6 ms·

How to quickly become effective when joining a new company

94 points by DRMacIver 13y ago

nraynaud 13y ago
In my last job, I hired a guy who was pretty impressive, in the morning he got the code on his machine with the help of a co-worker next to him and got accounts in the dev tools, after lunch he sat alone, he put on his headphones and started killing bugs moving his head to the music. He corrected maybe 3 or 4 bugs on his first day. His code respected all the conventions we had set (it's consistent so he gathered them from the existing code).
- jiggy2011 13y ago
  Did he used to be a freelancer? Figuring out new tools and codebases is a skill one tends to acquire very quickly in that line of work.
  - nraynaud 13y ago
    I don't really know him that well, I left the week he arrived :) edit: but it felt like that, he knew the framework, but I guess he had seen quite a few codebases before, also he was young in age.
- AznHisoka 13y ago
  Brogrammer!
dpatru 13y ago
My summary: To become productive, get in the habit of doing things. More specifically, get in the habit of immediately doing what needs doing. Don't spend a lot of time learning in preparation for some future grand work when there is useful work that you could be doing right away. When faced with a new situation, quickly learn enough so that you can start doing useful work. Avoid the temptation to spend a lot of time learning before contributing. Hence the advice: "Acquire as little information as possible." This meshes well with Sam Altman's advice to: "Have a good operational cadence where projects are short and you’re releasing something new on a regular basis." (http://blog.samaltman.com/startup-advice http://blog.samaltman.com/startup-advice)
gvb 13y ago
I'm not wild about the labels "implicit" and "explicit" for mental models. "Explicit" is not bad, but "implicit" is less intuitive. IMHO, "behavioral model" is a better label. With simulations (e.g. CPUs), what the OP referred to as an "implicit model" is a "behavioral model" (the results are right, but the simulation takes shortcuts). An "explicit model" is a "cycle accurate model" because the simulation goes through all the actual motions that the real target (CPU) would do. Behavioral models are much faster but less detailed and sometimes less accurate. For instance, in a CPU simulator, you get estimated execution times for the code whereas for a cycle accurate model you will get actual (simulated) clock cycles that the instructions took to execute the code.
- DRMacIver 13y ago
  Yeah, I'm not wild about those labels either. I confess they were thought up on the spur of the moment to try to explain the idea. The reasoning for the naming is essentially that an explicit mental model is one where you can write down all the steps, whileas an implicit model is one that just arises naturally from the things already in your brain and you can't really point to it and say what it is. I'm not sure that behavioural model quite captures that, but I'm definitely up for a better naming convention.
deleted 13y ago
[deleted]
molbioguy 13y ago
Acquire as little information as possible This is an often overlooked opportunity. Learn as little as you absolutely need so you don't get mired in the dogma. Some of the best solutions for problems come from people who have not yet become indoctrinated in the "standard" methodology. They approach problems with a fresh perspective and can come up with new solutions that everyone else who's been there a while missed. This opportunity is short lived, since everyone inevitably learns all the standard ways, so it is very apt for when you join a new company.
- tome 13y ago
  This is absolutely true, but none of the (few) companies I've worked for were interested in a fresh perspective (with the exception of the company I was hired to bring a fresh perspective to). Entrenched mindsets dominated, unfortunately.
  - molbioguy 13y ago
    Agreed. I've always experienced pressure to conform, too. But I know some of my best contributions came when I didn't do things the standard way. Of course, going at things differently is risky, since you have no cover if things fail; however, if you find the right solution, it's very satisfying and can elevate your status quickly.
- dalke 13y ago
  "Some of the best solutions for problems come from people who have not yet become indoctrinated in the "standard" methodology." Is that really true, or a hypothesis? How was it tested, and what are the numbers? For example, do 5% of the solutions come from people in their first year and the other 95% come from those with between 1 year and 40 years? Or is it more like 80% and 20%? Knowing those numbers helps determine strategy. The former suggests that novel solutions are hard, and inspiration is only weakly connected to experience, while the latter suggests that people should move to new fields every year or two, in order to take advantage of this effect. For that matter, if the numbers are 1% and 99% then it implies that while 'some of the best solutions' come from new people, the overwhelming majority do not, in which case your observation, while still true, has a different interpretation. In my own research, I came up with a novel and useful implementation for a multiple-graph maximum common subgraph isomorphism. It's a problem that I worked on when I first entered this field, when I was in my late 20s, but with 10+ years of experience in the field I was able to come up with a faster, more efficient and more general purpose method. (FWIW, it's based on the observation that in practice, for the types of graphs I work with, a certain NP-hard method - pairwise subgraph isomorphism - is actually very fast. New people to the field assume 'NP-hard' means 'avoid at all costs', so avoid use this method.) Is my story anecdotal? Absolutely. Which is why I'm curious to see the evidence you used to form your statement.
tmorton 13y ago
Cache link: http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:pONjMF-sswIJ:www.drmaciver.com/2013/08/how-did-you-get-started-so-quickly/+&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:pONjMF-...
- DRMacIver 13y ago
  Thanks. I'm currently paying the price for my foolish decision to self-host wordpress. In the process of trying to fix.
  - jontas 13y ago
    As a quick fix, just grab the source from the Google cache and throw up a static HTML file.
    - DRMacIver 13y ago
      Ah. That's a good idea which I totally failed to follow. Instead I flailed around blindly in the usual manner of trying to get PHP applications to work and seem to have fixed the problem. :-) I should really move my blog to an environment I actually understand and have control over.
      - packetslave 13y ago
        WP Super Cache is definitely your friend if you must self-host.
        DRMacIver 13y ago
        Yes, I know. I had it but my config was badly broken so it wasn't doing anything. Whoops.
  - yaddayadda 13y ago
    I think this is proof of Principle 1's pros and cons. (I still don't have a self-hosted blog because I tend to account for all contingencies. Therefore, when I finally self-host, it won't have this flaw. Meanwhile, you already have a self-hosted blog and are simply working out the kinks as they happen.)
a3voices 13y ago
What is the advantage of quickly becoming effective? You'll probably only get promoted marginally faster, at best.
- DRMacIver 13y ago
  If your sole measure of advantage is promotion then yeah, feel free to kick back your heels and do whatever you want. Personally, I quite like to be doing useful work, and normal ramp-up times for people seem to be about 3-6 months, which if you work at a company for < 3 years can be as much as 10-20% of your time. More if you're switching between projects within a company. It's pleasant to not have to waste that large a percentage of your time getting up to speed.
- scrabble 13y ago
  Not being effective sucks. Do you enjoy the feeling of starting somewhere new or starting with a new project and not knowing what you're doing? The trick is to minimize that time so that you can: a] feel effective b] not have a long term, negative impact on your team's velocity.
- nasalgoat 13y ago
  I give new hires exactly one month to prove themselves now. I've found that giving more time does not increase the success rate of workers in any measurable way. Here's a good example - I hired two admins within a week of each other. The second hire had closed more tickets in two weeks than the first one did in three. The first was gone soon after.
splatcollision 13y ago
Thanks for the detailed explanation of how your brain works - I found it a fascinating read and insightful for my own thought processes as well, also having one of those brains that "won't shut up" as you so aptly put it.

94 points by DRMacIver 13y ago

In my last job, I hired a guy who was pretty impressive, in the morning he got the code on his machine with the help of a co-worker next to him and got accounts in the dev tools, after lunch he sat alone, he put on his headphones and started killing bugs moving his head to the music. He corrected maybe 3 or 4 bugs on his first day. His code respected all the conventions we had set (it's consistent so he gathered them from the existing code).

jiggy2011 13y ago
Did he used to be a freelancer? Figuring out new tools and codebases is a skill one tends to acquire very quickly in that line of work.
- nraynaud 13y ago
  I don't really know him that well, I left the week he arrived :) edit: but it felt like that, he knew the framework, but I guess he had seen quite a few codebases before, also he was young in age.
AznHisoka 13y ago
Brogrammer!

dpatru 13y ago

My summary: To become productive, get in the habit of doing things. More specifically, get in the habit of immediately doing what needs doing. Don't spend a lot of time learning in preparation for some future grand work when there is useful work that you could be doing right away. When faced with a new situation, quickly learn enough so that you can start doing useful work. Avoid the temptation to spend a lot of time learning before contributing. Hence the advice: "Acquire as little information as possible." This meshes well with Sam Altman's advice to: "Have a good operational cadence where projects are short and you’re releasing something new on a regular basis." (http://blog.samaltman.com/startup-advice http://blog.samaltman.com/startup-advice)

gvb 13y ago

I'm not wild about the labels "implicit" and "explicit" for mental models. "Explicit" is not bad, but "implicit" is less intuitive. IMHO, "behavioral model" is a better label. With simulations (e.g. CPUs), what the OP referred to as an "implicit model" is a "behavioral model" (the results are right, but the simulation takes shortcuts). An "explicit model" is a "cycle accurate model" because the simulation goes through all the actual motions that the real target (CPU) would do. Behavioral models are much faster but less detailed and sometimes less accurate. For instance, in a CPU simulator, you get estimated execution times for the code whereas for a cycle accurate model you will get actual (simulated) clock cycles that the instructions took to execute the code.

DRMacIver 13y ago
Yeah, I'm not wild about those labels either. I confess they were thought up on the spur of the moment to try to explain the idea. The reasoning for the naming is essentially that an explicit mental model is one where you can write down all the steps, whileas an implicit model is one that just arises naturally from the things already in your brain and you can't really point to it and say what it is. I'm not sure that behavioural model quite captures that, but I'm definitely up for a better naming convention.

deleted 13y ago

[deleted]

molbioguy 13y ago

Acquire as little information as possible This is an often overlooked opportunity. Learn as little as you absolutely need so you don't get mired in the dogma. Some of the best solutions for problems come from people who have not yet become indoctrinated in the "standard" methodology. They approach problems with a fresh perspective and can come up with new solutions that everyone else who's been there a while missed. This opportunity is short lived, since everyone inevitably learns all the standard ways, so it is very apt for when you join a new company.

tome 13y ago
This is absolutely true, but none of the (few) companies I've worked for were interested in a fresh perspective (with the exception of the company I was hired to bring a fresh perspective to). Entrenched mindsets dominated, unfortunately.
- molbioguy 13y ago
  Agreed. I've always experienced pressure to conform, too. But I know some of my best contributions came when I didn't do things the standard way. Of course, going at things differently is risky, since you have no cover if things fail; however, if you find the right solution, it's very satisfying and can elevate your status quickly.
dalke 13y ago
"Some of the best solutions for problems come from people who have not yet become indoctrinated in the "standard" methodology." Is that really true, or a hypothesis? How was it tested, and what are the numbers? For example, do 5% of the solutions come from people in their first year and the other 95% come from those with between 1 year and 40 years? Or is it more like 80% and 20%? Knowing those numbers helps determine strategy. The former suggests that novel solutions are hard, and inspiration is only weakly connected to experience, while the latter suggests that people should move to new fields every year or two, in order to take advantage of this effect. For that matter, if the numbers are 1% and 99% then it implies that while 'some of the best solutions' come from new people, the overwhelming majority do not, in which case your observation, while still true, has a different interpretation. In my own research, I came up with a novel and useful implementation for a multiple-graph maximum common subgraph isomorphism. It's a problem that I worked on when I first entered this field, when I was in my late 20s, but with 10+ years of experience in the field I was able to come up with a faster, more efficient and more general purpose method. (FWIW, it's based on the observation that in practice, for the types of graphs I work with, a certain NP-hard method - pairwise subgraph isomorphism - is actually very fast. New people to the field assume 'NP-hard' means 'avoid at all costs', so avoid use this method.) Is my story anecdotal? Absolutely. Which is why I'm curious to see the evidence you used to form your statement.

tmorton 13y ago

Cache link: http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:pONjMF-sswIJ:www.drmaciver.com/2013/08/how-did-you-get-started-so-quickly/+&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:pONjMF-...

DRMacIver 13y ago
Thanks. I'm currently paying the price for my foolish decision to self-host wordpress. In the process of trying to fix.
- jontas 13y ago
  As a quick fix, just grab the source from the Google cache and throw up a static HTML file.
  - DRMacIver 13y ago
    Ah. That's a good idea which I totally failed to follow. Instead I flailed around blindly in the usual manner of trying to get PHP applications to work and seem to have fixed the problem. :-) I should really move my blog to an environment I actually understand and have control over.
    - packetslave 13y ago
      WP Super Cache is definitely your friend if you must self-host.
      - DRMacIver 13y ago
        Yes, I know. I had it but my config was badly broken so it wasn't doing anything. Whoops.
- yaddayadda 13y ago
  I think this is proof of Principle 1's pros and cons. (I still don't have a self-hosted blog because I tend to account for all contingencies. Therefore, when I finally self-host, it won't have this flaw. Meanwhile, you already have a self-hosted blog and are simply working out the kinks as they happen.)

a3voices 13y ago

What is the advantage of quickly becoming effective? You'll probably only get promoted marginally faster, at best.

DRMacIver 13y ago
If your sole measure of advantage is promotion then yeah, feel free to kick back your heels and do whatever you want. Personally, I quite like to be doing useful work, and normal ramp-up times for people seem to be about 3-6 months, which if you work at a company for < 3 years can be as much as 10-20% of your time. More if you're switching between projects within a company. It's pleasant to not have to waste that large a percentage of your time getting up to speed.
scrabble 13y ago
Not being effective sucks. Do you enjoy the feeling of starting somewhere new or starting with a new project and not knowing what you're doing? The trick is to minimize that time so that you can: a] feel effective b] not have a long term, negative impact on your team's velocity.
nasalgoat 13y ago
I give new hires exactly one month to prove themselves now. I've found that giving more time does not increase the success rate of workers in any measurable way. Here's a good example - I hired two admins within a week of each other. The second hire had closed more tickets in two weeks than the first one did in three. The first was gone soon after.

splatcollision 13y ago

Thanks for the detailed explanation of how your brain works - I found it a fascinating read and insightful for my own thought processes as well, also having one of those brains that "won't shut up" as you so aptly put it.