10 ms·

The hustle never ends and I'm so over it

161 points by news_hacker 3y ago

2-718-281-828 3y ago
This journey 1 percent finished. is my command of english off? this sentence is a lyrical way to write "this journey which only 1 percent have" finished ... not this journey is 1 percent finished ... ;D
- spiffytech 3y ago
  "We have only completed one percent of the journey". I.e., the work is never done. Urgency is forever, because no matter how much you've done, most of the work is still ahead of you, so don't slack off. I think the original quote was transcribed with a missing word: "This journey is one percent finished".
PartiallyTyped 3y ago
I view my work at AWS as being paid to deal with meetings and other people. Hadnt I bills to pay and mouths to feed, I'd be doing this "work" for free. Well, almost, I'd be coding all day, but I wouldn't set foot on a single meeting. Maybe it's a matter of perspective? It sure helps that I am working on interesting projects. Maybe the diff is that this is how I am having fun.
- JohnFen 3y ago
  I know people are different, but I'm like you in that programming is fun for me. Except when I'm doing it as paid work for someone else. That drains the fun out of it for me. As a result, I have to have my fun by programming when I'm off work, too.
- skydhash 3y ago
  Enjoy it while you can. I love computer science and programming. But there’s so much CRUD apps you can work on before it stops being exciting. Now, I just do my job in the work hours, then move to personal stuff in my spare time. Unless it’s for myself, I wouldn’t work on anything if not for the money.
  - honkycat 3y ago
    Agreed. I was "the programmer" among my friend group who are mostly programmers. I still find it fun to work on something novel but I am not nearly as passionate as I used to be. Now I find music more fun.
  - PartiallyTyped 3y ago
    Had I been working on CRUD apps, I would do the same thing. The moment what I am doing stops being interesting, I just leave.
paxys 3y ago
There comes a time in everyone's career when they realize that the "emergency situation" they are in never really ends. There is always a fire to put out. There is always a P0 bug that will sink the entire company if not fixed. There is always a release that absolutely cannot be delayed for any reason, and everyone must work nights and weekends to get it out. The best you can do is learn to tune out management bullshit and identify what is really important. There is no point losing sleep over the rest. It will be there to work on tomorrow, and the day after.
- jghn 3y ago
  This was an eye opening moment when it happened to me. Almost nothing has the impact it purports to have. Percentage-wise, very few things are the emergency/fire that people make them out to be, at least in the grand scheme of things. I think part of it is that people get too wrapped up in their local world and don't see the big picture. For instance "If we don't get this widget added to the thingamabob in the next 3 days the company will go under!" when the thingamabob is just a minor piece of the puzzle for the larger company. Part of it though is driven from the top. The one downside to having had this realization is it goes both ways. It also means that very few things you do have impact in a positive way as well. For some people this can be motivation killing.
  - parpfish 3y ago
    not everybody gets sucked into firefighting to 'save the company'. if the fire started due to something you helped create and you have even a smidgen of impostor syndrome, fighting fires is about about saving yourself and cleaning up the messes you've made. the only way to prevent this is to build a team with a strong sense of collective ownership/responsibility and a healthy attitude towards mistakes.
    - cybersandwich 3y ago
      One of the biggest "fire fighters" I ever worked with was a serial arsonist. She created these cluster fcks and then would throw out her shoulder patting herself on the back for putting it out. She was in a constant state of panic. It was exhausting to watch her work.
fullshark 3y ago
Don't know if this person worked at FB, but FB literally has its walls covered in propaganda posters, designed to "inspire" but I find them to be disturbing. https://www.businessinsider.com/facebooks-propaganda-posters-tokyo-photos-2017-1 https://www.businessinsider.com/facebooks-propaganda-posters...
- parpfish 3y ago
  i once worked in a small company that had a new ceo. he read about the posters at facebook and decided to invent some of his own, so he came up with a stupid phrase and got designers to mock a bunch up and print them out (if i remember correctly, it was some variant of "Keep your hands inside the vehicle at all times" and had pictures of rollercoasters). the posters were very effective at getting us to stop taking the new ceo seriously.
- llimos 3y ago
  Interesting that 'favours' uses the British spelling, but 'focused' and 'prioritization' the American one.
  - NeoTar 3y ago
    I suspect they all could be British English, since the variations are less pronounced that one might think: re: Focused - to quote Wiktionary: "The spelling focused is much more common in the US but also more common in the UK and Australia. The Oxford English Dictionary describes the spelling focussed as irregular." Speaking a native British English speaker, I'd agree. I focused looks OK, but focussed looks weird to me. Prioritization: The 's' versus 'z' debate is perhaps a little more complicated than often presented. There are some words which always were historically spelt with a 'z', but since the interpretation that 'z' is American have started to be spelt with an 's' in English. In particular the OED (Oxford English Dictionary) tends to favour 'z' spellings for a number of words over the 's' spellings - I think 'nationalization' is a particular example.
    - smitty1e 3y ago
      At least they did not wax Germanic with "focuß". One can always cheer a bit of optimization like merging 'ss' to 'ß'. In the spirit of the thread, though, stopping at just the one seems odd.
windex 3y ago
I personally think all organizations want to be cults with unthinking followers. I read every inbound piece from "management" like they are propaganda leaflets with an implied threat of violence. It helps.
- fullshark 3y ago
  And all the talk about "diversity" and "diversity of opinions" being cherished is nonsense, they want a hivemind singularly focused on executing leadership's various whims.
  - Loughla 3y ago
    I think that really is super dependent on your workplace, and probably your field. In higher education, I can tell you, they do not value diversity of opinion, but they get it in spades. Every decision is questioned, argued, analyzed, and beat to death. Leadership hates it, but I love it. It's one of the closest environments to that 'value diversity of opinion' statement that I've ever been a part of.
    - clarge1120 3y ago
      Diversity of opinion is allowed, but not diversity of worldview. If a dissenting worldview is expressed it is quickly removed from the discussion and the dissenter is eliminated.
    - pc86 3y ago
      Maybe this is why nothing ever gets done in higher ed.
      - SantalBlush 3y ago
        That may be part of it, but I think the main reason is that higher ed is process-oriented to a fault. You need five people to sign off on what you're doing, and John is out until next Tuesday, so he can't sign it. When he gets back, he notices that Christine missed something on the form, so he waits five days and kicks it back. Repeat this until you give up.
Damogran6 3y ago
I've been in security longer than most job applications ask for. Every security solution is just the same Black Box with a one-trick-pony in it. After the 40th one, they all kinda blur together after awhile. They all have accounts and permissions and reporting and maintenance and update processes and a way to store the data they create...and a single line on a single tab on a single webpage that 'does the trick'. I'm with the OP. I'm tired of installing SIEMs when the leadership undergoes an upheaval and the new CISO comes in with some form of "Everything you have is CRAP! My stuff is awesome! Warm up the forklift!" It's all the same alchohol lubricated meetings in a bar with the same deep fried taquitos and the same fidget spinners emblazoned with the product name, usually a VERBNOUN.
- tristor 3y ago
  > Every security solution is just the same Black Box with a one-trick-pony in it. This is a cultural problem in the information security space and one reason why I've left that space. I call this "checkbox compliance" culture. Most customers want a box they can rack, check the box on a compliance audit, and move on. Very few companies actually give a shit about security as a practice or philosophy, and don't actually do any of the work to build security into their products and systems. The epitome of this is that many companies operate devices at their border that strip encryption via using a company-provided CA to man-in-the-middle all traffic across their network to do DPI, and then re-encrypt (hopefully) to the ultimate target. From the perspective of the employee, the primary attacker on the network is the company's own infosec team, because the policies and compliance checkboxes are achieved in the worst possible iteration of how you might meet compliance without any regard to /security/. This is a fixable situation, but it's a hard thing to fix because like most cultural issues, it's ultimately some kind of tragedy of the commons.
  - Damogran6 3y ago
    Completely agreed. I also see it as a side effect of leadership that's not IT savvy. The person setting policy, if they don't understand the problem and risks, often picks solutions that make it 'somebody's elses problem'. 'I don't know Security, so I'm going to pay an MSSP to do it for me.' This is not a bad thing, per se, it just means that their controls are ceded to a company who has marketing, shareholders, management layers, and _they_ want to optimize _their_ costs....so the protection of your organization will be 1/n of the response team's attention...where N is the number of other companies they're responsible for monitoring. It's POSSIBLE that you'll get better support by letting an expert multiply their skills across a larger population of targets...it's just not LIKELY.
lubesGordi 3y ago
I left silicon valley because of agile development. Sprinting all the time was the thing that lead to my burnout, and when we finally released our app, the company was pivoting and 'going epic mode'. I quit then. In retrospect it would've been fine if I had taken a more relaxed attitude towards it all. Sprints don't mean you have to literally sprint. Epic mode is just a narrative. Work at your pace and it'll be fine.
- IAmGraydon 3y ago
  >I left silicon valley because of agile development. Sprinting all the time was the thing that lead to my burnout... Hard work doesn't cause burnout. Constantly feeling like you have no control or impact causes burnout.
  - wonderwonder 3y ago
    You are right but to expand on it, hard work with an arbitrary often impossible deadline without working OT definitely contributes. One can only run on the treadmill for so long before something breaks.
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
  - LouisSayers 3y ago
    I don't think you can really have a generic "this is why you're burnt out" or "that's not real burn out => look over here!". There could be many reasons why someone is in a burnt out state - from lack of control, to being over-worked, being constantly over stimulated, emotional trauma or any number of other reasons. It's something unique to the individual and is not always obvious.
    - solarmist 3y ago
      I think they’re pointing out that if you feel like what you’re doing really matters then burn out doesn’t happen. Assuming there aren’t factors outside work. I strongly believe burnout is a for of depression.
adamwong246 3y ago
As far as I'm concerned, it always was and always shall be "work faster or die". I was unaware that we were given a third choice?
- JohnFen 3y ago
  You aren't given other options. You have to take them, and then you discover that they were always there and you just didn't notice.
- fullshark 3y ago
  The choice is actually between "work faster and die" and "work slower and die."
- BizarreByte 3y ago
  You're going to die regardless, how hard you work between now and then is only relevant to the lifestyle you want. If one can work less and be content with their lifestyle all the power to them.
- phkahler 3y ago
  >> As far as I'm concerned, it always was and always shall be "work faster or die". I was unaware that we were given a third choice? Yeah, it turns out you get to define things in your life, including your pace at work. Be productive but don't burn yourself out. Most likely nothing will happen. Worst case you dodge a bullet and find a more reasonable company. Either way you will be working at your pace.
- milesvp 3y ago
  There is a third option that most people don’t seem to know about, which is to slow down to speed up. I find there are many instances where if I slow down I not only accomplish more, but the things I work on are more important. It can be really hard to get in this mindset, and even harder to know if you need to actually be putting in more effort/hours. But by and large, taking breaks and getting enough sleep can actually be a superpower.
commandlinefan 3y ago
Actually, I think it's more of a "I don't have to outrun the bear, I just have to outrun you" culture - which is pretty bad, too, especially when they spend all their time praising "teamwork".
nine_zeros 3y ago
I was recently berated and given negative performance ratings for rolling something out 2 weeks late. The reason I rolled it out 2 weeks late was because we were in holiday season and the company CTO had asked people to exercise caution during holidays. But lo and behold, my management didn't like that I was cautious. They gave me a negative rating. I asked, "Why was the 2 weeks so important? Are there any customers waiting for it? Is the company going to lose money? Why is the CTO saying one thing and you are saying something different?" There was no clear answer to it. Turns out, the managers have designed a game where they assign percentage points for things completed by the end of the quarter. My manager was getting lower points because I was exercising caution - as requested by the CTO. It is these BS management games that made me realize that the industry is broken beyond repair. I no longer hustle to make managers look good. Quiet quitting on exploitation is a fair trade. I ain't sacrificing my personal life for BS games.
- throwaway2203 3y ago
  Same here. We're always getting mixed signals... "if you need to delay, delay. you're the best judge of that." And "we have commitments we have to hit at the end of the quarter."
  - digitalsushi 3y ago
    Half of us can discern corporate messaging and half of us cannot (let us say). The cynic, the street smart corporate bilinguist hears those two messages and understands plainly that only the latter is true. The person who takes things at face value is perplexed: They have been told not to hurt themselves, but also told that if they hurt themselves the company will be pleased. How bizarre, to be told opposing requirements, and that half of people are not also perplexed.
    - nine_zeros 3y ago
      > The cynic, the street smart corporate bilinguist hears those two messages and understands plainly that only the latter is true. It is true that the only message you need to follow is the one said by your own manager (and their manager). But remember, if you follow the manager's message and something fails, this manager will throw YOU under the bus. The real street smart corporate bilinguist recognizes that blindly following your management makes you vulnerable to become the sucker, fall-guy, doesn't-really-need-promotion-guy. If your management is dishonest, the only real game out there is a game of dishonesty.
lapcat 3y ago
I've got one that can see! https://youtu.be/DPZOi8EgcYM https://youtu.be/DPZOi8EgcYM
ziroshima 3y ago
I enjoy my job and the lifestyle it provides. But as other have said, I tune out the "emergencies" and people panicking over it. It's all BS and I think it's important to recognize that. You're going to die in a short period of time. Do your best while at your job, and pretend to give a shit while you're there. But make sure to budget time for your family and yourself.
IAmGraydon 3y ago
Why are we sprinting? To win. The business world is Darwinian. Sit back and relax, and someone else who is more motivated will eat your lunch. Why do we want to win? To make money so we can have what we want. If you don't feel like you're getting somewhere, maybe you're applying force to the ground in the wrong way.
- T4iga 3y ago
  How many companies do you think go under my sprinting to slow vs in the wrong direction? I would love to hear an example where in business it came down to motivation of the companies workforce. I suggest this video about the question of success: Luck or hard(-re in this case) work? https://youtu.be/3LopI4YeC4I https://youtu.be/3LopI4YeC4I
- JohnFen 3y ago
  What you say is true in many parts of the business world. But not all of them.
- droobles 3y ago
  Slow and steady wins the race, and the majority of startups fail. I agree that a balance needs to be struck and something needs to be done, but I'd favor a healthy cadence for my team than have them burn out and quit, leaving me holding the bag.
- namaria 3y ago
  > The business world is Darwinian. Then look at apex predators. They spend most of their time resting. Their efforts in hunting are extremely focused. Lions are not 'griding' yet they dominate the savannah.
trentnix 3y ago
> I have similar issues with the agile methodology and its 2-week “sprints”. Why are we sprinting… ALL. THE. TIME. Can’t we at least mix in some brisk walks every now and then a la high intensity interval training? Following the fitness metaphor, the concept of periodization is an overwhelmingly common training strategy. Periodization turns fitness plans into smaller cycles that include active and passive periods of rest. It’s recognized that these rest periods are where performance improves - the grind that came before was simply tearing the body down to induce the body to rebuild itself fitter and stronger than before. These rest periods are not a vacation, but rather a reduction in intensity and training load and often include cross-training and other activities that give the athlete a mental and physical break. I’ve always been surprised some enterprising Agile consultant hasn’t jumped on the same concept to push the concept of recovery sprints, like like an Ironman triathlete will have a recovery week baked into their plan. I’ve heard of sprints that might be focused on technical debt or experimentation, but nothing about a reduction in velocity or anything like that. I think it would be an interesting experiment to try to help mitigate the endless grind. Additionally, two-week sprints weren’t originally the norm. I left software for a while when four weeks was the most common sprint length and when I came back , everything seemed to have settled on two weeks as the magic number. I never got an explanation why.
- jgust 3y ago
  1 week: no planning, just reaction 2 weeks: minimal planning effort, not a long enough period to agitate stakeholders when you say "next sprint" 4 weeks: it's MY request and I NEED IT NOW!
- digitalsushi 3y ago
  If I don't plan, then I have to sprint. If I plan, I get to jog. But I have to work extra hours to have a plan because my day is full of sprinting. So I can work twice as long and jog or I can work the regular amount and sprint. And we reward people who are sprinting because they go twice as fast and that's obviously very valuable because we are optics oriented programmers.
outworlder 3y ago
While agile methodologies have a place, I agree with the author about this 'sprinting' nonsense. Not everything can be timeboxed in a couple weeks. Combine that with the daily reports... that sort of stuff works very well if you are working on your 78th Web CRUD app. It doesn't work so well when you are doing something much more complex. "Oh that's what POCs are for!" - yes but they are, once again, aggressively timeboxed. If the 'agile' industry wanted to design the Space Shuttle, it would have to fit in a POC, rather than taking a realistic amount of time to allow for proper design. The sad truth is that no manager gets promoted by quoting that their project will take 2 years. They will say 6 months, with one shoddy demo at 3 months full of smoke and mirrors, and that buys them time to file "bugs" and "improvements" that will stretch the time it will take to 2 years anyway. By which time they are already going to be at another company.
rhyme-boss 3y ago
I'm jealous of older generations that were at least compensated for their hard work. We're expected to hustle all the time, for no benefit in our personal lives. Software engineering is a "high earning job", yet the basic shit it affords you isn't even to the level of "low" and "middle" paying jobs of the past. You can grind yourself to the bone for years and still not be able to afford to buy a home and raise a family.
- wonderwonder 3y ago
  I think it depends where you live. Its relatively easy to land a 100k plus job after a couple years in software in the US. If the argument is things are just way more expensive now, then preach on, its insanity how much a trip to the grocery store costs now.
  - Claude_Shannon 3y ago
    That feels like USA thing. In Europe it's way lower in average, in Poland average programmist will earn 6-7k per month - around 1.700 USD Heard similarly about pay in Germany - being a programmist doesn't pay you well
    - pc86 3y ago
      Literally the first sentence: "I think it depends on where you live."
      - Claude_Shannon 3y ago
        I know, sorry if it sounded that way - I was just trying to add to that.
    - mkaszkowiak 3y ago
      An average programmer in Poland earns 18k PLN net monthly, which is around 14k PLN after taxes. This is 5 times the minimal salary - UoP after taxes equals to ~2709 PLN monthly. You can earn 6k even at an internship outside of Warsaw. This allows you to live in really comfortable conditions, no matter what city you're in. In my opinion, Poland is one of best countries to be a programmer in Europe, due to the possibilities of overseas remote work, low costs of living and very low taxes. As for Germany - well, maybe someone else can chip in
cdnsteve 3y ago
My reflection is this is a symptom of North American work culture. In the end, it manifests stress, lost time to decompress and a significant impact on your health. After traveling to LaTam, we have it all backwards. Focus on happiness, family and health are where energy needs to be invested, before anywhere else.
- distcs 3y ago
  Correct! When I moved out to a certain part of Europe and saw how life is much more than a hustle, it filled me with a renewed energy and perspective towards life.
FrustratedMonky 3y ago
It isn't just programming. It is all of us. Self inflicted. Each of us is part of the system. MOLOCH. https://slatestarcodex.com/2014/07/30/meditations-on-moloch/ https://slatestarcodex.com/2014/07/30/meditations-on-moloch/
- digitalsushi 3y ago
  I have the fantasy of working in the software industry but that we're ants: there's a single correct goal that we all share. What would it be like to work in this industry where our goals aligned and our communication flawless? What would we have built in the same time, with the same piles of sand?
Jemm 3y ago
Take the resources wasted on managing agile and put those resources in to actual work. Shocking how the job now gets done and workers are motivated.
honkycat 3y ago
Managing your attitude and stress levels is critical in the tech industry. I would argue getting invested is actively bad. Not giving a shit and getting the job done is better than caring too much and constantly battling to "improve" things. I can't handle giving a shit. It burns me out. The best i can do is a "good job" on what i feel like is a reasonable workload. My grandmother used to say "The graveyards are full of indispensable people." It's true. You leave a void quickly filled after you die. You might as well enjoy the ride.
fairity 3y ago
> I’m not against hustle, but when the hustle becomes an end in-and-of-itself, rather than a means to an end, that is alarming. Is it possible to hustle all the time & not burn out? Yes, but it takes a special type of person who values the hustle, in and of itself, which is rare. It's important to realize that there's no right or wrong with what you choose to value. And, as an employee, changing your org's values is probably an impossible task. Instead, get clear on what your values are. Then, find an environment where you're surrounded with people who share your values. You'll be much happier.
- JohnFen 3y ago
  > Instead, get clear on what your values are. Then, find an environment where you're surrounded with people who share your values. This cannot be overstated.
- KnobbleMcKnees 3y ago
  > Instead, get clear on what your values are. Then, find an environment where you're surrounded with people who share your values. You'll be much happier. This is a nice thought in theory but if your values include something along the lines of "treat people like they have families and lives and don't use them like a resource until they burn out", that eliminates a surprisingly large number of companies. Having worked at a few big tech companies at different stages in their lifecycle, I think I'm starting to see where the sweet spots for joining are where they are more likely to align with the ways I want to work (if not all of my values). Equally I'm also starting to learn when it's time to jump from the ship.
  - freetinker 3y ago
    Would you mind sharing your insights re sweet spots and when it’s time to jump? Thanks!
    - KnobbleMcKnees 3y ago
      For me the sweet spots for joining are are: * inception: this is any point at which the whole company can fit around a board room table. The environment is intimate and people are passionate and engaged. * Post-IPO: as in, immediately post-IPO. This is the calm after the storm as, immediately pre-IPO, there will be a focus on pure profit and growth of value without growth of business, which means a lot of crunch and a lot of burnout. This does mean likely not getting the kind of stock offering that they might have given previously. For jumping ship: * Pre and/or post merger: mergers are horrible and lead to similar behaviours as IPO but with headcount reductions, culture clashes, and lots of wife reaching decisions without consultation. You'll also see an exodus of colleagues at both ends. * Pre-IPO: if you've already banked your shares, don't stay to tighten the purse strings and burn out, similar to my comments on post-IPO. A tl;dr would be: I like working at a company when the focus is on growth rather than profits because that's when people are working most to create new things and please customers.
rqtwteye 3y ago
One way to keep my sanity is to take a look at the big picture every six months or so. You quickly see that basically nothing has changed but there was a ton of noise in between. The same works for news. Ignore news for 3 months. When you read them again you also see that almost nothing substantial has changed.
tristanperry 3y ago
A great essay, and it explains exactly why I left software development (as a career working for someone else). Too much of what I call emergency-led management.
pixel3234 3y ago
[flagged]
johnea 3y ago
All burned out? Just wait.... Until you've been through another 30 years. You haven't even reached mid-burn yet...
- pc86 3y ago
  "Things were hard for me, there's no way they're harder or even as hard for you!" What purpose is this comment?
alexachilles90 3y ago
The worst is when you are trying to escape the hustle and changing your attitude to take it at your own pace at work but there is that one team member that buys into the hustle culture, sending emails at night, ticking things off their check list like their life depended on it, promoting the race to the bottom.
- JohnFen 3y ago
  Why is the existence of that team member a problem? You don't have to read the emails until the start of the workday no matter when they send them.
  - supriyo-biswas 3y ago
    Because their “endeavor” becomes the benchmark for other employees to replicate, leading to a race to the bottom.
    - newswasboring 3y ago
      That sounds like a bad manager rather than a bad team mate.
    - JohnFen 3y ago
      I guess that I'm weird. It never occurred to me to measure my performance in contrast to my coworkers!
      - gilmore606 3y ago
        It definitely occurs to your manager.
        JohnFen 3y ago
        Maybe. If so, it isn't something that matters to me, though. I'm not competing with my teammates.
  - 3y ago
throwaway22032 3y ago
I don't mind sprinting, as long as I'm in with a shot at the podium at the end of the race. If I'm getting a normal salary, you get a bog standard morning run.
swader999 3y ago
You're allowed to take a felt and mark up those posters. Management will be disappointed if a bit of humour never surfaced. Especially on April fools day.
javier_e06 3y ago
I remember a phrase I heard on my martial arts class after many years of training: "Don't be afraid of bitter work" It really hit home when our main motto was and is "We Wei" Effortless effort.
vinay_ys 3y ago
In my experience actual reality is somewhat different – at least at large Internet apps companies. In high-functioning successful team, everyone is spending significant time in 1. discovery – learning things about the constantly evolving product/functional domain and the tech, and 2. ideation – figuring out what's important and how to solve it, 3. and some non-trivial amount of time in large team collaboration related activities. But the problem is these activities (and their taxonomies) are not made explicit – their purpose is not explicitly stated; instead people participate in packaged rituals that are supposed to produce results. But because they do it without understanding it, they could feel like a cog in the machine. But there's also another big part of the reality – those who work themselves too hard and get themselves burnt out are also chasing personal career promotion goals and not succeeding at it. Then, there are some who don't even have that objective but have a broken work habit and get burnt out. Of course there are other things at the worst end of the spectrum – bad manager, bad CEO, bad business, bad co-workers, bad vendor-partners etc – that can make things toxic and they get burnt out.
xyzelement 3y ago
> Just observe the colorful language from Bezos’ 2016 letter to shareholders: “Day 2 is stasis. Followed by irrelevance. Followed by excruciating, painful decline. Followed by death. And that is why it is always Day 1.” Is it just me, or is this just another way of saying: work hard or you will die. The reason this author is confused/upset by the Bezos quote is because they are talking about the same sport but a different class. If an olympic champion told you about their training and diet regiment, you'd say "this sounds horrible" but what you'd mean is "it's not for me, because I am not training for the olympics." On the flip-side if your goal was to be an olympic champ too, your reaction would be "this is what it takes, good to know." Bezos wasn't setting himself up for an easy 9-5 and he wasn't building a me-too company. He was building Amazon into.. well.. what it is, an absolute champion across multiple industries. And perhaps doing that requires what he describes. If you're not looking to build an Amazon and you're not looking to be a part of the culture that can do it, then of course "this sounds horrible." And that's OK, just realize you're saying that because "it's not for me, because I don't care about that." It could very well be for other people - and those people might have greater wealth and work engagement than you do as a result. And that's OK too.
namaria 3y ago
There's always someone trying to light a fire under your ass. Fear politics is how we got a police force at war with citizens due to moral panics. Would be authoritarians thrive on that shit. Salespeople want you to panic and close to escape the danger. Leadership wants you to exhaust yourself for their cause. The real trick is realizing that's bullshit 99% of the time. Special forces train you to take control of your fight or flight reflex. You need to decide when to unleash the adrenaline. If you lose that control, you're in the whirlwind... Being grounded and tuning out the noise so you can navigate properly is a fundamental life skill.
drewr 3y ago
It's unfortunate and ironic that Agile's legacy now apparently includes burn-out, when it specifically was designed to prevent it: "Agile processes promote sustainable development. The sponsors, developers, and users should be able to maintain a constant pace indefinitely." https://agilemanifesto.org/principles.html https://agilemanifesto.org/principles.html

161 points by news_hacker 3y ago

This journey 1 percent finished. is my command of english off? this sentence is a lyrical way to write "this journey which only 1 percent have" finished ... not this journey is 1 percent finished ... ;D

spiffytech 3y ago
"We have only completed one percent of the journey". I.e., the work is never done. Urgency is forever, because no matter how much you've done, most of the work is still ahead of you, so don't slack off. I think the original quote was transcribed with a missing word: "This journey is one percent finished".

PartiallyTyped 3y ago

I view my work at AWS as being paid to deal with meetings and other people. Hadnt I bills to pay and mouths to feed, I'd be doing this "work" for free. Well, almost, I'd be coding all day, but I wouldn't set foot on a single meeting. Maybe it's a matter of perspective? It sure helps that I am working on interesting projects. Maybe the diff is that this is how I am having fun.

JohnFen 3y ago
I know people are different, but I'm like you in that programming is fun for me. Except when I'm doing it as paid work for someone else. That drains the fun out of it for me. As a result, I have to have my fun by programming when I'm off work, too.
skydhash 3y ago
Enjoy it while you can. I love computer science and programming. But there’s so much CRUD apps you can work on before it stops being exciting. Now, I just do my job in the work hours, then move to personal stuff in my spare time. Unless it’s for myself, I wouldn’t work on anything if not for the money.
- honkycat 3y ago
  Agreed. I was "the programmer" among my friend group who are mostly programmers. I still find it fun to work on something novel but I am not nearly as passionate as I used to be. Now I find music more fun.
- PartiallyTyped 3y ago
  Had I been working on CRUD apps, I would do the same thing. The moment what I am doing stops being interesting, I just leave.

paxys 3y ago

There comes a time in everyone's career when they realize that the "emergency situation" they are in never really ends. There is always a fire to put out. There is always a P0 bug that will sink the entire company if not fixed. There is always a release that absolutely cannot be delayed for any reason, and everyone must work nights and weekends to get it out. The best you can do is learn to tune out management bullshit and identify what is really important. There is no point losing sleep over the rest. It will be there to work on tomorrow, and the day after.

jghn 3y ago
This was an eye opening moment when it happened to me. Almost nothing has the impact it purports to have. Percentage-wise, very few things are the emergency/fire that people make them out to be, at least in the grand scheme of things. I think part of it is that people get too wrapped up in their local world and don't see the big picture. For instance "If we don't get this widget added to the thingamabob in the next 3 days the company will go under!" when the thingamabob is just a minor piece of the puzzle for the larger company. Part of it though is driven from the top. The one downside to having had this realization is it goes both ways. It also means that very few things you do have impact in a positive way as well. For some people this can be motivation killing.
- parpfish 3y ago
  not everybody gets sucked into firefighting to 'save the company'. if the fire started due to something you helped create and you have even a smidgen of impostor syndrome, fighting fires is about about saving yourself and cleaning up the messes you've made. the only way to prevent this is to build a team with a strong sense of collective ownership/responsibility and a healthy attitude towards mistakes.
  - cybersandwich 3y ago
    One of the biggest "fire fighters" I ever worked with was a serial arsonist. She created these cluster fcks and then would throw out her shoulder patting herself on the back for putting it out. She was in a constant state of panic. It was exhausting to watch her work.

fullshark 3y ago

Don't know if this person worked at FB, but FB literally has its walls covered in propaganda posters, designed to "inspire" but I find them to be disturbing. https://www.businessinsider.com/facebooks-propaganda-posters-tokyo-photos-2017-1 https://www.businessinsider.com/facebooks-propaganda-posters...

parpfish 3y ago
i once worked in a small company that had a new ceo. he read about the posters at facebook and decided to invent some of his own, so he came up with a stupid phrase and got designers to mock a bunch up and print them out (if i remember correctly, it was some variant of "Keep your hands inside the vehicle at all times" and had pictures of rollercoasters). the posters were very effective at getting us to stop taking the new ceo seriously.
llimos 3y ago
Interesting that 'favours' uses the British spelling, but 'focused' and 'prioritization' the American one.
- NeoTar 3y ago
  I suspect they all could be British English, since the variations are less pronounced that one might think: re: Focused - to quote Wiktionary: "The spelling focused is much more common in the US but also more common in the UK and Australia. The Oxford English Dictionary describes the spelling focussed as irregular." Speaking a native British English speaker, I'd agree. I focused looks OK, but focussed looks weird to me. Prioritization: The 's' versus 'z' debate is perhaps a little more complicated than often presented. There are some words which always were historically spelt with a 'z', but since the interpretation that 'z' is American have started to be spelt with an 's' in English. In particular the OED (Oxford English Dictionary) tends to favour 'z' spellings for a number of words over the 's' spellings - I think 'nationalization' is a particular example.
  - smitty1e 3y ago
    At least they did not wax Germanic with "focuß". One can always cheer a bit of optimization like merging 'ss' to 'ß'. In the spirit of the thread, though, stopping at just the one seems odd.

windex 3y ago

I personally think all organizations want to be cults with unthinking followers. I read every inbound piece from "management" like they are propaganda leaflets with an implied threat of violence. It helps.

fullshark 3y ago
And all the talk about "diversity" and "diversity of opinions" being cherished is nonsense, they want a hivemind singularly focused on executing leadership's various whims.
- Loughla 3y ago
  I think that really is super dependent on your workplace, and probably your field. In higher education, I can tell you, they do not value diversity of opinion, but they get it in spades. Every decision is questioned, argued, analyzed, and beat to death. Leadership hates it, but I love it. It's one of the closest environments to that 'value diversity of opinion' statement that I've ever been a part of.
  - clarge1120 3y ago
    Diversity of opinion is allowed, but not diversity of worldview. If a dissenting worldview is expressed it is quickly removed from the discussion and the dissenter is eliminated.
  - pc86 3y ago
    Maybe this is why nothing ever gets done in higher ed.
    - SantalBlush 3y ago
      That may be part of it, but I think the main reason is that higher ed is process-oriented to a fault. You need five people to sign off on what you're doing, and John is out until next Tuesday, so he can't sign it. When he gets back, he notices that Christine missed something on the form, so he waits five days and kicks it back. Repeat this until you give up.

Damogran6 3y ago

I've been in security longer than most job applications ask for. Every security solution is just the same Black Box with a one-trick-pony in it. After the 40th one, they all kinda blur together after awhile. They all have accounts and permissions and reporting and maintenance and update processes and a way to store the data they create...and a single line on a single tab on a single webpage that 'does the trick'. I'm with the OP. I'm tired of installing SIEMs when the leadership undergoes an upheaval and the new CISO comes in with some form of "Everything you have is CRAP! My stuff is awesome! Warm up the forklift!" It's all the same alchohol lubricated meetings in a bar with the same deep fried taquitos and the same fidget spinners emblazoned with the product name, usually a VERBNOUN.

tristor 3y ago
> Every security solution is just the same Black Box with a one-trick-pony in it. This is a cultural problem in the information security space and one reason why I've left that space. I call this "checkbox compliance" culture. Most customers want a box they can rack, check the box on a compliance audit, and move on. Very few companies actually give a shit about security as a practice or philosophy, and don't actually do any of the work to build security into their products and systems. The epitome of this is that many companies operate devices at their border that strip encryption via using a company-provided CA to man-in-the-middle all traffic across their network to do DPI, and then re-encrypt (hopefully) to the ultimate target. From the perspective of the employee, the primary attacker on the network is the company's own infosec team, because the policies and compliance checkboxes are achieved in the worst possible iteration of how you might meet compliance without any regard to /security/. This is a fixable situation, but it's a hard thing to fix because like most cultural issues, it's ultimately some kind of tragedy of the commons.
- Damogran6 3y ago
  Completely agreed. I also see it as a side effect of leadership that's not IT savvy. The person setting policy, if they don't understand the problem and risks, often picks solutions that make it 'somebody's elses problem'. 'I don't know Security, so I'm going to pay an MSSP to do it for me.' This is not a bad thing, per se, it just means that their controls are ceded to a company who has marketing, shareholders, management layers, and _they_ want to optimize _their_ costs....so the protection of your organization will be 1/n of the response team's attention...where N is the number of other companies they're responsible for monitoring. It's POSSIBLE that you'll get better support by letting an expert multiply their skills across a larger population of targets...it's just not LIKELY.

lubesGordi 3y ago

I left silicon valley because of agile development. Sprinting all the time was the thing that lead to my burnout, and when we finally released our app, the company was pivoting and 'going epic mode'. I quit then. In retrospect it would've been fine if I had taken a more relaxed attitude towards it all. Sprints don't mean you have to literally sprint. Epic mode is just a narrative. Work at your pace and it'll be fine.

IAmGraydon 3y ago
>I left silicon valley because of agile development. Sprinting all the time was the thing that lead to my burnout... Hard work doesn't cause burnout. Constantly feeling like you have no control or impact causes burnout.
- wonderwonder 3y ago
  You are right but to expand on it, hard work with an arbitrary often impossible deadline without working OT definitely contributes. One can only run on the treadmill for so long before something breaks.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
- LouisSayers 3y ago
  I don't think you can really have a generic "this is why you're burnt out" or "that's not real burn out => look over here!". There could be many reasons why someone is in a burnt out state - from lack of control, to being over-worked, being constantly over stimulated, emotional trauma or any number of other reasons. It's something unique to the individual and is not always obvious.
  - solarmist 3y ago
    I think they’re pointing out that if you feel like what you’re doing really matters then burn out doesn’t happen. Assuming there aren’t factors outside work. I strongly believe burnout is a for of depression.

adamwong246 3y ago

As far as I'm concerned, it always was and always shall be "work faster or die". I was unaware that we were given a third choice?

JohnFen 3y ago
You aren't given other options. You have to take them, and then you discover that they were always there and you just didn't notice.
fullshark 3y ago
The choice is actually between "work faster and die" and "work slower and die."
BizarreByte 3y ago
You're going to die regardless, how hard you work between now and then is only relevant to the lifestyle you want. If one can work less and be content with their lifestyle all the power to them.
phkahler 3y ago
>> As far as I'm concerned, it always was and always shall be "work faster or die". I was unaware that we were given a third choice? Yeah, it turns out you get to define things in your life, including your pace at work. Be productive but don't burn yourself out. Most likely nothing will happen. Worst case you dodge a bullet and find a more reasonable company. Either way you will be working at your pace.
milesvp 3y ago
There is a third option that most people don’t seem to know about, which is to slow down to speed up. I find there are many instances where if I slow down I not only accomplish more, but the things I work on are more important. It can be really hard to get in this mindset, and even harder to know if you need to actually be putting in more effort/hours. But by and large, taking breaks and getting enough sleep can actually be a superpower.

commandlinefan 3y ago

Actually, I think it's more of a "I don't have to outrun the bear, I just have to outrun you" culture - which is pretty bad, too, especially when they spend all their time praising "teamwork".

nine_zeros 3y ago

I was recently berated and given negative performance ratings for rolling something out 2 weeks late. The reason I rolled it out 2 weeks late was because we were in holiday season and the company CTO had asked people to exercise caution during holidays. But lo and behold, my management didn't like that I was cautious. They gave me a negative rating. I asked, "Why was the 2 weeks so important? Are there any customers waiting for it? Is the company going to lose money? Why is the CTO saying one thing and you are saying something different?" There was no clear answer to it. Turns out, the managers have designed a game where they assign percentage points for things completed by the end of the quarter. My manager was getting lower points because I was exercising caution - as requested by the CTO. It is these BS management games that made me realize that the industry is broken beyond repair. I no longer hustle to make managers look good. Quiet quitting on exploitation is a fair trade. I ain't sacrificing my personal life for BS games.

throwaway2203 3y ago
Same here. We're always getting mixed signals... "if you need to delay, delay. you're the best judge of that." And "we have commitments we have to hit at the end of the quarter."
- digitalsushi 3y ago
  Half of us can discern corporate messaging and half of us cannot (let us say). The cynic, the street smart corporate bilinguist hears those two messages and understands plainly that only the latter is true. The person who takes things at face value is perplexed: They have been told not to hurt themselves, but also told that if they hurt themselves the company will be pleased. How bizarre, to be told opposing requirements, and that half of people are not also perplexed.
  - nine_zeros 3y ago
    > The cynic, the street smart corporate bilinguist hears those two messages and understands plainly that only the latter is true. It is true that the only message you need to follow is the one said by your own manager (and their manager). But remember, if you follow the manager's message and something fails, this manager will throw YOU under the bus. The real street smart corporate bilinguist recognizes that blindly following your management makes you vulnerable to become the sucker, fall-guy, doesn't-really-need-promotion-guy. If your management is dishonest, the only real game out there is a game of dishonesty.

lapcat 3y ago

I've got one that can see! https://youtu.be/DPZOi8EgcYM https://youtu.be/DPZOi8EgcYM

ziroshima 3y ago

I enjoy my job and the lifestyle it provides. But as other have said, I tune out the "emergencies" and people panicking over it. It's all BS and I think it's important to recognize that. You're going to die in a short period of time. Do your best while at your job, and pretend to give a shit while you're there. But make sure to budget time for your family and yourself.

IAmGraydon 3y ago

Why are we sprinting? To win. The business world is Darwinian. Sit back and relax, and someone else who is more motivated will eat your lunch. Why do we want to win? To make money so we can have what we want. If you don't feel like you're getting somewhere, maybe you're applying force to the ground in the wrong way.

T4iga 3y ago
How many companies do you think go under my sprinting to slow vs in the wrong direction? I would love to hear an example where in business it came down to motivation of the companies workforce. I suggest this video about the question of success: Luck or hard(-re in this case) work? https://youtu.be/3LopI4YeC4I https://youtu.be/3LopI4YeC4I
JohnFen 3y ago
What you say is true in many parts of the business world. But not all of them.
droobles 3y ago
Slow and steady wins the race, and the majority of startups fail. I agree that a balance needs to be struck and something needs to be done, but I'd favor a healthy cadence for my team than have them burn out and quit, leaving me holding the bag.
namaria 3y ago
> The business world is Darwinian. Then look at apex predators. They spend most of their time resting. Their efforts in hunting are extremely focused. Lions are not 'griding' yet they dominate the savannah.

trentnix 3y ago

> I have similar issues with the agile methodology and its 2-week “sprints”. Why are we sprinting… ALL. THE. TIME. Can’t we at least mix in some brisk walks every now and then a la high intensity interval training? Following the fitness metaphor, the concept of periodization is an overwhelmingly common training strategy. Periodization turns fitness plans into smaller cycles that include active and passive periods of rest. It’s recognized that these rest periods are where performance improves - the grind that came before was simply tearing the body down to induce the body to rebuild itself fitter and stronger than before. These rest periods are not a vacation, but rather a reduction in intensity and training load and often include cross-training and other activities that give the athlete a mental and physical break. I’ve always been surprised some enterprising Agile consultant hasn’t jumped on the same concept to push the concept of recovery sprints, like like an Ironman triathlete will have a recovery week baked into their plan. I’ve heard of sprints that might be focused on technical debt or experimentation, but nothing about a reduction in velocity or anything like that. I think it would be an interesting experiment to try to help mitigate the endless grind. Additionally, two-week sprints weren’t originally the norm. I left software for a while when four weeks was the most common sprint length and when I came back , everything seemed to have settled on two weeks as the magic number. I never got an explanation why.

jgust 3y ago
1 week: no planning, just reaction 2 weeks: minimal planning effort, not a long enough period to agitate stakeholders when you say "next sprint" 4 weeks: it's MY request and I NEED IT NOW!
digitalsushi 3y ago
If I don't plan, then I have to sprint. If I plan, I get to jog. But I have to work extra hours to have a plan because my day is full of sprinting. So I can work twice as long and jog or I can work the regular amount and sprint. And we reward people who are sprinting because they go twice as fast and that's obviously very valuable because we are optics oriented programmers.

outworlder 3y ago

While agile methodologies have a place, I agree with the author about this 'sprinting' nonsense. Not everything can be timeboxed in a couple weeks. Combine that with the daily reports... that sort of stuff works very well if you are working on your 78th Web CRUD app. It doesn't work so well when you are doing something much more complex. "Oh that's what POCs are for!" - yes but they are, once again, aggressively timeboxed. If the 'agile' industry wanted to design the Space Shuttle, it would have to fit in a POC, rather than taking a realistic amount of time to allow for proper design. The sad truth is that no manager gets promoted by quoting that their project will take 2 years. They will say 6 months, with one shoddy demo at 3 months full of smoke and mirrors, and that buys them time to file "bugs" and "improvements" that will stretch the time it will take to 2 years anyway. By which time they are already going to be at another company.

rhyme-boss 3y ago

I'm jealous of older generations that were at least compensated for their hard work. We're expected to hustle all the time, for no benefit in our personal lives. Software engineering is a "high earning job", yet the basic shit it affords you isn't even to the level of "low" and "middle" paying jobs of the past. You can grind yourself to the bone for years and still not be able to afford to buy a home and raise a family.

wonderwonder 3y ago
I think it depends where you live. Its relatively easy to land a 100k plus job after a couple years in software in the US. If the argument is things are just way more expensive now, then preach on, its insanity how much a trip to the grocery store costs now.
- Claude_Shannon 3y ago
  That feels like USA thing. In Europe it's way lower in average, in Poland average programmist will earn 6-7k per month - around 1.700 USD Heard similarly about pay in Germany - being a programmist doesn't pay you well
  - pc86 3y ago
    Literally the first sentence: "I think it depends on where you live."
    - Claude_Shannon 3y ago
      I know, sorry if it sounded that way - I was just trying to add to that.
  - mkaszkowiak 3y ago
    An average programmer in Poland earns 18k PLN net monthly, which is around 14k PLN after taxes. This is 5 times the minimal salary - UoP after taxes equals to ~2709 PLN monthly. You can earn 6k even at an internship outside of Warsaw. This allows you to live in really comfortable conditions, no matter what city you're in. In my opinion, Poland is one of best countries to be a programmer in Europe, due to the possibilities of overseas remote work, low costs of living and very low taxes. As for Germany - well, maybe someone else can chip in

cdnsteve 3y ago

My reflection is this is a symptom of North American work culture. In the end, it manifests stress, lost time to decompress and a significant impact on your health. After traveling to LaTam, we have it all backwards. Focus on happiness, family and health are where energy needs to be invested, before anywhere else.

distcs 3y ago
Correct! When I moved out to a certain part of Europe and saw how life is much more than a hustle, it filled me with a renewed energy and perspective towards life.

FrustratedMonky 3y ago

It isn't just programming. It is all of us. Self inflicted. Each of us is part of the system. MOLOCH. https://slatestarcodex.com/2014/07/30/meditations-on-moloch/ https://slatestarcodex.com/2014/07/30/meditations-on-moloch/

digitalsushi 3y ago
I have the fantasy of working in the software industry but that we're ants: there's a single correct goal that we all share. What would it be like to work in this industry where our goals aligned and our communication flawless? What would we have built in the same time, with the same piles of sand?

Jemm 3y ago

Take the resources wasted on managing agile and put those resources in to actual work. Shocking how the job now gets done and workers are motivated.

honkycat 3y ago

Managing your attitude and stress levels is critical in the tech industry. I would argue getting invested is actively bad. Not giving a shit and getting the job done is better than caring too much and constantly battling to "improve" things. I can't handle giving a shit. It burns me out. The best i can do is a "good job" on what i feel like is a reasonable workload. My grandmother used to say "The graveyards are full of indispensable people." It's true. You leave a void quickly filled after you die. You might as well enjoy the ride.

fairity 3y ago

> I’m not against hustle, but when the hustle becomes an end in-and-of-itself, rather than a means to an end, that is alarming. Is it possible to hustle all the time & not burn out? Yes, but it takes a special type of person who values the hustle, in and of itself, which is rare. It's important to realize that there's no right or wrong with what you choose to value. And, as an employee, changing your org's values is probably an impossible task. Instead, get clear on what your values are. Then, find an environment where you're surrounded with people who share your values. You'll be much happier.

JohnFen 3y ago
> Instead, get clear on what your values are. Then, find an environment where you're surrounded with people who share your values. This cannot be overstated.
KnobbleMcKnees 3y ago
> Instead, get clear on what your values are. Then, find an environment where you're surrounded with people who share your values. You'll be much happier. This is a nice thought in theory but if your values include something along the lines of "treat people like they have families and lives and don't use them like a resource until they burn out", that eliminates a surprisingly large number of companies. Having worked at a few big tech companies at different stages in their lifecycle, I think I'm starting to see where the sweet spots for joining are where they are more likely to align with the ways I want to work (if not all of my values). Equally I'm also starting to learn when it's time to jump from the ship.
- freetinker 3y ago
  Would you mind sharing your insights re sweet spots and when it’s time to jump? Thanks!
  - KnobbleMcKnees 3y ago
    For me the sweet spots for joining are are: * inception: this is any point at which the whole company can fit around a board room table. The environment is intimate and people are passionate and engaged. * Post-IPO: as in, immediately post-IPO. This is the calm after the storm as, immediately pre-IPO, there will be a focus on pure profit and growth of value without growth of business, which means a lot of crunch and a lot of burnout. This does mean likely not getting the kind of stock offering that they might have given previously. For jumping ship: * Pre and/or post merger: mergers are horrible and lead to similar behaviours as IPO but with headcount reductions, culture clashes, and lots of wife reaching decisions without consultation. You'll also see an exodus of colleagues at both ends. * Pre-IPO: if you've already banked your shares, don't stay to tighten the purse strings and burn out, similar to my comments on post-IPO. A tl;dr would be: I like working at a company when the focus is on growth rather than profits because that's when people are working most to create new things and please customers.

rqtwteye 3y ago

One way to keep my sanity is to take a look at the big picture every six months or so. You quickly see that basically nothing has changed but there was a ton of noise in between. The same works for news. Ignore news for 3 months. When you read them again you also see that almost nothing substantial has changed.

tristanperry 3y ago

A great essay, and it explains exactly why I left software development (as a career working for someone else). Too much of what I call emergency-led management.

pixel3234 3y ago

[flagged]

johnea 3y ago

All burned out? Just wait.... Until you've been through another 30 years. You haven't even reached mid-burn yet...

pc86 3y ago
"Things were hard for me, there's no way they're harder or even as hard for you!" What purpose is this comment?

alexachilles90 3y ago

The worst is when you are trying to escape the hustle and changing your attitude to take it at your own pace at work but there is that one team member that buys into the hustle culture, sending emails at night, ticking things off their check list like their life depended on it, promoting the race to the bottom.

JohnFen 3y ago
Why is the existence of that team member a problem? You don't have to read the emails until the start of the workday no matter when they send them.
- supriyo-biswas 3y ago
  Because their “endeavor” becomes the benchmark for other employees to replicate, leading to a race to the bottom.
  - newswasboring 3y ago
    That sounds like a bad manager rather than a bad team mate.
  - JohnFen 3y ago
    I guess that I'm weird. It never occurred to me to measure my performance in contrast to my coworkers!
    - gilmore606 3y ago
      It definitely occurs to your manager.
      - JohnFen 3y ago
        Maybe. If so, it isn't something that matters to me, though. I'm not competing with my teammates.
- 3y ago

throwaway22032 3y ago

I don't mind sprinting, as long as I'm in with a shot at the podium at the end of the race. If I'm getting a normal salary, you get a bog standard morning run.

swader999 3y ago

You're allowed to take a felt and mark up those posters. Management will be disappointed if a bit of humour never surfaced. Especially on April fools day.

javier_e06 3y ago

I remember a phrase I heard on my martial arts class after many years of training: "Don't be afraid of bitter work" It really hit home when our main motto was and is "We Wei" Effortless effort.

vinay_ys 3y ago

In my experience actual reality is somewhat different – at least at large Internet apps companies. In high-functioning successful team, everyone is spending significant time in 1. discovery – learning things about the constantly evolving product/functional domain and the tech, and 2. ideation – figuring out what's important and how to solve it, 3. and some non-trivial amount of time in large team collaboration related activities. But the problem is these activities (and their taxonomies) are not made explicit – their purpose is not explicitly stated; instead people participate in packaged rituals that are supposed to produce results. But because they do it without understanding it, they could feel like a cog in the machine. But there's also another big part of the reality – those who work themselves too hard and get themselves burnt out are also chasing personal career promotion goals and not succeeding at it. Then, there are some who don't even have that objective but have a broken work habit and get burnt out. Of course there are other things at the worst end of the spectrum – bad manager, bad CEO, bad business, bad co-workers, bad vendor-partners etc – that can make things toxic and they get burnt out.

xyzelement 3y ago

> Just observe the colorful language from Bezos’ 2016 letter to shareholders: “Day 2 is stasis. Followed by irrelevance. Followed by excruciating, painful decline. Followed by death. And that is why it is always Day 1.” Is it just me, or is this just another way of saying: work hard or you will die. The reason this author is confused/upset by the Bezos quote is because they are talking about the same sport but a different class. If an olympic champion told you about their training and diet regiment, you'd say "this sounds horrible" but what you'd mean is "it's not for me, because I am not training for the olympics." On the flip-side if your goal was to be an olympic champ too, your reaction would be "this is what it takes, good to know." Bezos wasn't setting himself up for an easy 9-5 and he wasn't building a me-too company. He was building Amazon into.. well.. what it is, an absolute champion across multiple industries. And perhaps doing that requires what he describes. If you're not looking to build an Amazon and you're not looking to be a part of the culture that can do it, then of course "this sounds horrible." And that's OK, just realize you're saying that because "it's not for me, because I don't care about that." It could very well be for other people - and those people might have greater wealth and work engagement than you do as a result. And that's OK too.

namaria 3y ago

There's always someone trying to light a fire under your ass. Fear politics is how we got a police force at war with citizens due to moral panics. Would be authoritarians thrive on that shit. Salespeople want you to panic and close to escape the danger. Leadership wants you to exhaust yourself for their cause. The real trick is realizing that's bullshit 99% of the time. Special forces train you to take control of your fight or flight reflex. You need to decide when to unleash the adrenaline. If you lose that control, you're in the whirlwind... Being grounded and tuning out the noise so you can navigate properly is a fundamental life skill.

drewr 3y ago

It's unfortunate and ironic that Agile's legacy now apparently includes burn-out, when it specifically was designed to prevent it: "Agile processes promote sustainable development. The sponsors, developers, and users should be able to maintain a constant pace indefinitely." https://agilemanifesto.org/principles.html https://agilemanifesto.org/principles.html