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I... would have in my early twenties agreed with you, but now I see the that if you're employed, you should do the most visible and most evidently rewarded for

I... would have in my early twenties agreed with you, but now I see the that if you're employed, you should do the most visible and most evidently rewarded for work, anything else is just extra if you've got time for it, but I'd argue you should give yourself that time back if possible. Or you can just do anything you can to make yourself valuable to keep around in some genuine way, but you need to have a keen sense of what's actually valuable. Put another way, regular forms of success in NA business culture, at least from my PoV, comes from "reading the room", and the unspoken implications that your higher ups who actually do have control over your ability to stay employed, are saying even if they're not saying it. If you spend more time on something because you feel it's virtuous or stylistic to do so, but your manager wanted just the most basic bullshit for some presentation, you've failed, and you've wasted time and money, and I think this is more common than not. Nobody ever got fired for picking Bootstrap or w/e the saying is. In rare circumstances you chance your way into doing something so efficiently or well, within budget in a way that specifically fulfills all the wishes of everyone who has tangible control over your income, and also in a way that was worth the time and money, so much so that you get praise and a raise eventually. You can't try and do this all the time thought, you'll burnout or maybe destroy trust or read the room wrong about your requirement. If there's not a very clear path to being well-rewarded, then focus on what you're getting paid for. The alternative is specialty contracting or running your own business, where you can choose your customers based on the fact that they want your unique expertise, if you're lucky. If you succeed at either, great, but don't necessarily set that bar for yourself.

hunterrrrrr 2y ago
> but don't necessarily set that bar for yourself. When someone is grotesquely underpaid the bar is pretty low. Take median salary for example. In some places merely buying a home and having it appreciate over the course of one singular year is enough to replace an entire median salary (in that same place) > if you’re lucky Can you help me understand how you derived being lucky from this equation? Kind of feels like we were maybe eagerly trying to arrive to a false “either this or that” outcome. Can you help me fix my understanding of your argument?
- brailsafe 2y ago
  > When someone is grotesquely underpaid the bar is pretty low. Take median salary for example. In some places merely buying a home and having it appreciate over the course of one singular year is enough to replace an entire median salary (in that same place) I don't necessarily agree that the bar is lower because you're paid less, because everyone feels like whatever they're paying you, regardless of whether they felt like they got a deal or not, is in exchange for the work they expect from you. When I hire a bike mechanic that charges less, I'm happy I'm paying less, but I naively still want my bike to work properly, and if they didn't match my expectation, I'm going to be unhappy with the service. Charging less doesn't necessarily change someone's expectation, but having junior in your title might give you more leeway. > Can you help me understand how you derived being lucky from this equation? Kind of feels like we were maybe eagerly trying to arrive to a false “either this or that” outcome. Can you help me fix my understanding of your argument? Being lucky, in the context I used it, meant that you've been able to successfully find a path of gradual and measurable or desirable evident skill advancement, perhaps with a few standout projects that prove you have those skills, and that people willing to pay you as a business operator (independent contractor or w/e, someone who has complete latitude to apply their apparent skills for money) will be compelled by (i.e I want you to make me a website because you seem to know your shit for x reason). Those projects aren't an every day thing, and you should try very hard to identify them and succeed at them, holding yourself to a higher standard than normal for your own sake. For famous programmers, that was Doom, or hacking the PS2 or Jailbreaking the iPhone, or inventing the Masonry layout, or maybe the Boston Globe website, all things they may or may not have done while being just an employee, but that they can obviously point to and be like "I worked at ___ for 5 years and one of the cool projects was this thing where we figured out how to do responsive images before it was feasible for a major newpaper", but otherwise a ton of smaller projects that nobody's heard of. Hire me for something as a contractor and I'll apply my skills in a way that I think will solve your problem well, not the agency I no longer work for.
  - hunterrrrrr 2y ago
    apologies if this comes off as a nitpick but when I read this > I don't necessarily agree that the bar is lower because you're paid less And then this > I naively still want my bike to work properly It reads like your conclusions are at odds with each other Anyway I think we can wrap this one up just heading over to levels.fyi and comparing 2021/2022/2023 salaries for positions with 2024 salaries for the same positions.

hunterrrrrr 2y ago

> but don't necessarily set that bar for yourself. When someone is grotesquely underpaid the bar is pretty low. Take median salary for example. In some places merely buying a home and having it appreciate over the course of one singular year is enough to replace an entire median salary (in that same place) > if you’re lucky Can you help me understand how you derived being lucky from this equation? Kind of feels like we were maybe eagerly trying to arrive to a false “either this or that” outcome. Can you help me fix my understanding of your argument?

brailsafe 2y ago
> When someone is grotesquely underpaid the bar is pretty low. Take median salary for example. In some places merely buying a home and having it appreciate over the course of one singular year is enough to replace an entire median salary (in that same place) I don't necessarily agree that the bar is lower because you're paid less, because everyone feels like whatever they're paying you, regardless of whether they felt like they got a deal or not, is in exchange for the work they expect from you. When I hire a bike mechanic that charges less, I'm happy I'm paying less, but I naively still want my bike to work properly, and if they didn't match my expectation, I'm going to be unhappy with the service. Charging less doesn't necessarily change someone's expectation, but having junior in your title might give you more leeway. > Can you help me understand how you derived being lucky from this equation? Kind of feels like we were maybe eagerly trying to arrive to a false “either this or that” outcome. Can you help me fix my understanding of your argument? Being lucky, in the context I used it, meant that you've been able to successfully find a path of gradual and measurable or desirable evident skill advancement, perhaps with a few standout projects that prove you have those skills, and that people willing to pay you as a business operator (independent contractor or w/e, someone who has complete latitude to apply their apparent skills for money) will be compelled by (i.e I want you to make me a website because you seem to know your shit for x reason). Those projects aren't an every day thing, and you should try very hard to identify them and succeed at them, holding yourself to a higher standard than normal for your own sake. For famous programmers, that was Doom, or hacking the PS2 or Jailbreaking the iPhone, or inventing the Masonry layout, or maybe the Boston Globe website, all things they may or may not have done while being just an employee, but that they can obviously point to and be like "I worked at ___ for 5 years and one of the cool projects was this thing where we figured out how to do responsive images before it was feasible for a major newpaper", but otherwise a ton of smaller projects that nobody's heard of. Hire me for something as a contractor and I'll apply my skills in a way that I think will solve your problem well, not the agency I no longer work for.
- hunterrrrrr 2y ago
  apologies if this comes off as a nitpick but when I read this > I don't necessarily agree that the bar is lower because you're paid less And then this > I naively still want my bike to work properly It reads like your conclusions are at odds with each other Anyway I think we can wrap this one up just heading over to levels.fyi and comparing 2021/2022/2023 salaries for positions with 2024 salaries for the same positions.