brianmcc

28 ms·

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by brianmcc 7y ago
In the UK, sites like autotrader.co.uk make price transparency crystal clear, even going so far as to prominently advise that an advertised price is great/low/fair/high for the make/model/age/mileage in questio
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by brianmcc 7y ago
As long as one is careful to head off the "here are 10 entirely new people to help you make up the time" trap (with credit to Mythical Man Month of course). I've never heard that saying btw but it's a great one, I&#x27
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by brianmcc 7y ago
Haven't heard of this much - but what a great idea. There is no downside I can see and you could make someone really happy to hear from you!
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by brianmcc 7y ago
IMO analogies and metaphors can absolutely help build trust across groups which may not yet really understand each other's domains. They can be highly successful, but from your comment it sounds like you've dealt with managers or
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by brianmcc 7y ago
Interesting insight. I would say that most of us s/ware engineers don't live in SV though, and often a salary bump truly is a tempting and significant incentive. But I'd like to think ICs are being better accommodated now (I
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by brianmcc 7y ago
Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying "management is a bad choice, period". Just try to be fairly sure of your own fit for it. Lots of people thrive in management it's very much "their thing" Do you like th
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by brianmcc 7y ago
If anyone is considering moving into engineering management, you'd do well to look not just at the how but the why . If it's for status/salary rather than the change in nature of the work be very careful about making the m
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by brianmcc 7y ago
London maybe - not wildly unrealistic for most other bits of the UK though.
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by brianmcc 7y ago
Most people would surely agree that neither under- nor over-stimulation is ideal on any kind of long term basis. A 2 week project crunch can be exhilarating, but 6 months? No thanks! Similarly a few weeks of beach vacation can be wonderfull
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by brianmcc 7y ago
I've been following it for a few years. Couldn't agree more, it brings about a quite unsettling feeling of melancholy for me, seeing these now quite old people talking about their ups and downs, having seen them so recently as ene
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by brianmcc 7y ago
I don't disagree, but I also recall an almost certainly apocryphal story of a web application developer who spent many many weeks honing their application and trimming waste wherever it could be found, proudly announcing they'd fi
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by brianmcc 7y ago
I can relate to this. Given a choice between tech I know works, and tech which is "trendy", I find it hard to take a punt on the new stuff. I do feel it's OK to require new tech to prove itself though and I am quite happy to
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by brianmcc 7y ago
Or take away any valuable "learnings"?
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by brianmcc 7y ago
Thanks for sharing; to me it sounds like a successful project which management/customer made feel like an unsuccessful one due to unreasonable demands. Way to ruin morale! Well done for at least attempting to introduce some flexibili
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by brianmcc 7y ago
I'm meaning "the policy is being considered" as others mention. Yeah I'm generally for it, but along with the wealth of consultation materials it's recognised as not being a panacea, it's a factor to help a cou
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by brianmcc 7y ago
Per unit of alcohol -> https://www.economicshelp.org/blog/7130/economics/minimum-pr...
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by brianmcc 7y ago
Apologies for some domestic political comment on HN - but surely the Scotsman isn't about to give the terrible SNP credit for something?! Was there not a more negative spin they could've used, e.g. "deaths fall by smaller per
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by brianmcc 7y ago
Might be brutally simply and obvious but still too many people manage to not achieve it. Appreciate a practical framework for how to measure too simply vs too complicated might be helpful, but often I suspect teams aren't remotely inte
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by brianmcc 7y ago
Exactly - novel meaning "new" is perfectly valid usage but it's the dual meaning that's the intention here, the "I am reading a novel" one. This got me wondering why books are called novels - apparently from th
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by brianmcc 7y ago
Sounds a rotten situation, hope things are better for you now. Your example highlights how toxic the softer/environmental aspects can be, not just challenging technical factors. Personally I find I am happy to deal with technical chall
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by brianmcc 7y ago
There's the "it'll do" mean of "good enough", which really isn't good enough. Then there's the "of sufficient quality" meaning, which is by definition good enough. The latter is the true
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by brianmcc 8y ago
Can second this - if asked to recommend one link/article I'd choose this one too, an excellent intro
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by brianmcc 8y ago
Insecurity wrapped and sold as "flexibility".
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by brianmcc 8y ago
A great series - thanks! Required reading for anyone preparing to "take a punt" at a technology they've not really done much actual work with.
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by brianmcc 8y ago
I enjoyed the write up. I love these kinds of semi-technical, semi-story-telling, pieces. I am saddened by many of the comments here though which equate to: "never try anything until you know everything " - sorry but that'
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by brianmcc 8y ago
Have you considered hiring in someone with relevant experience? They could both help you out and provide a good mentoring/learning aspect. If you don't know 100% what good leadership looks like, it's hard to make that journey
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by brianmcc 8y ago
Welcome! This should be all you need to thrive and succeed in our dangerously-repressed passive-aggressive culture: https://www.anglotopia.net/british-identity/brit-humour-30-t...
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by brianmcc 8y ago
The level of bluntness one would need to get through to the typical blowhard described here is higher than many people are comfortable exercising except as a last-resort, bridges-burning nuclear option. Certainly in the UK we'd tolerat
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by brianmcc 8y ago
I do. I'm honestly not sure what my reasons are, I certainly don't have any kind of "following". Mostly I think I get an enjoyable sense of accomplishment from getting down "properly" the stuff I find myself co
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by brianmcc 8y ago
Sometimes it's good for people to have the chance to simply vent, tbh. Don't need to assign blame, or come up with "solutions". Sounds like GP has had a tough time and we should maybe simply sympathise.

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