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Similar humiliations used to happen to me at my first job. It was the first time I was programming professionally and made a few mistakes that would've cost the

Similar humiliations used to happen to me at my first job. It was the first time I was programming professionally and made a few mistakes that would've cost the startup a lot. On my second week opn the job, I commented out, by mistake, the initialization of variable $user (arrrgh!!). The website crashed on all the signed-in users. My boss being the stressed nerv-ball that he was crictized me in the same way described in the article. I think there's a lesson to be taken here. Not for managers (clearly good management would criticize privately) but for the employee. Learn to take a yell. It's not good style but it's widely common, people above you scream at you when you screw up. Learn not to take it personal, and not to let such incidents affect your passion for your work. The yelling is bad form, but it's not direct criticism at you. In large entreprises, it's the result of a chain of screaming starting at the top. In startups it's the result of the nerve-wrecking stress, founders go through. 'Constructive criticism' is an advice we give would-be managers, but it's a luxury starting employees rarely get. You're lucky if you meet one such boss in your career. Learn to take criticism, the bad kind, leaving out the humiliation. I found the best way to cut a yelling short is by answering loudly: "You're right I screwed up, I'm sorry. At least now I learned it, it won't happen again". After getting yelled at like this a few times, you'll realize it's really not against you, and such an answer would calm down your boss quickly; make sure not to make that mistake again, because then you'd really deserve a humiliation ;). This is easier said (written?) than done, but it's a natural part of one's career. I take it as a mental strength test. Also, you won't be the junior on the team forever. One day you'll be responsible for an intern screwing up. Remember that moment and don't be too harsh.

AznHisoka 14y ago
Yup, I also find it's best to say stuff like "Yup, you're right. This was a dumb mistake. I should be fired for this"
- zxcvb 14y ago
  Never EVER say "I should be fired for this". You probably mean it as a little joke. Getting yelled at for screwing up is not the right time to make a joke. Unless of course you are serious, in which case you're an idiot. Saying something that weird will just make it seem like you don't care or you're weird. The fact you say you 'find it best' suggests you get shouted at a lot or you are making this up. Either way, you shouldn't be dispensing this kind of nonsense advice to other people who may well follow it.
  - AznHisoka 14y ago
    This is an internet message board, not an concentration camp. Lighten up.
    - deleted 14y ago
      [deleted]
    - Tomis02 14y ago
      From my experience humour is not tolerated on HN, everyone takes themselves very seriously. If you tell a joke you risk being downvoted into oblivion and/or banned. So yeah, your comparison with a concentration camp might actually be appropriate in this case, at least in terms of atmosphere.
    - zxcvb 14y ago
      I'm just asking you not to lie or give stupid advice to other users who might take your advice seriously. You need to grow up.
      - AznHisoka 14y ago
        You're a god? You determine what's stupid or not? You grow up.
lkrubner 14y ago
> On my second week opn the job, I commented out, by > mistake, the initialization of variable $user (arrrgh!!). > The website crashed on all the signed-in users. I'm trying to imagine a professional, well run software shop that would actually hold you responsible for this. I can not. It seems to me that for this to have happened, many things must have gone wrong, or many professional practices must have been completely missing: 1.) there were no code reviews 2.) there were no unit tests 3.) there were no functional tests 4.) no one noticed any problems on the development site 5.) there was no QA person, or the whole QA team somehow failed to test this 6.) there were no 3rd party testing services that might have caught this (like Airbrake), nor any in house error logging services (errbit) I could go on. I'm trying to imagine how a programmer comments out the $user variable and that change makes it all the way to production without anyone noticing. I think a lot of things have to wrong, all through the organization, before that becomes possible. I read your story and I have 2 quick thoughts: 1.) I have made many worse mistakes (thought I was changing database password for dev, in the config file, but actually changed it for production) 2.) None of my worst mistakes ever made it to production, because the company had some process that caught them before such a change ever got pushed to production. No programmer can avoid mistakes. That simply isn't possible. To insist that a programmer always write perfect code would be like insisting that an NBA basketball player make 100% of his 3 point shots: the world would be a very different place if it was possible to insist on perfection. A well run organization has multiple checks that ensure mistakes made in development don't make it to production. Any organization that puts 100% responsibility on one programmer is taking a 100% certain risk that eventually some terrible mistake will make it to production. Some organizations put more responsibility on individual programmers and some organizations put less. That is fine. A range of strategies can be defended. But if an organization wanted to shift most of the responsibility onto a single programmer, then they would also have to give that programmer broad latitude regarding time, so that the programmer can implement whatever they feel is necessary to ensure the robustness of the code (for instance, unit tests, functional tests, setting up automated uptime checks, etc). I'm guessing, from what few details are written above, that the above commenter both had responsibility for the code but was also under pressure to move quickly and shove stuff out the door. Under such circumstances, management needs to take 100% responsibility if something goes wrong. Now I will qualify everything I said above with an anecdote: In 2005, when working at monkeyclaus.org, we had a little startup where I was the only programmer and we would push my changes straight to the "live" site. But we hadn't really launched yet and the few dozen users we had were just friends of ours, so the "live" site was really a "dev" site.
tomjen3 14y ago
babarock are you a doormat? I had extensive experience with bullies in school and let me tell you being submissive or showing fear of any kind only brings out the worst in them. I know you can't throw the boss against the wall (which would get a school bully of your back) but at least don't make it worse. And no, I hope you will not stay long enough in a place like that. There are better jobs elsewhere. Shoveling shit isn't as bad as that. Of course if it was a one time thing and the manager apologized (in public) that is another thing.
NameNickHN 14y ago
I can't believe that you are actually accepting this abuse and recommend to others to just suck it up. Management has a lot of responsibilities. Screaming at their subordinates isn't one of them.

AznHisoka 14y ago

Yup, I also find it's best to say stuff like "Yup, you're right. This was a dumb mistake. I should be fired for this"

zxcvb 14y ago
Never EVER say "I should be fired for this". You probably mean it as a little joke. Getting yelled at for screwing up is not the right time to make a joke. Unless of course you are serious, in which case you're an idiot. Saying something that weird will just make it seem like you don't care or you're weird. The fact you say you 'find it best' suggests you get shouted at a lot or you are making this up. Either way, you shouldn't be dispensing this kind of nonsense advice to other people who may well follow it.
- AznHisoka 14y ago
  This is an internet message board, not an concentration camp. Lighten up.
  - deleted 14y ago
    [deleted]
  - Tomis02 14y ago
    From my experience humour is not tolerated on HN, everyone takes themselves very seriously. If you tell a joke you risk being downvoted into oblivion and/or banned. So yeah, your comparison with a concentration camp might actually be appropriate in this case, at least in terms of atmosphere.
  - zxcvb 14y ago
    I'm just asking you not to lie or give stupid advice to other users who might take your advice seriously. You need to grow up.
    - AznHisoka 14y ago
      You're a god? You determine what's stupid or not? You grow up.

lkrubner 14y ago

> On my second week opn the job, I commented out, by > mistake, the initialization of variable $user (arrrgh!!). > The website crashed on all the signed-in users. I'm trying to imagine a professional, well run software shop that would actually hold you responsible for this. I can not. It seems to me that for this to have happened, many things must have gone wrong, or many professional practices must have been completely missing: 1.) there were no code reviews 2.) there were no unit tests 3.) there were no functional tests 4.) no one noticed any problems on the development site 5.) there was no QA person, or the whole QA team somehow failed to test this 6.) there were no 3rd party testing services that might have caught this (like Airbrake), nor any in house error logging services (errbit) I could go on. I'm trying to imagine how a programmer comments out the $user variable and that change makes it all the way to production without anyone noticing. I think a lot of things have to wrong, all through the organization, before that becomes possible. I read your story and I have 2 quick thoughts: 1.) I have made many worse mistakes (thought I was changing database password for dev, in the config file, but actually changed it for production) 2.) None of my worst mistakes ever made it to production, because the company had some process that caught them before such a change ever got pushed to production. No programmer can avoid mistakes. That simply isn't possible. To insist that a programmer always write perfect code would be like insisting that an NBA basketball player make 100% of his 3 point shots: the world would be a very different place if it was possible to insist on perfection. A well run organization has multiple checks that ensure mistakes made in development don't make it to production. Any organization that puts 100% responsibility on one programmer is taking a 100% certain risk that eventually some terrible mistake will make it to production. Some organizations put more responsibility on individual programmers and some organizations put less. That is fine. A range of strategies can be defended. But if an organization wanted to shift most of the responsibility onto a single programmer, then they would also have to give that programmer broad latitude regarding time, so that the programmer can implement whatever they feel is necessary to ensure the robustness of the code (for instance, unit tests, functional tests, setting up automated uptime checks, etc). I'm guessing, from what few details are written above, that the above commenter both had responsibility for the code but was also under pressure to move quickly and shove stuff out the door. Under such circumstances, management needs to take 100% responsibility if something goes wrong. Now I will qualify everything I said above with an anecdote: In 2005, when working at monkeyclaus.org, we had a little startup where I was the only programmer and we would push my changes straight to the "live" site. But we hadn't really launched yet and the few dozen users we had were just friends of ours, so the "live" site was really a "dev" site.

tomjen3 14y ago

babarock are you a doormat? I had extensive experience with bullies in school and let me tell you being submissive or showing fear of any kind only brings out the worst in them. I know you can't throw the boss against the wall (which would get a school bully of your back) but at least don't make it worse. And no, I hope you will not stay long enough in a place like that. There are better jobs elsewhere. Shoveling shit isn't as bad as that. Of course if it was a one time thing and the manager apologized (in public) that is another thing.

NameNickHN 14y ago

I can't believe that you are actually accepting this abuse and recommend to others to just suck it up. Management has a lot of responsibilities. Screaming at their subordinates isn't one of them.