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Let me provide an adjacent perspective: I started my career as an academic and excellent writing was survival in that jungle. While that's a profession where re
by akhayam 3y ago
Let me provide an adjacent perspective: I started my career as an academic and excellent writing was survival in that jungle. While that's a profession where research and writing can actually "pay your bills" (metaphorically), it resembled Liu Cixin's dark forest:
“The (academic) universe is a dark forest. Every civilization (professor / grad student) is an armed hunter stalking through the trees like a ghost, gently pushing aside branches that block the path and trying to tread without sound. Even breathing is done with care."
Profs and students would poach ideas, submit before the research was even complete blatantly violate double-blind reviews, and submit to multiple venues in parallel (a huge no-no in academic publishing).
Arvix is the only silver lining on that cloud: https://arxiv.org/ https://arxiv.org/.
- cmrdporcupine 3y agoHonestly what you describe is not dissimilar to how some engineers behaved at e.g. Google around projects and perf process. I'm not sure if they learn it in academia, or if the perf process is inspired by academia, or if it's just... human nature ... to create reward systems that amplify credit-stealing and fame seeking. But it sucks. And there's whole demographics of people who think it's normal.
- akhayam 3y agoI feel it's all rooted in bad leadership. Leaders who don't understand who's actually doing the work hire more folks like them and then there is a chain reaction. Unfortunate, but true, part of most big companies.
- cmrdporcupine 3y agoThe performance review process at e.g. Google explicitly promotes credit and fame seeking. Recognition and "impact", especially cross-team, are called out as critical. You will not advance there without it. I saw plenty of projects get derailed by this. Technical goals in general take the back seat to presentation goals.