a hero waking up after a few hours of sleep each night and I'd quietly get to work. If anyone bothered to ask me how I did it, I'd just shrug and say, "someone's got to get this done." What a stupid asshole I was. The truth was I just felt like I was getting more done. Maybe on the first night or two of this I would. But after hour ten and eleven go by it started taking me longer to form sentences and get my ideas out. And it seemed that despite my best efforts writing unit tests and all that, my code would somehow still come out buggy. After a few weeks of this I wasn't being effective; I was just feeding the fire and making more work for myself. Now I find ways to get more done in a day before I just shrug and throw in more over time. This has lead me to become very disciplined in how I approach my day. Sometimes it feels a little routine, but I have more energy for my work and am ready to relax when I'm done. I show to the office 30-40 minutes early and get some code kata time in to warm up. Then I get a coffee, review team updates, and get down to hacking. When my editor is open I'm just coding. If it's not open, I'm at my whiteboard jotting down notes and making plans on how to solve the problem so that when my editor is open I'm just coding. Social interaction happens at specific points in the day and I keep it short and sweet. The afternoon is when I get the most work done. When five o'clock comes around I've usually gotten everything done that I wanted to do that day so I leave. Now that I'm a little older I see the young guys in the office doing what I used to. They throw themselves at the work. They work late for weeks at a time. They come to the stand ups all grizzled looking and swaying like an exhausted frond of seaweed. And sometimes they still manage to slip their stories for the sprint. You know what changed my mind? Death. We're all just getting older. There are no do-overs in life. Once your youth is gone it's gone for good. I don't have any kids myself yet so the center of my life is my career but that doesn't stop me from doing the things I want to do. I like to go camping, rock climbing, spending time with my wife and our friends. I like to spend lazy afternoons reading and occasionally stay up late writing. The worst thing I can imagine is wishing you had enjoyed your time on this earth more when you had the chance.

kamaal 15y ago

There is always, repeat always who is going to do more work than you. That's fundamentally how competition works. And the one who does more work than you do, will always have an edge over you. Both on the shorter and the longer run. There are rewards to do that extra. And that motivation will always drive a person to do more work than you do. And trust me inevitable he will end up being successful someday. You may do a quick comparison and call that extra work 'not worth it' when you compare against other aspects of your life that demand time. But after say a decade when you look back and find that guy to have taken a huge leap ahead of you, suddenly you get that thought that occupies every person in such a situation: 'Why couldn't have I done that?' And then starts the analysis. You will end up finding that you were a lot more intelligent than him yet the guy somehow manage to beat you. That's when you will realize the most dangerous fact of the world. Hard work * time gives surprising success. In my case I will rather take my chances do more work than my peers and even fail. Then have a regret that I could have worked hard and won but I didn't.

moocow01 15y ago
Your basing your argument on the idea that everyone is in some linear race and we will all do an assessment of ourselves and everyone else at the age of 40 to see who is ahead. Unfortunately many of the typically unhappiest people do this and they base their assessment on money and job titles. Success is not just about money and job titles. We all (well atleast some of us) have our own versions. One person who goes home after 8 hours may end up dedicating their extra time to building a great family life or hobby while pittying his past high performing coworker who now has made CEO. Who do you think is happier when they look back - the person who followed what they wanted to do or the person who 'won' against their peers?
- kamaal 15y ago
  I would still say the CEO. As a I CEO I will have all the money in the world to chase any hobby/fun activity I will ever want. Also my kids and family are enjoying luxury and privileges which other families aren't so even they are happy. Also I have time and patience only for one hobby. Most of the time even with a touch schedule I manage to work on my hobby.
  - danssig 15y ago
    Except most people who follow your advice are never going to be CEO. They're going to throw their whole life away chasing this, never to reach it. Other's may get a lot of money exploiting such people though.
agentultra 15y ago
You also have to assume that you can maintain focus and efficiency for more than eight hours a day. I've worked fourteen hour days for weeks on end. I was young, driven, and ignorant at the time. All I could smell was success. I felt like a hero waking up after a few hours of sleep each night and I'd quietly get to work. If anyone bothered to ask me how I did it, I'd just shrug and say, "someone's got to get this done." What a stupid asshole I was. The truth was I just felt like I was getting more done. Maybe on the first night or two of this I would. But after hour ten and eleven go by it started taking me longer to form sentences and get my ideas out. And it seemed that despite my best efforts writing unit tests and all that, my code would somehow still come out buggy. After a few weeks of this I wasn't being effective; I was just feeding the fire and making more work for myself. Now I find ways to get more done in a day before I just shrug and throw in more over time. This has lead me to become very disciplined in how I approach my day. Sometimes it feels a little routine, but I have more energy for my work and am ready to relax when I'm done. I show to the office 30-40 minutes early and get some code kata time in to warm up. Then I get a coffee, review team updates, and get down to hacking. When my editor is open I'm just coding. If it's not open, I'm at my whiteboard jotting down notes and making plans on how to solve the problem so that when my editor is open I'm just coding. Social interaction happens at specific points in the day and I keep it short and sweet. The afternoon is when I get the most work done. When five o'clock comes around I've usually gotten everything done that I wanted to do that day so I leave. Now that I'm a little older I see the young guys in the office doing what I used to. They throw themselves at the work. They work late for weeks at a time. They come to the stand ups all grizzled looking and swaying like an exhausted frond of seaweed. And sometimes they still manage to slip their stories for the sprint. You know what changed my mind? Death. We're all just getting older. There are no do-overs in life. Once your youth is gone it's gone for good. I don't have any kids myself yet so the center of my life is my career but that doesn't stop me from doing the things I want to do. I like to go camping, rock climbing, spending time with my wife and our friends. I like to spend lazy afternoons reading and occasionally stay up late writing. The worst thing I can imagine is wishing you had enjoyed your time on this earth more when you had the chance.