Ask HN: What lessons did you learn from your best or worst colleagues? • Hacker News Board

Re: Ask HN: What lessons did you learn from your best or worst colleagues?

#101

Post by plorntus » Sat, May 15, 2021, 9:27 AM UTC

mjthompson wrote: post #43

quanto wrote: post #28

Best: It was a lesson I got as a fresh grad. I was losing sleep over stress from work. "This is just a job," an older colleague told me. In reality, he really did his job -- he was always on time, his code was impeccable, and he used cool logic to solve any problem. And yet, he was never too emotionally attached to work. He always welcomed criticism of his work. He had the demeanor of a cool-headed hitman finishing h…

Clearly he's got some issues given the reaction. However, was he informed of the bug? Was there an expectation he would fix his own mistakes? I don't work in IT/Software Engineering - I work in law. But when I find fault in other's work, it's a courtesy to let them know and give them an opportunity to address it. It's part of being a team player. I am not trying to be critical of you. It's just reading this reminded…

Not the original poster but I think things are just radically different by the sounds of it. Every company I have worked at, once the code is in the main revision everyone is responsible for it. At that stage the code has gone through many people from reviewers to testers, its not one single persons fault.

Easiest thing to do ia not to blame but to just find a solution and see as a team if it was a genuine mistake that is unavoidable or if you can make some adjustment to the process to ensure quality and reliability of your code.

People can specialise in a certain area of the codebase but no one 'owns' anything. Everyone needs to respect that any change to the code is a neccesary one. The 'expert' or original coder is usually a reviewer of the changes proposed anyway so thats when they can voice opinion on whether someone has misunderstood something or not.

Bugs/Features can be worked on by anyone without ego getting in the way.

Re: Ask HN: What lessons did you learn from your best or worst colleagues?

#102

Post by gkbrk » Sat, May 15, 2021, 9:46 AM UTC

byteface wrote: post #80

beforeolives wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can. My point is that I can do it without having been explicitly taught touch typing. It's just a skill I developed over time and I thought that it happened for everyone else too.

So you feel for the 'home keys' instincitvely without looking? every time you type? and never had a single lesson?

Isn't this a thing that naturally happens over time? I've never heard of anyone taking typing lessons, even among programmers.

Re: Ask HN: What lessons did you learn from your best or worst colleagues?

#103

Post by bruce343434 » Sat, May 15, 2021, 9:47 AM UTC

applepple wrote: post #88

From worst colleague: Succeeding in our modern economy has nothing to do with ability, intelligence or work ethic. It's about luck and intimidation. From best colleague: 10x, 100x, 1000x... developers are real. I also learned that making bold, controversial claims will yield respect dividends in the future when they turn out to be true. For one of my past startups, I was working closely with the CTO who was at least…

What do you mean by 10x, 100x, 1000x?

Re: Ask HN: What lessons did you learn from your best or worst colleagues?

#104

Post by cube00 » Sat, May 15, 2021, 9:48 AM UTC

plorntus wrote: post #101

mjthompson wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Clearly he's got some issues given the reaction. However, was he informed of the bug? Was there an expectation he would fix his own mistakes? I don't work in IT/Software Engineering - I work in law. But when I find fault in other's work, it's a courtesy to let them know and give them an opportunity to address it. It's part of being a team player. I am not trying to be critical of you. It's just reading this reminded…

Not the original poster but I think things are just radically different by the sounds of it. Every company I have worked at, once the code is in the main revision everyone is responsible for it. At that stage the code has gone through many people from reviewers to testers, its not one single persons fault. Easiest thing to do ia not to blame but to just find a solution and see as a team if it was a genuine mistake th…

This is exactly why we don't put @author comments in our code. Once the code is in the main line it's owned by the team.

It also helps to promote quality within the team because if you see something unreasonable you are empowered to take action (that may not be possible immediately because we all have our day jobs but at least adding a TODO for it)

The standard you scroll past is the standard you accept.

Re: Ask HN: What lessons did you learn from your best or worst colleagues?

#105

Post by gwn7 » Sat, May 15, 2021, 9:51 AM UTC

beforeolives wrote: post #69

byteface wrote: post #61

I was inspired by a guy from Brazil to learn to touch-type. It not on the national curriculum in the UK. I'd say well over half of UK coders can't touch-type. I can easily do 90+ words per minute without trying. I just think and my fingers wobble and words appear. It's like magic. I'd say everyone should learn. I learned to run code without re-reading it from a bad coder. I used to spend a few mins reading code I'd w…

I never understood this way of thinking about touch typing as a distinct skill from typing. My experience was that when you're kid and use a computer for the first time, you need to look at the keys, and then over time you look less and eventually you can type without looking at all. I never saw it as a distinct skill that needs it's own name or needs to be taught in school (apparently I'm wrong about this). It's jus…

> I never understood this way of thinking about touch typing as a distinct skill from typing.

Touch typing is a special technique. Typing and touch typing being distinct things isn't a "way of thinking", it's a clear fact. It's not open to interpretation.

The keyboard is an instrument. Anyone can use it without learning the proper technique, but the technique helps a great deal. That's the whole point.

It is greatly comparable to musical instruments. For instance you can learn how to play the guitar yourself, but if you know the proper technique, you'll have better mastery in a shorter time. This is why it needs to be teached, especially to knowledge workers, who type, type and type all day long.

Maybe the skill you currently have is enough for you, but you shouldn't dismiss the proper technique, especially if you haven't tried it (you sound like you didn't really).

Though if you can answer yes to all the questions below, then you probably don't need the technique:

- Can you easily do 80+ wpm whether it is prose or code?

- Do you have more than 95% accuracy at all times?

- Do you never (no exceptions) look at the keyboard?

These things all make a difference. Having less friction with the input instrument results in a higher stamina in a knowledge worker, which means more productivity per unit of time. Few realize this.

Re: Ask HN: What lessons did you learn from your best or worst colleagues?

#106

Post by cutemonster » Sat, May 15, 2021, 9:51 AM UTC

DayDollar wrote: post #90

wiether wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> One of my mentors at the first company I worked for in Silicon Valley never said “no” to one of my ideas. He said “okay, we’ll try it out and see what happens.” He was inherently supportive of new ideas and as a junior engineer it felt very refreshing to not have to argue my way into a feature that I felt strongly about. I’ve carried that same mentality throughout my career. I try to always have this kind of mindse…

You can at least entertain the idea, bad ideas spin themselves apart at the planning stage. "I have a mobile smal bbq kit at home. I could bring that in for a try tomorrow. But were do we bbq. Fire detectors go off inside the building, so should be outside. Will bring it, but i wont grill out there in the rain, im for a rotating job on that. Volunteers?" There - death by self-execution. And you didnt even murder it b…

> Will bring it

What if they say yes, and then you spend time bringing the bbq equipment to the workplace (although you didn't want to) and then your manager wonders "what are you doing, this'll set of the fire alarm", and you say "the others wanted to try this"

Re: Ask HN: What lessons did you learn from your best or worst colleagues?

#107

Post by applepple » Sat, May 15, 2021, 9:53 AM UTC

bruce343434 wrote: post #103

applepple wrote: post #88

From worst colleague: Succeeding in our modern economy has nothing to do with ability, intelligence or work ethic. It's about luck and intimidation. From best colleague: 10x, 100x, 1000x... developers are real. I also learned that making bold, controversial claims will yield respect dividends in the future when they turn out to be true. For one of my past startups, I was working closely with the CTO who was at least…

What do you mean by 10x, 100x, 1000x?

A single developer who can complete projects in the same amount of time as 10 or 100 or 1000 regular developers to at least the same quality standard (but usually to a higher quality standard because code quality is key to getting that productivity gain in the first place and code quality usually translates to project quality).

That said there are projects for which a developer could be infinity-x compared to other regular developers. For example, a highly complex project which regular developers do not have the capacity/talent to complete, ever... Just imagine some very complex project programming a quantum computer or certain kinds of blockchain or distributed systems projects; some developers will never be capable of delivering such projects. It's beyond their innate ability and capacity for learning.

Project complexity maximizes the utility value of highly productive developers. It would be difficult to identify a 100x developer on a simple project (they might only appear as 2x) but they would stand out as a definite 100x on a complex project.

Re: Ask HN: What lessons did you learn from your best or worst colleagues?

#108

Post by StavrosK » Sat, May 15, 2021, 9:55 AM UTC

moosebear847 wrote: post #52

geocrasher wrote: post #38

From my worst colleague: This man thought things were funny, and they weren't. I bicycle commuted to work, and he thought it funny to buzz me, passing just a few inches away from me, doing about 60mph on his street motorcycle. Another time, I was a bit stressed and needed some downtime so on my way out of the office, I said as much and added "so don't call me unless something is on fire." So, he called me, on my lunc…

Vindication is morally questionable, but someone could be tempted to it to attach consequence to the offending behavior. After deciding not to take the low road, how did you handle these situations in the future?

By "vindication" do you mean "revenge"? Because vindication is absolutely not questionable. Revenge may be questionable, but I find that not teaching bad people a lesson isn't much better.

Re: Ask HN: What lessons did you learn from your best or worst colleagues?

#109

Post by stavros » Sat, May 15, 2021, 9:57 AM UTC

gwn7 wrote: post #105

beforeolives wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I never understood this way of thinking about touch typing as a distinct skill from typing. My experience was that when you're kid and use a computer for the first time, you need to look at the keys, and then over time you look less and eventually you can type without looking at all. I never saw it as a distinct skill that needs it's own name or needs to be taught in school (apparently I'm wrong about this). It's jus…

> I never understood this way of thinking about touch typing as a distinct skill from typing. Touch typing is a special technique. Typing and touch typing being distinct things isn't a "way of thinking", it's a clear fact. It's not open to interpretation. The keyboard is an instrument. Anyone can use it without learning the proper technique, but the technique helps a great deal. That's the whole point. It is greatly…

I could easily do 120 wpm at 98% accuracy before I switched to touch typing years ago. Now I'm at 80wpm at 95%.

Re: Ask HN: What lessons did you learn from your best or worst colleagues?

#110

Post by _n_b_ » Sat, May 15, 2021, 9:58 AM UTC

bigcorp-slave wrote: post #13

I learned from my best colleagues: success is about trust. Nothing pays better dividends than being humble, being right a lot, and doing good work. This builds allies and allies build careers. I learned from my worst colleagues: don’t assume that anyone will protect you from toxic or abusive people. You must be willing to protect yourself. When people come for you and your project, either be willing to throw down (me…

> Bad people often don’t have bad careers, and there is no justice

I always like to think that “the arc of the moral universe is long but it bends towards justice.” Not all of them, but many of the bad folks you work with eventually flame out or stall.

The rest seem to become CEOs.