4 ms·

I work with and around a lot of really smart people, including for my job. I have a very intimate relationship with the very smartest of those people. I get to

I work with and around a lot of really smart people, including for my job. I have a very intimate relationship with the very smartest of those people. I get to see behind the curtain quite a bit. The top 10% have no idea how hard the top 1% work. Many think the top 1% are coasting because everything is so easy for them. I fall into that trap myself a lot. The truth is that most real results take time consuming work. I once had a conversation with somebody who lost their bid for a networking job to some 18-year old kid who "probably just plays a lot of video games." They never saw the 1000 hours the kid had spent the last two years fighting for better network latency. They didn't know the kid could quote two dozen different RFCs and could give you the strengths and weaknesses of 6 different routing protocols. Which candidate was "smarter"? I have no idea. I know which one had spent more hours preparing for the job. Even if their competition thought they were just playing around all hours of the day and night.

screye 3y ago
That's one of the annoying realities I am slowly having to face. Among highly technical ICs, the people who are paid $500k/year often do tend to work 2x the people who get paid $200k. Sure, these people are also more efficient, more effective and more knowledgeable. But, most of all, they work some insane hours. It's incredible, they are thinking about work when they're eating, sleeping, on vacation...it's like an obsession. I am in one such ~60 hrs/week job right now, and everyone in an IC role that's paid more than me, works more hours than I do. Yeah, my (supposed) compensation went up with this job hop, but in IC roles, hourly rates stay the same. I love my work & my top 1% coworkers. But man, I look at the ones who are 10 years older than me, and that is not the kind of life I want to be living. I know a person who made millions before 25, and this person had never so much as taken a real vacation, watched a random TV show or played a computer game, despite always having the financial capacity to do so. I am not sure if there is dollar value for which I would give up those precious moments from my teens and 20s.
wrp 3y ago
In the psychological research on domain expertise and performance, a common observation is that while greater expertise/performance is generally recognized to be the result of greater effort, people at lower levels vastly underestimate just how much greater effort.

screye 3y ago

That's one of the annoying realities I am slowly having to face. Among highly technical ICs, the people who are paid $500k/year often do tend to work 2x the people who get paid $200k. Sure, these people are also more efficient, more effective and more knowledgeable. But, most of all, they work some insane hours. It's incredible, they are thinking about work when they're eating, sleeping, on vacation...it's like an obsession. I am in one such ~60 hrs/week job right now, and everyone in an IC role that's paid more than me, works more hours than I do. Yeah, my (supposed) compensation went up with this job hop, but in IC roles, hourly rates stay the same. I love my work & my top 1% coworkers. But man, I look at the ones who are 10 years older than me, and that is not the kind of life I want to be living. I know a person who made millions before 25, and this person had never so much as taken a real vacation, watched a random TV show or played a computer game, despite always having the financial capacity to do so. I am not sure if there is dollar value for which I would give up those precious moments from my teens and 20s.

wrp 3y ago

In the psychological research on domain expertise and performance, a common observation is that while greater expertise/performance is generally recognized to be the result of greater effort, people at lower levels vastly underestimate just how much greater effort.