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Motivational Incongruence and Well-Being at the Workplace

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Re: Motivational Incongruence and Well-Being at the Workplace

#61

Post by ewjordan »

s_kilk wrote: post #31
city41 wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I also left a job due to pair programming. That company pair programmed 100% of the time. It concerns me that might become a norm. I wrote a blog post on why I think that's a bad idea: http://www.mattgreer.org/articles/pair-programming-is-not-a-...

I wonder if these kinds of teams are lead by extroverts, who appreciate having a captive audience for their peopley, extroverted shenaniagns. Having a stable of people who are contractually obligated to put up with their outgoing personalities.

I've mostly seen it pushed (as a hard 100% policy, at least) by well meaning but naive people that have done it a few times before, got obsessed with it, and decided it's this week's cure for everything.

The reality is, it will make the team produce fewer bugs. It will also help in knowledge sharing, and in some cases result in tidier designs.

But you'll basically have half the manpower. So unless you actually have serious problems with bugs, knowledge sharing, or code design, it's not going to be worth it. There are other ways to achieve quality, and most senior people can do that very well without someone pairing with them.

Re: Motivational Incongruence and Well-Being at the Workplace

#62

Post by HarryHirsch »

JackFr wrote: post #35
joyeuse6701 wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Tolerance is largely relative I think. You could have a crank that spits out pennies so long as you crank it. Invariably we will tire of turning the crank because it's monotonous uninspiring unfulfilling work. The argument could be made that someone somewhere does not have the opportunity to so easily spin a crank for money so we ought to be grateful, but the mind's adaptability is a double edged sword. You exalt the…

Inspiring fulfilling work is a luxury not everyone can afford, and it is a conceit of the modern world that meaning and fulfillment in your life should come from your employment.

There's a difference between a boring workplace and one that's actively hostile. If the work is dull but decently paid you can have fun in the evenings. I'd rather turn parts on a lathe for 8 hours a day and be decently paid than do programming in an open-plan office.

Re: Motivational Incongruence and Well-Being at the Workplace

#63

Post by eikenberry »

treehau5_ wrote: post #25

Yeah I have expereined this very thing at work right now, but the great thing about being a human is you can change and adapt at the face of adversity. In my case it was either get fired/quit spend a month or two getting a new job and hear it from my wife or suck it up and be the person myorganization wants me to be -- it wasn't that hard at the end of the day because I get paid handsomly, get to sit in an air condit…

Why not suck it up while looking for a new job?

Re: Motivational Incongruence and Well-Being at the Workplace

#64

Post by learning___ »

hacker_9 wrote: post #7
ams6110 wrote: post #2

I quit a job when I felt burnout developing. The cause? Pair programming. I just cannot that close to someone for the majority of the workday without feeling constant low-level stress and annoyance, and I can't focus and think about problems in that setting. When you have to sit in your car for 15 minutes every morning just to summon the resolve to get out and go into the office, something's wrong with your work envi…

I had a similar experience that made me quit my last job, but for me it was being in an open plan office. I just found that I felt constantly under someones gaze, and I couldn't look around without looking someone in the eye. It was a low level stress like yours, and was really uncomfortable when trying to work through problems. For example I find closing my eyes helps me visualise a process in my head, but then some…

How long at the job did it take you to realize that it caused a constant low level stress? How long did you end up staying there before leaving? Did you reveal the real reason for leaving? I believe I am going through something similar right now, I have an especially chatty coworker who I sit beside that never shuts up and seems to crave solving problems as a pair much to my productivities detriment. I feel like my time is always being wasted and have the added bonus of them being above me so telling them to buzz off feels very uncomfortable.

Re: Motivational Incongruence and Well-Being at the Workplace

#65

Post by jMyles »

dasmoth wrote: post #40
jMyles wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This phenomenon is one of the distinct situations where I have found that the effects of cannabis are helpful. Smoke a bit with your partner, go for a walk, maybe apologize or retract some things if necessary. Maybe stop being such a perfectionist and just merge what does work now.

I have no objection to canabis or those who choose to enjoy it, but the idea that I might need psychoactives to handle the work environment -- even when I'm doing something I'm widely considered to be pretty decent at -- is repellant.

> the idea that I might need psychoactives to handle the work environment

It occurs to me that many people, perhaps even a majority, perceive a need for coffee in order to have the energy and focus they need.

My assertion is that cannabis sometimes has a similarly useful effect, and that one distinct example is in how it affects teamwork.

Re: Motivational Incongruence and Well-Being at the Workplace

#66

Post by learning___ »

freddyc wrote: post #11
hacker_9 wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I had a similar experience that made me quit my last job, but for me it was being in an open plan office. I just found that I felt constantly under someones gaze, and I couldn't look around without looking someone in the eye. It was a low level stress like yours, and was really uncomfortable when trying to work through problems. For example I find closing my eyes helps me visualise a process in my head, but then some…

I had a very similar experience where I actually dreaded going into the office because I knew my productivity would fall off a cliff. I slowly found myself accepting the day would be a loss with pointless meetings and other distractions, and got into the habit of doing my "head-down" work later once I got home. My wife pointed out how stupid that was (and frankly, unsustainable) so I pretty quickly jumped ship to a d…

I have the same questions for you as I asked the parent poster, as I mentioned in that post I feel like I am going through something similar to you both right now due to an open office. I also feel like it is hard and rare to get the real "head-down" work done while at work due to constant interruptions. How long at the job did it take you to realize that it caused a constant low level stress? How long did you end up staying there before leaving? Did you reveal the real reason for leaving when you left?

Re: Motivational Incongruence and Well-Being at the Workplace

#67

Post by erikpukinskis »

hughperkins wrote: post #48
JackFr wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Inspiring fulfilling work is a luxury not everyone can afford, and it is a conceit of the modern world that meaning and fulfillment in your life should come from your employment.

Not really. Computers let us create any virtual environment we want, fulfill all of our fantasies. so what do we use it for? Play cs: simulate approximately tribal warfare, and hunting for food. Genetically this is what millions of years of evolution programmed us to enjoy.

> so what do we use it for? Play cs: simulate approximately tribal warfare, and hunting for food. Genetically this is what millions of years of evolution programmed us to enjoy.

Gamers, broadly speaking, are a specific subset of the population, with very specific interests, and this self-reinforces to create a culture of making games about killing, sports, driving, etc. It's hard to sell a game without killing, so such games get less funding, which alienates the part of the market who is turned off by killing, and they stop playing games, which makes it harder to fund games that aren't about killing. The history of killing games also means that any game designers who are following in the tradition of games will more likely make a game about killing.

Your claim that this situation is the result of genetic programming is a very old claim. "We are doing barbaric thing X because our ancestors were barbarians" is a very common argument which has never been substantiated by solid research, and probably never will be. Not because it's false, but because it's unfalsifiable.

There is lots of very good, repeatable science showing cultural expectations reinforcing short-sighted thinking.

Re: Motivational Incongruence and Well-Being at the Workplace

#68

Post by twic »

shostack wrote: post #51
aantix wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm pretty sure Pivotal and Carbon Five, two high end Rails consulting firms in SF require pair programming. I'm pretty sure that you can't hire Pivotal without contracting two of their engineering, strictly for pair programming. Some of my best code has been written with pair programming but I can see the flip-side. There's no day-dreaming, there's no zoning out, complete engagement all day long. It's the same menta…

Any idea how much of that is to juice margins by billing two people minimum? Surely the work is not completed twice as quickly.

I work at Pivotal, although in London. We do indeed insist on doing all programming paired. I honestly don't think that's because of margins, though - it's that everyone buys into the XP idea that it's the best way to program. I don't think it does much for margins, because you have to spend twice as much on developers to get that double revenue, so the margin is the same.

Our normal thing is to form joint teams of Pivotal and client developers, and in that situation, pairing is also a really good way to teach the clients our way of doing things.

Re: Motivational Incongruence and Well-Being at the Workplace

#69

Post by twic »

quotemstr wrote: post #50
BurningFrog wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I love pair programming teams, and would not want to work anywhere else. Of course, a team like that needs to only hire people who are up for that lifestyle.

It takes all types, I guess. I would sooner quit a job than pair program 20% of the time, much less 100%. I do my best work alone, in the dark, in the middle of the night. I don't think there's a tech company on earth that could pay me enough to spend dozens of hours each week sharing a keyboard and monitor with someone.

Actually, a common way to do pairing these days is to give each person their own keyboard and monitor, just connected to the same computer.

You probably still wouldn't like it much, sadly!

Re: Motivational Incongruence and Well-Being at the Workplace

#70

Post by amelius »

JackFr wrote: post #35
joyeuse6701 wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Tolerance is largely relative I think. You could have a crank that spits out pennies so long as you crank it. Invariably we will tire of turning the crank because it's monotonous uninspiring unfulfilling work. The argument could be made that someone somewhere does not have the opportunity to so easily spin a crank for money so we ought to be grateful, but the mind's adaptability is a double edged sword. You exalt the…

Inspiring fulfilling work is a luxury not everyone can afford, and it is a conceit of the modern world that meaning and fulfillment in your life should come from your employment.

> Inspiring fulfilling work is a luxury not everyone can afford, and it is a conceit of the modern world that meaning and fulfillment in your life should come from your employment.

But you could also argue that the modern world is creating unfulfilling work. Not only the "bullshit jobs" (see [1]), but also highly repetitive work.

In ancient/prehistoric times, work was more diverse (and perhaps hence more inspiring) for a lot of people, I suppose.

[1] http://strikemag.org/bullshit-jobs/

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