18 ms·

Giving a Shit as a Service (2022)

494 points by damir 3y ago

underseacables 3y ago
I used to puzzle over why potential clients who reached out to me always seemed to get more interested in hiring us if I tried to dissuade them by asking challenging questions. I think the biggest reason is that pushing back demonstrated that I care. This seems bizarre. I work in sales, and I avoid making things too challenging for potential clients. Pushing back on the scope is one thing, but I think the way to show that you care about a potential client is to listen, identify their issue, and provide them with a solution that meets their budget. So many sales people try to push the envelope, to maximize the sale, for better or for worse, but I've never done that.
- petesergeant 3y ago
  > I work in sales What are you selling? I imagine that would make a difference
  - underseacables 3y ago
    Networking equipment, but also a network monitoring service.
    - mcmcmc 3y ago
      Exactly - you’re selling commoditized products, not bespoke pieces.
      - underseacables 3y ago
        Still seems bizarre.
- pasc1878 3y ago
  Surely challenging means that you show that you are listening to the client and shows you understand. How does a client tell the difference between what you do and a salesman overpromises both of these salesmen listened and said that they could do it. Many people have experience of the bad salesperson and so will assume that they are all like that.
- travisjungroth 3y ago
  Asking challenging questions isn’t the same as making things challenging. I had the same experience as the author. It’s not about asking questions that take up their time or are hard for the hell of it. It’s about asking questions that show you’re not only planning on making the sale, but on doing the work. If you’re selling a product, it’s the questions that show you want to make sure the product is successful for them. They’re challenging in the sense there’s a slight tone of “are you sure you really need this?” in them, and they often don’t have top-of-mind answers.
- saargrin 3y ago
  theres a line between giving a shit and not giving a shit eh
sgarland 3y ago
There is probably a lot of bias with these two companies - one is a bespoke software company , and the other a bespoke woodcraft company. At a glance, the software company produces native apps for iOS and Android, rather than React Native, which to me seems indicative of attention to detail. People with that mindset tend to want it in others, and will believe it to be the cause of successful relationships. I say this as someone with precisely the same belief. I’ve no idea if it’s causal, correlated, or simply a coincidence that my brain sees as a pattern, but for the moment I’m convinced it’s at the very least correlated.
- Simon_ORourke 3y ago
  > People with that mindset tend to want it in others Totally agree, but folks like that will run into the "it won't scale" types and get frustrated with their corner cutting ways for the sake of future scaling opportunities.
  - sgarland 3y ago
    Or worse, they run into people who have neither belief and are just yeeting shit into prod because it works well enough. Then all three sides fight and nothing gets done.
- contrarian1234 3y ago
  Aren't native Java apps on Android effectively deprecated? I feel last I looked Google just pushed Flutter/Dart. I was thinking to try to get a Clojure application ported to Android (it uses a lot of Java libs under the hood) and .. I got the impression nobody uses Java anymore! Though, to start with, it was bit unclear if Clojure still doesn't run on ART/Dalvik/whateveritscallednow
  - Permik 3y ago
    Nah, It's ART still underneath so anything that compiles to JVM will compile to ART, so Java is never dying. On the Flutter side, it's just another cross platform toolkit like React Native, but a la Google, and won't/can't replace the years and years of Java development. But the current and foreseeable future Kotlin will be the Java successor because of its JVM/Java compatibility, ecosystem and ease of use. For a while some of the new committed code in Android has been Kotlin.
jimkleiber 3y ago
Previously discussed here as well: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32071349 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32071349 Also maybe add 2022 to the title.
- dang 3y ago
  Thanks! Macroexpanded: Giving a shit as a service - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32071349 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32071349 - July 2022 (152 comments)
foobarbecue 3y ago
> Was it because the furniture makers were experts? No. Weren't they? Weird line.
- arrow7000 3y ago
  They were indeed experts but that wasn't a sufficient reason for it to be such a smooth experience
  - didibus 3y ago
    For table making it might have been?
  - foobarbecue 3y ago
    I mean... if the point he's making is that expertise doesn't affect the quality of the product or experience then he's very wrong.
vivekd 3y ago
I guess it's good for small businesses trying to distinguish themselves. But it seems like giving a shit doesn't really scale. It seems like at some point in growth all companies attract a critical number who don't really care. Maybe it's just hard for people to care when the numbers are big. Maybe that caring is hard to maintain as things get more institutionalized
- ano-ther 3y ago
  If you are careful, then GAS can certainly scale. Examples: - Microsoft commitment for Windows to be backward compatible or their care about Excel (including using their own compiler, 1-2-3 compatibility in early years etc). Doesn’t means that there aren’t also examples of the clearly not-GAS. - Hospitality industry which trains their staff and makes extensive use of checklists and SOPs. Disney comes to mind or high-end hotels. - Most services in Japan, where it scales culturally
- gavinhoward 3y ago
  Maybe you are right. I certainly haven't seen anything to contradict you. So this is the exact reason that my software business will only grow to the point that it provides enough for my wife and me. Why are people so obsessed with growth? They're like the businessman/tourist in [1], and I just want to be the fisherman. [1]: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anekdote_zur_Senkung_der_Arbeitsmoral https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anekdote_zur_Senkung_der_Arb...
- fullspectrumdev 3y ago
  I’ve noticed companies tend to sacrifice giving a shit for an increase in perceived growth that often is not sustainable over the long term. There’s honestly probably a lengthy blog post in this. Especially in the sector of managed/professional services or SaaS - companies try to scale up fast to have more customer acquisition (focus on net new), and tend to sacrifice the level of bespoke service that retains customers, leading to increased churn over time. This approach usually means that ARR will increase over the short term (3-5y), which is totally fine, but unless your service is really sticky or you gain market dominance, the growth curve will eventually plateau and enter a decline. You also see this outside of tech - in the service industry in general. Company expands rapidly, service deteriorates over time, eventually enters a decline phase. Maintaining quality of service is hard over the long term to balance with growth, you really gotta put the work in.
pfix 3y ago
Not negating the sentiment that giving a shit helps, but table making is an old business and most of the challenges have been encountered over the centuries. So result and cost comes down to having an experienced craftsman. And I assume that someone making a living from it for let's say the 10,000 hours can make a table any way you want and be pretty accurate in estimating effort and material expense. Giving a shit makes for a more happy customer, but cutting a board oval shaped is what they do in a workshop for breakfast.
- okwhateverdude 3y ago
  > Giving a shit makes for a more happy customer, but cutting a board oval shaped is what they do in a workshop for breakfast. Maybe. It could also be that the majority of their customers only want boring non-oval shit most of the time. So the chance to flex a bit on a "non-standard" order and getting to actually demonstrate those skills leads to a much better outcome for everyone including the craftspeople.
- vivekd 3y ago
  You would think so, but I work in construction and I can confirm that finding a skilled builder is just as hard as finding a skilled coder. Probably more so because coders seem more intent on lifelong learning whereas construction types tend to act like they already know everything. Just look at the top comment, works in construction, electricity is over 100 years old, still had trouble finding people who care. Part of the challenge is that practicing construction is expensive so not everyone gets a chance to do so. Practicing code is easy and inexpensive. There's an accessibility to it that isn't there for building. I code stuff that doesn't work all the time and I don't care, I just start over because I didn't lose much. It's very different when dealing with expensive construction materials.
shell_game 3y ago
“it depends on X and Y” and “here are things you should care about” is the most annoying thing ever IF you actually need to make a decision and IF the service provider doesn’t give you a path forward. It’s fine if you’re just gathering information, but not when there is a business impact to delaying. This goes for people in a consulting capacity in internal roles, too. There are way too many “SMEs” who will show up to your meetings, tell you it’s “complicated”, and then leave, thinking they’ve made a contribution. If you raise issues but don’t help your customer navigate this complexity, you are adding negative value.
- dudul 3y ago
  Came here to say this. I think if as a customer you have some understanding of what you're trying to do, sure working with the folks who "give a shit" will be great. If you just want to get it done and don't have a clue about the details it feels like friction.
ProllyInfamous 3y ago
I always carry a two dollar bill and fifty-cent piece, for when (e.g.) an entry-level store-clerk does something which most-other-clerks wouldn't resolve, I can say to them "Thank you for giving. a . shit." As a blue-collar electrician (although retired), I want to hire anybody that seems to give even the tiniest shit. While working, it took me a decade to realize that "if you're the only person that 'gives a shit,' YOU'RE GONNA HAVE A BAD TIME."
- nonrandomstring 3y ago
  > it took me a decade to realize that "if you're the only person that 'gives a shit,' YOU'RE GONNA HAVE A BAD TIME." Oh my goodness. That perfectly describes my last 5 years in academia. The last person on the deck of a sinking ship, directing panicking souls, after everyone smart and agile already jumped in the lifeboats. But I don't regret it. I helped a lot of kids into lifeboats, and even found a nice lump of driftwood for myself as the university system gave one final creaking groan then plunged into the darkness.
  - ProllyInfamous 3y ago
    My favorite former client [we're both retire now] is approaching 90 years old. Wow. She is a distinguished portrait artist from The Silent Generation, and she recently told me [upon her own best friend's recent death]: "Nobody wants to be the last one left at the party. You have to help clean up, then..." We ended our professional relationship over petty words when I felt like the only person giving a shit about maintaining her assets [as her maintenance guy]. Our personal relationship has outlasted any pettiness; but it still hurts seeing her squander her massive inheritance without maintenance.
    - nonrandomstring 3y ago
      Had to look up "The Silent Generation" and discovered the stereotype of my mum. Enlightening and funny, so thanks for that journey. "Last one out please turn off the lights..." seems a motif not just of the post-war generation, but the whole post-war culture and institutions.
xyzelement 3y ago
It’s the same on every level. Past some entry bar, the difference between employees, spouses, etc that are happy and succeed vs miserable and fail is that attitude.
NarcisMirandes 3y ago
I am from a small country in Europe. When I first read the article I was confused. A clarification for people who do not have English as a first language: "give a shit" about something, it means they care deeply or are genuinely interested in that particular thing. So, in essence, "giving a shit" in this context means being highly dedicated, passionate, and attentive to the details, which often leads to a better outcome and a more satisfying experience for the customer
- qwertox 3y ago
  > It was because they gave a shit. I did stop reading there. I was 100% convinced that this meant that they couldn't care less about what they were doing, yet their homepage seemed to indicate that they'd give a lot of dedication to detail. In German "drauf scheißen" (to shit on something) means to not care at all about a given thing.
  - nmstoker 3y ago
    You are misreading how this phrase is used! It means they do care. If they didn't give a shit that would mean they didn't care and this is the opposite.
  - sambeau 3y ago
    It's not surprising. English has a load of this weirdness. We can, especially in American English, shit on something (normally an idea or plan for some reason) with the same meaning. "I don't mean to shit on your idea out of hand, but…" No doubt it's a direct import from the German.
    - arrowsmith 3y ago
      We say this in the UK too. Also "to shit all over", e.g. "I didn't go see that movie because I read some reviews that shat all over it."
      - sambeau 3y ago
m0rissette 3y ago
Absolutely.
gavinhoward 3y ago
Yes, absolutely. I'm starting a business, and this is my real product. Most everybody will see my FOSS code as my product, but that's my loss leader. My real product, the stuff people will actually pay for, is doing stuff such as responding to bug reports like [1]. In other words, my product is caring about your needs and meeting them. On the flip side, I want customers who care too. I think one reason those furniture people did so well is because they had a customer who cared, and it was refreshing. When you do something day in and day out, you either become careless, or obsessed. As a customer, you want to seek out the latter, but as a vendor, when you are the latter, getting a customer who cares is not just refreshing, it's enormously fun! [1]: https://github.com/gavinhoward/bc/issues/66 https://github.com/gavinhoward/bc/issues/66
- actionfromafar 3y ago
  To be clear, do you have paying bc customers? I guess not, but I wanted to absolutely sure! :-)
  - gavinhoward 3y ago
    No, absolutely not! bc is my gift to the world. It will remain that way. I'm writing other software, upon which my business will be based. You could say bc is how I advertise my services. :)
  - kahnclusions 3y ago
    Then he wouldn’t be giving a shit, he’d be selling some shit.
- darkwater 3y ago
  You are a wonderful person, Gavin!
  - gavinhoward 3y ago
    Thank you for the compliment and encouragement! I've been feeling down lately, and it's helped.
BOOTRACER 3y ago
Girlfriend As A Service pays better
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
RA2lover 3y ago
I wonder how someone could create a jig to plot such a table for arbitrary exponents.
- okwhateverdude 3y ago
  The furniture people probably also had the same question and were excited to figure it out.
maroonblazer 3y ago
At least for me, 'giving a shit' (GaS) is not a static feature. I have great respect for people who GaS and they inspire me to want to GaS too. Most days I take pride in my work and so try very hard to GaS. However there are days when my workload has exceeded my capacity and the priority is simply to get things 'out the door', in which case the degree to which I can GaS begins to vary.
bratwurst3000 3y ago
“Giving a shit” I love the American language because of things like this. “Fucking shit” Sex with poop. Bukowski and the Cohen brothers made those words art
rob 3y ago
> Was it because they charged a lot of money? No. I'm sure that plays into it, yes. In most cases, the more money you give the more they will "give a shit."
marban 3y ago
Welcome to Japan.
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
photochemsyn 3y ago
It comes down to incentives. If you're the owner of a small business that relies on a good reputation and repeat customers, you're going to care about quality of service because it directly impacts your bottom line. As companies grow, they might choose to hire employees and managers who are paid flat wages regardless of whether the company does a lot of business or a little. If the employees work hard and the business flourishes, but they see no reward of any kind, this fosters resentment and they stop caring about quality of service. Intelligent business owners recognize this reality and offer incentives that reward employees if business is good - e.g. commissions on sales in the retail world, stock options in the startup world, wage increases in the manufacturing sector, etc. Greedy shortsighted owners ignore this dynamic, so their employees are incentivized to do the least amount of work possible, just enough to avoid being fired. Where things get really bad is when monopolization grows and markets end up controlled by very few players, so customers have nowhere else to turn to (Comcast etc.).
ChrisMarshallNY 3y ago
I remember this article from here, a while back. I enjoy it, but am keenly aware that "giving a shit" often gets severely punished, these days.
schmichael 3y ago
The Forks episode of The Bear is one of my favorite stories on giving a shit: a fork polisher at a fancy restaurant learns you don’t work in food service because you love polishing forks. You do it because you want to bring people joy and polishing the forks is one of many steps to that end. You can find purpose in fork polishing through both excellence and empathy for your customers. There’s a lot of days the code I write is about as exciting as fork polishing, but you do it for your teammates and users.
SergeAx 3y ago
2022, discussed then (120+ comments): https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32071349 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32071349
btbuildem 3y ago
The corollary here is that giving a shit doesn't scale. The furniture makers that inspired this article can afford to give a shit because 1) they're expert at what they do and 2) they charge a lot of money. These are constraints on both ends: on the supply of labour and on the demand for it. This is also why most people can't afford to give a shit -- they're not good enough to charge enough for that rare commodity.
- schmichael 3y ago
  I don’t think that is necessarily true. Sure it may be “easier” to give a shit when you’re an artisan charging a premium for your craft. However you can still give a shit if you’re a designer for IKEA. You can take joy knowing the more you minimize price while maximizing durability you not only bring joy to the majority of people who can’t afford hand crafted tables, but your efficiency can have major waste and ecological ramifications that an artisan shop can’t hope to copy. What you give a shit might change, but giving a shit absolutely scales.
- willi59549879 3y ago
  why is everybody so obsessed with scale? the good things in live don't scale, like relationships. the dream of scaling everything to a 1 billion business is just greed talking. caring about a craft and building relationships will be more fulfilling than a billion in the bank
  - teaearlgraycold 3y ago
    Exactly. Once you have met your needs why the fuck are you trying to get more money? You’ve maxed out on money, you fool! Work on another dimension of life!
    - jaggederest 3y ago
      Like the story of the businessman meeting the fisherman - "once you've built a business you can retire and do a little fishing" - "but I already do that"
  - 3y ago
anonu 3y ago
I glanced over the title and for a moment I thought this was going to be an article about the SaaS-ification of sites like https://www.shitexpress.com/ https://www.shitexpress.com/
hardkorebob 3y ago
Indeed as a Hospitality pro with 25+ yrs of expertise, seeing someone be present in a heart for excellence is rare. Excellent service is an art.
snmx999 3y ago
In my experience caring too much is often perceived as a negative, especially if the other party does not care that much but just wants to get the job done. Asking questions and god forbid, pushing back just makes you a difficult person.
cryptoegorophy 3y ago
How do you motivate your employees to give a shit. Even with good salary.
- wizerdrobe 3y ago
  Stepping beyond the obvious, pay them a good wage. Filter at the door, look for people who give a shit, have a passion for the work, etc. Hire them, look to avoid people who got into it simply because it’s a fat paycheck. I wouldn’t confuse this with “I spend all day everyday in my off time coding,” but seek out people who have a reasonable articulable love for a tool, a language, or something and or can articulate why they don’t like a thing. I have opinions on, say, Java over NodeJS and can speak at length with passion about why I feel the way I do. Understand and manage them as human beings. I’ve been hired on to companies that experienced radical change within the first days, weeks, and months of accepting the job. I’ve walked into jobs such that what I interviewed for literally did not exist when I started on Day 1. I’ve worked at companies that have had serious pivots around product-market-fit such that the job I accepted radically changed, i.e. from Full-Stack SE to AWS DevOps. Those companies just offered no honest conversation or explanation around circumstances, just managers magically started assigning random tickets one day. Coincidentally, I hated those jobs and couldn’t have given less of a shit if they succeeded or failed. I’m not a cog, a fungible unit, or a human-resource. I’m a human, full-stop. The firms I’ve worked with that suffered turmoil but offered me the basic human decency of a conversation, however, earned loyalty out of me and enabled me to continue giving a shit.
- RugnirViking 3y ago
  When people understand the wider context their work falls under they naturally give a shit. People want to give a shit, it feels good to have meaningful work and do it well. They only stop giving a shit when given a reason to do so (usually because they are heaped with meaningless work and have no connection to whether the work is good or bad). That doesn't (just) mean "incentives", it literally means them simply being told "great job, no problems reported from the client" or even more preferably the client themselves telling them that. The more steps between them and the effect of their work, and the less feedback, the less possible it is to give a shit even if they try. Trying to game or make this process as low effort or box-check-y as possible is noticable and counterproductive, it needs to come from a genuine involvement. People involved in meetings tend to care more. Not "involved" as in invited to, involved as in people want to hear their opinion and care what they think. The trope of people hating/not listening in meetings comes from it literally not mattering whether they are in the room or not. I get that you might not initially care what <newhire> has to say, they're hardly bringing insights, but the best onboardings ive seen are those where seniors want to hear their experience, what they struggled with, and work with them to make it easier for them and future newhires. It's noticable how much harder people work shortly after seeing their feedback/work being put to use. Another thing ive observed a lot is its common for people who give a shit to get promoted to lead others, but by taking on a lot of the meaningful work themselves, overworking, and failing to delegate, they breed people under them that dont give a shit, due to leaving only meaningless tasks and having no time for feedback or informing their reports what is even going on. Finally, once someone has fallen into the habit of not giving a shit at a specific company, unfortunately it requires a mighty effort to bring them back again. It's usually possible with time, but much harder than just keeping them happy in the first place. I guess give a shit about people and you may well find they give a shit themselves
xyst 3y ago
GaSaaS would be a great product for a large majority of Fortune 500. Oh wait that already exists, it’s called “consulting firms”. And they are useless most of the time. Unfortunately for this to work, ALL parties need to “give a shit”. Sure this might work for a small “boutique” firm working with another small “boutique”. But at the end of the day, big firms are probably farming the work down to a low level employee or contractor (think VP -> Executive VP of Acquisitions -> Managing Director -> Director -> Manager -> Lead Project Manager -> Project Manager -> some person working with project manager) with a set of requirements. Initially it was to be completed in 4 weeks. But in order to impress their boss, one or more of these people kept reducing the deadline and suddenly it’s a project that’s wanted to be completed over the weekend. Low level person doesn’t give a shit. As long as it meets min spec, it’s Gucci. The further questions asked by the 5th vendor will probably get ignored. Upon completion, everyone is “happy” it’s delivered before their anticipated deadline. Except upon delivery the product is “half assed”. Nobody is really happy but they keep their mouth shut and accept it anyways so they can pump their numbers.
- WendyTheWillow 3y ago
  Consulting firms aren’t useless, they’re just not useful in the straightforward way one would presume their value would manifest. They’re great catalysts for change, they’re fantastic scapegoats, etc.
nativeit 3y ago
This has been the model for my largely solo IT consultancy for the last several years. I offer ultimate accountability, I take ownership of every project, and I demonstrate fierce loyalty to my clients and their interests. It’s not the easiest way to make money, but I am proud of everything I do, I hardly ever lose a client, and when I do it’s generally without any bad blood or acrimony.
- tornato7 3y ago
  I'm currently looking for a good IT consultant after going through a few bad ones that for lack of better words didn't give a shit. Want to chat?
reubenswartz 3y ago
I didn't realize how rare (and precious) a commodity giving a shit is. I expected it to be the default state, but it's not. I remember calling a customer to apologize for a bug and having them console me with something like, "all my apps have bugs and irritations, but you're the only one who seems to care enough to call me and fix it promptly."
- m463 3y ago
  I wonder if it can be "a commodity "at all. Do you think it's possible to give a shit in volume?
neilv 3y ago
> If you email 4 software studios for a quote and 3 say “Sure, here’s a quote” but the 4th says “Hm, we certainly could build it but we can’t be sure about cost without knowing X and Y, and here are some other concerns we’d have” then the 4th is going to seem like they give a shit. I usually end up responding like that, having started to think about the problem and approach. But I just know what the takehome message will be for some. Now it'll be someone's CRM startup feature: responds to RFQs with an LLM prompted to give the appearance of thoughtful consideration of the problem. Because, one time, a blogger said you should ask questions like that, to make a better impression, was the takehome message they got. Or it'll become a mnemonic for remembering the mix of kinds of questions on an RFQ you should ask, for the sake of appearances, and you'll fail an interview for not hitting each letter of the mnemonic exactly once, and in order. ("Sorry, bro, I was really hoping you'd pass, but you forgot the R in SCROT. You're not Amazoogle caliber yet, but take some more interview prep classes, and you can try again in a year.")
- klabb3 3y ago
  Yes, there’s a constant arms race between the authentic and the impersonators. Happens in every field. Look at how much the “artisanal” and “rustic” aesthetic became completely colonized over the 2010s to the point of being “the new bland” today. That’s also why I liked this article. It doesn’t propose an excessively precise definition of “giving a shit”. It requires paying attention and being vigilant – the impersonators are always around the corner, watching and learning.
- teaearlgraycold 3y ago
  This is the same as the old metrics-as-targets failure mode. Or the stock market - as soon as something is public knowledge it’s already priced in.
matheusmoreira 3y ago
People praise professionals who give a shit but nobody seems to value them. When you care, it is soul destroying to watch people who don't give the slightest shit make metric fucking tons more money than you. It's sociopathic and it's extremely common. When I was a teenager I actually quit professional programming as a career because I felt that I would be miserable in this field. I felt that way because every single developer I met at the time simply did not give a shit about stuff, they just wanted their paycheck at the end of the month. Well I wanted to give a shit and so I turned it into my hobby. It's not without its problems, of course. Giving too much of a shit turns you into an obsessive perfectionist which can be paralyzing. Can spend days thinking about the best way to do something instead of just doing it. Thankfully I have no deadlines.
zubairq 3y ago
Really love this, yes I always pay top dollar for people who give a shit
amzn-throw 3y ago
I know a lot of people here are writing about how this can be done for small consulting companies, but I also saw it in Big Tech. Amazon until 2022 really genuinely exemplified this. I saw it for more than a decade leading up to this. Just an unbelievable collection of people that truly Gave A Shit. Publicly we called it "Customer Obsession" and through that lens you could move mountains around here in the pursuit of Doing The Right Thing. The first sign of trouble was 2021. Salaries skyrocketed in the industry. Amazon didn't keep up. A lot of great people left because they got obscene offers, and you know, who could blame them? Our core of "intermediate" engineers (L5 here) got decimated - why bust your ass for a promotion when you can just get a Senior offer from one of 100 over-funded Unicorns for more money than you would've made here. Sensible. Then in 2022 the stock price dropped in half and a bunch of folks who seems like were only putting up with the bullshit as long as the stock grew indefinitely left too. Then 2023 brought layoffs. There's still a lot of us around that Give A Shit, but I feel like we are outnumbered more and more by those that just want to punch in and out and no longer Make History. I get it. I can't blame anyone individually. But I miss it.
- d0gsg0w00f 3y ago
  Trust me. We as the customers can tell. It's really sad. Everything that gets released today seems cobbled together and half baked. The "this is something we bought and slapped an API and product umbrella on top of" is glaringly obvious. Back in 2018 we used to get strong "give a shit" vibes from all the product teams we talked to. Now it's more "this is what we're going to build, isn't it going to be great?". I skip all the product meetings we get invited to now.
- gnicholas 3y ago
  > Amazon until 2022 really genuinely exemplified this. I remember Amazon from 2002 — that felt like they really gave a shit. There are occasionally times where it feels that way now, as a customer. But most of the time the customer service experience is slow, impersonal, and painful. I understand they're a big company, and I don't expect it to be as good as when they started out. But I wouldn't say that Amazon "genuinely exemplified" giving a shit up until last year. Apple might fit that bill, but even they have fallen off recently (apparently you now have to make appointments to buy products in-store?!).
fuzztester 3y ago
Watch "Gary Vaynerchuk: Rails Conference Keynote | 2010" on YouTube https://youtu.be/ZIaLTuaK1-k?si=rkic-7X67KrZvwmf https://youtu.be/ZIaLTuaK1-k?si=rkic-7X67KrZvwmf Saw it some years ago. IIRC, somewhere in the video, he yells, almost groans, "give a fuck" (about things you do), meaning the same as "giving a shit", the title of this HN thread. The overall talk is a bit funny to watch, including him strutting around the stage.
ezekiel68 3y ago
"See, I met a man who told me once, 'Sincerity's the key. And once you learn to fake it son, you're gonna be home free!'" -Dennis DeYoung, Styx, "Fallen Angel" (Anecdotally, may have been referring to a quote by comedian George Burns)
avg_dev 3y ago
i would call this "paying attention".
l8rlump 3y ago
Previous discussion (152 comments): https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32071349 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32071349
mikhailfranco 3y ago
Love the superelliptical table.
rongenre 3y ago
Jason Lemkin's advice for startup SaaS businesses is to heavily invest in customer success: you need to give a shit. Otherwise your customer churn numbers are going to be high, and it makes failure increasingly likely. When I was being courted by a startup for an IC position, the best question I asked was "What does your churn look like?". It was really low, and despite some other reservations I ended up taking the job, and we had an awesome exit. Because our customers really loved us, and we worked hard to make them successful.
Elena120 3y ago
[flagged]
Elena120 3y ago
[flagged]

494 points by damir 3y ago

I used to puzzle over why potential clients who reached out to me always seemed to get more interested in hiring us if I tried to dissuade them by asking challenging questions. I think the biggest reason is that pushing back demonstrated that I care. This seems bizarre. I work in sales, and I avoid making things too challenging for potential clients. Pushing back on the scope is one thing, but I think the way to show that you care about a potential client is to listen, identify their issue, and provide them with a solution that meets their budget. So many sales people try to push the envelope, to maximize the sale, for better or for worse, but I've never done that.

petesergeant 3y ago
> I work in sales What are you selling? I imagine that would make a difference
- underseacables 3y ago
  Networking equipment, but also a network monitoring service.
  - mcmcmc 3y ago
    Exactly - you’re selling commoditized products, not bespoke pieces.
    - underseacables 3y ago
      Still seems bizarre.
pasc1878 3y ago
Surely challenging means that you show that you are listening to the client and shows you understand. How does a client tell the difference between what you do and a salesman overpromises both of these salesmen listened and said that they could do it. Many people have experience of the bad salesperson and so will assume that they are all like that.
travisjungroth 3y ago
Asking challenging questions isn’t the same as making things challenging. I had the same experience as the author. It’s not about asking questions that take up their time or are hard for the hell of it. It’s about asking questions that show you’re not only planning on making the sale, but on doing the work. If you’re selling a product, it’s the questions that show you want to make sure the product is successful for them. They’re challenging in the sense there’s a slight tone of “are you sure you really need this?” in them, and they often don’t have top-of-mind answers.
saargrin 3y ago
theres a line between giving a shit and not giving a shit eh

sgarland 3y ago

There is probably a lot of bias with these two companies - one is a bespoke software company , and the other a bespoke woodcraft company. At a glance, the software company produces native apps for iOS and Android, rather than React Native, which to me seems indicative of attention to detail. People with that mindset tend to want it in others, and will believe it to be the cause of successful relationships. I say this as someone with precisely the same belief. I’ve no idea if it’s causal, correlated, or simply a coincidence that my brain sees as a pattern, but for the moment I’m convinced it’s at the very least correlated.

Simon_ORourke 3y ago
> People with that mindset tend to want it in others Totally agree, but folks like that will run into the "it won't scale" types and get frustrated with their corner cutting ways for the sake of future scaling opportunities.
- sgarland 3y ago
  Or worse, they run into people who have neither belief and are just yeeting shit into prod because it works well enough. Then all three sides fight and nothing gets done.
contrarian1234 3y ago
Aren't native Java apps on Android effectively deprecated? I feel last I looked Google just pushed Flutter/Dart. I was thinking to try to get a Clojure application ported to Android (it uses a lot of Java libs under the hood) and .. I got the impression nobody uses Java anymore! Though, to start with, it was bit unclear if Clojure still doesn't run on ART/Dalvik/whateveritscallednow
- Permik 3y ago
  Nah, It's ART still underneath so anything that compiles to JVM will compile to ART, so Java is never dying. On the Flutter side, it's just another cross platform toolkit like React Native, but a la Google, and won't/can't replace the years and years of Java development. But the current and foreseeable future Kotlin will be the Java successor because of its JVM/Java compatibility, ecosystem and ease of use. For a while some of the new committed code in Android has been Kotlin.

jimkleiber 3y ago

Previously discussed here as well: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32071349 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32071349 Also maybe add 2022 to the title.

dang 3y ago
Thanks! Macroexpanded: Giving a shit as a service - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32071349 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32071349 - July 2022 (152 comments)

foobarbecue 3y ago

> Was it because the furniture makers were experts? No. Weren't they? Weird line.

arrow7000 3y ago
They were indeed experts but that wasn't a sufficient reason for it to be such a smooth experience
- didibus 3y ago
  For table making it might have been?
- foobarbecue 3y ago
  I mean... if the point he's making is that expertise doesn't affect the quality of the product or experience then he's very wrong.

vivekd 3y ago

I guess it's good for small businesses trying to distinguish themselves. But it seems like giving a shit doesn't really scale. It seems like at some point in growth all companies attract a critical number who don't really care. Maybe it's just hard for people to care when the numbers are big. Maybe that caring is hard to maintain as things get more institutionalized

ano-ther 3y ago
If you are careful, then GAS can certainly scale. Examples: - Microsoft commitment for Windows to be backward compatible or their care about Excel (including using their own compiler, 1-2-3 compatibility in early years etc). Doesn’t means that there aren’t also examples of the clearly not-GAS. - Hospitality industry which trains their staff and makes extensive use of checklists and SOPs. Disney comes to mind or high-end hotels. - Most services in Japan, where it scales culturally
gavinhoward 3y ago
Maybe you are right. I certainly haven't seen anything to contradict you. So this is the exact reason that my software business will only grow to the point that it provides enough for my wife and me. Why are people so obsessed with growth? They're like the businessman/tourist in [1], and I just want to be the fisherman. [1]: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anekdote_zur_Senkung_der_Arbeitsmoral https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anekdote_zur_Senkung_der_Arb...
fullspectrumdev 3y ago
I’ve noticed companies tend to sacrifice giving a shit for an increase in perceived growth that often is not sustainable over the long term. There’s honestly probably a lengthy blog post in this. Especially in the sector of managed/professional services or SaaS - companies try to scale up fast to have more customer acquisition (focus on net new), and tend to sacrifice the level of bespoke service that retains customers, leading to increased churn over time. This approach usually means that ARR will increase over the short term (3-5y), which is totally fine, but unless your service is really sticky or you gain market dominance, the growth curve will eventually plateau and enter a decline. You also see this outside of tech - in the service industry in general. Company expands rapidly, service deteriorates over time, eventually enters a decline phase. Maintaining quality of service is hard over the long term to balance with growth, you really gotta put the work in.

pfix 3y ago

Not negating the sentiment that giving a shit helps, but table making is an old business and most of the challenges have been encountered over the centuries. So result and cost comes down to having an experienced craftsman. And I assume that someone making a living from it for let's say the 10,000 hours can make a table any way you want and be pretty accurate in estimating effort and material expense. Giving a shit makes for a more happy customer, but cutting a board oval shaped is what they do in a workshop for breakfast.

okwhateverdude 3y ago
> Giving a shit makes for a more happy customer, but cutting a board oval shaped is what they do in a workshop for breakfast. Maybe. It could also be that the majority of their customers only want boring non-oval shit most of the time. So the chance to flex a bit on a "non-standard" order and getting to actually demonstrate those skills leads to a much better outcome for everyone including the craftspeople.
vivekd 3y ago
You would think so, but I work in construction and I can confirm that finding a skilled builder is just as hard as finding a skilled coder. Probably more so because coders seem more intent on lifelong learning whereas construction types tend to act like they already know everything. Just look at the top comment, works in construction, electricity is over 100 years old, still had trouble finding people who care. Part of the challenge is that practicing construction is expensive so not everyone gets a chance to do so. Practicing code is easy and inexpensive. There's an accessibility to it that isn't there for building. I code stuff that doesn't work all the time and I don't care, I just start over because I didn't lose much. It's very different when dealing with expensive construction materials.

shell_game 3y ago

“it depends on X and Y” and “here are things you should care about” is the most annoying thing ever IF you actually need to make a decision and IF the service provider doesn’t give you a path forward. It’s fine if you’re just gathering information, but not when there is a business impact to delaying. This goes for people in a consulting capacity in internal roles, too. There are way too many “SMEs” who will show up to your meetings, tell you it’s “complicated”, and then leave, thinking they’ve made a contribution. If you raise issues but don’t help your customer navigate this complexity, you are adding negative value.

dudul 3y ago
Came here to say this. I think if as a customer you have some understanding of what you're trying to do, sure working with the folks who "give a shit" will be great. If you just want to get it done and don't have a clue about the details it feels like friction.

ProllyInfamous 3y ago

I always carry a two dollar bill and fifty-cent piece, for when (e.g.) an entry-level store-clerk does something which most-other-clerks wouldn't resolve, I can say to them "Thank you for giving. a . shit." As a blue-collar electrician (although retired), I want to hire anybody that seems to give even the tiniest shit. While working, it took me a decade to realize that "if you're the only person that 'gives a shit,' YOU'RE GONNA HAVE A BAD TIME."

nonrandomstring 3y ago
> it took me a decade to realize that "if you're the only person that 'gives a shit,' YOU'RE GONNA HAVE A BAD TIME." Oh my goodness. That perfectly describes my last 5 years in academia. The last person on the deck of a sinking ship, directing panicking souls, after everyone smart and agile already jumped in the lifeboats. But I don't regret it. I helped a lot of kids into lifeboats, and even found a nice lump of driftwood for myself as the university system gave one final creaking groan then plunged into the darkness.
- ProllyInfamous 3y ago
  My favorite former client [we're both retire now] is approaching 90 years old. Wow. She is a distinguished portrait artist from The Silent Generation, and she recently told me [upon her own best friend's recent death]: "Nobody wants to be the last one left at the party. You have to help clean up, then..." We ended our professional relationship over petty words when I felt like the only person giving a shit about maintaining her assets [as her maintenance guy]. Our personal relationship has outlasted any pettiness; but it still hurts seeing her squander her massive inheritance without maintenance.
  - nonrandomstring 3y ago
    Had to look up "The Silent Generation" and discovered the stereotype of my mum. Enlightening and funny, so thanks for that journey. "Last one out please turn off the lights..." seems a motif not just of the post-war generation, but the whole post-war culture and institutions.

xyzelement 3y ago

It’s the same on every level. Past some entry bar, the difference between employees, spouses, etc that are happy and succeed vs miserable and fail is that attitude.

NarcisMirandes 3y ago

I am from a small country in Europe. When I first read the article I was confused. A clarification for people who do not have English as a first language: "give a shit" about something, it means they care deeply or are genuinely interested in that particular thing. So, in essence, "giving a shit" in this context means being highly dedicated, passionate, and attentive to the details, which often leads to a better outcome and a more satisfying experience for the customer

qwertox 3y ago
> It was because they gave a shit. I did stop reading there. I was 100% convinced that this meant that they couldn't care less about what they were doing, yet their homepage seemed to indicate that they'd give a lot of dedication to detail. In German "drauf scheißen" (to shit on something) means to not care at all about a given thing.
- nmstoker 3y ago
  You are misreading how this phrase is used! It means they do care. If they didn't give a shit that would mean they didn't care and this is the opposite.
- sambeau 3y ago
  It's not surprising. English has a load of this weirdness. We can, especially in American English, shit on something (normally an idea or plan for some reason) with the same meaning. "I don't mean to shit on your idea out of hand, but…" No doubt it's a direct import from the German.
  - arrowsmith 3y ago
    We say this in the UK too. Also "to shit all over", e.g. "I didn't go see that movie because I read some reviews that shat all over it."
    - sambeau 3y ago

m0rissette 3y ago

Absolutely.

gavinhoward 3y ago

Yes, absolutely. I'm starting a business, and this is my real product. Most everybody will see my FOSS code as my product, but that's my loss leader. My real product, the stuff people will actually pay for, is doing stuff such as responding to bug reports like [1]. In other words, my product is caring about your needs and meeting them. On the flip side, I want customers who care too. I think one reason those furniture people did so well is because they had a customer who cared, and it was refreshing. When you do something day in and day out, you either become careless, or obsessed. As a customer, you want to seek out the latter, but as a vendor, when you are the latter, getting a customer who cares is not just refreshing, it's enormously fun! [1]: https://github.com/gavinhoward/bc/issues/66 https://github.com/gavinhoward/bc/issues/66

actionfromafar 3y ago
To be clear, do you have paying bc customers? I guess not, but I wanted to absolutely sure! :-)
- gavinhoward 3y ago
  No, absolutely not! bc is my gift to the world. It will remain that way. I'm writing other software, upon which my business will be based. You could say bc is how I advertise my services. :)
- kahnclusions 3y ago
  Then he wouldn’t be giving a shit, he’d be selling some shit.
darkwater 3y ago
You are a wonderful person, Gavin!
- gavinhoward 3y ago
  Thank you for the compliment and encouragement! I've been feeling down lately, and it's helped.

BOOTRACER 3y ago

Girlfriend As A Service pays better

deleted 3y ago

[deleted]

RA2lover 3y ago

I wonder how someone could create a jig to plot such a table for arbitrary exponents.

okwhateverdude 3y ago
The furniture people probably also had the same question and were excited to figure it out.

maroonblazer 3y ago

At least for me, 'giving a shit' (GaS) is not a static feature. I have great respect for people who GaS and they inspire me to want to GaS too. Most days I take pride in my work and so try very hard to GaS. However there are days when my workload has exceeded my capacity and the priority is simply to get things 'out the door', in which case the degree to which I can GaS begins to vary.

bratwurst3000 3y ago

“Giving a shit” I love the American language because of things like this. “Fucking shit” Sex with poop. Bukowski and the Cohen brothers made those words art

rob 3y ago

> Was it because they charged a lot of money? No. I'm sure that plays into it, yes. In most cases, the more money you give the more they will "give a shit."

marban 3y ago

Welcome to Japan.

deleted 3y ago

[deleted]

photochemsyn 3y ago

It comes down to incentives. If you're the owner of a small business that relies on a good reputation and repeat customers, you're going to care about quality of service because it directly impacts your bottom line. As companies grow, they might choose to hire employees and managers who are paid flat wages regardless of whether the company does a lot of business or a little. If the employees work hard and the business flourishes, but they see no reward of any kind, this fosters resentment and they stop caring about quality of service. Intelligent business owners recognize this reality and offer incentives that reward employees if business is good - e.g. commissions on sales in the retail world, stock options in the startup world, wage increases in the manufacturing sector, etc. Greedy shortsighted owners ignore this dynamic, so their employees are incentivized to do the least amount of work possible, just enough to avoid being fired. Where things get really bad is when monopolization grows and markets end up controlled by very few players, so customers have nowhere else to turn to (Comcast etc.).

ChrisMarshallNY 3y ago

I remember this article from here, a while back. I enjoy it, but am keenly aware that "giving a shit" often gets severely punished, these days.

schmichael 3y ago

The Forks episode of The Bear is one of my favorite stories on giving a shit: a fork polisher at a fancy restaurant learns you don’t work in food service because you love polishing forks. You do it because you want to bring people joy and polishing the forks is one of many steps to that end. You can find purpose in fork polishing through both excellence and empathy for your customers. There’s a lot of days the code I write is about as exciting as fork polishing, but you do it for your teammates and users.

SergeAx 3y ago

2022, discussed then (120+ comments): https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32071349 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32071349

btbuildem 3y ago

The corollary here is that giving a shit doesn't scale. The furniture makers that inspired this article can afford to give a shit because 1) they're expert at what they do and 2) they charge a lot of money. These are constraints on both ends: on the supply of labour and on the demand for it. This is also why most people can't afford to give a shit -- they're not good enough to charge enough for that rare commodity.

schmichael 3y ago
I don’t think that is necessarily true. Sure it may be “easier” to give a shit when you’re an artisan charging a premium for your craft. However you can still give a shit if you’re a designer for IKEA. You can take joy knowing the more you minimize price while maximizing durability you not only bring joy to the majority of people who can’t afford hand crafted tables, but your efficiency can have major waste and ecological ramifications that an artisan shop can’t hope to copy. What you give a shit might change, but giving a shit absolutely scales.
willi59549879 3y ago
why is everybody so obsessed with scale? the good things in live don't scale, like relationships. the dream of scaling everything to a 1 billion business is just greed talking. caring about a craft and building relationships will be more fulfilling than a billion in the bank
- teaearlgraycold 3y ago
  Exactly. Once you have met your needs why the fuck are you trying to get more money? You’ve maxed out on money, you fool! Work on another dimension of life!
  - jaggederest 3y ago
    Like the story of the businessman meeting the fisherman - "once you've built a business you can retire and do a little fishing" - "but I already do that"
- 3y ago

anonu 3y ago

I glanced over the title and for a moment I thought this was going to be an article about the SaaS-ification of sites like https://www.shitexpress.com/ https://www.shitexpress.com/

hardkorebob 3y ago

Indeed as a Hospitality pro with 25+ yrs of expertise, seeing someone be present in a heart for excellence is rare. Excellent service is an art.

snmx999 3y ago

In my experience caring too much is often perceived as a negative, especially if the other party does not care that much but just wants to get the job done. Asking questions and god forbid, pushing back just makes you a difficult person.

cryptoegorophy 3y ago

How do you motivate your employees to give a shit. Even with good salary.

wizerdrobe 3y ago
Stepping beyond the obvious, pay them a good wage. Filter at the door, look for people who give a shit, have a passion for the work, etc. Hire them, look to avoid people who got into it simply because it’s a fat paycheck. I wouldn’t confuse this with “I spend all day everyday in my off time coding,” but seek out people who have a reasonable articulable love for a tool, a language, or something and or can articulate why they don’t like a thing. I have opinions on, say, Java over NodeJS and can speak at length with passion about why I feel the way I do. Understand and manage them as human beings. I’ve been hired on to companies that experienced radical change within the first days, weeks, and months of accepting the job. I’ve walked into jobs such that what I interviewed for literally did not exist when I started on Day 1. I’ve worked at companies that have had serious pivots around product-market-fit such that the job I accepted radically changed, i.e. from Full-Stack SE to AWS DevOps. Those companies just offered no honest conversation or explanation around circumstances, just managers magically started assigning random tickets one day. Coincidentally, I hated those jobs and couldn’t have given less of a shit if they succeeded or failed. I’m not a cog, a fungible unit, or a human-resource. I’m a human, full-stop. The firms I’ve worked with that suffered turmoil but offered me the basic human decency of a conversation, however, earned loyalty out of me and enabled me to continue giving a shit.
RugnirViking 3y ago
When people understand the wider context their work falls under they naturally give a shit. People want to give a shit, it feels good to have meaningful work and do it well. They only stop giving a shit when given a reason to do so (usually because they are heaped with meaningless work and have no connection to whether the work is good or bad). That doesn't (just) mean "incentives", it literally means them simply being told "great job, no problems reported from the client" or even more preferably the client themselves telling them that. The more steps between them and the effect of their work, and the less feedback, the less possible it is to give a shit even if they try. Trying to game or make this process as low effort or box-check-y as possible is noticable and counterproductive, it needs to come from a genuine involvement. People involved in meetings tend to care more. Not "involved" as in invited to, involved as in people want to hear their opinion and care what they think. The trope of people hating/not listening in meetings comes from it literally not mattering whether they are in the room or not. I get that you might not initially care what <newhire> has to say, they're hardly bringing insights, but the best onboardings ive seen are those where seniors want to hear their experience, what they struggled with, and work with them to make it easier for them and future newhires. It's noticable how much harder people work shortly after seeing their feedback/work being put to use. Another thing ive observed a lot is its common for people who give a shit to get promoted to lead others, but by taking on a lot of the meaningful work themselves, overworking, and failing to delegate, they breed people under them that dont give a shit, due to leaving only meaningless tasks and having no time for feedback or informing their reports what is even going on. Finally, once someone has fallen into the habit of not giving a shit at a specific company, unfortunately it requires a mighty effort to bring them back again. It's usually possible with time, but much harder than just keeping them happy in the first place. I guess give a shit about people and you may well find they give a shit themselves

xyst 3y ago

GaSaaS would be a great product for a large majority of Fortune 500. Oh wait that already exists, it’s called “consulting firms”. And they are useless most of the time. Unfortunately for this to work, ALL parties need to “give a shit”. Sure this might work for a small “boutique” firm working with another small “boutique”. But at the end of the day, big firms are probably farming the work down to a low level employee or contractor (think VP -> Executive VP of Acquisitions -> Managing Director -> Director -> Manager -> Lead Project Manager -> Project Manager -> some person working with project manager) with a set of requirements. Initially it was to be completed in 4 weeks. But in order to impress their boss, one or more of these people kept reducing the deadline and suddenly it’s a project that’s wanted to be completed over the weekend. Low level person doesn’t give a shit. As long as it meets min spec, it’s Gucci. The further questions asked by the 5th vendor will probably get ignored. Upon completion, everyone is “happy” it’s delivered before their anticipated deadline. Except upon delivery the product is “half assed”. Nobody is really happy but they keep their mouth shut and accept it anyways so they can pump their numbers.

WendyTheWillow 3y ago
Consulting firms aren’t useless, they’re just not useful in the straightforward way one would presume their value would manifest. They’re great catalysts for change, they’re fantastic scapegoats, etc.

nativeit 3y ago

This has been the model for my largely solo IT consultancy for the last several years. I offer ultimate accountability, I take ownership of every project, and I demonstrate fierce loyalty to my clients and their interests. It’s not the easiest way to make money, but I am proud of everything I do, I hardly ever lose a client, and when I do it’s generally without any bad blood or acrimony.

tornato7 3y ago
I'm currently looking for a good IT consultant after going through a few bad ones that for lack of better words didn't give a shit. Want to chat?

reubenswartz 3y ago

I didn't realize how rare (and precious) a commodity giving a shit is. I expected it to be the default state, but it's not. I remember calling a customer to apologize for a bug and having them console me with something like, "all my apps have bugs and irritations, but you're the only one who seems to care enough to call me and fix it promptly."

m463 3y ago
I wonder if it can be "a commodity "at all. Do you think it's possible to give a shit in volume?

neilv 3y ago

> If you email 4 software studios for a quote and 3 say “Sure, here’s a quote” but the 4th says “Hm, we certainly could build it but we can’t be sure about cost without knowing X and Y, and here are some other concerns we’d have” then the 4th is going to seem like they give a shit. I usually end up responding like that, having started to think about the problem and approach. But I just know what the takehome message will be for some. Now it'll be someone's CRM startup feature: responds to RFQs with an LLM prompted to give the appearance of thoughtful consideration of the problem. Because, one time, a blogger said you should ask questions like that, to make a better impression, was the takehome message they got. Or it'll become a mnemonic for remembering the mix of kinds of questions on an RFQ you should ask, for the sake of appearances, and you'll fail an interview for not hitting each letter of the mnemonic exactly once, and in order. ("Sorry, bro, I was really hoping you'd pass, but you forgot the R in SCROT. You're not Amazoogle caliber yet, but take some more interview prep classes, and you can try again in a year.")

klabb3 3y ago
Yes, there’s a constant arms race between the authentic and the impersonators. Happens in every field. Look at how much the “artisanal” and “rustic” aesthetic became completely colonized over the 2010s to the point of being “the new bland” today. That’s also why I liked this article. It doesn’t propose an excessively precise definition of “giving a shit”. It requires paying attention and being vigilant – the impersonators are always around the corner, watching and learning.
teaearlgraycold 3y ago
This is the same as the old metrics-as-targets failure mode. Or the stock market - as soon as something is public knowledge it’s already priced in.

matheusmoreira 3y ago

People praise professionals who give a shit but nobody seems to value them. When you care, it is soul destroying to watch people who don't give the slightest shit make metric fucking tons more money than you. It's sociopathic and it's extremely common. When I was a teenager I actually quit professional programming as a career because I felt that I would be miserable in this field. I felt that way because every single developer I met at the time simply did not give a shit about stuff, they just wanted their paycheck at the end of the month. Well I wanted to give a shit and so I turned it into my hobby. It's not without its problems, of course. Giving too much of a shit turns you into an obsessive perfectionist which can be paralyzing. Can spend days thinking about the best way to do something instead of just doing it. Thankfully I have no deadlines.

zubairq 3y ago

Really love this, yes I always pay top dollar for people who give a shit

amzn-throw 3y ago

I know a lot of people here are writing about how this can be done for small consulting companies, but I also saw it in Big Tech. Amazon until 2022 really genuinely exemplified this. I saw it for more than a decade leading up to this. Just an unbelievable collection of people that truly Gave A Shit. Publicly we called it "Customer Obsession" and through that lens you could move mountains around here in the pursuit of Doing The Right Thing. The first sign of trouble was 2021. Salaries skyrocketed in the industry. Amazon didn't keep up. A lot of great people left because they got obscene offers, and you know, who could blame them? Our core of "intermediate" engineers (L5 here) got decimated - why bust your ass for a promotion when you can just get a Senior offer from one of 100 over-funded Unicorns for more money than you would've made here. Sensible. Then in 2022 the stock price dropped in half and a bunch of folks who seems like were only putting up with the bullshit as long as the stock grew indefinitely left too. Then 2023 brought layoffs. There's still a lot of us around that Give A Shit, but I feel like we are outnumbered more and more by those that just want to punch in and out and no longer Make History. I get it. I can't blame anyone individually. But I miss it.

d0gsg0w00f 3y ago
Trust me. We as the customers can tell. It's really sad. Everything that gets released today seems cobbled together and half baked. The "this is something we bought and slapped an API and product umbrella on top of" is glaringly obvious. Back in 2018 we used to get strong "give a shit" vibes from all the product teams we talked to. Now it's more "this is what we're going to build, isn't it going to be great?". I skip all the product meetings we get invited to now.
gnicholas 3y ago
> Amazon until 2022 really genuinely exemplified this. I remember Amazon from 2002 — that felt like they really gave a shit. There are occasionally times where it feels that way now, as a customer. But most of the time the customer service experience is slow, impersonal, and painful. I understand they're a big company, and I don't expect it to be as good as when they started out. But I wouldn't say that Amazon "genuinely exemplified" giving a shit up until last year. Apple might fit that bill, but even they have fallen off recently (apparently you now have to make appointments to buy products in-store?!).

fuzztester 3y ago

Watch "Gary Vaynerchuk: Rails Conference Keynote | 2010" on YouTube https://youtu.be/ZIaLTuaK1-k?si=rkic-7X67KrZvwmf https://youtu.be/ZIaLTuaK1-k?si=rkic-7X67KrZvwmf Saw it some years ago. IIRC, somewhere in the video, he yells, almost groans, "give a fuck" (about things you do), meaning the same as "giving a shit", the title of this HN thread. The overall talk is a bit funny to watch, including him strutting around the stage.

ezekiel68 3y ago

"See, I met a man who told me once, 'Sincerity's the key. And once you learn to fake it son, you're gonna be home free!'" -Dennis DeYoung, Styx, "Fallen Angel" (Anecdotally, may have been referring to a quote by comedian George Burns)

avg_dev 3y ago

i would call this "paying attention".

l8rlump 3y ago

Previous discussion (152 comments): https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32071349 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32071349

mikhailfranco 3y ago

Love the superelliptical table.

rongenre 3y ago

Jason Lemkin's advice for startup SaaS businesses is to heavily invest in customer success: you need to give a shit. Otherwise your customer churn numbers are going to be high, and it makes failure increasingly likely. When I was being courted by a startup for an IC position, the best question I asked was "What does your churn look like?". It was really low, and despite some other reservations I ended up taking the job, and we had an awesome exit. Because our customers really loved us, and we worked hard to make them successful.

Elena120 3y ago

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Elena120 3y ago

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