Have you tried to not be a good business man, giving mediocre advice and make business mistakes to disaualify yourself from that part?
Ask HN: What to do when you are successful, hate it, and can't seem to change?
31–40 of 61 posts
Re: Ask HN: What to do when you are successful, hate it, and can't seem to change?
#32Refuse. Do you have a problem saying no? Why are you not setting boundaries? If your home life is important to you then you need to speak your mind. Tell them 'No, I dont want your promotion, I will be going home at a reasonable time to my family'. Is that so hard? Here's another tip - accept remote positions, and remove any business education from your resume.
Honestly, I do have a hard time saying no. Rarely is the conversation "We'd like to increase your responsibility, here is some more pay and a new title". It's more like "Hey, your opinion in stand up this morning was awesome, can you sit in on this meeting." This seems to lead into "You can't make it to yet another meeting about strategy with the investor's? Do you know what will happen if you're not there! It's the…
If you think about it, this is a good answer to one of those bullshit interview questions "What is your biggest weakness?". I have a similar one which i've been working on a lot which is trying to have a better work/life balance. I used to have a lot of trouble saying no...and I worked a lot more than I do now. I _still_ work probably too much; however, my team now knows I will not be bothered from 6 to 8 pm as that's when my kid is home, lucid, and we're having some family time. Trying to find that balance is a constant battle.
Do you think you can _and_ should improve on this? Awesome. Introspection and room for improvement for the win!
Re: Ask HN: What to do when you are successful, hate it, and can't seem to change?
#33Refuse. Do you have a problem saying no? Why are you not setting boundaries? If your home life is important to you then you need to speak your mind. Tell them 'No, I dont want your promotion, I will be going home at a reasonable time to my family'. Is that so hard? Here's another tip - accept remote positions, and remove any business education from your resume.
In my experience, doing this will ultimately end up in being let go as 'not a team player'. I was in the same position as the OP many times and got tired of always getting moved out of software into more business management. When I started saying no, I was always cut loose before long. Went to companies after this occurred and didn't say no, and got right back into the same situation.
Anecdotally. Mine is the opposite. I've noticed the more someone tends to delegate and / or say no, the more they end up becoming respected in the organizations I've worked in. It's not that they say "That's not my job". It's more that they say "I can not take that on with my current responsibilities and perform it at a level that it deserves."
Re: Ask HN: What to do when you are successful, hate it, and can't seem to change?
#34Refuse. Do you have a problem saying no? Why are you not setting boundaries? If your home life is important to you then you need to speak your mind. Tell them 'No, I dont want your promotion, I will be going home at a reasonable time to my family'. Is that so hard? Here's another tip - accept remote positions, and remove any business education from your resume.
Honestly, I do have a hard time saying no. Rarely is the conversation "We'd like to increase your responsibility, here is some more pay and a new title". It's more like "Hey, your opinion in stand up this morning was awesome, can you sit in on this meeting." This seems to lead into "You can't make it to yet another meeting about strategy with the investor's? Do you know what will happen if you're not there! It's the…
Have you considered whether an ownership stake in the company would change your point of view? If you really are valued for your insights on the business side, but you are supposed to give 100% to development as well, why not bump up the stakes? See whether they are just giving their monkeys to you (as in http://www.amazon.com/The-Minute-Manager-Meets-Monkey/dp/068...) ? You could always ask for a raise (if shares are too much to ask for). There's an equilibrium in front of you waiting to be discovered.
Are the ones dragging you to late meetings shareholders? Or maybe they work on commission? Or perhaps there's a big bonus waiting for them but not for you ? Find out whether money is the problem or not, it's easier to find the solution once you understand others' motivations.
I'm guessing you're more of a generalist than a specialist in one field and that's partially why you see things the way business would like "tech" to see. It's actually a good thing and helps you build better software. In the worst case just change job one more time, sometimes it takes longer than one or two switches to find the right place. Good luck!
Re: Ask HN: What to do when you are successful, hate it, and can't seem to change?
#35You must be making baller money. Just live frugally, bank it away and invest it. And in a few years you will NEVER HAVE TO WORK AGAIN.(or just work on your own projects)
Your advice of living frugally and investing is good, but since you need, let's say $5M, to retire in your 30-40s with the expectation of living the same lifestyle, "a few years" is much longer than you might think.
If you're living frugally, your annual expenses will go down. Supposing you continue living frugally after retiring (which is easier, since you have more time to "DIY" expensive things you formerly hired someone for or paid extra not to have to do), you don't need 5 million. Wow no.
Let's assume the common 4% withdrawal rate. $5 million will provide you with $200,000 a year for all eternity. This assumes you never do anything for extra money. It further assumes you never put any money back into the investment (because, you know, you're not saving for retirement anymore).
Going even more conservative with a 3% withdrawal rate you'll be pulling $150,000 a year.
Interest is beautiful, living frugally combined with interest is even more so. Supposing you wanted to pull $30,000 yearly you'd only need $750k.
More on this at mrmoneymustache.com
Re: Ask HN: What to do when you are successful, hate it, and can't seem to change?
#36Refuse. Do you have a problem saying no? Why are you not setting boundaries? If your home life is important to you then you need to speak your mind. Tell them 'No, I dont want your promotion, I will be going home at a reasonable time to my family'. Is that so hard? Here's another tip - accept remote positions, and remove any business education from your resume.
Honestly, I do have a hard time saying no. Rarely is the conversation "We'd like to increase your responsibility, here is some more pay and a new title". It's more like "Hey, your opinion in stand up this morning was awesome, can you sit in on this meeting." This seems to lead into "You can't make it to yet another meeting about strategy with the investor's? Do you know what will happen if you're not there! It's the…
"Hey, your opinion in stand up this morning was awesome, can you sit in on this meeting."
There's your problem. Stop outing yourself. Don't give your opinion on things you don't want to be dragged into. Zip your lip. Then you probably don't have to say "no" to anything because they probably won't ask. Give opinions on those things that are related to the domain you desire to work in and then make polite noises about "not my area" or something if pressed on these other things that you don't really want to work on.
Re: Ask HN: What to do when you are successful, hate it, and can't seem to change?
#37Earlier quoted context omitted.
Honestly, I do have a hard time saying no. Rarely is the conversation "We'd like to increase your responsibility, here is some more pay and a new title". It's more like "Hey, your opinion in stand up this morning was awesome, can you sit in on this meeting." This seems to lead into "You can't make it to yet another meeting about strategy with the investor's? Do you know what will happen if you're not there! It's the…
Have you considered whether an ownership stake in the company would change your point of view? If you really are valued for your insights on the business side, but you are supposed to give 100% to development as well, why not bump up the stakes? See whether they are just giving their monkeys to you (as in http://www.amazon.com/The-Minute-Manager-Meets-Monkey/dp/068... ) ? You could always ask for a raise (if shares a…
Money might not make up for a depressing job, if he feels he's already making enough to support his desired life style.
Re: Ask HN: What to do when you are successful, hate it, and can't seem to change?
#38Earlier quoted context omitted.
Your advice of living frugally and investing is good, but since you need, let's say $5M, to retire in your 30-40s with the expectation of living the same lifestyle, "a few years" is much longer than you might think.
Does it really cost $5M to retire in your 30s?
A general rule is that you can live indefinitely if you withdraw 3-4% of your investments annually to pay living expenses. There are calculators out there (Google 'FIRECalc') that work out the odds of success (i.e, not going bankrupt) with various starting points and spending rates. At 3% there's about a 95% chance of success over a few decades, based on the past performance of the financial markets.
Let's say you spend $5k/month normally, as a round number. That works out to between $1.5M ($5000x12/3%) and $2M ($5000x12/4%) to sustain your living expenses indefinitely with no further income.
Re: Ask HN: What to do when you are successful, hate it, and can't seem to change?
#39You live in Utah. Go take a hike, literally.
Re: Ask HN: What to do when you are successful, hate it, and can't seem to change?
#40As another commenter said remove "anything business" from your resume if it is in there.
Also something that might help is trying to keep your thoughts for yourself(keep your mouth shut) in meetings for things not directly related to engineering or your team's work aspect. This might be a bit harder at first, been there and it takes a good exercise but at least for me it was in a company where we didn't have meetings at 8PM with execs.