7 ms·

> not having to worry about stupid office politics, planning, or performance reviews You don't have performance reviews as a pilot? Maybe that should concern m

by pyth0 4y ago

> not having to worry about stupid office politics, planning, or performance reviews You don't have performance reviews as a pilot? Maybe that should concern me next time I'm flying

catonmylap 4y ago
I heard an interesting podcast where they interviewed a German pilot. And he said that in order to get promoted(getting to fly a bigger plane, in his case) the only factor that counts is the years of experience. There is nothing a pilot can do (this might depend on the airline) to speed up this process. The reason is that they want to avoid pilots taking risks in order to "get better", like being faster, more fuel efficient etc.
faeyanpiraat 4y ago
I mean what would increased performance mean in this case? You have to arrive at your destination at a specific time, if you go faster that is going to be a problem..
veryfancy 4y ago
Puts a different light on "demonstrating impact"
inoffensivename 4y ago
We have line checks, but if you're doing your job according to standard operating procedures, it's just like flying any other leg. Not something to lose any sleep over. I used to dread every performance review in tech.
jjav 4y ago
Do any other fields of work have the insane performance review style as tech? None of my accountant, lawyer or doctor friends do. For example at a previous tech company the levels were something like this (going by memory, not exact): 1 - Fails to meet expectations. 2 - Meets all expectations, delivers on time with only occasional mistakes. 3 - Exceeds expectations, delivers ahead of schedule with better quality than asked. 4 - Consistently invents new technologies and promotes them within the organization with demonstrable financial gain to the company. 5 - Invented the field (literally, that's what the description said!) So unless you're one of a few people in the world (who didn't work for that company), it's impossible to be rated a 5. A 4 is also nearly impossible, sure maybe once a decade you might achieve that but nobody on earth does that every year. Doing your job solidly well is clearly a 2, but a 2 is also seen as a straight road to RIF. In what other industry is that so? So basically everyone is competing for 3 (mediocre bonus) or 2 (RIF). Sure, a few 4 and 5 get handed out to the friends of the VP but not for meeting that impossible criteria, only through politics.
- curiousguy 4y ago
  Why do you think you need to achieve 4 or 5? Or even 3? Salary in tech are so high that even with a mediocre bonus, it’s still a good life. For the last two years, I aimed for just meet expectations. Easy job, no stress, just taking some time to relax. Last few months, I decided to continue progressing in my career so I started taking more responsibilities. The point is that work is not linear, it’s fine to relax a bit or even downgrade your role.
  - jjav 4y ago
    > Why do you think you need to achieve 4 or 5? Or even 3? Because if you do a solid good job that's a 2, but a couple 2s fairly quickly gets you on the RIF train to getting fired. Which is nuts. So everyone has to outcompete their team trying to get those 3s. And the manager is put in the nasty position of having to rotate the 2s (which they must hand out since there's always quotas) among the team so that hopefully nobody gets RIFd while still meeting the quotas. (Assuming a 5 point scale here, which is fairly common, but I've seen other scales but the same principles apply.) My partner was a manager at the G of faang for many years and twice a year the whole month was blocked off for 60-80 hour weeks just to fill endless review paperwork. And their employees spend all of the six months between reviews scheming ways to fill that next round of paperwork. It's all a monumental waste of time, effort and cause of unnecessary stress for everyone. None of this nonsense exists in other industries, at least as far as I know from talking about it with my circle of connections in other professions such as law, medicine, accounting.
    - curiousguy 4y ago
      > Because if you do a solid good job that's a 2, but a couple 2s fairly quickly gets you on the RIF train to getting fired. This definitely seems bad, but it’s not common in every tech company. Maybe is something in your company or city/country? I worked in a few countries and I’m UK at the moment. Large corporations do have performance reviews, but there is no expectations that everyone needs to over achieve. If your job is burning you out, maybe is worth it to look around for a new one. Is the high salary of FANG worth it? “Boring companies” can still pay good enough and have really interesting tech challenges. > None of this nonsense exists in other industries, at least as far as I know from talking about it with my circle of connections in other professions such as law, medicine, accounting. Maybe not in the same way, but they still have their own struggles to progress in their careers. The main difference is that the tech industry doesn’t have labor regulations and every company needs to do their career progression. However, Law can be as bad on that, lawyers need to grind for years before getting seniority and higher salaries. Medicine and accounting is extremely government regulated and you need to get specific certification to pass to the next role. So there is a lot of pressure to get those.

by pyth0 4y ago

> not having to worry about stupid office politics, planning, or performance reviews You don't have performance reviews as a pilot? Maybe that should concern me next time I'm flying

catonmylap 4y ago

I heard an interesting podcast where they interviewed a German pilot. And he said that in order to get promoted(getting to fly a bigger plane, in his case) the only factor that counts is the years of experience. There is nothing a pilot can do (this might depend on the airline) to speed up this process. The reason is that they want to avoid pilots taking risks in order to "get better", like being faster, more fuel efficient etc.

faeyanpiraat 4y ago

I mean what would increased performance mean in this case? You have to arrive at your destination at a specific time, if you go faster that is going to be a problem..

veryfancy 4y ago

Puts a different light on "demonstrating impact"

inoffensivename 4y ago

We have line checks, but if you're doing your job according to standard operating procedures, it's just like flying any other leg. Not something to lose any sleep over. I used to dread every performance review in tech.

jjav 4y ago

Do any other fields of work have the insane performance review style as tech? None of my accountant, lawyer or doctor friends do. For example at a previous tech company the levels were something like this (going by memory, not exact): 1 - Fails to meet expectations. 2 - Meets all expectations, delivers on time with only occasional mistakes. 3 - Exceeds expectations, delivers ahead of schedule with better quality than asked. 4 - Consistently invents new technologies and promotes them within the organization with demonstrable financial gain to the company. 5 - Invented the field (literally, that's what the description said!) So unless you're one of a few people in the world (who didn't work for that company), it's impossible to be rated a 5. A 4 is also nearly impossible, sure maybe once a decade you might achieve that but nobody on earth does that every year. Doing your job solidly well is clearly a 2, but a 2 is also seen as a straight road to RIF. In what other industry is that so? So basically everyone is competing for 3 (mediocre bonus) or 2 (RIF). Sure, a few 4 and 5 get handed out to the friends of the VP but not for meeting that impossible criteria, only through politics.

curiousguy 4y ago
Why do you think you need to achieve 4 or 5? Or even 3? Salary in tech are so high that even with a mediocre bonus, it’s still a good life. For the last two years, I aimed for just meet expectations. Easy job, no stress, just taking some time to relax. Last few months, I decided to continue progressing in my career so I started taking more responsibilities. The point is that work is not linear, it’s fine to relax a bit or even downgrade your role.
- jjav 4y ago
  > Why do you think you need to achieve 4 or 5? Or even 3? Because if you do a solid good job that's a 2, but a couple 2s fairly quickly gets you on the RIF train to getting fired. Which is nuts. So everyone has to outcompete their team trying to get those 3s. And the manager is put in the nasty position of having to rotate the 2s (which they must hand out since there's always quotas) among the team so that hopefully nobody gets RIFd while still meeting the quotas. (Assuming a 5 point scale here, which is fairly common, but I've seen other scales but the same principles apply.) My partner was a manager at the G of faang for many years and twice a year the whole month was blocked off for 60-80 hour weeks just to fill endless review paperwork. And their employees spend all of the six months between reviews scheming ways to fill that next round of paperwork. It's all a monumental waste of time, effort and cause of unnecessary stress for everyone. None of this nonsense exists in other industries, at least as far as I know from talking about it with my circle of connections in other professions such as law, medicine, accounting.
  - curiousguy 4y ago
    > Because if you do a solid good job that's a 2, but a couple 2s fairly quickly gets you on the RIF train to getting fired. This definitely seems bad, but it’s not common in every tech company. Maybe is something in your company or city/country? I worked in a few countries and I’m UK at the moment. Large corporations do have performance reviews, but there is no expectations that everyone needs to over achieve. If your job is burning you out, maybe is worth it to look around for a new one. Is the high salary of FANG worth it? “Boring companies” can still pay good enough and have really interesting tech challenges. > None of this nonsense exists in other industries, at least as far as I know from talking about it with my circle of connections in other professions such as law, medicine, accounting. Maybe not in the same way, but they still have their own struggles to progress in their careers. The main difference is that the tech industry doesn’t have labor regulations and every company needs to do their career progression. However, Law can be as bad on that, lawyers need to grind for years before getting seniority and higher salaries. Medicine and accounting is extremely government regulated and you need to get specific certification to pass to the next role. So there is a lot of pressure to get those.