5 ms·

Our company fired a bunch of talent and I know we are going to struggle to grow now because demand for time is off the charts. If only all our companies weren’

Our company fired a bunch of talent and I know we are going to struggle to grow now because demand for time is off the charts. If only all our companies weren’t run by the same monoculture of ivy grads with the same excel sheets taking orders from the moves of the Fed.

kragen 3y ago
what do you mean by 'demand for time is off the charts' is there like a market where i can buy a couple of years, new in box, to add to my life
- bmelton 3y ago
  Assume you have a product (x) that you are considering building. If you can get to market quickly, you can maybe grow revenues or whatever. X will take 48 person-months to complete 48 person months is 48 months with 1 persons 48 person months is 24 months with 2 persons 48 person months is 12 months with 4 persons etc When time to market is critical, companies will often choose to "buy time" by paying people to cut the time requirements. The math isn't as linear as I've suggested, but most of the time, for most of the projects, you can increase velocity made good by adding people to a project.
  - kragen 3y ago
    this seems like a plausible guess about what mensetmanusman meant but usually people refer to this as 'demand for labor' rather than 'demand for time' so i'm not sure
    - mensetmanusman 3y ago
      That’s what I meant. Demand for time is how I experience the labor shortage, so it seemed more suitable :)
      - kragen 3y ago
        thanks for explaining!
  - yellowapple 3y ago
    > 48 person months is 48 months with 1 persons 48 person months is 24 months with 2 persons 48 person months is 12 months with 4 persons etc If only it were that simple: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brooks%27s_law https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brooks%27s_law Basically: between the added communication/management overhead and the training/ramp-up needed, "buying time" this way can end up costing time. If more of these MBAs calling the shots read The Mythical Man-Month we'd have a less schizophrenic economy and maybe even world peace.
    - kragen 3y ago
      probably ramping up to two or four humans will save you time tho, maybe even reduce the number of person-months; the humans have complementary skills, and are better at spotting design errrors and bbugs in others' work than in their own if they can keep from fighting
      - ryan_lane 3y ago
        You should really read the book listed. It only saves time when work on a project is parallelizable, and only if the communication needs between folks is low. It's not a matter of folks fighting, it's a matter of the amount of context needed to coordinate work. Often more people on a project results in the project moving slower, not faster.
        kragen 3y ago
        don't be an idiot, obviously i've read the book
        ryan_lane 3y ago
        Have you? Your comments don't reflect the points the book is making; in fact, they're counter to them.
        flygurl 3y ago
        That applies far more to going from 10 to 20 than 1 to 2.
  - icedchai 3y ago
    You know you’re dealing with amateur management when they think doubling people is going to linearly halve the time of a project. This completely ignores the varying skill sets, and difficulty in decomposing some tasks. Onboarding and ramp up is also very time consuming. Productivity of existing team members will drop, temporarily, as they onboard new people. Communications overhead is also very real.
    - bmelton 3y ago
      If that's the point yoi thought I was making, i encourage you to reread my comment and its parent

kragen 3y ago

what do you mean by 'demand for time is off the charts' is there like a market where i can buy a couple of years, new in box, to add to my life

bmelton 3y ago
Assume you have a product (x) that you are considering building. If you can get to market quickly, you can maybe grow revenues or whatever. X will take 48 person-months to complete 48 person months is 48 months with 1 persons 48 person months is 24 months with 2 persons 48 person months is 12 months with 4 persons etc When time to market is critical, companies will often choose to "buy time" by paying people to cut the time requirements. The math isn't as linear as I've suggested, but most of the time, for most of the projects, you can increase velocity made good by adding people to a project.
- kragen 3y ago
  this seems like a plausible guess about what mensetmanusman meant but usually people refer to this as 'demand for labor' rather than 'demand for time' so i'm not sure
  - mensetmanusman 3y ago
    That’s what I meant. Demand for time is how I experience the labor shortage, so it seemed more suitable :)
    - kragen 3y ago
      thanks for explaining!
- yellowapple 3y ago
  > 48 person months is 48 months with 1 persons 48 person months is 24 months with 2 persons 48 person months is 12 months with 4 persons etc If only it were that simple: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brooks%27s_law https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brooks%27s_law Basically: between the added communication/management overhead and the training/ramp-up needed, "buying time" this way can end up costing time. If more of these MBAs calling the shots read The Mythical Man-Month we'd have a less schizophrenic economy and maybe even world peace.
  - kragen 3y ago
    probably ramping up to two or four humans will save you time tho, maybe even reduce the number of person-months; the humans have complementary skills, and are better at spotting design errrors and bbugs in others' work than in their own if they can keep from fighting
    - ryan_lane 3y ago
      You should really read the book listed. It only saves time when work on a project is parallelizable, and only if the communication needs between folks is low. It's not a matter of folks fighting, it's a matter of the amount of context needed to coordinate work. Often more people on a project results in the project moving slower, not faster.
      - kragen 3y ago
        don't be an idiot, obviously i've read the book
        ryan_lane 3y ago
        Have you? Your comments don't reflect the points the book is making; in fact, they're counter to them.
      - flygurl 3y ago
        That applies far more to going from 10 to 20 than 1 to 2.
- icedchai 3y ago
  You know you’re dealing with amateur management when they think doubling people is going to linearly halve the time of a project. This completely ignores the varying skill sets, and difficulty in decomposing some tasks. Onboarding and ramp up is also very time consuming. Productivity of existing team members will drop, temporarily, as they onboard new people. Communications overhead is also very real.
  - bmelton 3y ago
    If that's the point yoi thought I was making, i encourage you to reread my comment and its parent