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Ask HN: I've been slacking off at Google for 6 years. How can I stop this?

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Re: Ask HN: I've been slacking off at Google for 6 years. How can I stop this?

#431

Post by OOPMan »

lovehashbrowns wrote: post #282
mindcrime wrote: post #208

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Their value to google is high enough to keep them employed but the job is beneath their capabilities. That's what we call "the perfect job." It pays the bills, but leaves you the maximum amount of (mental|emotional|psychological|spiritual|whatever) energy to work on the things that really interest you ... outside of work. Of course different people will approach this differently, but I don't want my job to be interes…

For me personally, being bored at work actually leaves me more tired at home afterwards. I'm working on something so boring at work now and I can't handle it. It's just going to kill me very slowly over the course of the next month. Now for your second point, I completely agree--I don't want to feel like my job is my worth or joy in life, and it isn't. But at the same time, I wouldn't take a job at an assembly line e…

Agreed. Boring jobs leave me unhappy and increase the odds I'll quit and move on.

In fact, I've changed jobs roughly every 2 to 3 years precisely due to boredom.

It sounds nice to be able to get by day-to-day in a full job but it's not a good fit for me personally.

Re: Ask HN: I've been slacking off at Google for 6 years. How can I stop this?

#432

Post by pravda »

NeverFade wrote: post #417
whack wrote: post #401

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've been away from the bay for a while, but it's amazing how bad the dating scene is, for exactly the reasons you described. I'm currently engaged to an amazing woman who has only ever lived in working-class suburbs and smaller cities. Her exes and her friends' husbands are shockingly anti-intellectual, didn't attend college, have some substance abuse issues, and/or make well under 6 figures. She keeps telling me ho…

> Engineers in places like SFBA severely underestimate how attractive they would be anywhere else in the country/world. I agree completely. > Her exes and her friends' husbands are shockingly anti-intellectual, didn't attend college, have some substance abuse issues, and/or make well under 6 figures. Here's what happened: Guys who are intellectual, attended college, have good discipline, and stayed away from substanc…

>she'd find at least one guy who is an exec or VC making 7 figures per year,

Does she have them audited? Because my "Tinder Salary" is an order of magnitude greater my actual salary.

Re: Ask HN: I've been slacking off at Google for 6 years. How can I stop this?

#433

Post by meken »

baby wrote: post #422
cantrevealname wrote: post #358

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> make the most of it by progressing deliberately in your social life Ironically the Bay Area is among the worst places on Earth for improving your social life if you're straight and male. I noticed that you don't live in the Bay Area, you're married, you probably meant a much broader meaning of "social life", so your experiences are likely very different. But the typical clean cut, well-spoken, hard working, respect…

> male SWE in the Bay Area making $120K+ a year in his 20s or 30s, who should be a magnet for women here's your problem

Agreed. Money is a step function. You need to make enough to live comfortably. But after that, having good interpersonal traits is everything.

Re: Ask HN: I've been slacking off at Google for 6 years. How can I stop this?

#434

Post by greenie_beans »

barry-cotter wrote: post #242
CydeWeys wrote: post #176

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What percentage of software engineers are doing "something meaningful"? That seems like a small number, no? Contrast with teachers, doctors, nurses, social workers, etc., almost all of whom I think would say they do something meaningful.

I’ve been a teacher. It’s basically just a job. If you want meaning have your own children. I have no idea what proportion of software engineers consider what they do meaningful but the team who work on Google Scholar have done a great deal for me and I’m not even an academic. The drivers at Uber and Lyft and their riders have almost all had their lives improved by their existence. Amazon has made the experience of b…

I'm not sure I agree that Amazon has done meaningful work in the world of books. They've crippled the book industry. They've ran a ton of brick and mortar bookstores out of business, which has effectively destroyed community centers. There are other alternatives to Amazon that have "made the experience of buying books so much easier". Visit powells.com or alibris.com.

And what they've done to the publishing industry is a whole nother beast.

Re: Ask HN: I've been slacking off at Google for 6 years. How can I stop this?

#435

Post by OOPMan »

astura wrote: post #183
flavor8 wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Every day you stay at Google the more valuable you become. Ehhh, to a point. Straight out of college and then (e.g.) 10 or 15 years at the same company says a lot about a person.

What do you mean?

It's pretty simple. He's saying OP worked at Google for 6 years but his career progression has been largely static.

Re: Ask HN: I've been slacking off at Google for 6 years. How can I stop this?

#436

Post by eanzenberg »

ChuckNorris89 wrote: post #290
eanzenberg wrote: post #266

Earlier quoted context omitted.

EU salaries have more to do with their tax structure than anything else.

Not really. US taxes aren't that much lower than Europe. The reason is supply/demand. There's the lack of VC funding and also due to the market size, European tech companies don't generate nearly as much value as the US ones and the few ones that do don't have any meaningful competition so there's no need to pay high salaries. Take the US defense sector alone. That's generating so many high paying tech and consultanc…

Nah. Taxes employers pay are way more than here. Why do you think salaries are 1/3 in EU? They’re protecting their working class from the evil job creators lol.

Re: Ask HN: I've been slacking off at Google for 6 years. How can I stop this?

#437

Post by NeverFade »

TwoBit wrote: post #427
NeverFade wrote: post #417

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Engineers in places like SFBA severely underestimate how attractive they would be anywhere else in the country/world. I agree completely. > Her exes and her friends' husbands are shockingly anti-intellectual, didn't attend college, have some substance abuse issues, and/or make well under 6 figures. Here's what happened: Guys who are intellectual, attended college, have good discipline, and stayed away from substanc…

Most startup CEOs don't make much. Are there really very many VCs out there?

> Most startup CEOs don't make much.

Depends on the startup and what stage it is. If it's a successful startup, then the CEO is sitting on a pile of stock that will likely be worth millions. If it's also a later stage startup, then likely he is making at least as much as his senior developers on top of that.

Either way, he's a much better bet if you want to be a millionaire's wife some day. Also, executives typically have expense accounts that afford them a very nice lifestyle _right now_, even if their salary isn't that high. You can be making a modest salary, but leading a jetset life on business expenses.

> Are there really very many VCs out there?

Yes there are. Here's just one random list of them:

http://www.calstartuplawfirm.com/venture-groups.html

Re: Ask HN: I've been slacking off at Google for 6 years. How can I stop this?

#438

Post by discordance »

s1artibartfast wrote: post #324
discordance wrote: post #254

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Regardless of what their understanding of Big O is, Google still needs a lot people to do CRUD work or make another mobile app, like any other company. The issue seems to be hiring the highly educated and entitled to do boring but necessary work. GSUs can only motivate people so much.

I think it is just an optimal solution for large companies with disposable income. A company I worked at hired smart engineer with a masters from Berkeley, and then tasked him with breaking down cardboard boxes and other mundane tasks. The fact that they were grossly overqualified for any of the tasks was a advantage because they were flexible, and reliably needed no oversight. If money isn't an object, why not get t…

Because those 'best tools' are easily bored and feel entitled to more?

Look at the political discourse spewing out of Googlers at the moment. It's bursting at the seams from internal ideological friction.

Re: Ask HN: I've been slacking off at Google for 6 years. How can I stop this?

#439

Post by NeverFade »

pravda wrote: post #432
NeverFade wrote: post #417

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Engineers in places like SFBA severely underestimate how attractive they would be anywhere else in the country/world. I agree completely. > Her exes and her friends' husbands are shockingly anti-intellectual, didn't attend college, have some substance abuse issues, and/or make well under 6 figures. Here's what happened: Guys who are intellectual, attended college, have good discipline, and stayed away from substanc…

>she'd find at least one guy who is an exec or VC making 7 figures per year, Does she have them audited? Because my "Tinder Salary" is an order of magnitude greater my actual salary.

I assure you, she is quite astute. The Tinder demonstration was just a fun way to show me how many options she has.

For example, with LinkedIn and its profile pics, it's very easy to figure out whether the guy you're chatting with really is the CEO of a hot startup.

Re: Ask HN: I've been slacking off at Google for 6 years. How can I stop this?

#440

Post by Tiktaalik »

wayoutthere wrote: post #65
dash2 wrote: post #13

It's sad and revealing to see the other comments here. Many of them say, don't seek fulfillment in your job, just keep on cruising. What a change from the exciting atmosphere of the 2000s. Seems like software engineering has become a safe, dull career nowadays. Don't listen to them. Your 20s are the time to learn, push yourself and discover who you are. Autopilot is for middle age.

Software engineering just isn't that hard. Tedious yes, but not remotely difficult. We've been fed the narrative of economic success that many folks have forgotten what personal success looks like. You can be successful in your career and still feel like a failure. Therapy is the answer here. You have to un-brainwash yourself from the notion that your job is your life and figure out what really matters to you. Then f…

> Software engineering just isn't that hard. Tedious yes, but not remotely difficult.

If you're ever feeling this way, move to a games company. Plenty of hard programming problems...

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