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Making 20% Time Work

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Re: Making 20% Time Work

#131

Post by nowarninglabel »

developer2 wrote: post #47
nowarninglabel wrote: post #19

We have successfully pulled off 20% for 5+ years now at Kiva, doing some of the things suggested here. However, the key thing we do is actually make the 20% be a full two-week sprint, it just happens every 5th sprint. That way, you can have the time to do some planning, suggesting, and documentation before setting out to build something and you get the full amount of time you needed to build it. We purposefully do tr…

If a developer places an idea up requiring only 4 points, can they pin their own 4 points to it and work on it alone without having to answer to anyone? The entire point of the 20% concept to me is that I get to work on my own idea . I do not like your version that makes it a popularity contest between developers and their separate ideas. Most of the fun that can be found in 20% is the lack of constraints and oversig…

Yep, a developer can work on their own 4-point project and doesn't require collaborating with anyone or any oversight other than approval from a PM before making it live if it is a user-facing feature.

The only requirement is documenting how the project is good for Kiva. Some people would like to do something like say go learn Perl with their time. That's great for the person, but better covered by the professional development budget than innovation iteration. So, sometimes something like that gets shot down, but it's rare.

Re: Making 20% Time Work

#132

Post by unquietcode »

mstade wrote: post #20
nowarninglabel wrote: post #19

We have successfully pulled off 20% for 5+ years now at Kiva, doing some of the things suggested here. However, the key thing we do is actually make the 20% be a full two-week sprint, it just happens every 5th sprint. That way, you can have the time to do some planning, suggesting, and documentation before setting out to build something and you get the full amount of time you needed to build it. We purposefully do tr…

I like the idea of every 5th sprint being devoted to this – a day week is barely enough to just switch context and get into gear. I can see how getting a couple of days distance between "real" work and the 5th sprint would be beneficial just to clear your mind and start fresh, knowing there are two glorious weeks of focus ahead.

I worked at a large company which in its quest to deploy agile everywhere introduced an innovation sprint. The actual concept went well, and we even had some great show-and-tell sessions from it, but absolutely zero things created during those sprints were allowed to ship. So in the end it was more of a blow-off valve for engineers before sending them back to another 10 weeks of normal engineering drudgery, while their innovative projects collected dust on a manager's shelf somewhere. If these were research spikes I feel like they would have gotten a little more respect from the higher-ups.

Re: Making 20% Time Work

#133

Post by colbyh »

fra wrote: post #79
codeonfire wrote: post #54

How to make 20% time: Just do it. Don't tell anyone. Tell that asshole trying to control your work to fuck off. When you've got something, tell the right people about it. Watch the other assholes at your job trip over themselves as they trash your work that you already got buy in from from the right people. Publish it. Launch it. Put it on your resume. You'll probably get fired because the assholes will resent that y…

This comment is appalling, and so are most of the posts under it.

Agreed 110%. If someone feels this combative about the company/org they chose to join then that is toxic.

Re: Making 20% Time Work

#134

Post by dang »

windowsworkstoo wrote: post #85
onion2k wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So, if I'm understanding you correctly, you think the way to advance your career is to spend 20% of your time working on unsanctioned side projects in work time, writing code that will be owned by your employer that you can't publish legally without permission, all the while taking longer to do your assigned tasks and looking like you slack off for a day a week? And you think that if that gets you fired you'll move u…

Cool, stay scared and not go anywhere. GP poster is gittin it dern - money, power and bitches will come to him.

Please don't do this here.

Re: Making 20% Time Work

#135

Post by js8 »

onion2k wrote: post #100
js8 wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree with GP. Can't really answer the hiring question (because I am not interested in being anyone's boss), but why not? Do you think that the way to advance your career is always do what you're being told? GP's suggestion, at least, makes life a lot more interesting.. And people willing to take risks and make their own projects typically will have better CVs. I would rather see somebody genuinely advance in the o…

I would rather see somebody genuinely advance in the organization by genuinely improving something (and taking some risk), while taking time from a stupid project, rather than by taking credit for work of someone else (but that never happens, right?). What you don't seem to realise is that there are no stupid projects . Someone in the business believes that the "stupid project" is a good idea that's worthwhile paying…

> there are no stupid projects

It seems akin to saying there are no stupid moves in chess. Because every move is vetted by the player, and he has a good reason to do it. Unfortunately, people do make mistakes and at least, better moves - than the ones you decided to do - happen.

> you're effectively telling everyone who has agreed to let the "stupid project" go ahead that they're all wrong and you know best

But sometimes you do know best. I didn't say you have to drop work on the stupid project entirely, I just think you should be entitled to be part of the decision too.

Speaking about that, what is the theoretical ideal of how the hierarchical decision-making should look like? I mean, when someone decides things on higher level, how can they do that? If they were to made optimal decision, they need all the information that individual decision makers under them have. So isn't the decision they made always suboptimal? Isn't actually the best way how to make decision in a hierarchy at all to let all the deciders on a lower level decide what decisions have to be made on the upper level?

There should be a mathematical model supporting how hierarchical decision making works, but I have never seen one.

> That is not the best way to further your career

If you do what I suggested, you're taking a risk. It may give you a good result or a bad one, as it happens.

> No one ever succeeds on their own

Even if that is true, which isn't, you can still at least spark a success on your own.

Re: Making 20% Time Work

#136

Post by makecheck »

20% time is important because not everyone has a ton of free time to improve their skills and do whatever they want to.

People with families, hobbies (that aren't programming), classes to take, or even extra-long commutes are not overflowing with time to devote to side projects.

Re: Making 20% Time Work

#137

Post by ansgri »

its2complicated wrote: post #112
monk_e_boy wrote: post #4

I've never met anyone who has this luxury, quick poll: Do you have 20% time?

Not 20%, but I got the manager to give us 2 hours every Friday. I guess that would be 5% time. I was doing C# enterprise work at the time, so I would use those 2 hours on totally different stuff; like brushing up on C++, or dicking around with Perl.

Are you joking? 2h is the time I need to just switch language/framework contexts to write anything morecomplicated than helloworld, never mind understand some code I've written a week ago.

Re: Making 20% Time Work

#139

Post by erikpukinskis »

onion2k wrote: post #78
codeonfire wrote: post #54

How to make 20% time: Just do it. Don't tell anyone. Tell that asshole trying to control your work to fuck off. When you've got something, tell the right people about it. Watch the other assholes at your job trip over themselves as they trash your work that you already got buy in from from the right people. Publish it. Launch it. Put it on your resume. You'll probably get fired because the assholes will resent that y…

So, if I'm understanding you correctly, you think the way to advance your career is to spend 20% of your time working on unsanctioned side projects in work time, writing code that will be owned by your employer that you can't publish legally without permission, all the while taking longer to do your assigned tasks and looking like you slack off for a day a week? And you think that if that gets you fired you'll move u…

> all the while taking longer to do your assigned tasks and looking like you slack off for a day a week?

The difference between a hirable employee and a fireable employee is not 20%. There is usually 2x or more of variation amongst people in a pay grade. As long as you're in that ballpark of productivity, you're fine. Personality conflicts will get you fired long before a 20% dip in stories checked in.

In fact, there's a good chance that taking the 20% of time off will actually increase your productivity the rest of the week. But if it drops you below the "worth their weight in pays stubs" line then you are already on very thin ice.

Re: Making 20% Time Work

#140

Post by developer2 »

mrow84 wrote: post #106
developer2 wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If a developer places an idea up requiring only 4 points, can they pin their own 4 points to it and work on it alone without having to answer to anyone? The entire point of the 20% concept to me is that I get to work on my own idea . I do not like your version that makes it a popularity contest between developers and their separate ideas. Most of the fun that can be found in 20% is the lack of constraints and oversig…

Out of interest, could you elaborate on what is it about agile methods that you dislike/despise?

I've been through the agile process at 5 different companies, and it has never been successful. My biggest issue is with the people who are brought in to implement it. The scrum masters always try to spin the whole thing as a positive for both the development team and the business. Both the team and the business's management are supposed to be disciplined. But the scrum masters always wind up being scum masters, always bowing to the will of the business's management. Meanwhile the team is left with nobody to defend their right to have the process respected.

The primary selling point is always the removal of the "old waterfall method". And yet every single sprint, 20-40-80 hours worth of "more urgent tasks" get dropped in without proper grooming or advanced planning. Whether or not other tasks get removed from the sprint to equalize the incoming work does nothing to alleviate the frustration.

Every agile process I have seen always winds up being the same old bullshit of management having no discipline to actually follow the rules. We call it agile, but it's still just waterfall glossed over with a name - with none of the actual principles being taken seriously.

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